Jazz Guard Sexton Nearly Won Game With Only Three Players

Donate To GopherHole
BleedGopher

BleedGopher

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 11, 2008
Messages
62,015
Reaction score
18,238
Points
113
per Ben:

Just one day after beating BYU at the Barclays Center Classic, 25th-ranked Alabama hosted 14th-ranked Minnesota with a chance to be named the in-season tournament championship.

However, a brawl nearly broke out between Alabama’s Dazon Ingram and Minnesota’s DuPree McBrayer.

McBrayer was assessed a technical foul for his role in the scuffle, while Crimson Tide players Alex Reese, Donta Hall, Lawson Schaffer, Herb Jones, Landon Fuller, Daniel Giddens, and Avery Johnson Jr. were all ejected for leaving the Alabama bench during the incident.

That left Alabama with only five healthy players over the final 13:39 of the second half, trailing Minnesota 57-50.

Two minutes later Ingram picked up his fifth personal foul and was disqualified from the game leaving Alabama with just four players with 11:37 left on the game clock now trailing 61-52.

That’s when disaster truly struck for the Crimson Tide.

Less than a minute later Alabama’s starting shooting guard John Petty suffered an ankle injury and had to be removed from the game, trimming the roster to just three available players with 10:50 left to play and facing an 11 point deficit.

While Minnesota should have coasted to an easy victory playing against the shorthanded Crimson Tide roster, Sexton took over the final 10 minutes of the game and etched his name in the college sports history books.

Despite facing double and triple teams by Minnesota defense, Sexton converted three layups, three three-point shots, and two free-throws over the final 10 minutes of the game trimming the Golden Gophers lead to just three points with 1:39 left to play.

“Collin Sexton could beat a single team just one guy by himself,” Minnesota head coach Richard Pitino said. “He’s that good.”

kslsports.com

Jazz Guard Sexton Nearly Won Game With Only Three Players

Looking back to when new Utah Jazz guard Collin Sexton became a household name by nearly winning a game with only three players in college.
kslsports.com kslsports.com

Go Gophers!!
 



Spottedmuskie said:
Having a hard time remembering those double and triple teams, our guys were just standing there
Click to expand...

Right. And we just gave up on offense too. It's like they were ashamed to take advantage of the 5 on 3. Throw it around the perimeter and chuck up a 20 footer as the shot clock expired. Pitino was the worst bench coach in the Country.
 

WAGopher said:
That’s the game that made me realize Pitino was not a coach that could adapt to changes during a game. He had no clue on how to play 5 on 3.

And he never played or watched much hockey.
Click to expand...
Yeah, he looked absolutely lost in this game.
 


This game didn’t really bother me. We won after all. I believe Alabama never had the ball with a chance to tie or take the lead after it was 5 on 3. Players probably lost their competitive edge after it became such an incredibly unfair fight. I said it in a previous thread, but Minnesota was like the muscular 30 year old man at the bar trying to prevent an angry drunk 21 year old woman from hurting herself, trying to restrain her, not beat the crap out of her and knock her out cold, and in the process she lands a couple blows. I disagree that giving 100% and trying to win by 40 against 3 players who are being run ragged, are on the floor for the entire rest of the game because it’s the only option, and are literally sipping oxygen during timeouts, is the obviously correct decision, or that that should be a very easy thing for any player to do. They probably could have kept a somewhat more comfortable lead, but they did get out of there with a win, which was all they were trying to do, and all they needed to do.
 


Funny, while I agree with the Pitino criticism from the game, they looked like he told them not to run it up.

I remember thinking Sexton was vastly overrated before the 5-3 situation. He looked like he had talent and zero fundamental basketball skills.

Nate Mason only played 23 mins that game (20 pts).

Isaiah Washington played 26, really green minutes. I recall Michael Hurt was in most of that time too. At that same time, we clearly weren’t trying to run up the score.

Sexton was taking every depsperate shot he could. Some went in. This was almost the entire second half, and I never even considered the game in doubt. Was more annoyed by the ESPN talking Colin Sexton up, given how obviously lopsided effort.

It was more pathetic basketball analysis than anything else.

.
 

WAGopher said:
That’s the game that made me realize Pitino was not a coach that could adapt to changes during a game. He had no clue on how to play 5 on 3.

And he never played or watched much hockey.
Click to expand...
I think he was trying to do the right thing and not run it up but it really backfired. They should have gotten the ball down low on every possession. Instead the settled for jump shots.
 




GophersInIowa said:
I think he was trying to do the right thing and not run it up but it really backfired. They should have gotten the ball down low on every possession. Instead the settled for jump shots.
Click to expand...
It was a weird tension/atmosphere after the fight. He just wanted that game over without any more fights/suspensions. It's hard to blame him IMO.
 

GophersInIowa said:
I think he was trying to do the right thing and not run it up but it really backfired. They should have gotten the ball down low on every possession. Instead the settled for jump shots.
Click to expand...
I think there is some truth here. However, I don’t recall the Gophers purposely running time off the clock as you would expect if they were trying to not run the score up. He definitely could have had a better strategy.
 

WAGopher said:
I think there is some truth here. However, I don’t recall the Gophers purposely running time off the clock as you would expect if they were trying to not run the score up. He definitely could have had a better strategy.
Click to expand...
Not every possession but there were some where they shot the ball with under 10 on the shot clock.

www.espn.com

Minnesota 89-84 Alabama (Nov 25, 2017) Play-by-Play - ESPN

Play-by-play action for the Minnesota Golden Gophers vs. Alabama Crimson Tide NCAAM game from November 25, 2017 on ESPN.
www.espn.com www.espn.com
 





Pretty sure Nate Mason was also ejected in that game. He had one of the coldest crossover threes in Sexton's face that I've ever seen. Made the move, looked at Sexton who damn near fell out of his shoes, looked back at the basket and then drained it. Those two were chirping all game. And I don't remember any triple or double teams. I thought we lazily played zone for some of it and you could even see Pitino telling everyone to back off from the bench.
 
Last edited:

Nate Mason ABSOLUTELY SCHOOLED Colin Sexton. Embarrassed him. And the Gophers were blowing-out #25 Alabama by 25 points in front of a raucous courtside crowd at the Barclays in NY.

The 2nd half starts with Mason drilling 2 3-pointers in a span of 20 seconds, right in Sexton's face...the 2nd of which was after a crossover that had Sexton FLAT ON HIS *SS. And Mason let him know about it.

That was the first technical & ejection and was what started it all.

The media LIES about what really happened.
 

I had to look up this specific play and if this is it, him looking at sexton was absolute gold.
 

BTChamp said:
I had to look up this specific play and if this is it, him looking at sexton was absolute gold.
Click to expand...
I was there and you can see me stand up when he drains it and here is the pic from the receving the hardware -

1662823935180.png
 



MNJay said:
Nate Mason ABSOLUTELY SCHOOLED Colin Sexton. Embarrassed him. And the Gophers were blowing-out #25 Alabama by 25 points in front of a raucous courtside crowd at the Barclays in NY.

The 2nd half starts with Mason drilling 2 3-pointers in a span of 20 seconds, right in Sexton's face...the 2nd of which was after a crossover that had Sexton FLAT ON HIS *SS. And Mason let him know about it.

That was the first technical & ejection and was what started it all.

The media LIES about what really happened.
Click to expand...
I was at the game on the baseline and saw the whole thing and Sexton scored 40 and was named all-tourney team - all the MN fans got up and gave him a standing O when he got his plaque - he was that good.

As raucous as 300 attendees can be - this includes the players/coaches/cheerleaders; NYC isn't a great college sports town unless it's the Big East (lots of grads) or ND (saw them play first football game at new Yankee Stadium vs. Army).

I had the experience of the Jelly contingent encouraging Isaiah because it was “his house.” Sexton must have thought they were playing it Atlanta – Nate and he knew each other from both being from the greater Atlanta area and he needed to school the youngster. Sexton was by far the best athlete on the floor and you could see that he was a definitive NBA level player. Nate played well and that crossover was legendary.

Dupree struggled badly and some wise ass Bama fans told him to enjoy his future CBA career, Pree told them to Suck It and the ref overheard the whole exchange and told the Bama fans to shut up or he’d run them – so this was a chippy affair. Richard Coffey was standing ten feet behind me, so I knew where I’d scurry to if things spilled over into the stands.

Wildest basketball game to see in person
 

Gopher_In_NYC said:
I was at the game on the baseline and saw the whole thing and Sexton scored 40 and was named all-tourney team - all the MN fans got up and gave him a standing O when he got his plaque - he was that good.

As raucous as 300 attendees can be - this includes the players/coaches/cheerleaders; NYC isn't a great college sports town unless it's the Big East (lots of grads) or ND (saw them play first football game at new Yankee Stadium vs. Army).

I had the experience of the Jelly contingent encouraging Isaiah because it was “his house.” Sexton must have thought they were playing it Atlanta – Nate and he knew each other from both being from the greater Atlanta area and he needed to school the youngster. Sexton was by far the best athlete on the floor and you could see that he was a definitive NBA level player. Nate played well and that crossover was legendary.

Dupree struggled badly and some wise ass Bama fans told him to enjoy his future CBA career, Pree told them to Suck It and the ref overheard the whole exchange and told the Bama fans to shut up or he’d run them – so this was a chippy affair. Richard Coffey was standing ten feet behind me, so I knew where I’d scurry to if things spilled over into the stands.

Wildest basketball game to see in person
Click to expand...
I watched the entire game on an internet site that was showing it.

I said the crowd was raucous because it seemed like they were really close to the action. Like yes, yelling back & forth with the players.

Yeah, Sexton deserved a round of applause. But he was far-from the best player on the floor until the game turned into a total joke. During the 5-on-3, it was clear that we didn't want to be there anymore. We definitely stopped trying hard...we just wanted the clock to run out. Sexton hit several circus shots...but Alabama had no chance to win.
 

Such a weird situation. Something that a coach never has to gameplan for. So can we really blame Pitino for seeing three guys out on the court and saying: "We've practiced against five guys.....even four once or twice. But three? How do we beat this?"

In all seriousness....I'm guessing that he couldn't imagine Bama coming back from that and didn't care to run up the score against three guys. But the second Sexton pulled them back to within single digits.....a good coach would have stomped out the threat. One of many red flags that Pitino didn't know what he was doing.
 

I remember Stephen Curry on Davidson sat in the corner double teamed, opposing team held him to 0 points. Davidson won the game playing 4 on 3 while Curry and two rivals had tea in the corner
 

stocker08 said:
Such a weird situation. Something that a coach never has to gameplan for. So can we really blame Pitino for seeing three guys out on the court and saying: "We've practiced against five guys.....even four once or twice. But three? How do we beat this?"

In all seriousness....I'm guessing that he couldn't imagine Bama coming back from that and didn't care to run up the score against three guys. But the second Sexton pulled them back to within single digits.....a good coach would have stomped out the threat. One of many red flags that Pitino didn't know what he was doing.
Click to expand...
They did pretty much stomp it out, they just waited about 3 possessions too long so it became a story.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.



Top Bottom