Cole's injury changed the game

[Dream Jobbed 2.0]

Hopefully Cole is okay. I hope GTown wins tomorrow. I like Creighton and have nothing against them, but GTown wins that means 4 teams from the Big East in the tourney.

You watched the team in Gray tonight and said “I like these dudes?” Weird

 

[navery12]

There were some small reasons that contributed too, but this was the big one. End of the day we're making the tournament and I'll expect to win every game

 

[Hi-Low]

This is not a great Uconn team and we'll be in the Tourney anyway with a 7 seed hopefully. Creighton is better and more experienced.

 

[dtrumpet]

Outscored 9-3 with no field goals after Cole injury, with haphazard possessions. No way that happens if he's in the game. Best lineup wasn't in at crunch time. That and the Bouk front end made for big problems.

 

[jimva]

When Cole has 5+ assists in a game we win. Tonight his ball distribution wasn’t there, plain and simple.

 

[uconntoatl]

They didn’t score a field goal for over 6 minutes.
I’d say Sanogo abd his 4th foul was the turning point. I believe they were up 4 when that happened.
Sanogo was the difference. Creighton couldn’t hang when he was in there. When he sat, they ate UCONN up in the paint. It was embarrassing.

FYI, not impressed with Bouknight....4-14??? C’mon.

Bouk missed the front end of and 1 and 1 and they responded with a 3 to tie it. Rather if we made 2 free throws their its a 5 point game. Brutal swing

 

[tcf15]

Well here’s hoping we have him for two more years. That embrace between Hurley and Cole after the game was tough to see.

 

[VCE]

You’re the better team than Creighton when healthy. Crazy good things happen to decent but not great Husky squads in March/April. I hope we steal some of that magic and win tomorrow and a game next week.

 

[aburks41]

Cole is in concussion protocol. Tonight could not have gone any worse for us.

 

[the Q]

It was also a foul and then they called a touch foul down the other end for a multi point swing

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

The Cole injury was the always going to be the perfect excuse to explain away whiffing an 0 for 3 against the most overrated team in the top 25.

Ugly ugly missed opportunity with a ton of blame to go around.

I'd love to know what you originally started to write, such that you ended up with "the always."

"Always" is a clear overreach, and tries to bully through the point that the aftermath of Cole's ill-chosen move has been pointed to as an "excuse."

At most, it offers descriptive explanation of a team crippled and unable to any longer protect a late lead that had been hard-earned through multiple defensive stops.

 

[uconnfan68]

to be honest, i don’t think we can count on gaffney ever getting there and should plan accordingly. he is a combo guard at best, and his lack of true playmaking skills is very pronounced compared to cole or even jackson.

at this point gaffney is kind of a one trick pony. he very casually passes around the perimeter with no probing of the defense, and occasionally puts his head down and bullrushes a drive that half the time has no endgame.

cole and diggins will run point next year. diggins is hopefully the future there.

gaffney is more suited as a reserve sg/combo.

Jackson shouldn’t even be mentioned as an option. He can’t get his own shot off, let alone help anyone else.

 

[olehead]

the more we keep calling creighton overrated the more we insult ourselves

Who says this?

 

[SwingDog]

He banged his head at 4:39, and we scored zero points from the floor thereafter.

The weakness in this roster has been apparent since Day 1: We have only one PG who can consistently get us into our sets and generate looks for everyone else. If Bouk gets hot he can paper it over with his shotmaking, but if he's cold and Cole's not out there, we really, really struggle.

Hopefully Gaffney will get there next year. He's a talented kid, but still more combo guard than PG.

Anyway, I love this team. They fought hard. Creighton's really good. No shame, just a lesson.

EDIT: College basketball has always, always always been a guard's game.

Good point, and certainly a gamechanger. In the postgame presser, Coach Hurley said if Zegarowski was missing for Creighton over the last 4-5 minutes things may have gone differently. Fair point. Let's hope Cole is healthy and ready to go for the 1st round of the NCAA Tourney.

 

[UncleSpliff]

We only have 2 competent guards right now that are at the level of a top 25 college basketball program. Our reserves are just not at that level yet and as some have mentioned in this thread... may never be. Gaffney is a point guard that doesn’t create for others all that well and can’t shoot. Ajax is young and has all the potential in the world but just isn’t there yet. It just seems like the moments are too big for both of them. We’re in trouble if we have to rely on them playing major minutes in the tournament if Cole can’t go. Especially when Hurley plays them together.

 

[huskyblooz]

Bouknight looked like a G-League player . Spends 50% of the game on the ground. Talented? yes.
Acts like everyone else isn't doing enough for him. I think he's reading too many mock drafts.

Don't get me wrong. Ive been in love with him for 1 1/2 years. The last few weeks his attitude has changed.
Its now about me.

 

[nychuskyfan]

Bouknight looked like a G-League player . Spends 50% of the game on the ground. Talented? yes.
Acts like everyone else isn't doing enough for him. I think he's reading too many mock drafts.

Don't get me wrong. Ive been in love with him for 1 1/2 years. The last few weeks his attitude has changed.
Its now about me.

If it was “all about me” you wouldn’t be seeing Bouknight at all. He’d be training for his pre-draft workouts with Jalen Johnson from Duke.

Also, you can pinpoint from behind your TV his attitude changes? Amazing.

 

[Umami Zen]

RJ has evolved over the season into an integral part of our team's successes. We are not going to make any noise in the Tournament without his floor game and leadership skills.

Yarders are going to have to live with his size--Most guards are bigger and stronger than him and its basically a mismatch every night for him.

Would have liked our chances with him on the floor in the last five minutes vs Creighton.

Lets get him out of concussion protocol and start game planning for our next opponent.

 

[SportsFan88]

Bouknight looked like a G-League player . Spends 50% of the game on the ground. Talented? yes.
Acts like everyone else isn't doing enough for him. I think he's reading too many mock drafts.

Don't get me wrong. Ive been in love with him for 1 1/2 years. The last few weeks his attitude has changed.
Its now about me.

Shut up and go sit in a corner somewhere. He acts like it’s all about him now? I really hate this fan base SMH some of you should be ASHAMED of yourselves

 

[Sphinx]

Sorry, but that’s an excuse. This team has played poorly down the stretch of most close games, and the same thing happened tonight. Just too many empty possessions and questionable rotational decisions.

You say that Cole's injury is just an excuse, then you proceed to document how his absence hurt the team. If you look past the "injury is no excuse" cliche, Cole's injury is the reason we gave up the lead in the last minutes.

 

[UConn990411]

You say that Cole's injury is just an excuse, then you proceed to document how his absence hurt the team. If you look past the "injury is no excuse" cliche, Cole's injury is the reason we gave up the lead in the last minutes.

Cole had 5 points last night and was largely ineffective offensively. He wasn’t alone in that regard, but it’s not like he was lighting it up last night.

And him exiting the game last night doesn’t explain the fact that this team has been bad in close games throughout the season.

 

[BigErnMcCracken]

Bouknight looked like a G-League player . Spends 50% of the game on the ground. Talented? yes.
Acts like everyone else isn't doing enough for him. I think he's reading too many mock drafts.

Don't get me wrong. Ive been in love with him for 1 1/2 years. The last few weeks his attitude has changed.
Its now about me.

if it was all about him he’d be getting shots up with a trainer in Miami right now, getting ready for the draft.

 

[Fore!]

He banged his head at 4:39, and we scored zero points from the floor thereafter.

The weakness in this roster has been apparent since Day 1: We have only one PG who can consistently get us into our sets and generate looks for everyone else. If Bouk gets hot he can paper it over with his shotmaking, but if he's cold and Cole's not out there, we really, really struggle.

Hopefully Gaffney will get there next year. He's a talented kid, but still more combo guard than PG.

Anyway, I love this team. They fought hard. Creighton's really good. No shame, just a lesson.

EDIT: College basketball has always, always always been a guard's game.

I don’t disagree, though I’d add Sanogo’s foul trouble was equally impactful (I thought he was their best performer last night). However, their outside shooting deficiencies really bit them hard last night.