HOYAS--UConn RECAP

[FLHoya]

Nobody's perfect.

A simple phrase (hackeneyed too I might add), but one with profound meaning (there goes another one).

This is why we could not win this game today. Far from a unique experience, today's game was yet another in a line of countless re-tellings of a story all in college basketball are familiar with.

We could not win this game today for the same reason nearly every team who finds themselves down 20 cannot win. We could not win for the same reason Penn State could not win against us after we pulled out to a 17-0 lead. We could not win today for the same reason we could not put away Pittsburgh after coming back from being down 19 in the second half in 2002 at the MCI Center.

When you find yourself down by 20 or so in the second half, no matter how hard you battle, no matter how many loose balls you dive for, no matter how many wild 3's start magically falling, no matter how good the adjustments...you almost always cannot win.

Because you've forced yourself to be perfect in order to win. And nobody's perfect.

In my head at halftime, I made the rather simple calculation that in order to crawl back into the game, the Hoyas needed to cut 2 baskets per TV timeout off of the UCONN lead. Well, as we saw, it looked like the team just might do it, as they pulled to 47-41 with 9:36 to go in the game. Who'd have thought they were capable of a 22-8 run after that first half?

During that run, the Hoyas were 5-6 from three point range, including the first 4 of the half. The other points? LAYUP, DUNK, LAYUP, FT. To put it one way, the Hoyas were playing about as perfect as they could on both ends of the floor for about 11 minutes. (Shot 50% in the second half by the way).

ABOUT as perfect.

Had they been perfect, they might have pulled one of the great comebacks in Hoya history. But we know they're not.

There were five plays in the second half that stand out to me and lay the groundwork for why we could not come all the way back. In a victory, nobody remembers these plays. In a blowout loss, they are merely small indistinguishable pieces of a fan's puzzlement and anger. But in a game where a furious comeback stalls just short of its mark, these are the plays that were less than perfect when only perfect would do. I think they're close to in the order in which they occurred:

1. Roy Hibbert misses his second layup of the second half (about the 16 minute mark). I thought on this one he had the right position and choice of shot, but put far too much mustard on the bank and it had no shot. A softer more patient touch seemed more appropriate there.

2. Ashanti Cook travels under no pressure. He wanted Darrell Owens on the wing--the pass wasn't open, Darrell knew it and wasn't looking back. Ashanti couldn't hold up his plant foot.

3. Ashanti Cook stripped in the lane. Almost on consecutive possessions with #2, might have actually been consecutive possessions.

4. Roy Hibbert misses a dunk. Which I can now laugh about in a dark humor kind of way, because one of the knocks I always hear about him is that he won't finish strong. And in this case, unfortunately, I don't think the dunk was right for that play. I thought he was too far away from the hoop--maybe a finger roll layup is better, I don't know. Just unfortunate--additionally b/c this was the possession AFTER we pulled to 57-51. It was 59-51 during the possession, and the miss led to Denham Brown's breakout dunk.

5. GU defense loses Denham Brown. Somebody lost him, because with 2:55 and GU down 9, Brown just walked behind a screen with no one helping out and took his time to bury his biggest shot of the game.

These aren't major things--if we wanted to talk about something MAJOR as a game trend from today, we could start and end the discussion with second chance points. But what ultimately the students and locals will remember about today is after a terrible first half in which we showed little signs of anything, we were somehow, inexplicably, right in the game halfway through the second half. And it didn't quite happen, in large part because of five plays that went less than perfect.

---------------------------------------------

Now you can choose to believe what I've said above, and what others are writing in the "if we only made our FTs and Hibbert could finish," "if Denham Brown didn't get hot," "Bob Donato sucks at his job" tradition.

I'm never a fan of excuses or "if only's" for the most part. And writing about 5 less than perfect plays is in no way to imply that we lost or would have WON had those not occurred. In the end, it's your team's fault for being in the position where little stuff like that is deadly in the first place.

Here's something completely alarming:

In the first half, we held UConn to 39% shooting. UConn committed more turnovers (9) than we did (8).

We were down by 20 at the half.

The scoreboard at halftime also told me that rebounding was even at 15-15. I don't believe that for a second.

What was so astounding to me is that I would not have given us a bad grade defensively in the first half. Charlie Villaneuva's first shot hit the side of the backboard if I remember correctly. UConn shot some airballs, had a bunch of shots altered, and a few blocked in the first half. And all of that--pretty much for naught as far as we were concerned. Because we could NOT keep UConn from earning second chance points at will. For most of the first half, second chance points were about half of their total points. I guess we could say they started okay defensively on possessions but did not finish the job--that is, the all important defensive rebound. Moreover, on more than a few boards at the end of the half, we received lucky bounces at our feet. Jonathan Wallace had 4 boards today--and, well, you know where he plays.

Nice to see ESPN.com's scoreboard and the AP Recap guy picking up on the "rebounding" pun. This is why we have journalism schools and Hoyatalk recappers work pro bono.

At one point, UConn botched an alley oop that bounced off the rim. And even that was cause for an offensive rebound--by the guy who threw the pass. And a foul--of the guy who botched the dunk. At this point myself and others speculated whether UConn might try walking the ball across the court and have Marcus Williams throw it in the general direction of the backboard and see what happened.

I'm perplexed as to the precise reason the rebounding was so poor. My theories are three, but I'd like other people's opinions:

1. UConn's stronger and bigger. That's the one we could have written before the game.

2. Poor weak side position. That is, the time's when anyone bothered to put a body on the weak side.

3. Too many guys altering shots. By this I mean it was never JUST Hibbert, JUST Green, or JUST Bowman. It was 2 or 3 of them. When most of your front line leaves their feet for a block, someone's floating waiting for the O-board.

But we can discuss that.

(BELOW: Runnin' and gunnin' with the Westchester Boys in the exciting conclusion to Part 1 of the Recap)

[FLHoya]

Now DFW pointed out in the other thread this stat:

Cook/Bowman: 8-27
Everyone else: 13-29

And I think I know the answer why, and also I have a theory on the pattern of how the offense fell apart in the first half.

Put frankly, I think Cook and Bowman are the only two on the team who can consistently create their own shot off the dribble. They're also, perhaps not surprisingly, the two most impulsive shooters BY FAR on the team. Today, the offense broke down because...well, I think we just decided to abandon it. Rather, I saw the team becoming so impatient and really losing their cool when UConn went on its big run that nobody was working for a good shot, and we were settling for quick, poor looks.

Here's the pattern:

1. In retrospect, though I didn't see it at the time, at the beginning of the game we had a good offensive blueprint. Jeff Green and Brandon worked the post against Villaneuva and Boone. Brandon worked dribble penetration against Rudy Gay. I had no idea why we pursued the post game early and often at the time--wasn't that our supposed weakeness against UConn? But sure enough, CV and JB had a foul each in the very first possessions of the game. And Rudy Gay couldn't defend Bowman's drives to save his life. Yet there was little point wise to show for it--you have to beat two lines of defense against UConn after all, or make FTs when you get fouled.

2. As the little window we had with the above strategy began to close as UConn adjusted, and UConn had it's early 1st half run, we got impatient. That is, we were probing the same strategy on offense, but far too quickly and with little regard to whether it was open or the best look. Cook began to drive wildly here, sensing openings on the perimeter but finding no smooth sailing on the interior. Bowman found his drives cut off now as well by the interior defense of UConn.

3. And when UConn pulled further away and upped the tempo, we folded. With our offensive strategy nullified and even the traditional offense producing little in the way of good looks, we jacked up whatever we saw. And the impulsive ones are the ones that'll jack the most and quickest. In the final 4:35 of the first half when UConn went on a 14-2 run, here's who missed shots:

Bowman 3
Cook 2
Owens, Reed, Wallace 1 each
(Wallace's was a halfcourt heave at the buzzer).

Five of the eight shots involved in the above were three pointers, few of them decent looks.

A final general note: I wish I could talk more about the intensity of the effort and the smart adjustments in the second half to cut the lead, but I'm getting long winded. An excellent decision to go to a 2-3 zone, an excellent strategy to up the pressure on UConn's inexperienced guards. And furthermore, a MUCH better job of recognizing when to go uptempo and when to slow the ball down. Good decision making all around there. SHould provide a blueprint for further games down the road. Just make sure when you do force the bad shots and hurried possesions, that they are ONE AND DONE possessions next time.

(BELOW: Player Observations, and the single most offensive thing I've heard at any Hoyas game I've ever been to)

[lichoya68]

good summaries i think the 2 of 11 or whateve shooting start some missed threess and a few missed easy ones inside put us in the whole but i think jeff played great against two of the best big guys around and charlie villlanuava certianly played probably his best game of season and got out of his slump.... hate the whingin of calhoun on play afte play when he got the call.. and the last thing glad jeff is back to himself.... NO DOUBT who is the best candidate for rookie of the year in the big east jeff smoked their good big guys not sure rudy gay did much at all NO COMPARISON with our jeff good comback great second half if not for ashantis walk after the steal and hiibs missed dunk and not scoring twice with postion inside we mighta been different but good effort beat rutygers who almost upset pittt at the rac but close count only in horseshoes and dancing go hoyas is calhoun a bigger whiner than boeheim not sure at this point ....maybe one of you should do a poll biggest whiner in the country or big east at least jimmy or jimmy ps although ill now hear from my conn relatives tonite i can at least ask how the uconn women did one good thing go hoyas beat rutgers

[FLHoya]

PLAYER OBSERVATIONS

Ashanti Cook: In a sense I've covered the two biggest things one could say about his game today already. We've talked about the two ghastly turnovers he had in short proximity to each other in the second half. And we've covered his tendency towards impulsive shots and poor shot selection at times. I love watching Ashanti Cook have breakout games--his performance at Tennessee was really a treat to watch, and his Pitt game on Wednesday came out of nowhere. But I hope for him that he will recognize that those games are not happening everyday. I'm from the "sometimes the smartest shot is the one NOT taken" school of basketball fans. And while I like that Ashanti is one of the few willing to drive the lane even at his height and create his own shot off the dribble...see the previous line. It should be noted UConn had a few guys who executed nice pull up mid range jumpers, coming around screens or off ball fakes at the perimeter. Ashanti tends to drive head-down, try to get a little pushoff, and fall away too much. I'd like to see more straight up and down stuff. It was indicative of his day today that Jonathan Wallace ran the show for much of the second half, even as Ashanti was on the court.

Brandon Bowman--Where Ashanti gets into trouble more with his head-down 2 point attempts, Brandon gets in trouble with the 3 point attempts. He's a respectable 4-10 from the field until you add in 1-6 from three. I talked in our big thread on three-pointers how what I care about most is SMART shots--3 point or otherwise. And Brandon's day today illustrates my point of how when you look at some of our scoring droughts and see the three pointers, you wonder if that was the best shot we could get.

What's interesting is that I thought he really had a mismatch going for him in the first half. It was clear Rudy Gay couldn't stay with him and "that backhand thing Brandon Bowman does with his first step off the dribble" (TM). And when UConn switched to Hilton Armstrong guarding Brandon, Hilton was just too slow. But Brandon really didn't get the drive going again until the second part of the second half. A lot of his assists (4) I gotta believe were layoffs off a drive to Jeff Green.

Also encouraging--by the second half, to FINALLY see Brandon playing above the rim for defensive rebounds. Good to know that you don't need an aerodynamic body completely devoid of hair, thus cutting down on wind-resistence, to do this sort of thing.

Jonathan Wallace--Let me try something. Here's Jonathan's stat line:

37 minutes, 3-6 shooting, 3-5 from three, 9 points, 4 rbs, 3 ast, 2 TOs, 2 stls.

What do you think?

Remarkable? Not really. Acceptable? Me personally, I think heck yes it is.

Jonathan's clearly got one big offensive talent--he shoots threes at a high clip and has excellent form. He very seldom makes dumb mistakes, almost never takes an ill advised shot, and plays within himself on defense. In so many ways, he's the polar opposite style of what Kevin Braswell was. I liked Kevin, but he was maddening at times even as he was great at others. Jonathan gives you steady, predictable...except when he drains crowd-erupting mega-bomb threes that roll around the rim twice before dropping.

Jeff Green--Here's Jeff's stat line:

8-11 FGs, 2-3 from three, 4-8 FT (meaning fouled in the act 4 times), game-high 22 total points, 6 rbs (3 offensive), 3 ast.

And I was told after the game that the man who spent the most time guarding Jeff tonight was named the Defensive Player of the Game by the TV or radio or whatever.

If this is true, it would be without a doubt the most offensive thing I've ever heard or seen at a Hoyas game that I've been to.

And I heard someone in the concourse after the game say the following: "...Josh Boone is the best defender in...". I got no context, and those are the only words I heard, so I can't tell if that was a sarcastic comment or someone was drunk. But give me a break.

I'll say it--Josh Boone's defense was terrible today. Terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible, terrible. Jeff beat him consistently, Jeff beat him often, Jeff beat him with simple moves at times, Jeff made it look painfully easy at times. Josh Boone had 2 defensive rebounds, 3 steals, and a block. And when you gotta figure a few of those steals were off Roy...I mean, are they picking names from a hat? I know they have to pick a guy from the winning team, but at least give it to someone who's man didn't dominate the interior.

One thing Jeff did not get as much of in the game was solid work from the high post as a passer, given that the cuts were not there except for a period in the second half. And he surely waited too long to get into the game with respect to the rebounding issue.

Meanwhile, Rudy Gay's main contribution to the action tonight was an unsuccessful attempt to supplant Julius Page for most thunderous and awe inspiring dunk against GU at the MCI Center. He missed.

Jeff also added a new wrinkle to his interior game in the offense--he worked a basic backcut move in the paint, where he'd draw his defender high to the FT line as if he'd play that passer role, then back cut behind him. It worked a few times.

Roy Hibbert--Again, as many others will say, temper your criticisms with the knowledge that he just turned 18 and he's still developing and probably is in too deep in terms of what he has to face on the court in the Big East. One thing I look forward to him developing is a better recognition of the type of shot he needs in a given situation. He tends to hurry shots when he doesn't need to, and as a result will throw up a hard bank when he's in real close, or dunk when a soft finger roll will do.

What he provides at this point is still mainly measured in intangibles. He DOES alter shots with his mere presence in the lane--that happened several times today. When he does score, it's an immediate crowd booster.

But he's still very green and can be exploited. He's not yet going up and taking rebounds away. He's slow to recover when he helps on defense on a drive, to the detriment of rebounds he could get. But he's working hard and scrapping and getting better, though the stat sheet this week won't show it.

(But boy, when Roy got stripped and gave up the ball to UConn, who called a timeout, JT3 lit into Roy like I've never seen...my god, coach was Editeded off something fierce at Roy).

Ray Reed--Clearly a casualty of the short bench, with almost no stats in 8 minutes. Surprising to me, since Ray's strength is supposedly his on the ball defense, and UConn's weakness is that their young guards don't handle on the ball pressure well.

Darrell Owens--You know what the biggest thing that frustrates me about the whole "Darrell disappears during games" theme? It's that I watch him on the court, and I honestly believe he's the "smartest" one on the court and has the best grasp of what he can do with the cutting aspect of the offense. Whether as a passer or the cutter (see Pitt game), Darrell consistently sees openings where others do not. I just wish he could connect more frequently than his 5 points, especially given that with Ashanti in the doghouse, Darrell was getting more looks at the two position. And he pays dividends with 4 assists.

Now, he also was about ready to bite Bob Donato or do something scary near the end of the game when Brandon was called for a questionable reach in foul. It took Jonathan Wallace wisely stepping in as Darrell walked towards Donato while BD was walking away and JT3 getting some instruction/calming to him to save DO from a technical.

Speaking of which, I pondered a few days ago which referee crew would work this game. I figured since Jim Burr worked GU-Pitt and Tim Higgins worked UConn-BC earlier in the week, there was a good shot we'd see Bob Donato today. And there he was. Interestingly, I felt almost all of the questionable calls made on rebounding and interior situations were in the second half, rather than the first where UConn truly controlled the boards and you'd think GU fans would be screaming for anything to be called. Clearly not the officials best effort today, however no one who's seen Big East basketball EVER should be surprised at the amount of contact they let go. It just so happens we are NOT well suited at all to handle physical games at this point.

(Below: How the 8th graders made my hangover worse before the Josh Boone praise shut down my central nervous system altogether, and other Nongame Observations)

[Nevada Hoya]

FLHoya, as always, well appreciated by those of us who didn't see the game. It seems as if, from one part of your recap, if we had kept our poised during UConn's run and gone with better shot selection (and no panic), we would have had a better chance to win this, when we made our move in the 2nd half.

[FLHoya]

NONGAME OBSERVATIONS

--FAN OF THE GAME won FAN OF THE GAME!! This is easily the greatest moment in the history of the Nongame Observations since the kid won the Chevy Scholarship Challenge at the UConn game in 2002. What was so alarming about this, even more so than him beating two kids, was that so many people in the crowd were completely aware of the significance of the event and reacted as such.

Of course my old roommate Jon had to be attending this game and standing next to me in the student section to see this happen. When we would go to games when were in our first couple years at GU, Fan of the Game was nominated almost every night. And since we had no idea who he was, we used to call him "Mark McGwire" and it became a running joke. Well, after I believe the 2002 Syracuse game, we're all rushing the court, and on the way back from center court I run into Fan of the Game (literally). And I write about this on the message board and of course call him "Mark McGwire"--and sure enough I get an email that night from him...Did I mention Josh Boone plays terrible defense? Seriously, Big East coaches, watch the tape from today...he can't guard anyone on the interior. It's insane!!!

--For a vacation game, I'd say the "student" turnout was fairly impressive. A particularly late arriving "student" crowd, I was worried about 5 minutes before the game. Filled the bottom section, a few rows above that. True, some were friends of GU students, some are graduate students at other D.C. universities and could care less about their Top 25 basketball team. And some GU "students" today seemed to have blue hair and were NOT CAHoya, so all in all a more "mature" GU student crowd today. Well, with the exception of the waaaaaay wacked out proportion of spilled beer today.

--Because I know everyone who wasn't down there in our section is wondering, the band today was from Shaw Junior High School--that's right, their 6th through 8th graders. I love GU's Pep Band, I sit next to the band for a reason, but I just can't get enough of the type of band we had today. My high school band was like that (and often much more entertaining to watch than the football game, they were that good). Gotta love the classy, brassy bands who clearly embrace the Georgetown basketball philosophy that MOVEMENT is the key to success.

(Having said this, I did sit next to them and I was coming off of a hangover and not nearly enough sleep in the past two days of traveling myself back to DC and resetting my apartment. So my ears are still ringing.)

--The funniest moment with the Shaw band was when the front row jumped up to catch one of the T-shirt tosses, and one girl dropped her flute and it came apart. The band director was standing right in front of her and gave her the most evil, penetrating stare I have ever seen for a good 30 seconds.

--Almost topping that was more violence and silly errors in the halftime contests. There was the race for the final musical chair where two kids basically slid through it and went down. And the kid attempting the 5 second length of the court thing who was about a centimeter from a nasty ACL tear and probably a super duper lawsuit settlement with MCI that would have almost certainly been donated to a new on campus arena...okay fine, he just slipped a little while shooting and it was mildly funny.

--Seattle and St. Louis--that's a playoff game?

--So if you're a student and you made it back early to watch today's game and you're hanging out in someone's apartment sleeping on their floor for a few days until Harbin or SWQ opens up again, good for you. I'm sure all Hoya fans appreciate your dedication and effort. For those of you who couldn't make it, we missed you, you missed a good...second half. And the greatest coverup since Roswell, New Mexico--Josh Boone, Defensive Player of the Game.

(Wow, a Roswell reference without Charlie Villaneuva. If you play well, you earn it.)

[Nevada Hoya]

What is the criterion for fan of the game?

[WilsonBlvdHoya]

FL, as usual, fantastic job! I can't add much more except the following:

1) First half, shots didn't drop but also it didn't seem the team was running the o as crisply and quickly as it obviously did in the second half (you get the feeling III tore into them in the lockerroom, maybe?!?). You can't go down 20 and not expect a Sisyphean effort....In fact, I was amazed they weren't down 20 earlier in the half but there was a definite breakdown in those last couple minutes....

2) BOX OUT BOX OUT BOX OUT BOX OUT BOX OUT BOX OUT BOX OUT BOX OUT BOX OUT BOX OUT.....One of these years a Gtown team will learn to do it and III will get it into their heads. I would love to see Roy, Jeff or Brandon in the lane after a shot with arms spread, butt down and pushing back an opponent to clear for a board...They did a better job, obviously, in the second half than the 1st....

3) This is not meant as a slam on either player but one cannot underestimate the momentum killers that were a) Ashanti's consecutive turnovers on dragging the pivot foot and driving the lane when CT defenders collapsed on him and b) Roy's missed bunnies and slam attempt. Otherwise, the offensive execution was superb in the 2nd half. Eliminate those 4-5 mistakes and we would have had quite a barnburner at the end....

4) The Jeff Green v. Rudy Gay debate goes to the good guy in Round 1. In some fairness to Gay, he's not asked to shoulder the position or role that JG is but I guess that's the point too. Other than a 3, Rudy didn't do much but he wasn't asked to.....

5) GU d did a good job in 2nd half on Boone and Villanueva after they killed Hoyas in 1st. Unfortunately, Brown stepped it up in the "vesper half."

[hoyabinx]

FL, The ACL tear guy was my good buddy, to his defense he was extraordinarily drunk (we started at 8:45 AM after a night at the Tombs). I was surprised he even made it to the basket. I predicted that he was going to puked at midcourt.

Good post as always

[MCIGuy]

FLHoya said:

Here's something completely alarming:

In the first half, we held UConn to 39% shooting. UConn committed more turnovers (9) than we did (8).

We were down by 20 at the half.

The scoreboard at halftime also told me that rebounding was even at 15-15. I don't believe that for a second.

What was so astounding to me is that I would not have given us a bad grade defensively in the first half. Charlie Villaneuva's first shot hit the side of the backboard if I remember correctly. UConn shot some airballs, had a bunch of shots altered, and a few blocked in the first half.

Which goes back to my earlier point that its not the defense that has been the problem as much as the lapses in offense (scoring droughts).

Good writeup as usual, FLHoya.

[FLHoya]

hoyabinx said:

FL, The ACL tear guy was my good buddy, to his defense he was extraordinarily drunk (we started at 8:45 AM after a night at the Tombs). I was surprised he even made it to the basket. I predicted that he was going to puked at midcourt.

Good post as always

One of my favorite trends this year has been the elevated threat of physical violence and/or injury in the halftime and timeout games. I was for about a split second genuinely worried for your friend, because that was not a "natural" looking fall. But it will never beat the comedy of the girl who tripped over herself pulling up for a shot and ate in a few games ago in the same contest. Or the kid who threw the ball and hit the other kid in the face at McDonough during musical chairs.

[hoyaboy1]

The ball throwing incident was by far the best. Dead hit to the temple.

[jackdog74]

A few comments about the Josh Boone as Defensive Player of the Game:

1) Actually did happen.
2) When it happened, there was well over 5 minutes left in the game and UConn was up by no more than 12 -- probably 10, but my memory fails me. In other words, the game was very much mathematically in doubt.
3) His stat line that "earned" him DPOTG at the time of the announcement? Two blocks and two steals. That's it. They did not even bother to mention his rebounding numbers which may/may not have made it evident. It was by far, one of the most bizarre happenings I had ever seen.
4) Nothing he did really stood out on defense. Those probably were the quietest 2 blocks, 2 steals, I had ever seen.

FL Hoya -- great post. I think you summed it up best -- "nobody's perfect." I was more upset than I thought I would be after the loss but not as upset as I was after all of the losses last year. There's an incredible effort with these guys that has been missing since JT2 left. Diving on the floor, jumping up and down, etc. One thing about Roy -- he did look like a freshman version of RBB with one exception -- when we were making our run and UConn called timeout, Big Roy was off the bench cheering the guys on. You know, he may not be perfect, he'll need time to develop, but Big Roy -- WE LOVE THAT ATTITUDE!!!

[FOTP]

As someone who has sat with Fan of the Game for the last six years of Hoyas basketball his winning the actual Fan of the Game was the most gratifying experience in my Hoyas lifetime. Well deserved and I promise you he appreciates the support from everyone.

He is a good friend and it's nice to see someone who is such a fan get the victory.

Tough loss yesterday because I honestly didn't think the Huskies were any better than us. Great second half effort and JTIII is really doing a great job.

[EasyEd]

Anyone see JT's newest comments on the team:
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A59080-2005Jan8_2.html

[3GenerationHoya]

A couple more misc. observations:

It was definitely a different type of crowd in the student section yesterday. I was sitting near where the visiting team comes out, and enjoyed the pregame atmosphere of being one of only about 30 people in the section. A few of us cheered the MCI event staff for no reason, the junior high band when they showed up, the refs as they entered the arena, and Jeff Green's mom, who was sitting behind us.

By game time our numbers grew to a little less than 150 i think. not a bad showing considering the great majority of the student body returns tuesday. And the people that were there tried as hard as they could to help the team rally back in the second half.

a symbolic (?) tipoff to start the game between Jeff Green and Rudy Gay won by Rudy...

As mentioned earlier, Rudy and Jeff didnt match up against each other, but it was still great to see Green have the better game against perhaps his closest rival for Big East Rookie of the Year.

I love how the "princetown" offense lulls it's opponents into a false sense of security - just as Boone was getting comfortable following Jeff Green to the high post, he gets hit with a great backdoor cut that leads to an easy score. Even after that play, Jeff would have had another basket off the same exact move, if he had not been tripped up making his cut.

I want to mirror what a previous poster said about leaving the game in a surprisingly good mood. I think it has something to do with the way we finished the game. With less than a minute to go, guys were still hustling all over the court. Ashanti slid across the floor and out of bounds going after a loose ball with about 10 seconds left.

In years past we have stuck with good teams for ten minutes, a half, or even 25-30 minutes into the game, but we almost always fell apart at the end for any number of reasons. It was fun to watch a Hoya team bounce back from adversity and really play as hard as they can, even when they were down big. We didnt fall apart completely once things went south in the first half. Hopefully we can build off this effort and beat Rutgers on tuesday.

[FLHoya]

I forgot to ask about Jeff Green's mom, I saw her waving and everybody clapping--this is at like 11:15 so it's real early and not a lot of people are there yet. I wasn't sure if she was someone's mom or just an appreciative fan. Wouldn't it have been great if we could've gotten her to sit with us in the first rows? There were certainly several parents and "older students" in the section already.

The early-bird stuff is one of my favorite parts of going to the MCI Center. I try to be one of the first people there--I succeeded in being the fifth person in the student section yesterday b/c not as many of the "runners" were there due to the break ("runners" being the name I give to the kids who run through the concourse right after the gate opens to get into the student section first, to the great annoyance of the MCI security staff). Always loved listening to the band's entire playlist, all of the shootaround antics, being in basically an empty arena.

What's weird is that after you do this enough, even if I don't know most of the students' names who are always there early, I recognize almost all of them now. It's to the point where I was talking to a friend who normally sits with me but didn't make it yesterday about the student crowd. And I'm describing "the person in the front with the backwards hat," "the person with the wig," and so on, and they know exactly who I'm talking about. I have met most of the early-bird people and talked to them in line waiting to get in, and it's always enjoyable--bunch of great people.

Of course, my former roommate and I still have a running reference going to the people we always sat in front of our freshman year (I believe that HoyaPhatty would be one of those folks). Also found people like sitting in the same seats---amazing how that works out every time. And sure enough, you can bet I'll be back in the third row aisle seats on Tuesday night.

[ColumbiaHeightsHoya]

I have to add that I was equally impressed that we even made a run in the second half. Our teams last year folded and rarely made an effort to get back into games. Despite the loss, I was pleased to see the effort from the team and can't help but think we are on our way back.

I was in the front row (courtesy of some g'town alum) and was about five feet from Thompson. He really is on it all game long and has a great feel for what is going on. He doesn't harp on every mistake but simply makes sure the player knows what they did and what they should have done.

It was also fun to yell words of encouragement to our guys as they came in and to know that they could hear every word I was saying. It was after Roy entered in the second half that I was yelling quite loud for him to take it to the rack. He tried that dunk attempt shortly thereafter. So for those who are blaming big Roy for that one, it was my fault. Beat RUTGERS!!!