Better team won tonight. Congrats to Portland.

[Sparlimb]

Congrats to Portland. They are a scrappy good team. They canned a ton of 3's and played better when it counts. We'll be seeing a lot of 2-3 zones this year as we have no one that can be counted on to score from the perimeter. I think this is a good thing for us though. We need to see our short comings and try and make them better. We kept fighting, which is what matters. Nolen had a great game tonight. Wish we could have hit a few more free throws. Fun game though. It's hard to win games on consecutive nights...How we possibly got outrebounded is beyond me. Oh well, Texas A&M will be a challenge too.

 

[PeanutButterGopherTime]

Anybody know the game time for A & M?

 

[bga1]

Shooting, shooting, shooting. Any night we shoot well we'll be fine. If not we are vulnerable. There will be plenty of night where shooting is a problem for us- this team is loaded with streak shooters. It was nice effort to even hang in there with that miserable shooting we displayed tonight.

 

[Rouser]

At least we made a game of it.. Portland is a good team. We are a better team IMO..by a long shot. Just not tonight.

 

[MRJ]

Agree. Portland definitely wanted it more than we did down the stretch. Overall, I have to admit I wasn't very impressed with them. But they played much harder than we did for the majority of the game and the team that works harder, generally wins.

 

[charlesbenjamin7]

If we had shot better from behind the 3-point arc (just 15%) and made some FTs (just 59%) the outcome would have been different. With that said, Portland did what they needed to.

 

[Swede]

Portland certainly deserved to win. Shows the importance of team basketball. Our guys seemed to come out thinking that because any single player on our roster is better than any single Pilot, the first part of the first half should be one touch possessions.

I hope that we are not seeing a relapse of last years schizophrenic, hot and cold team. Again, credit Portland's D, but the offense looked as though Jed Fisch was drawing up plays.

Perhaps a game like this is a great recruiting call to Corey Joseph. For as tough as Al Nolen is, he is still an offensive liability. He was able to get to the rim against a less athletic Portland team (why did he wait until the end of the game to do it?), but until he can hit a jump shot and free throws, he might as well be Miles Tarver. What team really doesn't want the ball in their PG's hands at crunch time?

Do the statistics show that we are as bad a free throw shooting team as it appears? When our little guys can't hit free throws, who will?

I can understand Rodney Williams sitting. We played a tough, smart basketball team who would be tough on an inexperienced young man. Notwithstanding, as tough a go as we were having, I wonder if we would have had any success just trying to beat them with athleticism?

Ugly, frustrating game to watch for a Gopher fan. This team is still without a go to guy.

 

[laxry]

Two glaring problems. Rebounding - Unacceptable to be outrebounded with our size, and the lack of offense rebounds against a 2-3...are you kidding me? Shooting - The rate at which we are missing free throws is unacceptable, three pointers look painful, and our runners are bricks. We should have lost by 30 the way we shot and rebounded. Someone needs to step up, get a rhythem, and lead this team.

Would have liked to see someone run the baseline as their 2-3 was so high. Rodney could have had a few easy alley oops which could have opened up the lane more.

 

[ncgo4]

I watched the game on the internet and then reviewed the box score and we are definitely the better team, except for field goal, 3-point and free throw shooting. Oh yeah, and except for rebounding. Oh yeah, and assists. Let's face it, when our pressure defense gives us break away field goals we are very good. But tonight our offense consisted, way too often, of throwing the ball from guard to guard and then chucking up a 3 point shot that we missed.

We really need to work on our half court game. And boy oh boy do we need Trevor or Royce, IMHO.

A tough night for the Big 10! Minnesota, Michigan and Mich. State all lost. It will be really interesting to watch what happens tomorrow against a very good Texas A & M team.

 

[MillionMoves]

Everyone talks about missing White and Mbakwe, but I actually think Bostick would be the most helpful to this team right now. We have rebounders in Carter, Iverson, Sampson. We need some shooters more than anything and Bostick has that ability to score.

 

[MRJ]

Everyone talks about missing White and Mbakwe, but I actually think Bostick would be the most helpful to this team right now. We have rebounders in Carter, Iverson, Sampson. We need some shooters more than anything and Bostick has that ability to score.

Unfortunately, none of them rebounded worth "diddly poo" (copyright, Jim Mora) tonight.

 

[underground629]

Did you watch the same game? The whole "Nolen's an offensive liability" has some legitimacy to it, but this game being the wake up call for that? He was our best offensive player tonight, he didn't wait until the end to go to the rim (did you watch the whole game?), and he went 7-9 from the FT line. Isn't talking crap about Nolen's offense getting old yet? This was probably the worst time to do it considering he was our one bright spot on offense tonight.

Portland certainly deserved to win. Shows the importance of team basketball. Our guys seemed to come out thinking that because any single player on our roster is better than any single Pilot, the first part of the first half should be one touch possessions.

I hope that we are not seeing a relapse of last years schizophrenic, hot and cold team. Again, credit Portland's D, but the offense looked as though Jed Fisch was drawing up plays.

Perhaps a game like this is a great recruiting call to Corey Joseph. For as tough as Al Nolen is, he is still an offensive liability. He was able to get to the rim against a less athletic Portland team (why did he wait until the end of the game to do it?), but until he can hit a jump shot and free throws, he might as well be Miles Tarver. What team really doesn't want the ball in their PG's hands at crunch time?

Do the statistics show that we are as bad a free throw shooting team as it appears? When our little guys can't hit free throws, who will?

I can understand Rodney Williams sitting. We played a tough, smart basketball team who would be tough on an inexperienced young man. Notwithstanding, as tough a go as we were having, I wonder if we would have had any success just trying to beat them with athleticism?

Ugly, frustrating game to watch for a Gopher fan. This team is still without a go to guy.

 

[underground629]

Those aren't the most impressive rebounders other than Carter offensive rebounding ability. Too bad the rest of his game isn't great so he's not in there all that much to rebound. And yes, we could really use White and Mbakwe, and not just for rebounding purposes, although they would definitely help there as well.

Everyone talks about missing White and Mbakwe, but I actually think Bostick would be the most helpful to this team right now. We have rebounders in Carter, Iverson, Sampson. We need some shooters more than anything and Bostick has that ability to score.

 

[Friend Of Tubby]

Congrats to Portland. They are a scrappy good team. They canned a ton of 3's and played better when it counts. We'll be seeing a lot of 2-3 zones this year as we have no one that can be counted on to score from the perimeter. I think this is a good thing for us though. We need to see our short comings and try and make them better. We kept fighting, which is what matters. Nolen had a great game tonight. Wish we could have hit a few more free throws. Fun game though. It's hard to win games on consecutive nights...How we possibly got outrebounded is beyond me. Oh well, Texas A&M will be a challenge too.

Excellent comments, thanks for a breath of fresh air here.

 

[steffyboy]

Everyone talks about missing White and Mbakwe, but I actually think Bostick would be the most helpful to this team right now. We have rebounders in Carter, Iverson, Sampson. We need some shooters more than anything and Bostick has that ability to score.

The fact that we left either center on the court at all times is why we lost this game. Portland is a smaller and quicker team that was clearly better tonight from a fundamental standpoint (ie. rebounding). Mbakwe would have been perfect here. We had nobody that could break there zone, Nobody that could shoot, nobody that could rebound. Sampson and Iverson should have sat this one out and we should have shuffled Carter and DJ in at the 5. A rare time that Tubby was outcoached. Portland is a good team. Their coach will be a head guy at a major conference school soon.

 

[Section201]

The best team won .

The best team won. Numbers dont lie when they pile up like they did in this game. The Gophers need to learn a few lessons from it and move on.

In any case losing to Portland will not be considered a bad loss in March, IMHO.

 

[figi]

Agree. Portland definitely wanted it more than we did down the stretch. Overall, I have to admit I wasn't very impressed with them. But they played much harder than we did for the majority of the game and the team that works harder, generally wins.

Actually, down the stretch, the Gophers played much better. It was the first 35 minutes they out played us.

 

[MRJ]

Actually, down the stretch, the Gophers played much better. It was the first 35 minutes they out played us.

Yeah, I should have clarified a little better. The first 30-35 minutes they definitely wanted to win more than we did, that's why I said they played harder.

 

[CaliforniaGopher]

The best team won. Numbers dont lie when they pile up like they did in this game. The Gophers need to learn a few lessons from it and move on.

In any case losing to Portland will not be considered a bad loss in March, IMHO.

The lesson is that now Tubby finally misses not having 5 Star Royce White and the Miami Muscle.

 

[From the Barn]

Their coach will be a head guy at a major conference school soon.

Oregon in about 5 months.

 

[Dice]

The reason we lost, as bad as our free throw shooting and rebounding was, was shot selection. They only took open 3s and slashed to the basket for easy buckets. I can't even remember how many deep 2s DJ shot, or how many turn around jumper Ralph took with 25 seconds left on the shot clock, etc. We made a comeback because Al seemed to be the only guy who realized that he was better off looking for a layup and/or getting to the line.