Semi Final Games

[bruinbball]

I was lucky enough to make it to the games last night and I was able to meet 1 notable BYer - DannyK. We were walking out about the same time and he was hard to miss. Unfortunately, due to my own teaching and coaching obligations, I will not be there on Tuesday night, but I wish UConn the best and Katie Lou a speedy recovery.

I did guess the Syracuse/UW game all wrong. Syracuse looked tight in warmups but came out shooting fire early on, and without Walton, I'm not sure UW is within 40 last night. Great energy by Syracuse during the game but Washington's lack of rebounding outside of Osahor really showed. Getting beat on the offensive glass 17-4 and losing the turnover battle 18 to 10 was cause for the quick blowout.

I definitely feel the Syracuse press will not work the same on UConn and I do not see us making similar mistakes as UW. I feel our rebounding advantage will be prevalent the entire game, but if Syracuse shoots the three ball at a near 50% clip, it may be less comfortable of a win than we want to see - we only win by 18.

Have fun at the game and enjoy Indy while you are here!

 

[RichZ]

Disclaimer: I rarely post on the women's board, and to be fair, I rarely watch any women's basketball other than UConn. And even then, only until Moriah sits for good. She's the most fun player to watch, period.

Last night I watched a bit of the 'other' women's semifinal. Orangewomen and west coast huskies.. Kind of like watching a train wreck, I was fascinated by the ineptitude on the part of Washington. I do not know who the Washington coach is. I do not know if this is the way they play all the time, or it was some ill conceived gameplan specifically for the cuse. But either way, he should be fired and run out of town on a rail.

Their game consisted of chucking up jumpers and dropping five players back the instant the ball left the shooter's hand. Every single washington offensive set I saw during the 10 minutes or so I watched, there were zero huskies showing any interest in the offensive board. Only once did I even see a single washington player still in their forecourt when the ball came off the rim. I assume she got yanked and chastised for not getting back quickly enough on D.

Apparently, they didn't want to give up the break. But this was that type of thinking taken to an absurd level.

Washington was credited with 4 offensive boards for the game. But 2 of those were 'team rebounds' (off missed first FTs?) so their players only actually had 2 offensive boards.

For the game.

Cuse had 29 Defensive boards, so Washington got 2 of 31 opportunities to take a board off their own glass. Apparently, by design.

This was a team that beat Maryland and Stanford?