Post by StPetersburgHoya (Inactive) on Feb 27, 2007 13:21:28 GMT -5
I took some time to think about the game yesterday and what the result means. We've been on a streak - but if you've been watching the games and looking at how we handle the ball objectively you'll notice that in the last few games of the streak we were winning despite not completely closing out on 3 point shots and despite not handling the ball as well as we could have. The answer in those situations (Nova and Pitt especially) has been to wait for someone to take the game over - whether its Summers, Sapp, Green, Wallace, or Hibbert - someone has stepped up in those games when it mattered to take the game over for a critical 3 to 4 minute stretch. That didn't happen today - you could tell that Jeff and Jessie were trying to take the ball to the basket and draw contact - in some cases this lead to bad shooting which lead to a rebound which lead to more empty offensive possessions - bottomline we didn't convert when it counted and what was suddenly a 2 or 3 point game got out of hand very fast. It also doesn't help when the team you are playing is shooting more than 80% from behind the three point line in the last 10 minutes of the game - you can view that as Cuse getting lucky, but we also gave them the opportunity to take those shots by not switching over to the shooter until it was too late.
Having said all of that - would I rather have a wake-up game now when we still need no one's help to win the Big East Season Championship or in the Big East Tournament or in the NCAAs? I think that if we had to have a let down game this was the best time to have it as opposed to in either of the tournaments. We know what we need to work on and it gives the team some urgency to work on those issues and come out with a fire lit under them going into tournament play. Sure, losing to Cuse sucks but if it had to happen I'd rather have it now than later.
As for Cuse storming the court - if any of you said it was ok to rush the court when we beat Notre Dame two years ago I feel that we shouldn't complain abou them storming the court either. They beat a Top 10 opponent and virtually eliminated any talk of bubble status on national television and on senior night - that's a pretty big deal and I really think that if the shoe was on the other foot we wouldn't be second guessing the decision.
Having said all of that - would I rather have a wake-up game now when we still need no one's help to win the Big East Season Championship or in the Big East Tournament or in the NCAAs? I think that if we had to have a let down game this was the best time to have it as opposed to in either of the tournaments. We know what we need to work on and it gives the team some urgency to work on those issues and come out with a fire lit under them going into tournament play. Sure, losing to Cuse sucks but if it had to happen I'd rather have it now than later.
As for Cuse storming the court - if any of you said it was ok to rush the court when we beat Notre Dame two years ago I feel that we shouldn't complain abou them storming the court either. They beat a Top 10 opponent and virtually eliminated any talk of bubble status on national television and on senior night - that's a pretty big deal and I really think that if the shoe was on the other foot we wouldn't be second guessing the decision.
