- Joined
- Aug 27, 2011
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I live in Hawaii so this was a *rare* opportunity for me!
I'm mostly a Boneyard lurker so here's my post.
The arena was relatively empty so I sat down in the front row right behind the Baylor bench.
Player intros:
The assistant coach noticed me in my grey Connecticut sweatshirt. He saw me using my flip to record the player introductions so he yelled at me to not use "that camera" to video their huddles. I'm sure he thought I was Geno's spy! I didn't want to distract anyone so I put the flip away for the first half.
The play of the game came early. I was watching Odyssey Sims guard Amber Orrange (I think - I was focused on Odyssey). She was so intense, like Mike Singletary but her eyes were crazier. Must be just terrifying when she's up on you. I swear I'd rather be guarded by Brittney than by Odyssey. Anyway Odyssey was only about 15-20 ft away from me when I saw Chiney stick out her knee which bumped Odyssey's thigh. I'm sure there was no intent to injure, only to disrupt, to slow her down. Like a pick. But boy, did Odyssey go down. When she got back to the bench she was crying, bawling like a little girl. I forgot I was a UConn fan and my heart just went out to her, she was in such agony. She had her head down and cried through the entire timeout while Kim was drawing up plays, then she left the court.
(Now I didn't see any news report state that Chiney was involved in the injury and there was no replay to confirm - but I was as close as the ref and that's how it looked to me.)
From that point on, Stanford built up its lead - they just double/triple teamed Brittney and no one was hitting from outside. It didn't seem to me that Brittney was making a major effort in the first half, she had at most 4 points. But then their shots fell and amazingly they closed in by halftime. I figured they'd win.
I moved up and around for a better view of the entire court for the second half, which was pretty even. Brittney came on with some unstoppable moves despite the triple teams. You could see Chiney measuring Brittney and thinking about how to deal with her size. She was careful and I think she avoided being blocked but made some shots that seemed just an inch or two beyond Brittney's reach. I had my doubts about her being top 5 but she's a great player. Majorly athletic and clearly the leader of the team.
Here's my youtube channel for some late 2nd half footage.
http://www.youtube.com/user/brianuc0
I'm mostly a Boneyard lurker so here's my post.
The arena was relatively empty so I sat down in the front row right behind the Baylor bench.
Player intros:
The assistant coach noticed me in my grey Connecticut sweatshirt. He saw me using my flip to record the player introductions so he yelled at me to not use "that camera" to video their huddles. I'm sure he thought I was Geno's spy! I didn't want to distract anyone so I put the flip away for the first half.
The play of the game came early. I was watching Odyssey Sims guard Amber Orrange (I think - I was focused on Odyssey). She was so intense, like Mike Singletary but her eyes were crazier. Must be just terrifying when she's up on you. I swear I'd rather be guarded by Brittney than by Odyssey. Anyway Odyssey was only about 15-20 ft away from me when I saw Chiney stick out her knee which bumped Odyssey's thigh. I'm sure there was no intent to injure, only to disrupt, to slow her down. Like a pick. But boy, did Odyssey go down. When she got back to the bench she was crying, bawling like a little girl. I forgot I was a UConn fan and my heart just went out to her, she was in such agony. She had her head down and cried through the entire timeout while Kim was drawing up plays, then she left the court.
(Now I didn't see any news report state that Chiney was involved in the injury and there was no replay to confirm - but I was as close as the ref and that's how it looked to me.)
From that point on, Stanford built up its lead - they just double/triple teamed Brittney and no one was hitting from outside. It didn't seem to me that Brittney was making a major effort in the first half, she had at most 4 points. But then their shots fell and amazingly they closed in by halftime. I figured they'd win.
I moved up and around for a better view of the entire court for the second half, which was pretty even. Brittney came on with some unstoppable moves despite the triple teams. You could see Chiney measuring Brittney and thinking about how to deal with her size. She was careful and I think she avoided being blocked but made some shots that seemed just an inch or two beyond Brittney's reach. I had my doubts about her being top 5 but she's a great player. Majorly athletic and clearly the leader of the team.
Here's my youtube channel for some late 2nd half footage.
http://www.youtube.com/user/brianuc0
