Pie-rat ThoughtZ™

[RichZ]

1. Akok starting over Whaley. Want to watch Isaiah's play closely -- see how he reacts to losing his starting spot.
2. We should NEVER-EVER pass to Adama outside the 3 point line. The ball stops moving, and nothing good happens.
3. Cole on the break just under 5 minutes in. Everybody in the gym saw the block coming before he even got to the foul line.
4. Great dime by AJ.
5. Horrible blocking call on Adama. See image sequence attached. He was clearly set more than a foot outside the arc, and never moved.
   
   
   
6. Out of character defensive mistake by Whaley at the 5 minute mark. Made up for it immediately with a nice midrange pop at the other end. Then made the same mstake at 3:14. And again, he made up for it immediately at the other end, with a sweet assist to Gaffney for the wide open lay-up.
7. Whaley turnover at 34 seconds. Ugh. Then he goes apeshit on D at the other end to keep them from scoring until we could regain possession.
8. Only 4 foul shots by both teams combined in first half.
9. We're behind on total boards and offensive board at half. Misleading though, because the Hall got 3 offensive boards on their last possession of the half.
10. Lousy start to 2nd half. Sanogo got the ball outside again. Threw up a brick, which led to a layup at the other end.
11. How often does AJ get a defensive board, then turn it over in the back court trying to dribble through a crowd to get down court? His handle just isn't good enough for that stuff. Seems like a couple time a game deal.
12. Those whistles that were quiet in the first half went crazy in the 2nd. Particularly at the pirate end.
13. There was a really great 2nd half sequence by Whaley. Got the ball down low, dropped it to a wide open Hawkins in the corner. Shot missed, Whaley got the board, drew the defense to the paint, then passed it to AJ for the wide open 3.
14. I get scared when Gaff is in the game without Cole.
15. The refs were REALLY screwing us over in the 2nd half. After we got the lead, it seemed like we got whistled on EVERY SH possession for about 8 minutes. First half, 5 fouls on the Huskies and 3 on SH. 2nd half? 14 - 9. We shot 12 FTs for the game to SH's 24.
16. Jackson took Tyrese by surprise with that pass at about 6:00. It looked like AJ had made his mind up to shoot before he got to the front court.
17. Ajax blown dunk at 4:48. His 2nd bad play in a row, but for some reason, that was when I felt the game slip away in an instant.
18. Not the best camera angle, but I rewound that walking call on Martin @ 2:38 a bunch of times, and I sure can't see it.
19. Foul call on Whaley, after 8 seconds of street fight on a loose ball was asinine.
20. I HATE that last play call of regulation. You could see it was going to end up in a prayer.
21. Absolutely no question that Richmond charged on that last SH regulation possession. No Call.
22. Cole NEVER misses that floater!
23. Tyrese bailed out Jackson, turning what looked like an uncatchable hail mary pass into a dime to a wide open Polley.
24. We did the same #@%% thing again at the end of OT. Even worse without Cole. No motion, trying to burn clock instead of set up a play. Except this time, no Cole, so a very predictable turnover. Hurley definitely needs to rethink his endgame strategy when we have the ball with approximately one shot clock and a tie or one possession game.
25. Actually getting a shot off at the end was surprising. Not the shot anybody really wanted, but a shot, and it came a lot closer than anybody in the gym might have guessed it would.
26. We scored 76 from the field, to SH's 70.
27. Sanogo had a game.
28. Whaley had I think one more really good play than bonehead plays. Didn't play anywhere near his normal minutes. Did losing the start to a guy who contributed only 6 points, 0 boards and 0 blocks get into his head?
29. Hawkins, for a guy just trying to find minutes, played pretty well. Except for 3 TOs.
30. Martin and AJ -- 9 TOs between them. Same as their combined rebound total. Splitting 23 points was OK, but the turnovers were killer.
    
    Overall, I thought the team played pretty well on the whole. But pretty well don't cut it when the other team is playing about as well as you and they have the benefit of a seriously home court whistle.

 

[Letsgohuskies11]

Good summary, I was with @Hey Adrien!, with a handful of Uconn fans up in 128. I honestly thought it was a very good/entertaining game with just a handful of brutal mistakes that cost us the game but was pleasantly surprised how competitive we were given the layoff. Very winnable game, like others, but wasting 30 seconds of the clock to just lose the ball without even getting a shot off as your last play (outside the Sanogo heave) was just brutal.

 

[salvagedsam]

Great game but the Huskies got ‘jobbed’ at the end of regulation. Sanogo got hammered on his put back attempt. No call. Richmond runs over Cole. No call. Get those calls and we likely win.

 

[mussels]

Have to say that after the long break, l enjoyed the heck out of that game. Wish the outcome were different, but was impressed with play of both teams.

Total bonus was that Sanogo appears fine despite all the abdominal/hamstring talk. Looking forward to the rest of the season. We will do well.

 

[Ts5034]

I was surprised with how competitive we were coming off the Covid shut down. Hopefully its full speed ahead from here. Nobody should be upset with the way we played, but sooner rather than later, these close losses have to turn into wins.

 

[Hi-Low]

How do you make 14 3 pointers (60%), out rebound opponent 40 to 25 and lose....19 turnovers & 19 fouls. We are a very sloppy team.

Can't really blame covid shutdown when did some things so well but just played very undisciplined especially in big spots.

 

[Hey Adrien!]

The refs were REALLY screwing us over in the 2nd half. After we got the lead, it seemed like we got whistled on EVERY SH possession for about 8 minutes. First half, 5 fouls on the Huskies and 3 on SH. 2nd half? 14 - 9. We shot 12 FTs for the game to SH's 24.

Overall, excellent summary and I agree with most of what you said.

As @Letsgohuskies11 mentioned, we were sitting smack in the center in the mezzanine, so there was an interesting view on a lot of the calls. I hate being a these refs suck guy and the game was called very fairly in the first 30 minutes of the game, but the last 10 heavily tilted in their favor in terms of home cookin'. Even though it had no impact on the game, the flop warning irked me the most: Cole stiff arms a guy who falls back WWF style isn't a flop but it was for UConn, that was the catalyst of the refs starting to need to book an optometrist soon.

I was one of those I just want a good fight guys entering the game, but I did leave feeling a bit sour not getting the win, especially after that awful last possession was a crummy way to complete an overall excellent game. Four losses by a combined 14 points is still impressive, but 2-3 in the last five doesn't feel great. If we can win five of the next six, I'll be feeling good entering the Nova game.