Marquette Post Game Thread

[Deepster]

I'd be showing Ball and Samson diving all over the place in the film room to hammer home hustle, valuing possession and just wanting it more than the opponent.

Maybe throw a few clips of THE WRENCH in there.

 

[Agent0]

You’re going to unleash the double big crew…. The reality is that his size and athleticism are better served as a stretch four but his skills are pretty relegated the five.

Agree he has the body of a 4 but his game is suited for the 5 in our offense

 

[woodchuck68]

Shaka is a class act. I really like the Big East coaches. Shaka, Pitino, Miller, McDermott, Matta, Holtman etc. It’s a coach’s league.

I feel like we are peaking again. Let’s see. A good run in the BET will set UConn nation on fire. I’m feeling better that we can make some noise.

Weird observation but I was thinking that there isnt really a team or coach that i hate at this point. The closest is Pitino (yeah others prob hate Rick more than me)

A lot of good dudes and Rick Pitino.

Yeah really other than Slick Rick there's nobody to hate. Maybe if Georgetown gets good again, it'll be fun to hate Cooley. But at this point he's not worthy of anger.

 

[StllH8L8ner]

He wasn't brilliant but I actually thought Mahaney was pretty decent tonight.

I thought the same.

He did exactly all he needs to do in the minutes where he comes in to give Diarra a rest…which is to not suck.

 

[Chin Diesel]

I owe Samson an apology from the chat where I said he couldn't rebound. He was angry tonight! Gold was a perfect matchup for him. Tarris on the other hand not so much. McNeeley's worse game of the season that I recall, seems like he was trying to do too much and none of his shots were falling that and Kam Jones was punking him all night.

He got pissed after a no call early in the second half. It was shortly before his steal, drive and lay up.
Sadly, what he did last night doesn't require anything other than attitude and desire. He wanted it more than Marquette players did.
Wish we'd see thst attitude and desire every game.

 

[Revrat]

Watched the game again….we do not help ourselves at times and I really hate complaining about the refs. That said…..we get a really freaking bad whistle.

There’s no leeway. It’s like we’re playing with a 30% lighter trigger than the other team. Mahaney and McNeeley got called for a few that would never, ever have been called our way.

There was one call on Mahaney where he brushed a guy with his hand. I commented that that foul happens to us 5-10 times per time down the court. We always think of the more obvious calls, but that one was egregious in both its not being a foul and the fact that there is no chance in hell we ever get that call. I mean, McNeeley was just getting brutalized, and you could see several times the stretched-out jersey of our guys trying to make cuts because they were being grabbed. I can more easily see the letting them play side of things but not if they are going to randomly call that tacky stuff. It really stands out when you watch the games again.

 

[WhereistheDove?]

He got pissed after a no call early in the second half. It was shortly before his steal, drive and lay up.
Sadly, what he did last night doesn't require anything other than attitude and desire. He wanted it more than Marquette players did.
Wish we'd see thst attitude and desire every game.

I think some of it’s that but also he just has some horrible matchups in this league due to his strength limitations. When Samson gets bodied, he gets off balance and that is where a lot of the issues stem from. Gold is unwilling and/or unable to really bang down low on either end of the floor, which put Samson in much better situations and the defensive scheme we ran last night really highlighted what an incredible athlete he is for his size. But yeah, he also got after it.

 

[7774]

Agreed. They were supposed to be so good last year and yet we beat Indiana and then crushed Illinois and Purdue in the tourney. I don’t give a crap what computer models spit out.

There are so many different things that show the Big Ten underperforms, but I'm not sure "a bunch of them lost to the best college team of the last 40 years" is one of them.

 

[aceboon]

Alex seems to have found his rhythm and is swinging back in the positive direction. Seton Hall should be another "get right" game to carry the momentum into the BET.

 

[6Nattys4Us]

While Samson got his motor revving and came up big (offensive rebounds?!) he was generally out of place once again guarding the 3pt line and Marquette got some very easy layups because he was nowhere near the rim.

At least we control our own destiny now - win vs Seton Hall and we are the 3 seed!

 

[UConnRock]

Huge win, but this board is so funny. Marquette was 3-22 from 3 on a bunch of open looks. If they were 6-22, which still sucks, we probably lose and Hurley and all the players would be getting destroyed, even though everything we did in the game would have essentially been the same.

We can "if" our way through this whole season. If UConn gets a couple of calls in Maui, If McNeeley doesn't get hurt, if Karaban doesn't go into a prolonged shooting slump. Playing the "if" game at its extremes, this team could be anywhere from 26-4 to 19-11.

The "if" I look at and hope that the committee looks at are the 3 losses w/o McNeeley. Lost to Nova by 2, Creighton by 5 (1 point game w/ 22 sec left) and Xavier by 4 (2 point game w/ 5 sec left). Flip 2 of those games and UConn is 15-4/23-7 and comfortable in the top 20. The "if" of injuries is something moderately quantifiable.

 

[Mr. French]

I wonder if Mahaney has a hard time understanding the offense. In the 1st half they ran a play for him where he had an open 3 he turned it down to take Ben Gold 1 on 1 and settled for a 19ft step back

Lack of confidence

 

[gsmooth]

Great Q1 win-Led by our captains. Solid floor game by Hass with Mitchell in his grill for most of the game. Great hustle plays by Samson-double/double.. Alex was everywhere. Dagger three. Thought our bench guys were solid and even looked like AM wanted the ball. Thought he played with energy and confidence.

Let's close the deal on Saturday and celebrate our 2 -time NC champs on Senior Night with a W.

Just like last year against Seton Hall, UConn owes those m'fers a beatdown.

 

[aceboon]

While Samson got his motor revving and came up big (offensive rebounds?!) he was generally out of place once again guarding the 3pt line and Marquette got some very easy layups because he was nowhere near the rim.

At least we control our own destiny now - win vs Seton Hall and we are the 3 seed!

Do you think that was by accident? The team was switching everything on screens so naturally he got switched onto guys at the perimeter.

 

[jibsey]

Marquette is a helluva team and Shaka is a great coach. I don’t criticize our defense as much as give credit to their incredible driving players Joplin and Jones. They were making some amazing creative shots in close. Tough team.
We have a 2 headed monster at the 5 that will vary depending on opponent. We are developing into a very tough resilient team. Is it enough? Who knows but playing like this I think we can compete with the best.
St. John's has to play Marquette away and that will say a lot. They only lost to home St. John’s by a few points Feb 4th. The 2 teams we saw tonight I think can beat them.
How are we not top 25? Are the top teams in the BE underrated?

 

[Vancat]

It was also crickets when we weren't in a run. Crowd there needs to be more consistently loud when we're struggling.

I was there & I didn't hear any crickets. Is that how it sounded on TV? My ears are still ringing.

 

[80shusky]

Great win for tourney seeding. Would like to grab that 3 seed and see if we can get off the 8/9 line in the NCAAs. Samson was awesome and nice to see Alex back. The rest was eh but Marquette plays tough defense and it's a great win. They could really use to grind Seton Hall into dust on Saturday to help get their heads right and go into the BET confident and angry.

 

[AllHusky]

Not going to call this an off game for Reed. Didn't have the stats but he did his job. Couple of great finds to AK on double teams, one down low for a layup and of course the dagger.

But Samson was on and rightfully carried the load at 5

I think both times it looked like he was getting it going he got called for a foul that benched him. Once in each half. I was watching saying, ok here it comes he is going to take over and then, sit down.

 

[3rdbass]

I thought the same.

He did exactly all he needs to do in the minutes where he comes in to give Diarra a rest…which is to not suck.

I thought Mahaney was pretty bad. But it is what we have now. The offense doesn't run well and Mahaney can barely do aanything. I guess at least he didn't turn it over but it was scary when he was in and Marquette was making that big run to end the 1st half.

 

[AllHusky]

Reed has improved so much this year with his passing out of double teams.

Remember when the criticism of Sanogo was that once you pass it in, it never comes out? Reed is already past that, maybe never had that problem. His game in Hurleys system is just coming together.

 

[aceboon]

Play of the game was the refs missing the shotclock violation on the missed Reed shot that Stewart put back slammed. That play energized the team and the crowd. It looked like a violation. Glad we got that call !

Reed got the shot off in time

 

[RuffRuff]

Marquette is a helluva team and Shaka is a great coach. I don’t criticize our defense as much as give credit to their incredible driving players Joplin and Jones. They were making some amazing creative shots in close. Tough team.
We have a 2 headed monster at the 5 that will vary depending on opponent. We are developing into a very tough resilient team. Is it enough? Who knows but playing like this I think we can compete with the best.
St. John's has to play Marquette away and that will say a lot. They only lost to home St. John’s by a few points Feb 4th. The 2 teams we saw tonight I think can beat them.
How are we not top 25? Are the top teams in the BE underrated?

The key reason to why we won last night is because Marquette shot 3-22 from 3. Joplin made it closer than it should have been with some unexpected heroics. It’s really hard to win when you shoot that poorly from 3, which has been an issue for Marquette for the second half of the season. Nice win and some good things happened, but didn’t walk away from that one thinking we turned some kind of corner. Samson played really well, won’t be repeatable against teams that run half court with real bigs, Alex had a really solid game. We protected the ball. Man Liam was not good.

I can see a mid major throwing a zone against Marquette first round and stifling them.

 

[6Nattys4Us]

The key reason to why we won last night is because Marquette shot 3-22 from 3. Joplin made it closer than it should have been with some unexpected heroics. It’s really hard to win when you shoot that poorly from 3, which has been an issue for Marquette for the second half of the season. Nice win and some good things happened, but didn’t walk away from that one thinking we turned some kind of corner. Samson played really well, won’t be repeatable against teams that run half court with real bigs, Alex had a really solid game. We protected the ball. Man Liam was not good.

I can see a mid major throwing a zone against Marquette first round and stifling them.

Liam with those back to back 3s in the first half was pretty good though. Thought the charge he took that they called a blocking foul was good too... Hurley almost got T'd up after that call.

 

[6Nattys4Us]

Reed got the shot off in time

The Passion of Tarris....

 

[YearoftheHusky]

After sleeping on it, I’m still not sure who that was in Sampson’s jersey!