***OFFICIAL WESTERN MICHIGAN AT MINNESOTA SEASON OPENING IN-GAME THREAD!!!***

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Did Cooper injure his ankle or something? Seems to be limping...
 






RogueGopher said:
EVERYONE NEEDS TO CALM DOWN AND STEP AWAY FROM THE EDGE!
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For anyone who wasn't able to watch, the Gophers were up 7 with about 10 seconds left. Western Michigan hit 2 quick 3's and Minnesota missed 4 of 4 free throw attempts. The last 3 was a buzzer beater to lose by 1 instead of by 4. It would have been nice to win more comfortably, but we were at no great risk of losing. Other than that, Minnesota maintained a lead of probably 6 to 10 points for most of the second half by my estimation. I'm also just going to hope our terrible free throw shooting tonight is a one off performance.
 

Cayman said:
For anyone who wasn't able to watch, the Gophers were up 7 with about 10 seconds left. Western Michigan hit 2 quick 3's and Minnesota missed 4 of 4 free throw attempts. The last 3 was a buzzer beater to lose by 1 instead of by 4. It would have been nice to win more comfortably, but we were at no great risk of losing. Other than that, Minnesota maintained a lead of probably 6 to 10 points for most of the second half by my estimation. I'm also just going to hope our terrible free throw shooting tonight is a one off performance.
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Had a few chances to blow them out but instead they missed free throws or turned it over.
 

Johnnyboy18 said:
Had a few chances to blow them out but instead they missed free throws or turned it over.
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so basically, apart from bad basketball, this team could have blown out WMU

decent 3 pt shooting. any other positives?
 


#14 TCU were dominated most of the game at home by Arkansas-Pine Bluff until hitting a clutch 3 pointer with 51 seconds to escape with a 1 pt victory. APB had 16 point lead with a few minutes left in half and go into halftime up by 11.
 

Anyone who knows basketball can’t lie to themselves and truly think this team will do anything this season. I don’t even think the NIT is possible. They lack shooting, defensive presence, basketball IQ, and rebounding. I do think Garcia and Battle will help with floor spacing. But it’s going to be tough to compete when you only have 2.5 legit Big Ten players on the roster (Garcia/Battle/Cooper). Cooper is solid but a bench guy on most Big Ten rosters.
 

#1 UNC struggles to find the groove in first game of season at home vs. UNC-Wilmington. Wins 69-56.
 

GopherBB12 said:
Anyone who knows basketball can’t lie to themselves and truly think this team will do anything this season. I don’t even think the NIT is possible. They lack shooting, defensive presence, basketball IQ, and rebounding. I do think Garcia and Battle will help with floor spacing. But it’s going to be tough to compete when you only have 2.5 legit Big Ten players on the roster (Garcia/Battle/Cooper). Cooper is solid but a bench guy on most Big Ten rosters.
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They 'competed' with only 2 'legit' players last year. They certainly miss shooters in Battle and Carrington. Hard to win without 2 of your top 6 players on the roster. Payne had a hard time getting going today. I am sure that he and the other frosh will have up and down games but we'll hope to see improvement as they get acclimated to college ball.
 

For everyone freaking out - replace 35 minutes throughout the game of ramberg/henley/samuels with 35 minutes of Battle. That game looks completely differently.

Win is a win is a win. Lots to improve, but saw some stuff I liked.

Cooper and Garcia are legit above-average big 10 players. Freshmen looked like talented freshmen, both in the good ways and the bad ways.

On to the next!
 

GopherBB12 said:
Anyone who knows basketball can’t lie to themselves and truly think this team will do anything this season. I don’t even think the NIT is possible. They lack shooting, defensive presence, basketball IQ, and rebounding. I do think Garcia and Battle will help with floor spacing. But it’s going to be tough to compete when you only have 2.5 legit Big Ten players on the roster (Garcia/Battle/Cooper). Cooper is solid but a bench guy on most Big Ten rosters.
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I think cooper looked great tonight. As a pass first point guard, to get 10 assists in a college game is always impressive, and adding in 2 more shooters will only help him.
 

Gold Vision said:
Nice run to end the half. Finally some movement and penetration. Looks like we have plenty of comfortable shooters too.

Cooper is a nice guard, but we’re going to struggle mightily with any team with speed. With all this length, they need to figure out how to create more turnovers and grab rebounds though.
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Good observation. Our guards are not quick at all for this level. Henley might be the quickest kid we have, I like his future a lot.
 

ecoperson said:
They 'competed' with only 2 'legit' players last year. They certainly miss shooters in Battle and Carrington. Hard to win without 2 of your top 6 players on the roster. Payne had a hard time getting going today. I am sure that he and the other frosh will have up and down games but we'll hope to see improvement as they get acclimated to college ball.
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skyman31 said:
I think cooper looked great tonight. As a pass first point guard, to get 10 assists in a college game is always impressive, and adding in 2 more shooters will only help him.
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There’s a pretty significant drop in basketball IQ after Battle/Cooper/Garcia. Last years team made up for the lack of talent with hard nose defense and IQ. I sure hope I’m wrong and we figure it out come Big Ten play. But we are at least two seasons out from seeing the Ben’s vision. Which I’m pretty pumped for!
 

My eyes hurt!! Sure hope Carrington is good enuf to play 30+ quality minutes. This team has lots of issues. Battle will definitely help but looks like he and Garcia will have to carry a full load
 

GopherBB12 said:
There’s a pretty significant drop in basketball IQ after Battle/Cooper/Garcia. Last years team made up for the lack of talent with hard nose defense and IQ. I sure hope I’m wrong and we figure it out come Big Ten play. But we are at least two seasons out from seeing the Ben’s vision. Which I’m pretty pumped for!
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There's also a VERY significant drop in college basketball experience after Battle/Cooper/Garcia. There were three freshman who were playing in their first ever collegiate game, and Thompson is a sophomore who really didn't play much last year. Off of a 1 game sample size, I'd be really hesitant to label those guys "low basketball IQ".
 

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Box score doesn't have minutes...didn't see game...hope Henley, Ola-Joseph and Payne are getting big minutes.
Serious question: they got 18 more shots than we did, we out rebounded them by two. We had 6 more TO's than they did...that gets it to -4 Gophers....where the 18 shots (or 14) coming from? Steals are reflected in turnovers. We shot 19 more free throws. We shot a better FG%...add it all up ... we win by 1. What am I missing?
 


GopherBB12 said:
Anyone who knows basketball can’t lie to themselves and truly think this team will do anything this season. I don’t even think the NIT is possible. They lack shooting, defensive presence, basketball IQ, and rebounding. I do think Garcia and Battle will help with floor spacing. But it’s going to be tough to compete when you only have 2.5 legit Big Ten players on the roster (Garcia/Battle/Cooper). Cooper is solid but a bench guy on most Big Ten rosters.
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They are still missing a couple of key guys. The path of this team will be the opposite of last year. Last year you had all old guys who played as well in the first 2-3 weeks as they did all year. They ran the offense and played sound defense. This team has far and away more talent and should get better as the year goes on. The guard play concerns me.

Henley, Carrington and Payne need to grow up fast if we are going to do anything. Battle, Garcia and Cooper are going to be tough - they can shoot.

I feel like the top 8 by mid season are:

Cooper, Carrington, Battle, Garcia and Payne with Henley, Joseph and Thompson
Maybe Ramberg gets some time because of his incredible hustle
 

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