1/15/12: Cleveland St. @ Valpo Game Thread

[cmack]

I like seeing Kenney coming off the bench. I don't see Bogan or Boggs being better players necessarily.  I think Kenney brings an energy to the court.  He makes terrible decisions at times, but we need to have someone coming off the bench to keep the intensity up.  Matt can do that.  Ben is not going to do that.

[KL31NY]

I like seeing Kenney coming off the bench. I don't see Bogan or Boggs being better players necessarily.  I think Kenney brings an energy to the court.  He makes terrible decisions at times, but we need to have someone coming off the bench to keep the intensity up.  Matt can do that.  Ben is not going to do that.

Fair point. It was the same on the women's team when Mallory Ladd was around. Definitely a good enough player to earn a start, but she had good, consistent game coming in off the bench.

I've liked Kenney a lot. He seems like a guy who can be overlooked because he is a regular sub, but he always seems to come up with the big plays on each end of the floor when needed.

[StlVUFan]

Good solid play by KVW with 8 minutes to go and 4 fouls!  I was very scared he would foul out quickly when put back in, but it did not happen this time.  Just like I said on the chat during the game, I absolutely hate teams that play the way CSU does.  It makes it easier to dislike a team when 1/2 of their fouls are called, but they still get 23...

I may be wrong, but sitting there during that exciting game, I came away with the feeling that CSU's "They-can't-possibly-call-them-all" fouling strategy was not a huge story.  Maybe Valpo beat them at their own game....?  Or else they figured out how to sell the fouls.

Actually, I didn't see all that much that was out of hand.  Maybe the fact that Valpo set the pace robbed them of that strategy, if the Cleveland Plain Dealer story is to be believed.

What I'm disappointed in is that I didn't try to scope out the CSU radio color analyst to see if he was the same one as in the Butler game on Friday.  That's just too cool.  Did anyone notice who it was (ESPNU tuned into them a couple of times)?

[StlVUFan]

I like seeing Kenney coming off the bench. I don't see Bogan or Boggs being better players necessarily.  I think Kenney brings an energy to the court.  He makes terrible decisions at times, but we need to have someone coming off the bench to keep the intensity up.  Matt can do that.  Ben is not going to do that.

Fair point. It was the same on the women's team when Mallory Ladd was around. Definitely a good enough player to earn a start, but she had good, consistent game coming in off the bench.

I've liked Kenney a lot. He seems like a guy who can be overlooked because he is a regular sub, but he always seems to come up with the big plays on each end of the floor when needed.

And finally an HL opponent managed to scout our hail mary play   I was impressed.

[StlVUFan]

For those who have been entertained by my whining about refs, I give you this chuckle a minute thread over on the CSU board: http://letsgovikes.com/forum/index.php/topic,1436.0.html

Actually, there were contributors who refused to go there, but for those who did my first thought was, "shoe's on the other foot now, eh?" (My second thought was "Who ya crappin?")

I also continue to be greatly amused by out-of-town fans whining about our announcers. 

[vu72]

Wow!  And I thought Butler fans whined a lot!  You'd think CSU was 3-15!!  No doubt Todd is as knowledgeable as any announcer I have heard, and that includes his football job!  He obviously is a Valpo announcer and having him do an Horizon League broadcast no doubt would upset the opponent listeners as it would us when some guy was jumping up and down every time the home team made a good play.

[StlVUFan]

Wow!  And I thought Butler fans whined a lot!  You'd think CSU was 3-15!!  No doubt Todd is as knowledgeable as any announcer I have heard, and that includes his football job!  He obviously is a Valpo announcer and having him do an Horizon League broadcast no doubt would upset the opponent listeners as it would us when some guy was jumping up and down every time the home team made a good play.

In fairness, I do think Todd is more exuberant than some HL play-by-play announcers, though I can think of others that are just as excitable.  Darren Sutton (UWM) can get up there in decibels too.  Viking play-by-play guy is just as excitable, for that matter.  Cry me a river.  You know what I think?  The only reason they hated it was because their team was losing.  I'd feel the same way if it was me (in fact I have felt that way before -- nobody likes listening to the other team's announcers when your team is losing).

There's plenty of reasons why I get upset at the other team's announcers, but excitability is WAY down on the list.  My number one go to example is 2008 Valpo at Houston, 2nd round of CBI.  Those turds were horrible.  Of course, the horrible part is that CBI rules forced people like me to listen to the Houston announcers or go mute.  Vikings fans at least had the option to fire up their own radio play-by-play.  I do that all the time when Valpo is on the road.  Yes, there's a lag, but it's really a small price to pay to listen to a friendly voice.

And by the way, if any of the whiners would like to come to St. Louis and listen to Bob Ramsey do Billiken games, they'd learn to appreciate Todd Ickow.  You want some guy's voice ringing in your ears, especially when the home team is draining 3s left and right, Bob's your guy.

[justducky]

Wow!  And I thought Butler fans whined a lot!  You'd think CSU was 3-15!!  No doubt Todd is as knowledgeable as any announcer I have heard, and that includes his football job!  He obviously is a Valpo announcer and having him do an Horizon League broadcast no doubt would upset the opponent listeners as it would us when some guy was jumping up and down every time the home team made a good play.

All of us have listened to Todd do a game where we have no access to the video. When listening to him in a heated battle,you very frequently get the impression on the road that the refs have teamed up with the opposition so that we are playing 5 against 8. However when I am watching a broadcast or video stream and listening to Todds play by play I almost always agree with the refs on probably 80% of the calls that he questions. As a VU fan this only slightly bothers me, but if I were a fan of the opponent I am pretty certain that I would want to choke him.

[StlVUFan]

Wow!  And I thought Butler fans whined a lot!  You'd think CSU was 3-15!!  No doubt Todd is as knowledgeable as any announcer I have heard, and that includes his football job!  He obviously is a Valpo announcer and having him do an Horizon League broadcast no doubt would upset the opponent listeners as it would us when some guy was jumping up and down every time the home team made a good play.

All of us have listened to Todd do a game where we have no access to the video. When listening to him in a heated battle,you very frequently get the impression on the road that the refs have teamed up with the opposition so that we are playing 5 against 8. However when I am watching a broadcast or video stream and listening to Todds play by play I almost always agree with the refs on probably 80% of the calls that he questions. As a VU fan this only slightly bothers me, but if I were a fan of the opponent I am pretty certain that I would want to choke him.

Which makes him like most, if not all, partisan play-by-play guys.

I also -- because I often do take my cues from Todd on this -- believe that we regularly read into such play-by-play more than that is there.  "Contact, no call" *sounds* like a complaint, but that's frequently an assumption made by the listener.  It could simply be an observation, nothing more.

I would also point out that Todd is not at all averse to observing when Valpo benefits from a bad call.  I feel like I have heard announcers who are incapable of that (much like many of our own fans in the ARC, sad to say).

Your last observation I would agree with, because as even-handed as Todd is, like any partisan play-by-play guy he's certainly going to report the two different kinds of bad calls with a different emotional tone.

Now, if you want a partisan announcer who usually sounded less partisan to folks from the other team, I give you rlh.  But I consider that to be far above the call of duty for partisan announcers.

[valporun]

Honestly, if people want partisan play-by-play announcers and color commentators, then they should be people hired by the HL, not the schools, but even then what these announcers do is equivalent to "selling you the game". If you don't like the presentation, then either that "salesman" won't be your cup of tea, or you can hope for a better "salesman" the next time. I've listened to our own Adam Amin a few times on ESPN broadcasts, and he knows how to be partisan, but also make the game exciting, even if the score or what you see on tv isn't exciting. At least he's not one of those announcers who only does the occasional mid-major/low-major game, and gets bored when the game is over on the court, but triple zero hasn't been reached on the scoreboard.

[StlVUFan]

Honestly, if people want partisan play-by-play announcers and color commentators, then they should be people hired by the HL, not the schools, but even then what these announcers do is equivalent to "selling you the game". If you don't like the presentation, then either that "salesman" won't be your cup of tea, or you can hope for a better "salesman" the next time. I've listened to our own Adam Amin a few times on ESPN broadcasts, and he knows how to be partisan, but also make the game exciting, even if the score or what you see on tv isn't exciting. At least he's not one of those announcers who only does the occasional mid-major/low-major game, and gets bored when the game is over on the court, but triple zero hasn't been reached on the scoreboard.

I think you meant bi-partisan or non-partisan, right?

[historyman]

"Our fouls are legit this game. A foul is a foul. We have to quit reaching so much"

We are manifesting all our weaknesses (e.g., no interior presence, no penetration, settling for the long shot, not defending the 3, fouling excessively).  This is a recipe for a defeat.

It would help if we defended against the damn 3 ball!!!!

Every time we try to get back in this game, we do something dumb.  Good thing their big man has 4! [but not enough fouls to take him out of the game]

I never expected a win today I hate how everything we do is a foul.

Harmon reaching, puts them into a 1 and 1!  Damn it!

Gotta get Van Douchebag his fifth.  Go right at him!

So many stupid fouls

One thing that I'll add, this Valpo team is simply a matchup problem for the Vikes.  We don't have anybody to guard Broekhoff or Van Wijk and they both killed us.  Any team with athletic bigs is a bad matchup for us, but its compounded with Valpo because they have an athletic "big" playing on the perimeter as well.  I'll take Dee Brown any day of the week, but Broekhoff has the advantage being 6-7.

The box and 1 killed us against Valpo. The Vikes just don't play it well enough to make it work. I don't think GW will make that mistake again. Broekoff is good, but he won't beat us by himself.



I think we may be selectively reading the CSU board

[StlVUFan]

I think we may be selectively reading the CSU board

I stated up front:

Actually, there were contributors who refused to go there

Perhaps I should have emphasized that more.  Folks, not all CSU fans were being silly.  I was poking fun *only* at the ones who *were* being silly.