Great game, several observations I had.
1. TJ, Deion, TA played really hard interior defense. GW had an immense size advantage. I mean they start a 6'9 guard and Larsen and Cavanaugh are probably two of the strongest guys in the league. We did get beat up the offensive glass, but was really impressed with their defensive effort in the second half and overtime.
2. In the VCU loss, Terry settled for a jumper when he should have tried to drive. With the game on the line, twice, Terry took his man off the dribble and it resulted in easy lay-ups. Also at least 3 of the 5 fouls on Terry were complete BS.
3. Khwan Fore flat won the game for us in the second overtime. Yes, SDJ hit a ton of FT's. But Khwan set the tone by getting a steal on the first possession and converting 2 FT's. He got fouled on the next possession and converted one of 2, grabbed a monster rebound in traffic and delivered the dagger rim rattling dunk. He was just exuding confidence. He knew he could beat their guards at anytime and did.
4. SDJ is just a big time player. I don't know what else to say about him. I don't know where he ranks in Mooney list of great guards, but I am putting him up in Ced territory.
5. Trey hit a big three pointer, no doubt. But look at the rest of his stat line. 1 rebound, 1 assist, 1-4 from the field, 5 personal fouls in 27 minutes. That is a whole lot of empty minutes. Deion did not have an imposing stat line either but he made a number of big plays out their on both ends of the court.
6. I had a couple bad flashbacks with Mooney tendencies that I thought he had gone away from. The offense-defense substitution started in earnest at the 4 minute mark, (didn't work) and having our PG not even attempt to pass the ball with the game on the line in both OT's (worked pretty well last night). Some of the latter was because TA fouled and also due to our recognition that GW was inexplicably using 2 big men to try to trap SDJ up top.
7. The end of game intentional fouling was a complete clusterf*ck. I understand the strategy and am OK with it but our execution of the strategy was just awful. First off, we foul way too early and don't allow enough time off the clock (this is a consistent issue). Secondly, if you are going to do that strategy, someone on our bench has got to recognize that Terry has 4 fouls and either instructs him not to foul OR they take him out of the game. What we did just cannot happen.
Finally, GW's seat are just awful. They are woefully uncomfortable and despite having mid court seats, I basically had to stand the entire time because the sight lines were to severe to fully see the court. Also, there 5500 seat arena was half full at best for an ESPN game and they were 15-4. The atmosphere/seating/sightlines at the Robins Center is night and day better.
1. TJ, Deion, TA played really hard interior defense. GW had an immense size advantage. I mean they start a 6'9 guard and Larsen and Cavanaugh are probably two of the strongest guys in the league. We did get beat up the offensive glass, but was really impressed with their defensive effort in the second half and overtime.
2. In the VCU loss, Terry settled for a jumper when he should have tried to drive. With the game on the line, twice, Terry took his man off the dribble and it resulted in easy lay-ups. Also at least 3 of the 5 fouls on Terry were complete BS.
3. Khwan Fore flat won the game for us in the second overtime. Yes, SDJ hit a ton of FT's. But Khwan set the tone by getting a steal on the first possession and converting 2 FT's. He got fouled on the next possession and converted one of 2, grabbed a monster rebound in traffic and delivered the dagger rim rattling dunk. He was just exuding confidence. He knew he could beat their guards at anytime and did.
4. SDJ is just a big time player. I don't know what else to say about him. I don't know where he ranks in Mooney list of great guards, but I am putting him up in Ced territory.
5. Trey hit a big three pointer, no doubt. But look at the rest of his stat line. 1 rebound, 1 assist, 1-4 from the field, 5 personal fouls in 27 minutes. That is a whole lot of empty minutes. Deion did not have an imposing stat line either but he made a number of big plays out their on both ends of the court.
6. I had a couple bad flashbacks with Mooney tendencies that I thought he had gone away from. The offense-defense substitution started in earnest at the 4 minute mark, (didn't work) and having our PG not even attempt to pass the ball with the game on the line in both OT's (worked pretty well last night). Some of the latter was because TA fouled and also due to our recognition that GW was inexplicably using 2 big men to try to trap SDJ up top.
7. The end of game intentional fouling was a complete clusterf*ck. I understand the strategy and am OK with it but our execution of the strategy was just awful. First off, we foul way too early and don't allow enough time off the clock (this is a consistent issue). Secondly, if you are going to do that strategy, someone on our bench has got to recognize that Terry has 4 fouls and either instructs him not to foul OR they take him out of the game. What we did just cannot happen.
Finally, GW's seat are just awful. They are woefully uncomfortable and despite having mid court seats, I basically had to stand the entire time because the sight lines were to severe to fully see the court. Also, there 5500 seat arena was half full at best for an ESPN game and they were 15-4. The atmosphere/seating/sightlines at the Robins Center is night and day better.
