The Sky is Falling!!!!

[JasonBourne21]

No reason to fret guys and girls!!! If you were to tell me that the Gophers would make one three pointer, shoot less than 40% and commit 19 turnovers and still have a chance to win at the end, I would say you're crazy!

We played one of our worst games of the year and still had a chance to beat a top 25 team on the road. I'm not convinced that it's time to throw Al Nolan under the bus, because of a few poor outings or that Blake will never see any PT next year. We have witnessed some pretty ugly ball over the span of the last few weeks, but that's what happens when you have a young inexperienced team.

The Big Ten is not the Horizon league, and it's a very physical meet grinder conference, even more so for a YOUNG team. Let's see how the remainder of the regular season/ Big Ten Tourney turns out, before we abandon the whole program. I don't know about you, but I'm truly excited for the future of the program. Sorry for the rant, but it could be much worse... On Gophers!!!!

 

[XMan]

Correct. Nice post.

 

[Schnoodler]

The sky did get a little lower. We let one slip away. but as a nod to your point, no one expected this game and the one or two victories we need are expected from the remaining two home games. So nothing was really lost tonight from our expectations. It's just that we could have gained. but spilled milk and such, we look forward.

 

[book]

But our shooting is out right terrible. Devoe had at least two wide open 3's, Blake had shots, and we not only miss but throw up airballs, etc. Tubby was really steamed at his guard play and the turnovers! We rebounded and played defense but we need help at the guard position. if Westbrook doesn't score we are in trouble!

 

[Gold Vision]

The sky did get a little lower. We let one slip away. but as a nod to your point, no one expected this game and the one or two victories we need are expected from the remaining two home games. So nothing was really lost tonight from our expectations. It's just that we could have gained. but spilled milk and such, we look forward.

Well put, it was disappointing the way they lost more than anything. To dominate the paint like that and be ice cold at the perimeter and turn the ball over just made it a tough way to lose. Move on and beat Bucky, it is now the biggest game of the year.

 

[cncmin]

Move on and beat Bucky, it is now the biggest game of the year.

I very much disagree. It would be great to beat Wisconsin, but we're not competing against them for the 7th and possibly final Big Ten slot into the tourney. They're in. Beating both Wisconsin and Michigan would certainly clinch a spot, but the Michigan game is more important, as one of Minnesota, PSU, and Michigan likely won't make the tourney. Two losses to Michigan plus the fact that they beat Duke and UCLA and now Purdue too will have them jump us if we don't beat them. If we beat Wisconsin and lose to Michigan, I believe that we'll need to win at least 2 in the Big Ten tourney to have a chance to re-jump Mich. or PSU. In other words, since that likely won't happen, Mich is the biggest game of the year.

By the way, a win at PSU in a game that was very winnable (they only had 3 scorers and we failed to defend 2 of those 3 = FTL), and we wouldn't be in this mess. If we end up not making the tourney this year, just hope that the players don't lose all of their fragile confidence for next year. They'll be physically better next year but will only go as far as their heads will take them. As shown this year, their heads got lost somewhere along the way, way too little confidence.

Also, White and Williams will contribute next year, but it's just as, probably more important that Mbakwe starts dominating at the PF position. We're really hurting there in the half court set - I love DJ but he won't win a game with his half court offense.

 

[SelectionSunday]

Badgers

I respectfully disagree. Though in good position because of their reamining schedule, the Badgers are not a shoo-in for the tournament by any stretch. There also will be a lot of pressure on the Badgers to win on Wednesday (which isn't a good thing because the odds of a veteran Bucky handing us another game like they did last time are very small; Gophers will have to earn it by playing well).

At this point we have more good wins than the Badgers do and we beat them head to head. If we get the sweep in my opinion we'd clearly be ahead of them in terms of a Big 10 "pecking order" heading into Indy. It's definitely arguable which game is bigger, but I'd go with Wisconsin. It would be another for-sure top-50 win (the Gophers 5th), while Michigan (currently #46) might not be by the time we play them again.

 

[bga1]

Agreed SS, beating the Badgers is the bigger game. The sad part is that right now, if we take off our Gopher hats, this team is playing the worst ball of any of the Big Ten teams on the bubble. And it's not close. I have to believe the selection committee is aware of this......

Let's hope the team wide jump shooting funk ends aginst Wisky. A quick look at the shot chart this morning and it appears that we made 3 of 23 shots outside of 5 feet!! The guards are just in tatters: Westbrook, Nolen and Joseph combined for 4 points, 1 assist and 9 turnovers. If they come out of it we'll be okay.

 

[Monty519]

You know what the difference is between the Gophers earlier in the season and the current Gophers? Not a whole lot except for more road games. This team has struggled on the road for most of the year, but since we played 12 of our first 14 games at home, it kind of hid those issues. Playing on the road in the Big Ten is not easy, and that is especially true when you're talking about a young squad. Look at our road slate:

Colorado State - Struggled to win 72-71 after trailing a ton of that game
Iowa - Struggled to win 52-49
Wisconsin - Struggled for much of the game before brilliant comeback to win 78-74 OT
Northwestern - Led at half, but fall apart in 2nd half to lose 74-65
Indiana - Struggled to win 67-63
Michigan State - Worst loss in Tubby era 76-47
Ohio State - Decent effort, lose 64-58
Penn State - Come up short again 68-63
Michigan - Defense struggles in losing 74-62
Illinois - Good effort, but offense fails in 2nd half, lose 52-41

Not in one single true road game this season have we really looked good. The one quality road win we have is the Wisconsin win, and we all know comebacks like that just don't happen very often. THAT is why we are struggling right now, because we just played a stretch of 5 of 7 on the road. Add a loss of confidence to already not being a good road team and that's a recipe for losing 5 straight road games.

Notice, we're still winning home games. Purdue and Michigan State are still our only home losses all year, where we are 15-2. That fact gives me a little confidence in trying to get a couple wins to end the year and maybe sneak into the tourney.