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Look, it was a win we needed no doubt about it and Yuri performed amazingly. But it WAS Boston College, a team lower than us in experience, with a new coach, at home, with a limited bench, lower rating, lower NET, yada, yada. This was not a team as seasoned as either Belmont or even UAB, although UAB was mostly transfers. Jimerson made shots. Okoro made shots. Yuri got assists. It's definitely a good sign going forward but now here comes a real team ---- Top 25 Auburn. Then a veteran Drake team. So I'll take it but I'm not proclaiming that all is well. All is much better than it was for sure. The best thing is it's a win before finals and a win before our biggest opponent to date. There is one less thing to worry about --- a losing streak --- as we head into finals and game prep for Auburn. Don't discount that. The one thing I will take away is how we seem to really lose our edge when it becomes walk-the-ball up time. Nesbitt is the only guy who can go one on one in the hero ball routine with the shot clock winding down. And he's a freshman still looking to find himself. As we slow the ball down to kill clock, hero ball comes into play. We are at our best when Yuri continues to push it and finds open Jimersons, Okoros and Hargroves out there. We were up 23 and dropped to 8. That's kind of like both Belmont and UAB. It didn't bite us this time but the pattern remains. I hope, if nothing else, we can look back at this wins and say we found something to change at the end of games --- the slow down. It's a fine line --- keeping the lead and the momentum. We are truly a team that needs all our individuals meshing as one.

It was a great night at Chaifetz. One young lady won 200 dollars making 3 shots, Yuri’s assist record, Nesbitt hitting some 3’s, Jimerson being Jimerson, and Okoro scored a lot and blocked shots. My wife spoke with Mrs. Hargrove tonight and told Mrs Hargrove what big fans of her son we are. We got to see a nice win and cheer our team off the court walking through the tunnel. Jordan Nesbitt acknowledged my wife and I cheering him.

This could go into a number of recent threads and it applies to any number of games over the past couple of years, and specifically the most recent three games, so I think it is appropriate here. I am a TF fan and think he is the right man for the HC job, but I also think he needs to seriously take a look at our closing out of games. Since it seems like we have that problem no matter which players are on the court, I suggest that it is a coaching issue that he and his staff need to be spending many hours on figuring out how to correct it. Players come and go, opponents come and go, but there has been one constant as we continue to give up large leads, and that constant is the system/style of play that the coaching staff has been using. It looks like the players took their recent sloppy play into their own hands with the players only meeting, likely led by Yuri. Now it is time for some serious soul searching on the part of the HC and his staff. the "end of the game" problem is the staff's issue and they need to identify the problem and fix it.

With all the Collins talk, and rightfully so, it’s easy to miss that Okoro had his best game as a Bill. 17 points on 7/8 shooting, 6 boards and 3 blocks. He finally made the bunnies he was missing earlier in the year. I think he is starting to get his basketball legs back. Each game he plays he’s going to get stronger and his timing is going to get better. He’s going to be a beast!

Quote of the day from Yuri in the Post: “I talked to the coaches, and one thing we emphasized was pushing the pace,” he said. “That’s how I like to play. I’m more effective that way, and that’s what we did. We got a lot of open shots.”

Well, if Travis leaves, I nominate Billiken Roy for HC. He’s been screaming this for 3 years. Push the ball! Speed it up! Use our athleticism! Fast break the fouck out of them!

OMG the Bruins must have got sloppy at the end. They won but Marquette is not a top tier team. Just kidding - my point is when you have a big lead it is not uncommon for the team with the big lead to let up. This is in reference to the GDT BC thread not to you.

I am not a fan of our walk it up run time off the clock strategy but if we continue to play fast and take quick shots early in the shot clock and not score then people complain and say why don't they work the clock with a 23 point lead. The problem is that we simply are not a half court offensive team without Perkins - Jimmerson tries that little curl shot that Perkins is so deadly on but he is not very effective with it unless he is facing the basket without jumping up on the move. Without Perkins we really should not be playing a half court offense unless we have too. The team's defense suffers when this happens also. At some point this team needs to run to keep their intensity high and we as fans have to just accept that they will take quick shots and sometimes turn the ball over with unforced mistakes. We can not have it both ways.

We won. Travis is a good coach.

They scored more points in the second half than the first, that did not happen the last 2 losses. This was a great win and the wife and I are celebrating in the local bar and grill. Yuri was not the only player to play well.

It’s time to stop spending time and money on student giveaways when half just go to the game and leave after receiving their item.

First 6 games he averaged nearly 35 minutes a game. Next 5 about 21. And he's not starting. That is called being benched.

11 games in and we have some real data. I don't subscribe to Ken Pom so can't say too much. But still... let's tip the cap to Jimerson, who got buried some last year and saw his stats in 21 games last season go down from his first year. His splits are 46/41/88, especially given the high volume (16.7 ppg). He has made up for a lot of what was lost when Perkins went down, but he gets his points in a much different manner. By comparison, 2021 Perkins was 47/38/87 in 21 games, averaging 17ppg. After the monster game, Yuri is up to 10 and 8, with an alarming 3.8 TO/game. His slash is 40/28/78. The main improvement from previous years is at the stripe. I think the TOs will go down over the course of the season. Ford is only playing 8, but the mpg for those players range from 17-31. I have to think the team will need Williams's shooting at some point but he must not be there in practice. I kind of feel like Ford buries TJ sometimes, but the stats say otherwise: TJ is 3rd in minutes. The team FT% of 75.8 is insane, and the only clunkers are Thatch (16-26), TJ (4-9), and Nesbitt (17-27). The one I'm worried just a bit about is Nesbitt, who, like J-Good, too often misses long. Kid, the front rim is the soft part of the rim. After losing two guys who had averaged 10 boards/game, SLU is struggling a bit but rebounding by committee. Okoro leads with 6.7. Gibson at 1.8 rpg may have to step up. 3 guys above 40% from 3 (TJ, Jimerson, Jones). Nesbitt respectable at 36%. Yuri and Thatch (3-12) clanking. Thatch statistically looking like a poor man's J-Good (56/25/62) and averaging 7 and 5 with 1.1 steals in 20mpg. He's the classic example of a glass half-full/half-empty player. Out one eye you see a strong defender who's rebounding and has the highest FG% on the team and probably the highest rebound rate. But out the other he's neither a creator nor a shooter; a big in a guard's body. I think Thatch is what he is, a strong rotation guy who can swing a few games and is way better than almost any other A-10 team's best bench guy. Finally, a little love for Traore. If in a 4 OT game a center went 13-18 FG, 4-6 FT, and grabbed 22 rebounds in 51 minutes, it would open eyes. Over six games, he's been pretty awesome, putting up those numbers in 51 minutes. Not at all worried about Okoro and Traore next year at the 5 after Linssen leaves.

stopping us from running is indeed inevitable. but that doesnt mean we have to walk the ball down the floor. run the stupid vanilla shuffle and reduce our opportunities. we should try to be the agressors all the time. we are athletic and it is beyond short sighted to eliminate that attribute.

Agree on the need to push as much as possible. But superior opposition with superior defenses will take you out of your game and force you to play some half court. SLU will then need to rely on its inside-outside game and ball movement to find the open shot.

I think Yurimania read the naysayers on here and said, how you like me now?

What a great game....Good to know that I was closer than all the experts and the only one to pick The Bills by double digits to win...kind of like a Price is Right moment ...closest to the actual score without going over. Btw, for those that can't wait for the next report card...Yuri is 2nd ITN in assists. What a night he had. For those who like quadrants, the double digit win should also help our NET ranking. If that doesn't make sense to you, check out the NET ranking post above. So let's see what happened this game..... Bold posting is from the original post in this thread. The team that shoots the best from the arc and rebounds best (no 2nd chances ) will probably win the game.... We matched them on rebounds ...32/31 ...2nd chance points 6 for each team...so no damage... and we crushed them on 3s...40.7% to 17.6%....this was the ball game. keep them under 65 pts... Close enough ....they scored some cheap points after the game was decided as we tried to seal up the the Yuri assist record. 47/38/75...with an emphasis on the 38%... This was a hit... 53 / 41 / 83... 41 was a hit because 1 less 3 and we would have fallen below 38...we made 1 extra FT and 3 extra 2s...extra 7 pts which we needed to balance some extra TOs TO 11 ... This was a miss ... 15 TOs...this resulted in 15 pts for BC ....Fortunately we were able to score 12 pts on only 10 TOs by BC...another concern was 10 stls ...way too high ...no matter for this game but we can't do that against Auburn. We need to bounce back on shooting ....We did Bottom line.... we shoot terrible against Belmont and we lose...we shoot great against BC and we win...I think the strategy is pretty clear going forward...... We shoot good ...we win...we shoot bad we lose. Since we are a good shooting team overall, the future looks bright.

slu is now 6-6 against the acc the past decade

6 days to prepare for Auburn. We need a perfect game and a packed place!

@larry72 ---- thanks for asking! The Joeys/Temple game was brutal. Temple has really fallen on hard times. Folks are calling for them to be #16 and come back to the A10. Right now, they are a middling program at best. Jordan Hall seems to want to pad his statistics as he likely goes pro next year. Again, he's no point guard. Temple is just bad. Another bad game was La Salle hosting Penn. And another was Duquesne eking out a last second shot and two point win over New Hampshire. Bonaventure ran pout of gas against Uconn; Adaway and Holmes played all 40 and Welch had 39. Another stellar two points from Schmidt's bench. In other news, Notre Dame beat Kentucky by two. This is the same team Boston College ran roughshod over. Kudos to Collins for setting the new school one game assist record with 19. I still think we have problems closing games. In this one, we were up 23 and they closed to 8 down the stretch. So we had double the lead we had over Belmont and UAB and it still got close. At the end, we quit attacking. Maybe there is a book that says this is what you should do when up by 23 or so. But the strategy killed our mojo and with four or five empty trips coupled with phantom defense and foul calls on our end, that lead shrunk considerably. It never became nervous time but I think it demonstrates quite clearly where the issue lies. You can't coast, you have to keep pressing and with this team and Collins, running. Free the Bills. Let the horses run. If Collins run, we have Jimerson, Nesbitt and Hargrove more open for uncontested threes. We outscored them 33 to 9 from three. At one point, it was 33 to 3!!!! And that was when it counted. BC's two threes came late when it was all over but the shouting. The other part of the strategy was in full view as well ---- beat the snot out Collins. The Langford boys were keen on trying to do that. The one kid fouled out; yet the other had zero fouls. We played well and balanced. Four guys in double figures and Hargrove one point shy of that. Too bad his three wasn't a second sooner. For as bad as they seemed and for the lead we attained, they still had less turnovers, less fouls, more rebounds, and more offensive rebounds than us. It begs to the question how did we win? I'm thinking the WIz will say 11 to 3 in the three point area. Take a week off, Auburn will be tough. By the way, announcers said Jimerson's black eye was courtesy of an Okoro wayward elbow in practice.

Also, what a sweat for bettors at -8

Best single game performance in TF era?

Yuri trying to hard to break the record, hurt offense last few minutes but great game otherwise

Last play was nice though.

Yuri is dropping dimes like an FBI informant today!

I liked the nesbitt point guard lineup... Didn't really do much... But I like it

It’s Steve’s sandbox. If you don’t like how he runs things, you don’t have to play here.

Fine first half, we have a comfortable lead. BC is not a team at the same level as Boise, UAB, or Belmont. Yuri is not been neutralized like he has been recently. Doing well, hope this goes like the old song "Second verse same as the first." Go Bills, win this one way over the Vegas line.

These are the exact reasons why he is an awful coach. He has no clue on game day. Sure he can recruit, but thats where it ends. Without a coach on the floor like Goodwin, Isabell etc around..this team is doomed

Perhaps if you showed consistency in how you addressed conflicting views, it wouldn’t happen, but you don’t and won’t...

Nope, I am just old.

The second half was different, BC came alive and gave us a hard time. We won this one by 11, still double the Vegas line but nowhere close the 20 point lead we had in the second period. A win is a win and this was a significant win for us, well done guys. Now onto the next one.

Porter Moser’s OU Sooners stomped #12 Arkansas today. That’s 2 wins over top 15 opponents already this season.

Once again, they can't finish strong.

I saw a lot of sloppy play in this game. Against a good opponent they lose, so I’m going with the former.