BU at Creighton game thread

[shaunguth]

one of the players who has been selected to start every game this season - got zero points, zero rebounds, zero assists, but did get in the scorebook with fouls & to

I am beginning to hear some of the arguments that maybe a lineup change can't do any worse...

I've been saying this since the 4th or 5th game of the season!

[Old Coach]

I found it interesting that up 12 points with about 12 seconds left, Creighton chose not to dribble out the game, but instead get McDermott two more points ahead of the buzzer. I wonder if there was something to that.

As for Creighton as a whole, I could see them getting knocked off by an 11 or 10 seed from the Big East in the first round. Ate am that has 2 physical post players will cause them problems.

[Chico]

I found it interesting that up 12 points with about 12 seconds left, Creighton chose not to dribble out the game, but instead get McDermott two more points ahead of the buzzer. I wonder if there was something to that.

As for Creighton as a whole, I could see them getting knocked off by an 11 or 10 seed from the Big East in the first round. Ate am that has 2 physical post players will cause them problems.

Doesn't bother me. Game is 40 minutes.

[DoubleJayAlum]

I found it interesting that up 12 points with about 12 seconds left, Creighton chose not to dribble out the game, but instead get McDermott two more points ahead of the buzzer. I wonder if there was something to that.

I'm sure that was motivated by the fact that 4 different times in that final possession, Creighton guards tried to back it out and just let the clock run out, only to have a Bradley defender close out on the ballhandler and swipe at the ball. Bradley forced Creighton to run an offensive play by not letting them dribble out the clock. When you do that, you can't complain when the opponent scores on that final possession.

[BeBrave]

I'm sure that was motivated by the fact that 4 different times in that final possession, Creighton guards tried to back it out and just let the clock run out, only to have a Bradley defender close out on the ballhandler and swipe at the ball. Bradley forced Creighton to run an offensive play by not letting them dribble out the clock. When you do that, you can't complain when the opponent scores on that final possession.

Nothing wrong with Bradley wanting to compete until the end.

And Im sure a few extra buckets won't hurt his scoring average and his bid for National POY.

[Old Coach]

I didn't say I had a problem with it, just that I found it interesting. That's all. Nine of ten times, the clock just gets run out at that point.

[LittleBrave]

Watched the replay of the game last night.

Saw some good things - again, lack of a true PG hurt us, as the turnovers piled up in the 2nd half.

Nice job defensively other than Echenique having some easy deuces.
Good job on the boards - seemed like on of our better efforts...and JP didn't even have 1!
Free throw shooting 7 of 8. Need to get to the stripe more than 10 times.
I liked our offensive flow in the 2nd half better than 1st half.

DSE needs to go harder to the rim. He's been getting there, but unable to finish. If he makes a couple of those layups, we make it a close game down to the last couple minutes probably.

All in all, nobody expected us to come within 20 pts. of #14 Creighton, let alone be in the game for 30+ minutes. How can we expect to pull out games when SS and JE contribute so little? (not a knock on these guys as they play their hearts out)

Really proud of the grittiness of this team if nothing else. Very few games I've witnessed this year have we lacked energy. There has to be something about the minutes our starters log - they just can't go all out for the whole 35 minutes.

[Buesch N Chips]

All in all, nobody expected us to come within 20 pts. of #14 Creighton, let alone be in the game for 30+ minutes.

Wrong. I expect us to be "in" every game. Maybe not win, maybe not be able to finish, but our performance at Creighton was what I expect to see every game, at a minimum.

[LittleBrave]

Wrong. I expect us to be "in" every game. Maybe not win, maybe not be able to finish, but our performance at Creighton was what I expect to see every game, at a minimum.

Maybe I shouldn't have said, "Nobody expected". But most BU fans probably didn't think we'd hang as closely as we did. (3 pts. at the 9-min. mark of the 2nd half)

You're right in saying that we should bring this kind of performance to the court in every game. Before the season started, I expected us to be "in" games as well. But I've come to realize our deficiencies. I hope it will be a looooong time (many seasons from now) that we'll have to say, "at least we were "in" the game. Starting next season, I will have a standard that we SHOULD be in every game, and losing by 20 points is NOT acceptable no matter who we play, and losing by double-digits to teams like SIU and Evansville is NOT acceptable.

In our games @ UE and @ SIU, we looked out of control on offense, leading to turnovers and easy baskets for the opposition. Then we found ourselves down by too much at the half. When we played CU both times, we handled the ball better and were down by single-digits at the half. This certainly has an effect on the mentality of the team when you go into the locker room thinking you still have a chance to win.

[tornado]

I found it interesting that up 12 points with about 12 seconds left, Creighton chose not to dribble out the game, but instead get McDermott two more points ahead of the buzzer. I wonder if there was something to that.

As for Creighton as a whole, I could see them getting knocked off by an 11 or 10 seed from the Big East in the first round. Ate am that has 2 physical post players will cause them problems.

Remember a couple years ago when Chris Roberts threw up a 40 footer at the end of a game that BU won and Gregg Marshall went ballistic about it??
Seems like there's only whining when it's BU who does it...when it happens the other way around it's fair because the game is 40 minutes long...

[LittleBrave]

Remember a couple years ago when Chris Roberts threw up a 40 footer at the end of a game that BU won and Gregg Marshall went ballistic about it??
Seems like there's only whining when it's BU who does it...when it happens the other way around it's fair because the game is 40 minutes long...

I don't think there should be any gripe about what happened. There was still time on the clock when the shot clock would have expired, and BU played defense as if the game still meant something, so Creighton did the same.
Nothing wrong with that.
I kind of question why Douggie was still in the game at the end, but it's so minor that it doesn't really matter.

[Da Coach]

I'm sure that was motivated by the fact that 4 different times in that final possession, Creighton guards tried to back it out and just let the clock run out, only to have a Bradley defender close out on the ballhandler and swipe at the ball. Bradley forced Creighton to run an offensive play by not letting them dribble out the clock. When you do that, you can't complain when the opponent scores on that final possession.

Sorry, but this had nothing to do with it. It was motivated entirely because McDermott is in contention for the top scorer in the country, and his team wanted to get a couple more points to get to his average. That is why he was in the game at the end, to ensure he got to his average, and it is why he played 36 minutes in the game, while every other Creighton player played 29 minutes or less.

By the way, Doug has fallen to 3rd in the country now-

http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/stats/leaders/NCAAB/PTSAVG/regularseason/yearly

[tornado]

a recent online fan vote for National POY by a MAJOR college basketball/sports web site had McDermott finishing as DISTANT 5th (among 5 candidates listed) in National Player of the Year voting...
I think this bodes poorly because of the VAST number of college coaches, sports writers, and fans who live out east and who have little more familiarity with Doug McDermott than they do with Weber State's Damien Lillard and Oakland's Reggie Hamilton who are ahead of McDermott in the scoring race nationally.
I am also going to stick my neck way out and guess very few will be watching BracketBusters even if it's on ESPN in prime time.
(Creighton may actually have had the BEST chance of getting seen had they drawn undefeated Murray State in BracketBusters, but that's not going to happen since both are home teams this year. So the next best matchups are St. Mary's and LBSU - both of whom are even less familiar to the vast majority of fans and media sources out east.)

[Da Coach]

Here are a few Player of the Year projections-

CBS Sports-

http://www.cbssports.com/collegebasketball/player-of-the-year

CNN-SI-

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2012/basketball/ncaa/01/10/midseason.all.america/index.html

Here is a fan vote (swayed by a ton of Kentucky fans, no doubt), and McDermott finished a distant 4th with Kentucky's Anthony Davis finishing first.

http://www.zagsblog.com/2012/01/24/vote-for-the-national-player-of-the-year/

[mrcoachdude]

McDermott needs to purchase a tent so he can keep up that camping he was doing...

I know they don't count to three much anymore, but seems like that lane can be inhabited quite a long time these days..unless you have the ball in your hands...

Not really picking on McDermott, but that really caught my eye when I watch the replay of the game...