The Big East needs to punish this kind of basketball

[nelsonmuntz]

Ed Cooley is bad for the Big East and he is bad for basketball. Today's game was unwatchable, because the referees were rewarding Georgetown's foul hunting on offense and were letting Georgetown get away with relentless clutching and grabbing on defense.

Cooley's style of play only works if the referees let it work, and Cooley's 3-7 NCAA Tournament record shows it doesn't work outside of the conference. Providence's losses were to 6, 11, 1, 11, 7, 1, and 6 seed. Cooley's 3 wins were over a 8, 13 and 12 seed. Cooley has shown that once he gets onto neutral courts with non-Big East refs, he struggles.

The referees just need to crack down on it. Call the flops and leg kicks, and don't call fouls on out of control drives that have no chance of scoring and are done solely to generate a foul call. And the referees need to call every clutch and grab, even if it results in 40+ free throws for the other team. This is not basketball, and the refs should treat it like the circus act that it is. The Cooley will have a choice. Either coach his team to play basketball, or lose every game.

 

[Ripper32]

Can't kill a coach for trying to win with a particular strategy that suits his personnel.

 

[upstater]

Agree about style of play in the BE

 

[SubbaBub]

This is classic Big East ball. The issue today is that there were a lot of marginal calls that should have been let go in a rough game like this. I'll accept the makeup in our favor at the end of the half after the bad call on Spencer. There was an equally bad call against a Karaban block in the 2nd.

The calls can't be that arbitrary throughout the game as it smacks of incompetent officiating and lends credence to the calls not being above board.

 

[biggieb1950]

Ed Cooley is bad for the Big East and he is bad for basketball. Today's game was unwatchable, because the referees were rewarding Georgetown's foul hunting on offense and were letting Georgetown get away with relentless clutching and grabbing on defense.

Cooley's style of play only works if the referees let it work, and Cooley's 3-7 NCAA Tournament record shows it doesn't work outside of the conference. Providence's losses were to 6, 11, 1, 11, 7, 1, and 6 seed. Cooley's 3 wins were over a 8, 13 and 12 seed. Cooley has shown that once he gets onto neutral courts with non-Big East refs, he struggles.

The referees just need to crack down on it. Call the flops and leg kicks, and don't call fouls on out of control drives that have no chance of scoring and are done solely to generate a foul call. And the referees need to call every clutch and grab, even if it results in 40+ free throws for the other team. This is not basketball, and the refs should treat it like the circus act that it is. The Cooley will have a choice. Either coach his team to play basketball, or lose every game.

I don't know, it was an ugly game, but I never thought Cooley was the reason. If Johnson played well, game probably would be a blowout

 

[elmcityboy]

georgetown shot 34% (25% from three) and had four total assists. hideous brand of basketball.

why does cooley feel like he is 65 years old and at the end of his coaching career? dude is only 3 or 4 years older than hurley.

 

[huskeynut]

Nothing will happen and nothing will change.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

This is classic Big East ball. The issue today is that there were a lot of marginal calls that should have been let go in a rough game like this. I'll accept the makeup in our favor at the end of the half after the bad call on Spencer. There was an equally bad call against a Karaban block in the 2nd.

The calls can't be that arbitrary throughout the game as it smacks of incompetent officiating and lends credence to the calls not being above board.

Cooley has been doing this for 10+ years. It wasn't a rough game today, it was just the regular clown car that Cooley tries to pass off as basketball. Cooley's teams clearly practice leg kicks, and how many times did a Georgetown player just crash into a defender and then go down like he was hit with a shotgun blast?

On the other end, Georgetown defenders just grab their opponent every time they are beat, just like Providence used to. Cooley coaches under the 90's Pat Riley strategy of the refs are not going to call every foul if you don't make them too obvious. The problem is that once Cooley's Providence teams got on a neutral court with non-Big East refs, the refs did call all those grabs, and Providence would lose.

The game looked ridiculous. The Fox team was brutal on the game style during the broadcast, and they should have been. The game was unwatchable, and the Big East offices should be listening because Fox is most likely the high bidder for the next TV deal.

 

[uconngb]

The officiating has reached a new low. And I don’t mean biased against UConn bad. I mean all around bad. Thst wasn’t basketball today.

 

[HooperScooper]

georgetown shot 34% (25% from three) and had four total assists. hideous brand of basketball.

why does cooley feel like he is 65 years old and at the end of his coaching career? dude is only 3 or 4 years older than hurley.

Georgetown and DePaul play like AAU teams. All one on one stuff with lots of drives to the baskets. I'm not going to rail against the officials. UConn needs to do a better of job of not fouling on all those wild drives to the basket. And grab the ----ing rebounds when the other team misses all those wild shots!

 

[JustbrewitMan]

Only significant sports game on at the time slot. Hate to be a conspiracy theorist but the refs did a great job of keeping it just close enough to keep people from shutting off the game or switching the channel…

 

[Chuck]

This is the Big East style. And that’s why teams like Providence, Seton Hall, old Pitt teams, etc. regularly underperform in the tournament. On every cut, UConn players are grabbed in Big East games. Honestly, it probably helps UConn since the tournament is a bit tougher than a pre conference game. But I agree, it takes away from the game and awards teams that shouldn’t get the benefit of the doubt.

 

[mauconnfan]

I mean you can talk about a lot of this from other coaches as well as Cooley. The holds, clutches and bumping is a strategy against a Husky team that screens a ton and runs offense that’s tough to defend. Let’s not call it unique for Cooley only.

Let’s say besides making a good percentage of 3s our guys kinda sucked overall. Rebounded poorly, fouled too much and got beat off the dribble a ton. Ugly game? Yeah it was but our unforced turnovers, inability to defend a physical team was part of the ugliness.

It’s a win but if Newton doesn’t get back to who we need him to be and DC doesn’t stay healthy this won’t be pretty all that often!

 

[willie99]

One call on Cam was particularly ridiculous. When the Hoya player merely fell with no contact from Cam

How come Cooley can get those calls but Hurley has to stop?

 

[willie99]

I mean you can talk about a lot of this from other coaches as well as Cooley. The holds, clutches and bumping is a strategy against a Husky team that screens a ton and runs offense that’s tough to defend. Let’s not call it unique for Cooley only.

Let’s say besides making a good percentage of 3s our guys kinda sucked overall. Rebounded poorly, fouled too much and got beat off the dribble a ton. Ugly game? Yeah it was but our unforced turnovers, inability to defend a physical team was part of the ugliness.

It’s a win but if Newton doesn’t get back to who we need him to be and DC doesn’t stay healthy this won’t be pretty all that often!

It's how SC defends our women. Grabbing, holding, body blocks... whatever it takes

Lou was being mauled last year, right in front of me. Evert play, every screen, every cut, there were plays her shirt was stretched 1 foot from her body, no call

 

[krinklecut]

One call on Cam was particularly ridiculous. When the Hoya player merely fell with no contact from Cam

How come Cooley can get those calls but Hurley has to stop?

Yeah cam was like 3 feet away from Cook and Cook tripped trying to grab a pass that was a bit too high. Foul on cam.

 

[mauconnfan]

One call on Cam was particularly ridiculous. When the Hoya player merely fell with no contact from Cam

How come Cooley can get those calls but Hurley has to stop?

Because Dan has hissy fits like the one on Alexs 2nd foul on the three ball. It was a foul period bad play by his guy. First thing the coach should do is pull Alex over and say “hand in his face please I need you in the game play smarter. Instead he creates a scene that not one of those refs could Ben happy with. The “No FN way” response didn’t draw a T like it could have so be happy they resisted. He’s made his own bed we will never get calls.

 

[John]

A lot of words to say Typical Big East Basketball

 

[Spaceman213J]

Like others have implied, Cooley doesn't blow the whistle. He can tell his guys to play like that, but it is the refs and upper echelon of the Big East who are responsible for the game being called like this. It's not attractive and hurts the conference in the long run. Aside from rewarding players for being out of control, today it wasn't even consistent. Newton was doing much of the same but didn't get to shoot nearly as many FT's.
The refs just flat out sucked today. Aside from rewarding players for crashing into defenders, they punished UConn defenders anticipating fouls on some clean blocks.

 

[Palatine]

They pushed UConn rebounders with better position out of way and got away with it for 30 minutes.

 

[Husky68]

Because Dan has hissy fits like the one on Alexs 2nd foul on the three ball. It was a foul period bad play by his guy. First thing the coach should do is pull Alex over and say “hand in his face please I need you in the game play smarter. Instead he creates a scene that not one of those refs could Ben happy with. The “No FN way” response didn’t draw a T like it could have so be happy they resisted. He’s made his own bed we will never get calls.

Seems like coach "K" complained a lot and still seemed to get a pretty good whistle, especially at Cameroon. "He's made his own bed we will never get calls", so are you saying the refs are cheating?

 

[auror]

why does cooley feel like he is 65 years old and at the end of his coaching career? dude is only 3 or 4 years older than hurley.

He could barely get out of the chair.

 

[REB1094]

They were actually averaging 13 FTs a game in BE play before today. Took 10 or less in 2/5 games (and one game at 11). 38 tonight lmao

I think it was a lot more obvious at PC. I called it the flop & flail strategy. Make a basketball move to get a step on your defender, then throw yourself either in the air or to the ground and wait for the whistle

 

[Spaceman213J]

He could barely get out of the chair.

And Ray who is about 5 years younger I think looks like he could out and still ball with the college kids.

 

[Waquoit]

Only significant sports game on at the time slot. Hate to be a conspiracy theorist but the refs did a great job of keeping it just close enough to keep people from shutting off the game or switching the channel…

Do you really believe that? That the refs ref for ratings?