The AJ Graves was the #1 play on ESPN SportsCenter's Plays of the Day.
What this proves is that if you don't have the MVC refs giving SIU all the breaks and a total pass on all the hand checking and the hard contact,
then the fouls will really hurt the Salukis. Too bad the refs we have in the Valley give them too much leeway with all the contact.
(talk to Barry Hinson about that. He has always said the way he prepares his team for their game vs. SIU is to bring a dozen angry
junk-yard dogs onto the practice floor and have the players scrimmage while the dogs scratch and bite like crazy)
Butler benefitted from 23 SIU fouls and took 30FT's
SIU benefitted from only 17 Butler fouls and took only 12 FT's.
I checked what the SIU fans thought of the officiating, and NOT one fan thought they were cheated, they all agreed that the Salukis dig their own holes by fouling too much.
One other observation that came up time and time again is how much they miss a kid like Tatum who could stick a clutch shot once in a while, and lots of SIU "fans" really heaped on Matt Shaw, and were pretty vicious.
Good thing BU doesn't have these kind of bandwagon fans that jump off and start criticising as soon as a couple tough losses occur!
ps-- one thing the game did was to bump the Valley's SOS (Strength of Scheduling) up a notch, past the Pac-10 and into 9th place. The RPI stays in 7th place.