Final score: Evansville 67 Bradley 55

[GoBUBraves98]

Rooney is a former White Sox play by play broadcaster. I have always like his very positive style. He never turns negative while broadcasting, and never dwells on bad calls or bad plays.

I agree. That is what makes him a great broadcaster. He is a good worker with Mike Shannon!

[Da Coach]

Bradley played well the 1st half but Evansville came out strong in the 2nd half and their zone hurt us. 19 turnovers hurt, too.

stats

http://stats.statbroadcast.com/mobile/?id=104269

Attendance 5523

[tornado]

consistently the turnovers have plagued us all year- lazy passes that maybe get thru in practice but not against most good DI teams in a game...
Evansville is an experienced team that knows how to "play the refs"...as they went to the line 30 times to our 14...

Nice game for Callum - build on it!!

I had a thought midway thru the 2nd half... I don't even see anyone else but Mockevicius & Balentine even being above average DI- players on their team!

what if we took our best defender and had him play a 1-man zone in the lane, then double-teamed Mockevicius and double-teamed Balentine constantly all nite...
then simply dared everyone else to beat us...

Mockevicius + Balentine were 15-25 plus 11-19 on FTs & 21 rebs= 44 pts/21 rebs - or they averaged between them 22 pts/10.5 rebs
everyone else on their team put together went 9-25, hit zero 3-pointers, and 7-11 on FTs & 8 rebs= 23 pts/8 rebs or they avg between them all 2.5 pts/1 reb
I'd love to see us try something like that on them if we face them in the tourney

[lefty]

consistently the turnovers have plagued us all year- lazy passes that maybe get thru in practice but not against most good DI teams in a game...
Evansville is an experienced team that knows how to "play the refs"...as they went to the line 30 times to our 14...

Nice game for Callum - build on it!!

I had a thought midway thru the 2nd half... I don't even see anyone else but Mockevicius & Balentine even being above average DI- players on their team!

what if we took our best defender and had him play a 1-man zone in the lane, then double-teamed Mockevicius and double-teamed Balentine constantly all nite...
then simply dared everyone else to beat us...

Mockevicius + Balentine were 15-25 plus 11-19 on FTs & 21 rebs= 44 pts/21 rebs - or they averaged between them 22 pts/10.5 rebs
everyone else on their team put together went 9-25, hit zero 3-pointers, and 7-11 on FTs & 8 rebs= 23 pts/8 rebs or they avg between them all 2.5 pts/1 reb
I'd love to see us try something like that on them if we face them in the tourney

I think some of their other guys are capable of scoring though T??¦??¦.but obviously the offense runs through those 2 for a reason.

[lefty]

consistently the turnovers have plagued us all year- lazy passes that maybe get thru in practice but not against most good DI teams in a game...
Evansville is an experienced team that knows how to "play the refs"...as they went to the line 30 times to our 14...

Nice game for Callum - build on it!!

I had a thought midway thru the 2nd half... I don't even see anyone else but Mockevicius & Balentine even being above average DI- players on their team!

what if we took our best defender and had him play a 1-man zone in the lane, then double-teamed Mockevicius and double-teamed Balentine constantly all nite...
then simply dared everyone else to beat us??¦



Mockevicius + Balentine were 15-25 plus 11-19 on FTs & 21 rebs= 44 pts/21 rebs - or they averaged between them 22 pts/10.5 rebs
everyone else on their team put together went 9-25, hit zero 3-pointers, and 7-11 on FTs & 8 rebs= 23 pts/8 rebs or they avg between them all 2.5 pts/1 reb
I'd love to see us try something like that on them if we face them in the tourney

And I thought DLO played real well??¦.11 points, 8 boards, and 7 assists??¦.and he played really well defensively too??¦..

[Da Coach]

I don't know why we didn't double-team Mockevicius when he received a pass into the low post. Most of the times he did, he scored or got fouled. Yet a simple weak side double-team would have stopped most of that. And though he is a pretty good passer, the rest of the team, other than Balentine, are not real adept at scoring. But the game plan didn't appear to include double-teaming him.

I agree that this Evansville team will see a significant dropoff next year. Marty will still have some good system players, but he'll need a lot more than that to stay in the upper half of the league. Balentine came along right at the perfect time to take over the primary scoring from Colt Ryan (who graduated in 2013), but do they have someone to take the baton from Balentine? I don't see it.
Jaylon Brown, Mislav Brzoja, and Blake Simmons will be the only returning players next season who average more than about 2 ppg, and none are very athletic, or are great shooters, or rebound the ball well.

[ihatetea]

And I thought DLO played real well??¦.11 points, 8 boards, and 7 assists??¦.and he played really well defensively too??¦..

Without a turnover. I feel good about next year with how the team, and especially Suggs Pittman DLO and van Bree, have finished out the year. Considering how much Evansville loses I think we could sweep them next year.

[Da Coach]

The assists and rebounds make DLO a better player, but his shooting really hurt Bradley during that stretch when the game got away from them. He was just 3-11 for the game. He was effective driving to the basket, but then he got away from that.

ESPN Box score-

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/boxscore?gameId=400843795

[molar50]

Sorry, but DLO struggles at the free throw line. He should be at least an 80% shooter at the FT line. He is barely over 50% and has missed a lot on the front end of one and one situations this season. I do like his toughness and his ability to get rebounds, but if he is to play significant minutes next season, he needs to improve his percentage of made FTs.

[lefty]

Sorry, but DLO struggles at the free throw line. He should be at least an 80% shooter at the FT line. He is barely over 50% and has missed a lot on the front end of one and one situations this season. I do like his toughness and his ability to get rebounds, but if he is to play significant minutes next season, he needs to improve his percentage of made FTs.

Obviously he could shoot better from the line??¦..but a guy with that stat line is going to play a lot??¦..and again he does some really great things defensively. He has great instincts there

[lefty]

The assists and rebounds make DLO a better player, but his shooting really hurt Bradley during that stretch when the game got away from them. He was just 3-11 for the game. He was effective driving to the basket, but then he got away from that.

ESPN Box score-
http://espn.go.com/mens-college-bask...meId=400843795

I think Mock had a lot to do with that…..DLO has been shooting much better since coming off the bench….and I don't think it was DLO's shooting that hurt us down the stretch….there were at least 2 or 3 of this shots were as the shot clock was winding down….Evansville physicality on defense gave our freshman fits too…….DLO is really good in the open floor getting to the basket and his defense is huge…….I'm looking forward to his next 3 years here

van Bree was the one MIA last night

[wily coyote]

IMO we just got beat by a better team last night but, if you look at the difference between our game in Evansville and last night we have to be elated. As most of you know, I was a Geno fan but I have to admit I saw very little improvement in our kids during his tenure. In fact some players digressed or just didn't improve at all. The improvement I've seen the last few weeks has been very encouraging. We've even seen improvement from several of the kids who haven't seen much playing time. Last night being the exception for James, Okafor and Cooper but all three have shown signs of being helpful down the road. I will go out on a limb here and predict this is our last Thur. in St. Louis for quite some time. If you add all our returning points and rebounds verses the rest of the league, I think we will like those figures. Granted that doesn't mean an upper division finish next year but if can reduce our turn overs, fouls and free throw shooting, I think we can be a factor next year. I think we have recruited help at the PG position but still need one more banger inside to be a serious contender.

[tornado]

I think some of their other guys are capable of scoring...

I just don't see it...there's certain aspects of their game that are decent but just about any bench player in the MVC would do that good if given the chance....
their 3rd, 4th & 5th best offensive players average...
-10.7ppg on 32% shooting from the arc
-8.2ppg on 42.6% shooting form the arc
-7.7ppg on 31% from the arc
..but none average more than ONE made 3-pointer per game and it falls way off after that with one of their starters averaging almost exactly the same number of points per minute played as Davante Cooper and way fewer than Scottie James!
And there's virtually never a game where anyone other than their two studs is team leader in scoring.


and Mockevicius always turns towards the baseline and never turns into the lane- yet we still seems to miss that at times

[molar50]

Yeah, I am encouraged by the development of this team and their attitude of not giving up. This team dives for loose balls and rebounds well. I never saw that with Geno's teams, especially last year. I am not just hopeful, but optimistic for the future of this program.

[lefty]

I just don't see it...there's certain aspects of their game that are decent but just about any bench player in the MVC would do that good if given the chance....
their 3rd, 4th & 5th best offensive players average...
-10.7ppg on 32% shooting from the arc
-8.2ppg on 42.6% shooting form the arc
-7.7ppg on 31% from the arc
..but none average more than ONE made 3-pointer per game and it falls way off after that with one of their starters averaging almost exactly the same number of points per minute played as Davante Cooper and way fewer than Scottie James!
And there's virtually never a game where anyone other than their two studs is team leader in scoring.



and Mockevicius always turns towards the baseline and never turns into the lane- yet we still seems to miss that at times

I know what you are saying but mostly because the other guys have not had the opportunities...Brzoja and Wing are 42. and 53% from 3 and Brown shoots almost 53% overall.....so while they haven't been the main players this year I think they are capable of making shots if left alone...


Heck, how many times have we seen over the last 5 years players shoot well against us when left unguarded and have career nights?


I agree on Mock though.....although that guy moves really well for a big on both ends of the floor....