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Every time it looked like Illinois was going to pull away, our guys hit them back and stayed in it.

The frustrating part was that every time it looked like we were getting back in it, Illinois would have an answer.

Regardless, fun game and our guys battled hard.
 

Gophers1992 said:
Every time it looked like Illinois was going to pull away, our guys hit them back and stayed in it.

The frustrating part was that every time it looked like we were getting back in it, Illinois would have an answer.

Regardless, fun game and our guys battled hard.
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Perfect summation.

That’s one we’ll never forget.
 

Feels like we are one player away from being really really good. We need a bigger guard or wing who can join Hawkins, Christie, Garcia and Payne. Move Mitchell to a 6th man role and you could have a team that could compete with pretty much anyone.

Maybe that player is on the roster already and we will see it come to fruition next year or maybe they go out and find the missing piece in the portal. But this team is really close.

On a side note, during the broadcast they showed Christie's heat chart. Crazy to see how good he is from 3 and how bad he has been at finishing at the hoop. That above all else is why he would be well served to spend another year in college, getting stronger and perfecting his drive to the basket. Could be unstoppable with his outside shooting if he starts slashing more to the hoop when teams come way out on him due to his outside shot.
 

Gophers are an NIT bubble team. They will not be in the NCAA tournamanr barring a shocking run in the B1G tournament.

The fun, close games against Purdue, Illinois, Missouri, and Iowa were syill losses. The critics have a point.

Gophers are so close....

Both optimists and pessimists have a place here.
 



Gopher_In_NYC said:
Perfect summation.

That’s one we’ll never forget.
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Considering what it looked like we had in November, which was pretty much, "I hope we can somehow squeeze out 5 BT wins", to the end of Feb., where we're gonna be disappointed if we aren't in a year -end tournament and looking back to last night and thinking, "If we could have just pulled out 3 more defensive stops, we would have upset the #13 team in the country on the road" is what I would call pretty good progress with-in the course of a season. It's fun to look forward to the next BT game with the idea that it won't be a huge upset if we win. Been awhile since we've had that.
 

Chico Gopher said:
Considering what it looked like we had in November, which was pretty much, "I hope we can somehow squeeze out 5 BT wins", to the end of Feb., where we're gonna be disappointed if we aren't in a year -end tournament and looking back to last night and thinking, "If we could have just pulled out 3 more defensive stops, we would have upset the #13 team in the country on the road" is what I would call pretty good progress with-in the course of a season. It's fun to look forward to the next BT game with the idea that it won't be a huge upset if we win. Been awhile since we've had that.
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Great post.

I’m even excited about the NIT -

Great experience fo the team & coaches

Validates to everyone, including HS recruits and transfers, thst were a “legit” option

Allows the team to imagine what can be accomplished together next year - shared experiences build stronger relationships

All the extra practices
 

USAF said:
LOL.
Moral victory hall of fame!!
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Fly Boy to the rescue 🛟

All you’ve ever done your whole life, is -


Please, please, please 🙏 don’t ever stop being the unique gift you are - always gives me the giggles 🤭

Here you go big guy (but I imagine you’re 5’8”) 🤗🤗🤗
 

SHGopher said:
Both optimists and pessimists have a place here.
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Maybe, but not an equal place. As far as I'm concerned, many of the "pessimists" have set an unfair standard for this team and a fair number of them have moved that standard upward as the season has progressed.

At the beginning of the year, most of them thought this team could win no more than 4 conference games. As the team surpassed that amount, they didn't compliment the team for exceeding their own low standards. They simply raised the satisfactory standard and continued to gripe when the team fell short of the revised standards.

Last night's game is a perfect example. The team stayed neck and neck on the road for most of the game against one of the two best teams in the league (and a Top 20 team nationally) before they ran out of gas. The team that never hit 80 points last season scored 97 points against Illinois on the road but the "pessimists" could only complain that they gave up 105. What was very clear to me last night is that we had an obvious deficit in depth, maturity, athleticism, and physical strength against Illinois. Only one conference team won at Champaign this season. Of the remaining losing teams, only Michigan State and Nebraska came closer than 8 points.

At the beginning of the season, I thought this team's ceiling was an 18-13 regular season finish. Most of the rating indexes are predicting a 19-12 regular season finish so I will be very happy with that finish.
 
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