- February 21st, 2009, 8:37 pm
#236159
The thing that changed the most in the second half to start ODU's run was that they stopped settling for jumpers. ODU would work the ball around and wait for an opening to take it underneath and then convert. After they did that a few times and got the lead built, we just gave in and stopped playing defense completely.
We played well in the first half. I told people I figured we'd be down then at halftime and we weren't. I was expecting a 5-10 point loss going into the game (optimistic we could win but not expecting it) and when I found out Jesse was hurt I pushed that number up to 10-15 points. Unfortunately it was a little more than that.
As for the fans, there were some good and some bad.
a) I was proud of how Liberty showed up. I was proud of the student turnout especially and how they all stayed to the end and cheered. It used to be there would be people behind us that would ask us to sit down if we were standing. Today I experienced something new and had four LU fans offer to move so that we could stand up and do our thing.
b) ODU has smart basketball fans. I loved that. It was something that I had never seen before. By smart basketball fans I mean they appreciated the little things. They were by no-means the rowdiest crowd I'd ever been around. However, one play that sticks out in my mind and is the best example of what I'm saying is when they took a free throw and missed, and then after the rebound got swatted around their point guard came up with it and reset at the top of the key. The entire arena clapped for that. It wasn't a spectacular play or anything other than an ordinary basketball play, but they appreciated it and cheered for it. That was pretty cool.
c) The ice cream song dance or whatever it was called was awesome. Had it only been the students doing it, I would've thought it was dumb. However, there were people all around the arena doing it. That's something that makes college basketball special.
d) With all of this being said, I was disappointed with the ODU student section. They have 18,569 undergraduates and had MAYBE 500-1000 of them at the game today that were active. C'mon, that's just bad. That's a very good basketball team in an amazing arena in maybe the top mid-major conference in America and only that many students showed up? That basketball team deserves better than that. Oh, and calling us Flamers? C'mon, you guys have to be smarter than that. Really? That's like saying "You Suck." It's something we've all heard that doesn't even phase us anymore.
e) I find it funny that ODU fans turned around to heckle our fans whenever their team did something good on the court. It was as if we were the ones that just got beat off the dribble or something. They spent almost as much time talking junk to us as they did cheering on their team. All we did was cheer on our team. I always laugh when other student sections start taunting the opposing team's section instead of cheering on their team. Isn't that counter-productive? VMI does it. Coastal does it. Now ODU did it. It just makes me laugh a little bit.
f) Funny thing happened after the game. About 20 of us were eating at Sobo and three of the ODU students came over and said they wanted to be good sports and instead of giving us a pitcher of beer they gave us a pitcher of water. They were trying to rub the whole Christian school thing in our faces but we just laughed it off. They ended up being your typical half-drunk student by talking crap when they left the restaurant.
g) While there were jerks like that, and the guy in the truck who drove by two and a half hours after the game and yelled "F--- you" at us, it was obvious to me they were the exception and not the rule. The rest of the ODU fans at Sobo talked to us, were polite with us, all of that good stuff. One guy even went as far as to apologize for "those a--hole fans who only show up once a year." I laughed pretty good at that.
All in all it was a good trip. I wish the outcome was different but hey, it's not. ODU would easily win the Big South. Next year in the Vines will be pretty fun as we will have all three post players and should have our other three guards we didn't have today. To think that we had four guys who could potentially start at times next year (and two that likely will) on the bench and still played a good first half shows that this program is heading in the right direction. We're not there yet, but we're getting there.
Last thing: The Ted is the second best arena in the state and there's a big gap between two and three. It was very nice. JPJ is obviously first, but for a mid-major school, that arena was absolutely perfect. It's easily the second nicest arena I've ever been in, and that includes Wake and VT. I don't have anything to base this on, but I would say it's Top 5 in all of mid-major basketball.
Yep, I would be fine with that too, as far as the regular season is concerned. Obviously, conference finals are another matter!
--Fumble (1961-2009), RIP
don't get me started on that jack***!
- By LU Armchair coach
- By Sly Fox
- By jbock13