Mistake by Cal: not to foul with under 50 sec

[hungry husky]

Exactly the same thing Donovan did on Saturday, and said so much afterwards - there was no point in putting us on the line, it'd be two free points. It sort of got to the point where our foul shooting in the last few minutes was like facing Rivera in the 9th of a World Series game.

This is a perfect explanation. Our unblievable foul shooting was almost as important as the consistently high level of defense we played.

 

[patrick]

Once they fouled at 55 seconds, which was a mistake, they were committed to fouling the rest of the way. It's inexplicable why they didn't.

You know it was the wrong strategy simply on the basis that the entire UConn was base was giddy with relief as those 30 seconds ticked off the clock.

and he used a timeout which gave us a full 35, only ten seconds but when there is under a minute left ten seconds is huge!

 

[Cthuskinaz]

I think the mistake was to not foul earlier in the game. Getting a shot clock reset and a new 35 took away any time they had. They basically had 2 bad choices at the end.

 

[SWHuskyFan]

I think the mistake was to not foul earlier in the game. Getting a shot clock reset and a new 35 took away any time they had. They basically had 2 bad choices at the end.

I agree that they had 2 bad choices at the end however one had a much higher percentage chance of working. Not fouling gave them pretty much zero chance of winning. Maybe they get a 1-5% chance of winning by fouling, it's still better than 0.

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

Exactly the same thing Donovan did on Saturday, and said so much afterwards - there was no point in putting us on the line, it'd be two free points. It sort of got to the point where our foul shooting in the last few minutes was like facing Rivera in the 9th of a World Series game.

What Cal/Donovan said was a lot like how I as a Red Sox fan always felt when Rivera came in to close. Still, he must have had some reason for 'preserving' both the fouls and the timeouts. Maybe he was thinking they'd be like Cingular rollover minutes. In context, how great was it that LK hit both free throws? Actually, damn near everything was great, and whatever wasn't serves to shut up anyone who said beforehand and would try to claim that UCONN had to playa "perfect" game to win. Hardly. Better team won. Again, by a pretty accurate margin.

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

This is a perfect explanation. Our unblievable foul shooting was almost as important as the consistently high level of defense we played.

Yeah, but I was little bummed out by their violating my holy trinity with a couple of lazy passes and the turnover when Bazz walked the ball up the court. It's like they were human and/or didn't read what's beneath my avatar. Oh well . . .

 

[J-dog]

Once they fouled at 55 seconds, which was a mistake, they were committed to fouling the rest of the way. It's inexplicable why they didn't.

You know it was the wrong strategy simply on the basis that the entire UConn was base was giddy with relief as those 30 seconds ticked off the clock.

You hit it on the head… He gave us a new 35 second clock after foul number 6 & then let us dribble out the clock.

That was the real mistake...

 

[Jimdish255]

Letting us stretch the lead to 10 would have hurt their RPI.

 

[Cthuskinaz]

He should have fouled three times quickly at about the 2 minute mark. I think it was clear they'd be down, and he'd have to use that strategy. By not doing this they chose death by gun instead of knife.

 

[The Funster]

Once they fouled at 55 seconds, which was a mistake, they were committed to fouling the rest of the way. It's inexplicable why they didn't.

You know it was the wrong strategy simply on the basis that the entire UConn was base was giddy with relief as those 30 seconds ticked off the clock.

I agree with this. I got the impression that Cal wasn't looking for the foul at 54 but when it happened he knew he was screwed. At that point you HAVE to foul. It's better than just conceding the game as he did.

 

[ddent68]

Donovan was right, Squid was wrong. Fl. was too far behind and needed too many possessions to make fouling us a viable strategy. I think it's laughable that the Squid is considered a good coach. He even tells everyone he isn't a good coach and people don't listen. Maybe they should have gone all out for a steal about a minute earlier when they had one to give instead of wasting a foul, and a timeout and then watching Baz and Boat run out the clock.

Basically Cal teaches these kids "the dribble drive" ,which they already know because it's played on every playground in America, and then he sits back blames them or the system when he loses and takes the credit when he wins. I think he thinks his contribution is just collecting all that talent in one place and then basically says "you guys figure it out".