Tennessee Postgame Thread | Page 5 | The Boneyard

Tennessee Postgame Thread

pvdoggy said:
I don't know why people are continued to be surprised by CW shooting. CW is really not that great of a shooter. Her mechanic is not that good, she tends to push the ball more than using her wrist, and when the timing is on she can have a good shooting day, but not in general. She needs to go take a lesson from Azzi Fudd.
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And if Azzi is not available, I'm sure Elmer could fill in nicely.
 
I'm still mentally exhausted. As a UConn fan, very exciting, and an exhilarating win over a "rival," though it was a win over a team ranked 23 by the #3 ranked team. But not really a game to be proud of. According to ESPN, UConn's winning shooting percentage was last below 32% in 2004. The beginning of Q3 had some dreadful shooting; if I was watching any other women's basketball game I would have changed channels. This heavily publicized game, shown on the main ESPN channel did no favors for women's basketball.

CD carried the team in the first half, then she ran out of gas; hope she isn't going into a slump, because she has been one of the most consistent of the players. Griffin was very impressive in the second half, a one-player chaos machine. It was as if she gave the Vols the game equivalent of a nervous breakdown. However, this was her first breakout game; pump the brakes. Anna, on the other hand, has been pretty consistent over several games -- she ended up subbing for Kyla for most of the game & contributed to the UConn counterattack in the second half. Megan hit some key 3s & did good defensive work in the absence of Olivia, but was unreliable on layups. Kudos to Olivia for doing some damage when she returned in Q4; in some ways fortunate she got 2 fouls fairly early in the first half. Being on the bench may have helped her strong showing in Q4; she was certainly the most rested of the players who closed the game. Christyn seems to have the yips in her shooting attempts (though she hit 2 3s against Tulsa), but she made some key rebounds and seems to have regained her layup touch. I wouldn't relegate her to the bench quite yet.

For the team as a whole, the moment seemed to have more of an effect on UConn; the tightness I suspect was largely psychological. Liked the second half since it was more of a team effort, despite Crystal's heroics in the first half. Vols played a little scatter-brained (27 TOs!) and might have made the UConn defense seem better than it was -- but no doubt the smaller Connecticut players were not intimidated by the Tenn size -- a good test for them.
 
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Bottom line. Griffin needs more minutes, Williams needs fewer minutes, Irwin shouldn’t be playing against tough opponents. Six players; that’s all this team has this season when it really matters. Makurat needs to be on the floor 38-40 minutes; she gets better every game.
 
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Jordy said:
Bottom line. Griffin needs more minutes, Williams needs fewer minutes, Irwin shouldn’t be playing against tough opponents. Six players; that’s all this team has this season when it really matters. Makurat needs to be on the floor 38-40 minutes; she gets better every game.
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I am almost at the point of saying MW should get less minutes - simply because of missed bunnies.
 
Love concentrating on her during game....we have the package.
 
Pretty simple. At least to me. When you hold a nationally-ranked team to 14 points in a half and go toe-to-toe with them - a MUCH taller team - on the boards, it takes a tremendous toll on your legs!
Wobbly legs make for poor shooting - 30% - need I say more?
IMHO, a better substitution pattern will ease fatigue and help immensely .. give 'em a breather.
So then, OFFENSE? or DEFENSE? what's it gonna be? which should we choose? can we have both?
 
VFLfan said:
Well we stuck with ya for a half and played decently but couldn’t stop turning it over. Y’all put on a clinic that second half. Congrats on the win. Appreciated Coach Geno’s comments about the LV in his after-game interview (said we were better than the 23rd ranking...kinda shocked he said that). Lots for us to work on. See y’all next year in Knoxville.
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u guys have good team some very good ingredients.... and Horston will stop being a freshman and have less TOs I am sure good luck in SEC schedule
 
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One of my favorite moments was Olivia riding on Horston's back for a few seconds. I think it was in the fourth quarter. The announcers seemed speechless for a moment. I guess the refs were too surprised to call anything.
 
I guess from a fan's standpoint, you could say that the game was ugly -- poor shooting by UConn and turnovers galore (many unforced) by Tennessee. But focusing just on UConn, I think it is wrong to draw the conclusion that the offense is deficient or is a major problem for future competitive games. To my eyes (watching live), the offense was working fine to get open jump shots for players who (based on history) should be able to make those at a good percentage, but tonight (as was the case against Baylor, UCF, and Memphis) those shots weren't falling.

It's hard to distinguish between bad offense and bad shooting, but they are two different problems. This year's team (with the exception of Crystal) does seem to shoot worse against better teams, even when they get open shots. I assume that is nerves. But getting a lot of makable, open jump shots does not seem to be a problem at all, and certainly was not a problem tonight (or against UCF and Memphis, for that matter). The shots were somewhat less open against Baylor, but that is because they were and are very good defensive team.
 
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Guess I'll add my 2cents. I thought it was a great game. Two teams both wanting desperately to win in a fired up environment. Both young. I'm surprised nobody called the police on me because of the shouting the first quarter due to the missed layups and shots yet UConn was only down 3 at the half (TN helped that a lot with turnovers but not all of those were unforced).

When running Aubrey (the energizer bunny) adds tons to the team. A bit less when playing the half court set as she is sometimes lost. Ania showing much more now and I love that. I like Kyla a lot but she is 6'2" also when jumping which she never does. Good to settle things down if it gets out of control though. You have to remember that the reason the "big" 3 were having issues is they had 5 people guarding them when UConn was on offense. The people who pointed out the "big" 3 only pass to Ania when absolutely necessary are correct. It has to stop. Aubrey needs as much experience as she can get at the right times. We will need her. She easily out jumped all the TN bigs.

I'm really beginning to love this team. They have matured, learned, improved, "figured it out". Imagine what they will be able to do once they start hitting shots.

Edited to say that I like the TN coach. I think she has class and will be good (does not in any way mean I like the Vols). I thought her post game presser was well thought out and I did not take her comment about Aubrey as an offense - they obviously didn't plan for her to have that kind of a game - me either!
 
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FridaFriend said:
One of my favorite moments was Olivia riding on Horston's back for a few seconds. I think it was in the fourth quarter. The announcers seemed speechless for a moment. I guess the refs were too surprised to call anything.
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or chuckling.
 
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VA Huskie said:
Regardless of who starts, going forward - Anna and Aubrey will play far more minutes than Irwin for the rest of the season. I don’t think this team realizes how good it can be. I hope tonite’s game helped us start to understand that. Will we win the NC? Will we make another final four? I don’t know... but I believe it entirely hinges on our believing we ARE that good. In my mind, if we play like we did in the 3rd quarter, we can be NC again. ITS ALL ABOUT CONFIDENCE! We certainly have the talent and the capability...
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Once this team plays to win games instead of playing not to lose games. They will be alright. They did both tonight.
 
Jingo said:
Pretty simple. At least to me. When you hold a nationally-ranked team to 14 points in a half and go toe-to-toe with them - a MUCH taller team - on the boards, it takes a tremendous toll on your legs!
Wobbly legs make for poor shooting - 30% - need I say more?
IMHO, a better substitution pattern will ease fatigue and help immensely .. give 'em a breather.
So then, OFFENSE? or DEFENSE? what's it gonna be? which should we choose? can we have both?
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What explains the poor shooting right from the git go? The whole team, outside of Dangerfield to start and Ono somewhat in the 4th, shot poorly from minute one to minute forty, period end of story. Nerves and confidence probably had more to do with it than legs but in reality, this team is what it is offensively.

Hard nosed defense, hard nosed rebounding, and hard nosed hustle won that game and I loved it. Offense can be very fleeting, but effort isn’t and is much more important.

I believe this team starting showing real chemistry last night in the collective effort and commitment they all showed. Great body language by all throughout the game. A lot of poor shooting, but very few poor shots and zero head hanging. This team is not going to waltz anywhere like some of the just flat out great Uconn teams but if they play with the passion they did last night they have a chance to achieve great things. And won’t deserve a shred of criticism IMO. All you control in life is effort.
 
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pvdoggy said:
I posted this in the badass thread...

In the postgame presser, coach Harper was asked about the play of Aubrey and she said Aubrey had a lot of success because she played hard, but also because UT was not focusing on her and she got a few trash baskets (her words).
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Hmmmm! Not focusing on Aubrey. Something tells me the Tennessee staff did an incomplete scouting report on UConn. Aubrey's logged enough minutes so far to know what her impact can be. As I said earlier, UT had no idea how to handle Aubrey.
 
Gotta agree with HopJim on Geno's halftime adjustments. The LVs were increasingly frustrated and visibly down in the mouth as the 3rd quarter wore into the 4th and they had no answer to the flexible and aggressive Connecticut play.

Thank God we stayed out of foul trouble despite the aggressive defense, we don't have the depth to foul. Surprising given what looked to be a very contact oriented game. Thankfully the refs were not whistle happy last night.

Tennessee played their game the first half and we really didn't have an answer. We played our game the second and prevailed.

From where I sat I thought superior coaching won the game.
 
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I guess I saw a somewhat different game than some others. In the first half, I saw the LV team play out of their minds and UConn have a really crappy shooting night but Tenn, for all that, was up all of 3 points at the half.

The Huskies’ shooting didn’t get all that much better, the team just cranked up the defensive pressure and got tons of garbage points off the billion LV turnovers and surprisingly weak rebounding

bad shooting nights happen. I’m just happy Geno changed up the defense and the team found a way to win. Good practice for the post season
 
Just a comment on the idea of Tennessee "preparing" for Griffin. First, not sure why any team would prepare for a freshman who is the 2nd player off the bench, but more salient, how do you prepare for a player who's success is predicated on tremendous hustle and desire?
 
The biggest thing I took away from this mistake filled game was AG and her defense. Thought her intensity to defending and rebounding raised the energy of the upperclassmen who often play lazy on the defensive end.
 
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