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Message: [QUOTE="Gurleyman, post: 5172029, member: 175"] I’ll ride with our guys and hope we can get hot at the right time - but the alarm bells are ringing watching us play. When we had our swoon two years ago, there was still a sense of how high our ceiling was based on our out of conference. This year, I’m not sure there’s anyone I would consider All-Big East on our team. We don’t have many places to get a bucket - and those we have we sometimes can’t get them the good shots we need against good defensive schemes. Felt like Creighton had the 3 best players on the floor tonight (Hass and Stew would be fourth and fifth). We also have some big flaws - defending the 3 and getting to the foul line - that are bad flaws for a one and done format. And we have 7 games coming up (two vs. SJU, two vs. Marquette, at Creighton, at X with Freemantle and at PC), where I’m not necessarily feeling confident. At PC, I’d like to think - but if they have Hopkins back by then - or just play harder than us, that could be a tough one too. They had us down 12 at our place. That said, there are some bright spots - Stewart’s emergence as a more consistent threat and Ball adding some mid range to his game off curls are promising developments. That’s being offset by Liam being out, Mahaney not turning the corner, and Reed regressing a bit (plus AK being less than reliable). I don’t know if Liam’s return will be the cure all. He might not be the same guy coming back after missing a month and dealing with an ankle that might feel stiff. That push off on a three-point shot mechanically could be difficult to overcome. But if we don’t have the right recipe to win it this year, hell, the last two years were magic and hard to complain after where we were pre COVID. Just hope we can play well enough to give a three peat our best shot. Nobody else has a chance at it. [/QUOTE]

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