Horns Put it Together Against TCU

Thanks for the game story post, Jeff. OK. I am home from the game and my Catahoulas have allowed me to return from their evening constitutional.

In the game thread I posted that, "We'll be there looking for any telltale signs of improvement." Well, I have read the sparse game thread posts (thanks Jeff and the other brave few. It must have been lonely.) I attribute the low turnout to the LHN and the fatigue induced by the "Ides of February 2nd". Not necessarily in that order. So here I am and I now intend to share my thoughts on tonights' game whether you like it or not. ;) Read it or don't.

Since we all seem to agree that we have little chance of making the NCAA playoffs unless we make a run in the Conference Tournament, and my thinking is that that is unlikely, what I was looking for in this game was any sign on the downside of whether the team was imploding or not, and on the upside, whether they would show any resiliency after the Kansas State game. Like more than a few on this website, I was a little heartened after the Tech game. I did not get to see the Kansas State game, but I sure did notice the downward spiral in the tone of basketball discussion post Kansas State.

I don't have the basketball expertise to carry on a technical discussion of what I saw tonight, like the likes of Dave, Jeff, bierce, HoopsCoach, and NYHorn to just name just a few of you, so I will limit my comments to impressions I had from what I saw tonight. To begin with, I was thinking this afternoon, if I were Coach, what would I say to this team? I would have said something like, "Guys. We are coming down to the end of the season, and it probably has not measured up, at this point, to any of our expectations. So, we gotta work with we got. I think it is time that we start acting like we are all a year older with commensurate experience. We gotta realize that we gotta stop waiting for the Cavalry to come rescue us, whether that is Sherriff Kabongo, or some ephemeral recruits that might or might not appear this summer. In fact, we are the only Cavalry that may be riding to our rescue. So, we should oughta start acting like we been there before if we want to be there again." So. In my self induced reverie of imagining that coach might actually be so delusional as to say something like that, this is what I saw.

The team came out with a determination that showed the resilience and some grit that they have previously shown this season after bad games. Despite the relapses that have been well chronicled in the game thread and the game story, they really seemed focused. The guards made the best entry passes that I have seen this season, and I guess that the corollary to that must be that the bigs did the best job that they have done this season setting themselves up to receive those entry passes. Let me elaborate a little.

Cameron Ridley came out on what I think was the first possession and worked to present himself in the low post. He did a pretty good job, even though as some posters have noted in other threads, he seemed a little slow in getting off his shot and it missed. I am not sure, but I think it was on the the next possession that he set himself up nicely again and made a nice move to the basket for the score. That seemed to set the tone for the inside game. Later in the first half Conner Lammert took the ball inside the three point line, found himself open and launched himself up for a jump shot. Now, I was sitting on the first row upstairs kind of right above him, and I clearly saw his facial expression and body language. Once he jumped, his expression said, "Oh crap, I should not take this shot!" His body language, reflected that thought as he was stiff as could be and looked pretty awkward. But, lo and behold, it went in. Next possession, I think, he set himself up well in the post for an entry pass that came to him right on time. Now, I thought that he was a bit too far out from the basket to effectively convert, but, pardon my use of lo and behold again, he dropped a step and slid a bit under and around the defender for a nice layup.

Now, my short term remembry may be a little mixed up and I may have the sequences a little out of whack, but there were some other moves by the posts in the first half that that showed some promise. Of course, some posters have posted that Jaylen Bond has no offensive game whatsoever, and that might be the truth, but he and Demarcus Holland teamed up on an off target alley oop where Jaylen showed great hands and body control by taking the pass and putting it in for a lay up.

Don't get me started on Papi. He continues to impress me with his ball handling, and now that he is having to play more at the five, he continues to show that he is adept at setting himself up in the post a little further out than you might think he should and still be able to make a move and convert. I am looking forward to seeing him in the future.

Of course, it has been posted often how Prince Ibeh doesn't have an offensive game - probably rightfully so. But I think that Coach may have put a bug in his ear that he should oughta go ahead and try anyway. The Prince had two post moves that were impressive even though neither of them went in. The first was a spin move with a sky hook at the end of it. The form was pretty good, just a little too much extension on his arm at the end of the shot with a loss of control. Now I don't know much about basketball, but the little I know is about hook shots. Long story short is that I broke my leg in football during my freshman year in high school. When basketball season started, in my cast, on the other end of the court, I practiced two dribble and one step and turn hook shots off of my cast leg. There was no such thing as a three point line in those days, but I got to where I could sink about 70% of those shots out to the top of the free throw arc around the court. I could not play basketball worth crap, but I could hit those shots. Sorry for the diversion of the story. Ibeh's next post up ended in a nice drop step spin move that ended up bouncing off of the rim. I know that this part of my story is stretching it a bit, but both shots showed good form and Coach did not take him out after those shots. Besides, how is he gonna develop any offensive moves unless he tries them in game conditions? I guess the TCU game was as good as any to try.

As some have commented, the team lost focus at times and defense seems to have suffered because of it. Though, as Coach said in his post game radio show, their press and trap defense was probably the best it has been this season and several times seemed to take an extra twelve to eighteen seconds off of the shot clock. The things that struck me about our defense was that we continue to get steals and get down on the floor and fight for the ball like I saw in the Tech game.

Like the entire game, the guards seemed to have a mixed game. Juice and McClellan both started slow but came on later offensively, and both showed good hands and scrapped at times on defense. Felix had one defensive play where he just reached up and took the ball off of the chest of the guy that he was defending and took off down the court. He was called for a foul, of course, but it showed some moxie on his part. Speaking of good defensive plays, Ridley had a great block where one of TCU's guards drove past Ridley on the left side facing the basket. He got well past Ridley and did a two footed jump stop to attempt a layup. Before he had barely left his feet and with the ball about chest high holding it with both hands, Ridley caught up with him, reached around him from behind and got an all ball block out of bounds. I know that I am mixing and matching my offense and my defense and my guards and bigs, but i would be remiss not to mention Demarcus again. Contrary to the fact that some have posted that he should not be on a D1 roster, that young man makes everybody around him better. Coach put him back in to play defense with twenty seconds to go. As the game ended, Papi came over to Demarcus and gave him a big ol' bro hug. I hope that that exemplifies that this team will continue to work together to improve. I noticed, and Coach brought up in his post game radio show that they were communicating with each other better in this game as coach said they they do more consistently in practice. Maybe it is time to grow up.

I know that this has gotten to be a long post. If that, or the style of the post bothers you, I apologise. A lot of people did not get to see what I consider was a pretty good game, and with all of the tribulations and gnashing of teeth of the "Ides of February 2nd", I though maybe some of you could use a good story. Telling it certainly was a bit cathartic for me, even though it is way past my bedtime. ;)

I know the words. But stringing them together even semi-coherently at two o'clock in the morning is another thing. Now for the bad thing. I accidentally hit the "down vote" button while trying to hit the "Quote" button on your post. I definitely should leave attempting high skill eye hand coordination to other, more sophisticated posters before my coffee in the morning. I Will make it up to you elsewhere, as you usually still have had worthy things to say long after I have exhausted my up votes. Now I guess I gotta go see what's going on on, "As the World Regurgitates". ;)