Arizona game: 11/7/2011

[vu84v2]

In defense of ESPN, the Drew family story is on the front page of the NCAA BB website.  You can't really say that they are not being supportive.

Agree with most of the comments about the game.  Three comments:  1.  It was nice to see the team stay in it through the end.  I can't stand moral victories, but the effort was there down the stretch. 2.  Team defense covering the guard coming around the screen out high in the second half was terrible.  There had to be three or four straight possessions where the Arizona guard was wide open after a simple move coming around the screen.  3.  Success for this team will be based on two things: (A) Broekhoff and Van Wijk staying healthy and (B) confident and consistent scoring emerging from Bogan, Harris, and Kenney - will need two of the three per game.  Bogan looked better in spells, which is encouraging.  Edwards looks lost if he feels he is not getting his points (and looks awful shooting the three) but at times seemed better on defense, hopefully Kenney will find his game as the season goes on as he usually does.

Bryce seemed to coach a good game overall - only negative was that he needed to call a timeout earlier in the second half when Arizona went up 10+ to try to change the momentum.  Of course, I can't say that would have helped.

[valpopal]

Rather than win or lose, this match is more important for the opportunity to test the team under real-game circumstances against a quality team in a hostile environment, as well as to add to their experience together, especially working the new guys into the system. In any case, we will start the season with a strong strength of schedule rating.

Latest Vegas odds have Arizona by 13. I'd love an upset; however, if we beat the odds and keep the margin to a dozen or less, I will be surprised and happy. In fact, I hope I'm wrong, but I think I might be a few points optimistic with my prediction of a 15-point margin:

Valpo    64
Arizona 79

By the standards I set above, I'm pleased with the evening. I even called the Valpo point total. There was a drought in the beginning of the second half, something we witnessed at times last year, but I think this was an overall positive experience for the team.

In addition, I keep reminding myself that this is just the start of a two-year project. We are in a rebuilding year after losing a majority of our scoring from last season, and next year this team (hopefully with the additions of Fernandez, Jakolis, Boggs, and Capobianco) should be experienced, much more impressive, and a lot deeper. 

[valpotx]

During that stretch in 2H, we simply didnt take care of the ball really well.  Lets face it, Arizona stepped up the intensity during that stretch and the officials kind of let things take care of themselves.  Our shot selection was pretty bad once we got down by 10 points.  Once Bryce got control of things later on, the offense looked better.

Kevin has got to eliminate those offensive fouls on ball screens.  You simply cannot make a movement after being set.  As the announcers stated, the ball handler must run off of that screen and await the timing.  This will easily be corrected.

Those offensive fouls on Kevin were not his fault, as our dribblers left way too early for him to set the screen as the announcers mentioned.  It is only natural to try and adjust if such a thing happens.

Overall, I am happy with this performance given what we lost, and playing against the team that we did.  Kevin is an absolute beast, and if he continues to play 25+ minutes without fouling this year, he will be very hard to contain.  Add in Ryan's 3-pt shooting getting back to what it was last season, and we will be able to run a nice 1-2 with them inside/out.  

Getting 5-8 minutes from Vucic every game will definitely help Edwards and Kevin.  He has definitely bulked up, gotten a little quicker, just needs to work on positioning himself better on defense to avoid dumb fouls.  It also would help if we don't dribble pass to him on the offensive end.  That is something Antti always struggled with too, in that it is very hard for a 7'0"+ person to reach very low for the ball under the basket.  

Bogan does look like a good shooter, and I believe his turnovers are due to finding his role on the team.  He is pretty quick, but initially seems indecisive when he should just let loose a shot.    

Buggs looks to have turned into a faster McPherson, minus the 3-pt shot.  I absolutely love his aggressiveness going to the basket, tenacious defense, and better FT stroke.  He is someone we needed to step up big this year and next, and it seems like the coaching staff got that through to him.  Also, you have to credit his work this past summer to get to this point.

As y'all are saying, Edwards looks a bit confused so far.  I know he will turn into a good player, but he is also trying to find his role.  It seems like he makes too quick of a decision to pass or shoot as soon as he touches the ball, never stopping to look around.  

Overall, I never felt like the game was going to get completely out of hand like I have in all of the years after I graduated when we play these better teams.  This team gives me the feel of those that I watched in person, in that they can go out and give someone a game, and if things fall in place against a good team, pull one out by a few points.  I may be eating these words later in the year, but even when it got to 15-20 pts late in the second half, I still had the confidence that we would get it back to single digits.  We had it within 10 pts for around 30 minutes of the game, and it isn't like they were playing their scrubs.  They have the #7 ranked recruiting class as FR who are also settling in, yes, but we have lost to other teams by a lot more when they were in similar situations.

I almost forgot to mention that I really like how Bryce handled his first game!  I really liked how we tried to work it into the post to allow Kevin an open basket on several occasions.  It seemed like that play worked 4-5 times for him, but it also resulted in a few rushed passes.  He seems to have a positive demeanor on the sidelines as well, which the players can feed off of. 

[lowposter]

I am not a big moral victory kinda guy, but that was a pretty good performance.  Particularly the playing hard to the end aspect.  With this being a young team, every opportunity to improve is critical and this team can build on their performance.

Gotta disagree with you on Kevin's fouls on the screens.  After one call, he MUST adjust his game.  There should be absolutely no movement on his behalf once he is set.  A player must adjust to how the game is being called.  Now, that being said, he was a beast down low.  As a former low poster, I was excited to see his tenacity, his footwork and skills.  This could be quite a breakout year for him.  Vujic has to get more involved.  It appears this coaching staff has as little confidence in him as last year's.  This would have been a good situation for him to play some minutes. 

Eric looks like he belongs out there in a big way.  He offered just enough offense and seemed to be the quickest player on the floor.  I agree with the assessments of Edwards...he must make contributions, but if it is all about his getting points, it will be a poor fit.  One of the biggest jobs of the coaching staff will be to get him on board the team bus.  I expected quite a bit more from Kenney.  He has been thru the ropes with this team and just didnt seem like he got in a rythem last night. 

[valpo95]

During that stretch in 2H, we simply didnt take care of the ball really well.  Lets face it, Arizona stepped up the intensity during that stretch and the officials kind of let things take care of themselves.  Our shot selection was pretty bad once we got down by 10 points.  Once Bryce got control of things later on, the offense looked better.

Kevin has got to eliminate those offensive fouls on ball screens.  You simply cannot make a movement after being set.  As the announcers stated, the ball handler must run off of that screen and await the timing.  This will easily be corrected.

I think to my mind, the larger issue is that they shot 5/20 from 3 point range, but they missed what seemed like 4-5 in a row in the first 10 minuts of the second half.  While some of that was good defense, they had some good looks at the basket but missed shots.  I would have liked to see how the game would have changed if they would have hit 2 of those, just to keep the game close and put more pressure on a good team.  Overall, I like the potential in this team, and they can get better.  It could be an interesting year in the HL.

[rink]

Holy crap, is this information from ESPN's game article correct?  "[The] Crusaders ... have lost 34 straight games against Top 25 teams since Drew beat Mississippi with a buzzer beater in the 1998 NCAA tournament."  That's pathetic.  I knew we had a bad string of failure against good teams, but I didn't know it was that awful.  What a joke.

Sad to say, Arizona did not look anything like a Top 20 team yesterday.  I thought we had a real chance to steal one from an overrated team and make a national headline for the first time in 13 years.  Sigh....

[vu72]

Holy crap, is this information from ESPN's game article correct?  "[The] Crusaders ... have lost 34 straight games against Top 25 teams since Drew beat Mississippi with a buzzer beater in the 1998 NCAA tournament."  That's pathetic.  I knew we had a bad string of failure against good teams, but I didn't know it was that awful.  What a joke.

Sad to say,  Arizona did not look anything like a Top 20 team yesterday.  I thought we had a real chance to steal one from an overrated team and make a national headline for the first time in 13 years.  Sigh....

So, what does a top 25 team look like?  Could it have anything to do with our defense? 
So good to have rink, cmack and setshot around to cool our enthusiasm!   

[valpotx]

I am not a big moral victory kinda guy, but that was a pretty good performance.  Particularly the playing hard to the end aspect.  With this being a young team, every opportunity to improve is critical and this team can build on their performance.

Gotta disagree with you on Kevin's fouls on the screens.  After one call, he MUST adjust his game.  There should be absolutely no movement on his behalf once he is set.  A player must adjust to how the game is being called.  Now, that being said, he was a beast down low.  As a former low poster, I was excited to see his tenacity, his footwork and skills.  This could be quite a breakout year for him.  Vujic has to get more involved.  It appears this coaching staff has as little confidence in him as last year's.  This would have been a good situation for him to play some minutes. 

Eric looks like he belongs out there in a big way.  He offered just enough offense and seemed to be the quickest player on the floor.  I agree with the assessments of Edwards...he must make contributions, but if it is all about his getting points, it will be a poor fit.  One of the biggest jobs of the coaching staff will be to get him on board the team bus.  I expected quite a bit more from Kenney.  He has been thru the ropes with this team and just didnt seem like he got in a rythem last night. 

I can understand that he needs to adjust his game if he is set and then moving, but the point is that the dribblers had already started moving before he even got within a few feet of them.  He was never able to be 'set' with them jetting towards the basket long before he gets there.  This is a timing thing that needs to be worked on in practice, as you see good teams waiting for the screen to be set before picking a direction to move off of the pick.

[okinawatyphoon]

Losing 34 straight games against top 25 teams is pretty disheartening, but if you count Butler (and was Washington ranked the season we beat them??), it doesn't look quite so bad. But yes, it would definitely be nice to upset a team once in a while... 

[valpotx]

No, Washington was not ranked.  If they were ranked that year, they would have been in the NCAA tournament rather than the CBI we played them in. 

[EddieCabot]

Losing 34 straight games against top 25 teams is pretty disheartening, but if you count Butler (and was Washington ranked the season we beat them??), it doesn't look quite so bad. But yes, it would definitely be nice to upset a team once in a while... 

Last win over a ranked team was 1998 ... that means Butler wasn't ranked last season when you beat them.

I thought it was a very good effort last night and the team did show a lot of heart in not giving up when the deficit got to 20.  It seems like a meaningless thing, but when Bryce is talking to a HS recruit, it's clearly a positive to be able to talk about a 9 point loss vs. a 20 or 25 point loss.

[vuweathernerd]

i think what typhoon was trying to say is that they were ranked at one point during that season, both for butler and for washington. we're all fully aware that they weren't ranked when we played them, but his point is that we have beaten teams that were fully capable of being ranked.

[vu84v2]

I believe that Valpo's win in the first game of the 1998-1999 seaason against South Carolina was the last time Valpo beat a ranked team.  If memory serves me, they were ranked #25. 

Of course that is one game after the 1998 NCAA tourament.

[swiftmutiny]

Losing 34 straight games against top 25 teams is pretty disheartening, but if you count Butler (and was Washington ranked the season we beat them??), it doesn't look quite so bad. But yes, it would definitely be nice to upset a team once in a while... 

I thought it was a very good effort last night and the team did show a lot of heart in not giving up when the deficit got to 20.  It seems like a meaningless thing, but when Bryce is talking to a HS recruit, it's clearly a positive to be able to talk about a 9 point loss vs. a 20 or 25 point loss.

I agree. They easily could have gotten into a defeatist mindset after being down by more than 15, but they gathered themselves together and fought back in the last few minutes to at least make it close. It's a good gauge of our team's attitude, and I like it.

[sectionee]

Holy crap, is this information from ESPN's game article correct?  "[The] Crusaders ... have lost 34 straight games against Top 25 teams since Drew beat Mississippi with a buzzer beater in the 1998 NCAA tournament."  That's pathetic.  I knew we had a bad string of failure against good teams, but I didn't know it was that awful.  What a joke.

Sad to say, Arizona did not look anything like a Top 20 team yesterday.  I thought we had a real chance to steal one from an overrated team and make a national headline for the first time in 13 years.  Sigh....

Are you going to post this same comment in a couple of weeks when we get knocked around by Ohio State?  It isn't like the team is playing the #25 or #24 ranked team in the country.  A lot of our ranked opponents seem to fall in the top 10.

[historyman]

So good to have rink, cmack and setshot around to cool our enthusiasm!  

I think you sometimes fail to see without these "enthusiasm coolers," for lack of a better phrase, this board is so one-sided. The board needs these guys to provide some balance. We all know this team is not just a joyful ride every year to the Horizon League title and a trip to the NCAA tournament. Realism is necessary when discussing this team. I'll grant you cmack, and especially setshot and rink can go terribly overboard with the criticism. There must be some posters that challenge all the eternal optimism. Yes, its an exageration of the reality but I believe it's simply a balance to the brown and gold colored thinking of many posters.

[historyman]

I just rewatched the first 10 minutes of the 2nd half of the Arizona game from last night.

Here are Valpo's numbers from that 10 minute stretch:

Turnovers: 6

Missed shots: Van Wijk=3 FG (fouled twice), 1 FT, (2 offensive fouls)
                    Broekhoff=2 treys
                    Buggs=2 FG
                    Bogan=1 trey
                    Kenney=1 trey
                    Edwards=1 FG
                   
Made shots:   Van Wijk=3 FT, 1 FG
                    Kenney=1 FG

Time Outs:    Arizona 1 at 15:32
                   Valpo 1 at 13:12
                   Media 1 at 11:24

At the 10:00 mark of the 2nd half the score was Arizona 52, Valpo 37
Halftime score was Arizona 32, Valpo 30

[wh]

I think you sometimes fail to see without these "enthusiasm coolers," for lack of a better phrase, this board is so one-sided. The board needs these guys to provide some balance.

Isn't suggesting that negativity adds positivity a contradictio in terminis?   

[valporun]

history, are you certain the timeout at 15:32 was called by Arizona, or was it the 16 min. media timeout? In the first ten minutes, if you're as accurate, then there would have been 4 timeouts, two team and two media.

[historyman]

history, are you certain the timeout at 15:32 was called by Arizona, or was it the 16 min. media timeout? In the first ten minutes, if you're as accurate, then there would have been 4 timeouts, two team and two media.

Yes, I'm sure Arizona called a time out at 15:32. When rewatching the DVR recording I noticed that after Broekhoff lost a pass from Bogan out of bounds at the 16:12 mark the refs did not call a media time out. It wasn't until Arizona called a time out at 15:32 that the first time out was called. I believe they called time out because the Wildcat player was nearly tied up and Arizona was afraid of losing possession of the ball. All I can tell you is those are the timeouts on the DVR recording. I was surprised also that another media time out was not called before the 10:00 mark.

[vu72]

Losing 34 straight games against top 25 teams is pretty disheartening, but if you count Butler (and was Washington ranked the season we beat them??), it doesn't look quite so bad. But yes, it would definitely be nice to upset a team once in a while... 

I think we all need to take a look at reality for a moment.  When a poster says losing 34 straight is a "joke", what did he expect?
Here is reality: Sagarin has had his rankings published for 13 years, going back to 98-99, just after out Sweet 16 run.  since then the highest we have been ranked at the end of a season is 62 in 01-02.  The next highest year was 02-03 witha 93 ranking and then last year  and 07-08 when we finished ranked 94. So, over 13 years we've been in the top 100 5 times.
Now, let's think about the 34 games.  How many were at the ARC?  3 or 4? How many were on a nuetral floor? 4 or 5?  The odds of a top 90 team beating a top 25 team on their floor are astronomical.  Still, we almost did it on several occasions.  So, is it a "joke" or pathetic?  I don't think so. 

[wh]

Losing 34 straight games against top 25 teams is pretty disheartening, but if you count Butler (and was Washington ranked the season we beat them??), it doesn't look quite so bad. But yes, it would definitely be nice to upset a team once in a while... 

I think we all need to take a look at reality for a moment.  When a poster says losing 34 straight is a "joke", what did he expect?
Here is reality: Sagarin has had his rankings published for 13 years, going back to 98-99, just after out Sweet 16 run.  since then the highest we have been ranked at the end of a season is 62 in 01-02.  The next highest year was 02-03 witha 93 ranking and then last year  and 07-08 when we finished ranked 94. So, over 13 years we've been in the top 100 5 times.
Now, let's think about the 34 games.  How many were at the ARC?  3 or 4? How many were on a nuetral floor? 4 or 5?  The odds of a top 90 team beating a top 25 team on their floor are astronomical.  Still, we almost did it on several occasions.  So, is it a "joke" or pathetic?  I don't think so. 

All good points, plus as sectionee mentioned earlier many of those games were against not only Top 25 but Top 10 teams.  Homer had a propensity for scheduling perennial powerhouses, not just teams that happened to be ranked at the time.  I'm sure everyone recalls that we played the No.1 ranked team in the country five consecutive years.   

[vu72]

So good to have rink, cmack and setshot around to cool our enthusiasm!  

I think you sometimes fail to see without these "enthusiasm coolers," for lack of a better phrase, this board is so one-sided. The board needs these guys to provide some balance. We all know this team is not just a joyful ride every year to the Horizon League title and a trip to the NCAA tournament. Realism is necessary when discussing this team. I'll grant you cmack, and especially setshot and rink can go terribly overboard with the criticism. There must be some posters that challenge all the eternal optimism. Yes, its an exageration of the reality but I believe it's simply a balance to the brown and gold colored thinking of many posters.

I'm all for "realism" and "balance".  Even I have been critical when a clear lack of effort is obvious.  But, people who post things like this:
I predict the usual against major conference opponent.  Valpo falls behind big from the opening tip, then pats themselves on the back for keeping within 20 in the second half.

Are obviously just trying to throw a wet blanket on the start of a new season. There is no "balance" to statements like this.  I reviewed the predictions for the AZ game and found estimates from 5(2) to a 27 point loss.  Are those who predict such losses being "realistic" or just plain negative for the sake of being grumpy??  

[lowposter]

Hats off to Purdue University for making the trip up US421. 

Playing tough opponents is good for VU.  The mental makeup of the teams has been strong enough to take a pounding.  Lets face it, college basketball players have been playing against all levels of competition for years.  As 10 year olds, most of them were heads above (literally and figuratively) the kids at the YMCA league.  As they moved into HS and serious AAU, they knew where they stood and used tough competition to measure their progress and their deficiencies.

Games against teams like Ohio State (and to a degree Arizona) point out the weaknesses, normally raw athletic abilities and serve as a lesson to the players that they CANNOT count on their athletic abilities to win these games.  Look at the first 10 minutes of 2H against Arizona.  That was worth the trip.  The one on one tendancies, quick 3 point shots on the first pass, the in traffic passes will not work against these types of teams, particularly after adjustments are made.  To Bryce's credit, he got the team back on track in the last 10 minutes to finish strong.  Let's see who learned from that lesson.  No moral victory here, but a good lesson.  More of the same vs THE Ohio State University soon.  Butler has been able to combine pretty good athletes, with the ability to play within a system that causes the big boys problems.  They are the model at this time.

[historyman]

I'm all for "realism" and "balance".  Even I have been critical when a clear lack of effort is obvious.  But, people who post things like this:
I predict the usual against major conference opponent.  Valpo falls behind big from the opening tip, then pats themselves on the back for keeping within 20 in the second half.

Are obviously just trying to throw a wet blanket on the start of a new season. There is no "balance" to statements like this.  I reviewed the predictions for the AZ game and found estimates from 5(2) to a 27 point loss.  Are those who predict such losses being "realistic" or just plain negative for the sake of being grumpy??  

I think maybe the way the statement was worded was somewhat "grumpy." But has not the past record of Valpo proven that in games against "major" top ranked teams they have sometimes fallen behind big and then coasted to a 20 to 30 point loss? Sometimes even a 40 point loss. To me the prediction that Valpo would lose to Arizona and keep the score within 20 in the second half could be interpreted as realistic. Valpo had not proven that much against Hillsdale or Augustana, except what a great player Kevin Van Wijk is when his back is healthy, what an outstanding shooter and scorer Ryan Broekhoff is and that Erik Buggs had improved his FT shooting and was just as quick as last year on defense. Nothing has been proven about whether the bench will help pick up some of the scoring slack which left with the departures of Wood and Johnson. Past performance of the Crusaders said this losing to Arizona by around 20 could have happened. It wouldn't have surprised me. I was very pleased to see that Valpo hung with Arizona through the first half and was able to take a lead a few times until their shooting went cold in the second half and Arizona toughened up their defense or fouled Kevin 2 or more times. I was also very happy to see Valpo brought back the confidence they had in the first half and out scored Arizona in the 2nd part of the 2nd half to finish the game 9 points down instead of 17 or 18 down or even possibly more than 20 points down. Yes, that statement was worded in a "grumpy" way due to frustration with past performance against top ranked teams but I would not call it unrealistic. How easily Valpo could have fallen to a 20 plus point loss if Bryce had not rallied them and the shooting stayed cold. This prediction could have easily happened. Certainly not the proper way to state a prediction but certainly not unrealistic.