My fiver on our brief trip to Kansas City ----
1. "Coffee is for closers". No coffee for our guys right now. Two turnovers = done. At the 3:57 mark, down one with the ball, Dax Miles turned the ball over which led to a break-out dunk by Gathers...next possession, Jevon Carter impersonates Javis Johnson with an unforced turnover which leads to a Medford layup. Now, we're down five with 3:19 to go, and the game had turned. No doubt we miss Juwan Staten, but we have very good players on the floor right now without Staten and Browne. Skilled guys. But, not closers. When we're in a tight game, Juwan is the guy we want with the ball. With Staten on the floor, we would've won that Kansas game, and we very well may have won this Baylor game. I hope he's back to his old self next week, as the NCAA Tournament is all about closing out games. Either in a good way like our '05 Creighton or '98 Cincinnati game, or in a bad way, like our '06 Texas or '05 Louisville games.
2. Royce O'Neal & Taurean Prince. One of my three keys to the game was containing these guys. Well, they score 18 & 16 respectively, and O'Neal was generally a thorn in our side once again. Next year, when we play these guys, we need to body them up, full court, and just generally make their lives miserable. We did it twice, for the most part, vs. Forte. No reason why we can't do it vs. these cats.
3. Referees didn't cause us to lose. I've seen quite a bit of conspiracy theorists maintain that the referees had it in for Huggs, and they were the reason we lost. I don't buy it. Out of 351 Division I teams, we're ranked 351st in fouls. It's in our DNA. We foul a lot. And, quite honestly, I don't think they call a lot of fouls that they could on our guys. We're very fond of giving ball handlers a little bump when hedging off screens, especially Adrian and Holton. I will say this --- that technical on Paige was garbage. He should've been given a warning. You don't make that call when the player has shown no other delay-of-game propensity. But, overall, we are a team who fouls. We play physical. We've survived it for the most part. But, Baylor was the aggressor yesterday in terms of getting to the rim, and we did foul them quite often.
4. Where's the press? Played hard. Overall, I thought we fought, played hard, had a good game plan, and shot well for the first 33 minutes. But, I don't like seeing us abandon the press. I know we don't have Juwan and Gary, but we do have five capable guards in Jevon, Dax, Jaysean, Tarik and Chase. Billydee is coming into his own. We have players...but I guess Huggs wanted to try to play them straight up on defense to see if it would work. And, the results were good from a scoreboard standpoint until the two turnover debacle. That said, our defense was still fairly porous. At this point in the season - we are who we are. I hope we go back to the controlled chaos in the Tournament. I hope we press full-court for 40 minutes and create havoc.
5. Moving on. If Juwan and Gary come back, we're still a very dangerous team. Especially if we dial up the pressure again. And, this is due in no small part to the seasoning that our new guys have received over the past four games without the two seniors. Jevon, Daxter, Tarik and Jaysean have all had their big moments over the past four games and they have all grown. (Also, I gotta say - I feel for Billydee. He gave us 3 pts on a trey, two rebound and an assist in just 3 minutes. Quick hook) While we went 1-3 without our seniors, I still think it has been a net positive. And, if Juwan and Gary come back, we're going to be a tough, tough out. When we play someone new, from a different conference, and we press for 40 minutes on a week's rest - running waves of athletes at them>>> I think we'll like what we see.
At this moment, the season hits "reset", and we get ready to compete for a national championship.
1. "Coffee is for closers". No coffee for our guys right now. Two turnovers = done. At the 3:57 mark, down one with the ball, Dax Miles turned the ball over which led to a break-out dunk by Gathers...next possession, Jevon Carter impersonates Javis Johnson with an unforced turnover which leads to a Medford layup. Now, we're down five with 3:19 to go, and the game had turned. No doubt we miss Juwan Staten, but we have very good players on the floor right now without Staten and Browne. Skilled guys. But, not closers. When we're in a tight game, Juwan is the guy we want with the ball. With Staten on the floor, we would've won that Kansas game, and we very well may have won this Baylor game. I hope he's back to his old self next week, as the NCAA Tournament is all about closing out games. Either in a good way like our '05 Creighton or '98 Cincinnati game, or in a bad way, like our '06 Texas or '05 Louisville games.
2. Royce O'Neal & Taurean Prince. One of my three keys to the game was containing these guys. Well, they score 18 & 16 respectively, and O'Neal was generally a thorn in our side once again. Next year, when we play these guys, we need to body them up, full court, and just generally make their lives miserable. We did it twice, for the most part, vs. Forte. No reason why we can't do it vs. these cats.
3. Referees didn't cause us to lose. I've seen quite a bit of conspiracy theorists maintain that the referees had it in for Huggs, and they were the reason we lost. I don't buy it. Out of 351 Division I teams, we're ranked 351st in fouls. It's in our DNA. We foul a lot. And, quite honestly, I don't think they call a lot of fouls that they could on our guys. We're very fond of giving ball handlers a little bump when hedging off screens, especially Adrian and Holton. I will say this --- that technical on Paige was garbage. He should've been given a warning. You don't make that call when the player has shown no other delay-of-game propensity. But, overall, we are a team who fouls. We play physical. We've survived it for the most part. But, Baylor was the aggressor yesterday in terms of getting to the rim, and we did foul them quite often.
4. Where's the press? Played hard. Overall, I thought we fought, played hard, had a good game plan, and shot well for the first 33 minutes. But, I don't like seeing us abandon the press. I know we don't have Juwan and Gary, but we do have five capable guards in Jevon, Dax, Jaysean, Tarik and Chase. Billydee is coming into his own. We have players...but I guess Huggs wanted to try to play them straight up on defense to see if it would work. And, the results were good from a scoreboard standpoint until the two turnover debacle. That said, our defense was still fairly porous. At this point in the season - we are who we are. I hope we go back to the controlled chaos in the Tournament. I hope we press full-court for 40 minutes and create havoc.
5. Moving on. If Juwan and Gary come back, we're still a very dangerous team. Especially if we dial up the pressure again. And, this is due in no small part to the seasoning that our new guys have received over the past four games without the two seniors. Jevon, Daxter, Tarik and Jaysean have all had their big moments over the past four games and they have all grown. (Also, I gotta say - I feel for Billydee. He gave us 3 pts on a trey, two rebound and an assist in just 3 minutes. Quick hook) While we went 1-3 without our seniors, I still think it has been a net positive. And, if Juwan and Gary come back, we're going to be a tough, tough out. When we play someone new, from a different conference, and we press for 40 minutes on a week's rest - running waves of athletes at them>>> I think we'll like what we see.
At this moment, the season hits "reset", and we get ready to compete for a national championship.
