[LUconn]

and there was a ref right on the baseline too. He was either hallucinating or just made it up.

As for TB, he was really tentative around the arch but he needed to be in there more during the 2nd half. He was just so darn effective in the post. Good movement without the ball, a couple of nifty post moves. I was really impressed and didn't think anybody on our team had that. On defense he was... tall. Which is better than what we had going without him in the game. Is there any way we can win this game at Radford? I don't see it. But hopefully there will be a large student contingent going and they will all learn to despise them. Speaking of which, did we get the hazmat team to bleach out the visitor's locker room yet?

[jcmanson]

After having a night to cool off, here's my thoughts:

Seth was amazing.
Ant was solid.
Kyle played well.
Brolin did well, but he had a few chances under the basket where he didn't get control of the ball. His potential is sky high though. The next 3+ years watching him will be fun.
Jesse's handles are fun to watch. He doesn't look like he can play, but he had some crazy crossovers and spin moves that completely faked Amir out. If he doesn't foul out we win the game in regulation, and a couple of his fouls he picked up were bogus.
Radford's big intimidated our guards when they would drive in, and to me that was the difference in the game. We would get by the top of their zone and into the paint nearly every possession. If we took a shot 9/10 he would either block it or cause us to adjust our shot to where we missed it. I think we should have taken more drives all the way to the hoop to try to draw some contact and get him in foul trouble.
I think Carter would have helped tonight, and speaking of him did anybody notice his pants.
The crowd was great especially towards the end. At the end of regulation when Radford missed their 3 shots, it was scary loud. Close to what it was during the Big South Championship game in 04 although that level of volume was pretty much from start to finish that day.

[Kolzilla41]

Zebras tonight made some bad calls, but we still played poorly. Dropped passes under the basket, Floyd a couple of times. Bad rebounding and we played a token press. I was disappointed we did not press more. With a five guard offense, I would want to make Radford get into a running game. I would have pressed especially in the 2nd half after every shot including free throws, just to get them running. My 2 cents worth.

A couple? He had 3 in the first half. I think I counted 6 for the game. That's almost 12 pts.

[PAmedic]

reading thru this novel- SMOOTHIE and MANSON basically posted everything I had to say.

It seemed after Jessie fouled out, we lost a lot of offensive cohesiveness (sp?) I underestimated the effect he has on the offense.

more of a "blast down the court, run a screen or two- jack up the first available shot"

not pretty to watch- esp the 2nd OT. I was disappointed in how we finished- or didn't. Clearly the guys were exhausted.

The physical stuff? WOW. But there were a lot of ticky-tack crap fouls called, too

Too many unforced errors/turnovers- sloppy play and MISSED LAYUPS cost us at least 4-6 points, by my count.

Overall, though- its nice to go into games expecting to WIN, or at least compete- and I'm proud of the turnaround in the program.

[PAmedic]

PS: great job by SCAR and RAY- its a treat to watch them "from my own d*** couch"

MrsPA likes the big man's camera presence

[JDUB]

i held off posting until i could cool off. I hate to blame the refs, but they deserve it. That was THE WORST officiated game I've seen in my entire life, and I've seen a lot. Including Middle school on up. They absolutely blew the game, and it wasn't just the one call on Brolin. They were horrible all night, and it just got worse as the game went on. I'm glad KK was there to see it. He better do something about it or he should lose his job (something I wouldn't mind anyway). The 2 worst calls were out of bounds on brolin and intentional on seth. They missed about 50 calls though, and the ones they did call were terrible.

with that said, TB has no confidence at all. He looked scared to death when he got the ball behind the arc. Seth is amazing, but after regulation and one overtime he was worn out. I think we need to go deeper into our bench or the team is gonna be really tired come the end of febuary.

[PAmedic]

I thought Baker looked alright on "D", esp as a guy who has seen EXTREMELY limited action the last 12 months.

his shooting- uhhh. Not sure what happened- had to be an abberation, I'm sure he's much better than that.

and it didn't help that KO just went ice cold from the corner. He must have had 5 open looks that were followed by "CLANK"

we make half of those and probably don't have to go to the 1st OT. Oh well. Live by the 3, die by the 3

[dompennix]

Smoothy, I have to agree that it was good to see Baker battling inside with Radford's bigs on defense in the OT, but I was wondering what happened to Austin Smith? If the refs aren't calling fouls in the block, that should have been Austin time for us: he doesn't have much weight yet, but he really tries to play physical when he's in.

Yeah, i was thinking the same thing

[jinxy]

i dont even know where to begin

Lynch Flore's attitude is what rubs me the wrong way, there is nothing wrong with being physical but he is vicious like a Rick Mahorn. The elbows were a great example of him losing his cool and trying to use his strength advantage to physically hurt the opposition. The play on Brolin should have been at least a fould at most a flagrant. If you watch the replay he had no intention of allowing a shot to get off, he could not have possibly went for the ball from behind. Our lack of depth really did hurt us tonight with the utter inconsistency of the refs.
-As to the guy earlier who said you cant blame the refs. There is a certain line that refs can cross when they open themselves to criticism. It's hard to enough to beat a quality D1 team by themselves but when you add in the help of terribly inconsistent referees it's even harder. There was absolutely no consistency in the way that fouls were called. We were absolutely mugged many times after clearing a defensive rebound, (and handchecked). Jesse clearly flopped on Lynche Flore underneath on the one possession and the official was right on top of it.

The bottom line is the refs should allow the players to decide the outcome all the while doing their job of keeping an orderly flow to the game, while not allowing the game to get out of hand. In my opinion the officials killed the flow of the game, called cheap fouls, then allowed mugging to occur, all the while missing out on several key important calls.

That being said Radsfords two big men pose a lot of problems with their own talents, but when they get that kind of help from the zebras its impossible to stop them.

[italunstalun]

Anyone talking about Tyler Baker being a great post presence is a joke. He's a nice guy and his game will come back as he gets better, but just about anyone on the team is more of a post presence than he is. Being tall does not make you a post presence, just ask Russell Monroe.

[olldflame]

Anyone talking about Tyler Baker being a great post presence is a joke. He's a nice guy and his game will come back as he gets better, but just about anyone on the team is more of a post presence than he is. Being tall does not make you a post presence, just ask Russell Monroe.

I do not recall ANYONE on this board EVER using the words "great post presence" to describe Tyler Baker. This even includes his PR man. I challenge you to find it and post the link. I will not hold my breath.

It HAS been said that he is one of our limited options to get some size on the floor, and I don't know how that can be disputed.

[Hold My Own]

Anyone talking about Tyler Baker being a great post presence is a joke. He's a nice guy and his game will come back as he gets better, but just about anyone on the team is more of a post presence than he is. Being tall does not make you a post presence, just ask Russell Monroe.

TB is playing on 0 confidence right now...I sure hope he comes across some...believe me when I say I think the hype that has surrounded him is quite bizarre and undeserving...but he really is a good player with a VERY GOOD shot from 3...but man, if I only saw him this year without ever seeing him in practice and scrimmages I would think he's the second coming of Russel or something...but he really is good with a VERY good stroke from distance...he just needs some confidence which, like I said I hope he comes across b/c we need it

[rjhenz]

i dont even know where to begin

Lynch Flore's attitude is what rubs me the wrong way, there is nothing wrong with being physical but he is vicious like a Rick Mahorn. The elbows were a great example of him losing his cool and trying to use his strength advantage to physically hurt the opposition. The play on Brolin should have been at least a fould at most a flagrant. If you watch the replay he had no intention of allowing a shot to get off, he could not have possibly went for the ball from behind. Our lack of depth really did hurt us tonight with the utter inconsistency of the refs.
-As to the guy earlier who said you cant blame the refs. There is a certain line that refs can cross when they open themselves to criticism. It's hard to enough to beat a quality D1 team by themselves but when you add in the help of terribly inconsistent referees it's even harder. There was absolutely no consistency in the way that fouls were called. We were absolutely mugged many times after clearing a defensive rebound, (and handchecked). Jesse clearly flopped on Lynche Flore underneath on the one possession and the official was right on top of it.

The bottom line is the refs should allow the players to decide the outcome all the while doing their job of keeping an orderly flow to the game, while not allowing the game to get out of hand. In my opinion the officials killed the flow of the game, called cheap fouls, then allowed mugging to occur, all the while missing out on several key important calls.

That being said Radsfords two big men pose a lot of problems with their own talents, but when they get that kind of help from the zebras its impossible to stop them.

I won't disagree with you about the refs and I didn't say they didn't make pee poor calls/no calls, but on the same note, they didn't decide the game. We missed I don't know how many layups or shots we should of hit. We weren't good at the line or as good as we have been and the list goes on. If we make 1 of those shots or free throws, the game is over in regulation, we win. The refs they made bad calls, but they didn't cost us the game. We had many chances to decide the game ourselves and didn't come through. I'm proud of the guys they played hard, they just came out on the wrong end of the score. They will bounce back.

[Hold My Own]

We had the ball on the baseline with 15 seconds to go with a player under the goal that got hogtied...which part of that did the officials not cost us the game?!?!?!