Taj79

You better check fire, young man, and readjust your aim. To compare any of the 330+ NCAA teams not considered blue bloods as Kentucky is is ludicrous and a failing proposition. That's like walking around this world looking for the transporter room, a Wookie or an Ewok, the Kracken, or Atlantis. Kentucky ermbraces basketball; not football. Alabama embraces football; not so much basketball. Well maybe both do but not to the same level of success and fanaticism. That exists in this town in one and onlY one unequivocal area ... the St. Louis Cardinals. At best, we caN be maybe a niche program ala Xavier, Gonzaga, Butler, Marquette. That's my perceived top row expectation. Kentucky misses a Dance, world ends. I'd be willing to settle for a Dance 50% of the time, with tiptop success being a 7-in-10 years ratio. Even that might be too high of a target. Our current success ratio, in my association, is currently at 14.3% I'm asking to go to a 70% success ratio (succes defined as only a NCAA bid; no NIT, no CBI, no other). Huge, likely ludicrous, hope/expectation.

To be fair to Grawer, I always thought he was a good guy with great intentions who was finally wiped out and wasted due to the extracurricular stuff of the administartion. Clock shows a good example of that with the great Craig Upchurch fiasco that ended up with us losing a highly regarded recruit to Houston AFTER we got him into summer school. As I recall, wasn't Footes a transfer as well. From SIU-C? Anyway, Grawer was in the process, I believe, of the meltdown as all the elements combined to form his perfect storm moment. This game was from the 90-91 season and the Bills were well above the standard Bills team ... 19-14 overall and 8 and 6 in the MCC. But they were falling from arguably Grawer's peakest team with 27 wins in 88-89, to 21 wins in 89-90, to this. It would all end the next year when he reposted his initial season's record of 5 and 23. In that year, I recall players walking off the court in the middle of games, never to return. Big Chill Robinson either quit or was thrown off the team seven game sinto 91-92. He tried to transfer to Arizona (I think) but don't believe it worked out. Wasted 7-footer. McGlother Irvin is the guy I remember just up and walking off the court during a game ..... I don't remember which one and stats say Irvin played in 17 games that year but it was a home game as I recall. That season saw two six-game losing streaks and we ended the season on an 8-game losing streak. Some great teams in those losses included Montana State, North Carolina A&T, and Northern Iowa (who then was no twho they are now). We even had home-and-homes that year with non-GWM teams SIU-C and Texas Christian! For you young'uns .. THOSE were the days. Anyone who lived through those dark days (except me, of course, as I don't want pity) deserves your youthful respect just for still being alive and still being Billiken fans. Double points to those who lived through that AND Ron Ekker. Those guys could produce one hell of a chorus of "... nobody knows the trouble I've seen ...."

Ed would not have been bad, considering Red is in there. But no real argument here. In today's ten-second sound bite, ESPN flahs drive world, even AB is ancient history. I'm surprised St.Joe's wasn't Jack Ramsey.

I like it. Quirky is good by me. I know Steve, kwjybo, roy, Bobby, the Wiz, SLUNick, willie, bonowich, larry72, tarheel and the shoes. Quirky is all I got.

As a tie or one-point game, Jett, no question. He makes the best driving candidate and even if they foul himn in a one-point deficit, he's a 50% shooter so the odds say the least we get is a tie. And we win a tie on the same logic. If it's a two-point game, and I'm the opposing coach, I'd foul Jett no matter what on the entry drive. i would not give him the opp for an "and 1." Make him make two to tie. Again 50/50 chance. And with no one on the rebounding lane... ooops, should not have gone there, differnet topic. A two- or three-point deficit is actually no tbad. You don't even put Jett onthe floor. You go with Mitchell, McCall, Loe, Ellis and Evans if all are available and you let one of the guards drive. If they make it fine. If fouled , they are two of our best. If it's a three, you drive and dish for a bomb frm the perimeter. Maybe even subbing Barnett for Evans in thi slook. These are the options of a veteran team. If you are Temple, you just give it to Wyatt. Singularly: right now, I'd go Mitchell for the 2+ situations. Jett for 1- situations.

The night before we opened with Umass, Dayton was at VCU and I was curious to see how that would go. It was only 36 to 32 at the half and Dayton was hanging tough. At a minute into the seocnd half, they closed to 2 on a three pointer by Vee Sanford (Georgetown transfer). They even cut that to one with 16 minutes to go, 47 to 46. They didn't score again for 5+ minutes but then were down only 56 to 50. Turnovers and poor shooting played into it with YouDee posting 26 turnovers for the night. I'm willing to bet the VCU defensive pressure go to them. I am hoping our senior/upperclass leadership and four guard rotation defeats this option for VCU but watching St. Joe's should be a better guage than YouDee. I don't know if Sanford can handle the ball, which would leave Dillard all to his lonesome. But St.Joes counters with Galloway, Jones and Wilson .. all upperclass guards and tends to play Kanacevic as a point-forward at times. This would seem to mimick Mitchell, McCall, Jett and Ellis. While it is at Richmond and home cooking will come into play, it should be an interesting game to watch/scout from.

This is from a Philly beat writer who covers Temple and the A10 as well as the rest of Big Five hoops. It comes on the heels of this past weekends' games, including our loss to Temple: http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/owlsinq/Owls-fourth-in-Atlantic-Ten-power-rankings-Temple-St-Joes-LaSalle-Butler-VCU-Charlotte-Xavier-UMass-Richmond-George-Washington-Fordham-Dayton-St-Bonnie-Rhode-Island-Duquesne-Richmond-Spiders-Hawks-Explorers.html Not that I disagree with the article in it's entirety just some observations: Butler and VCU are literally neck and neck (sans Rotnie Clark's neck) in this race for the top dog. St. Joe's is at VCU this Thursday 1/17 on the CBS Sports Network. I want to watch so I can get a real feel for just what VCU is. No way Xavier is #3. They are living off the fact that they opened at home for their first two conference games and in one, beat the beat writer's team. Plus the other was a nondescript GeeDub team. Xavier is too young, too limited, and too weak for me going down the stretch. If nothing else, I like that they have lost one of their last 50 home conference games and that's to us. But still, it should serve as a harbinger of how tough the road will be in the A10 this year. I'll let him have Temple at 4 over us because of their home win but again, they are a one-man team who are constantly searching on game night who their #2 will be. Lee, by the way, was named Big Five player of the week for his work against us and Xavier. His 37 total points in those two games raised his average by 1 ppg. Not much? That's actually pretty tough this time of the year when you have double-digit number of games under your belt. Once again, we made some 6'8" guy a star. Interesting tidbit on Cory. I think jbizz had that one somewhere. So does that mean Cory should take more shots for us? He's shooting it so well does it stands to reason he should double or even triple his shot attempts in order for us to take proper advantage of this. F05? What do you think? Spot on with Charlotte. Who have they played? La Salle is the same team as last year except a transfer has now come eligible. They are saying thisTyrone Garland, a transfer from Virginia Tech, can fill it. Problem is, once again, he's 6'1" so now La Salle can go with a five guard lineup (Durren, Mills, Galloway, Garland and Peterson). Not impressed. I think Umass is most likely going to rise up and supplant Xavier by the time it's all said and done. Maybe even Temple, I am that down on Temple. I still think St. Joe's was overrated to begin with -- Martelli stilkl runs his West/Nelson offense and he only goes five deep. Plus, a Temple writer isn't going to prop up St. Joes, Nova or any other Philly team much like a Mizzou writer won't help SLU. News flash here: that Mack truck forward for Richmond gone for a month -- we could miss him come February 9th. Given our track record of creating stars out of guys like this, fine by me. Wait a minute! Okay, this guy is full of sh*t. The YouDee Fryers at #11?!?! He obviously doesn't know who SVU is and how dare he disrespect so storied a program. He's fouked up. Armwood was a big recruit for Nova, not surprised he's thriving more at GeeDub given the difference in OOC competition but he won't carry them much as noted. The Bonnies worst skid in 20 years? Where's that brown indian dude? How can this be? They are the defending league champs, one trick pony (Nicholson) or not. The other three ... who cares. On a side note, I know he's the Temple beat writer and a homer just like Joe Lunardi over at St. Joe's but if indeed Temple is the class of the city, it's a bad year for Philly basketball IMO.

@duff man -- sorry. No way until hell freezes over that the A10 gets six bids. EVER. Five is pushing it as well. The only way you get five is if the expected rank and file teams win their conferences with no upsets and some of the supposed high-major, BCS conferences are down. Way down. For example, the ACC is a mess. Only teams of high class note seem to be Duke and NC State. Maryland was held to 14 points at half in Miami Sunday night. Florida State started out ranked. UNC is as blue as blue blood gets. Elsewhere, Texas A&M crushed Kentucky at Rupp. We crushed Texas A&M. What they did to UK will matter more latere there then our assciation to what we did to TX A&M. That's the way it goes. Of your list of five A10 suspects, only Xavier has a chance if you ask me and that's only because of their recent bloodlines. And if any of the others are in the regular season running, then some of the so-called top four will most certainly be dragged down. I think four is the A10 limit --- just my opinion. Yaeh, yeah, we got ofur last year but one (STB) was due to the autobid. Adding Butler and VCU means six but I just can't see the simpl emath of four plus two equals six happening.

From the nearby ashes of the La Brea tar pits, rises another dinosaur. No thanks.

@jmm28 -- okay, I'll take that. Still, being here, doubt they/anyone got out of Philly that night. @cowpoke --- a, b and d all are correct. As for c, I'm not sure. I did not see the Temple/Syracuse game live and I do know Wyatt went off for like 33 there, but Temple's supporting cast is pitiful in my opinion. Lee is good, not as good as we made him but good. All others showed me nothing. In year's past, Temple threw Christmas, Tyndale and Allen at you. Then Moore, Fernandez, Eric and Wyatt. They've always had other servicable cogs in the shadows like Mardy Collins, Sergio Olsmos (only his senior year), Ryan Brooks, and Chris Clark but they are extremely light this year. F05 was right on when he said Hollis-Jefferson was somewhat useless based on his output Saturday. Randall has lost all confidence right now, Cummings is nothing. Both DiLeo and O'Brien are grad students occupying space at best. And there is nothign of much value in their current crop of freshmen; Decosey started Saturday and I didn't even notice. I like to think that our defense helped contribute to thei rpoor game as their did to ours. The only guy outside of Wyatt I'd take is Lee. As for a ---- I agree. Already discussed previously. And b is certainly true. And I have to believe d is true but am trying to reconcile that with a. Road wins will certainly separate the wheat and chaff. Butler is +2. VCU is +1. Charlotte is +1. Of those, Butler's is most impressive having gone to St. Joe's and Dayton. Winning at home would be eight wins but complicated for us with visits by the big guys, especially VCU and Butler. One misstep there and it's 7 wins, two missteps is six wins. That means two more needed on the road just to climb back to .500. Again, I'll assume wins only at Fordham and Duquesne, and we are now back to even. Down one with Temple, making us one game below .500. I'm goin gto say down two with a road game at Butler. It makes the Bonnies, Richmond and Xavier the swing road games in any equation. Sweep and protect th ehome ocurt and it's all changing. I think there is too little evidence by which to project from. In still don't know who we really are at this point.

I disagree larry72. Screw them, we make ours and it's nip-and-tuck down the stretch. The pressure is racheted up and w/o Wyatt, they are nothing. Plus Lee closed with four fouls. One freaking whistle on him in the first half and he's gone. There were at least five times I recall where, as Rammer says, "their prayers are answered." I think this is another situation where, who knows, with a HOFer on the bench, he pulls the right strings and we advance. Not blaming Crews, just saying it's another example of how one can't measure intangibles and Rick, love him or hate him, was one hellova master there.

@JMM28 ---- c'mon. You had 70 minutes after my post. Last I checked the only planes/craft flying in a fog like that were ones with red-nosed reindeer as the lead dog. Charters or commercials ---- fog is fog. And we're at it again today here weather-wise. Viz is like 500 feet at ground level.

I'm guessing fog. Ugly night here on the I95 corridor.

Also spoke to Rammer and Earl. Asked Rammer if he's moving and to where. He said "not so fast" so more to follow. Also told them I haven't missed a game yet this year and get themoff the internet. They were surprised yet ecstatic. They like to know we are out here .... wherever here is. Funny .... only Meg was here from SLU. No May. No Biondi. No nobody. Hmmmmmm.

Sunday morning and only Dayton failed to cover? Wow. Pretty damn good, I'd say.

Having been at the game and now reading this, thanks for helping me relive it. Based on all these comments, i knew exactly where each one was during the run time. We are a funny lot. I posted in jbizz's thread about what I though before reading this, but you all hit it. For the record, no sky is falling comments from me. We did indeed let one get away here.

I happen to believe no one missed KM more than RL. As KM rises soi too does RL. Next up likely CE.

There is no need for a "sky is falling" crescendo to build. Last night's game was indeed winnable. Temple is a one-man show in Khalid Wyatt. He went off for 24, 8 above his average. W/o him on the floor, Temple was pitiful. Randall has lost all confidence. Hollis-Jefferson is a role player. Cummings isn't even a complimentary two guard (he wasn't the point, Wyatt was). Their bench is abysmal with Martin, DiLeo and Decosey. If the new BE was the old BE, they are likely to be cannon fodder ala Depaul for quite a few years. The problem was, once again, we let a middling 6'6" to 6'9" frontline player go off in Anthony Lee scoring 20. Plus, we lost it in our free throws, and our shooting. They are a very good defensive team and as an in-donference team they knew exactly who we are and what to take away while forcing us to the interior game where Dwayne is still rushing, Cody is nubile, and Rob and Cody are not strong (although Rob's back-to-back games have been huge). Our guards were collectively 4-for-23. Welcome to a typical night on the road in conference. YET ---- it was a two-possession game with two to play. We will be fine. I thought we could win provided we didn't have a Lee/Randall/Jefferson coming out performance and we made shots while playing stellar defense. I heard Crews say in the first 15 minutes that "one guy is doing all the scoring" and that was Wyatt. After that, we got tough on Wyatt but it seemed to require a second defender and Lee was swooping to the glass. Plus, we make a few of those free throws and the pressure stayed up on Temple's inferior supporting cast, who knows. Lee/Wyatt were 15-for-24 combined. The rest were 8-for-24. In the first half, Temple was called for two fouls. TWO!!! That seems freaking impossible to me. We were 1-0f-2 from the line. So we thengo 9 of 15 in the second half. Those six points made make the last few minutes of that game crucial. Now...... maybe Wyatt does take over and the result is the same. But we just weren't with it last night and that means no road win. But not everybody is Temple.

What are your lines onother A10 games today? My buddy is going to Butler at YouDee. Says its a "pick 'em" game. No way!

I think it's more of a case that defenses know WHO we are in terms of who the shooters are and what they like to do. I doubt there is anyone that doesn't know, for example, that our 6'11" center is a three pointer shooter NOT an interior banger. Same goes for Cody. Plus both are vertically-challenged so going inside is a surprise, more that a consistency.

Put all these answers together and you've got it: last two opponets pressed us to disrupt our flow, RM is not there demanding perfection, BC is gone and we are still searching for a consistent interior option, KM continues to round into shape, etc. This is exactly why one cannever say "he, we only lost BLANK, we'll be fine." Too many things are interdependent oneach other. Today's game will be a mano-a-mano cruiserweight fight in long shorts. Temple goes really five deep. Their starters are it with Peppar, DiLeo and Martin only offering relief or breather minutes. Randall, H-J, Wyatt, Cummings and Lee are it. As a point, Wyatt will walk the ball up and use clock. So will we. Could be us playing a team like looking in th emirror defensively. The home court will likely be the sway; neutralize that and we'll be in good shape. Not letting Temple "discover" another star to team with Wyatt will be good as will not letting Wyatt go for 30. Going to have to run all four guards at him -- including maybe JB. Can't wait. Certain programs give like 4 or 4.5 points to the home team as an at home advantage. If Temple is over favored by two, it tells me we are better than them in a neutral court setting. We most certainyl can do this and sayonara and happy trails in whatever they think the Big East will now be.

bonowich --- if you're hanging with Rammer and in JC Corcoran's book, and are that nice BUT ....NOT in the Billiken Hall of Fame, where's the justice? You got massivetime two feet from the Billiken ice at the Arena. You and the Rammer are practically twins. Wait, anyoneever seen Joe and Bob together AT THE SAME TIME? Hmmmmm. Give me a "CHUCK DUUUUUUUUUUUUROACHERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR" for old times sake, will ya'?

@nark ---- frankly, I had forgotten where VCU had come from to join the A10. You are right, the Colonial. But no ---- I saw George Mason and MasonNation in person two years ago at the Cleveland pod. Thet beat Nova so they would have an addition of at least two more credits to the Colonial. Plus their Final Four appearance in 05-06 would add six more credits to the Colonial tally sheet if you use the NCAA formula of counting back 10 years.

It is truly good to see 05 maturing before our very eyes. Of course, whatever will he do to relieve his stress now?

Not whining. Analyzing. And .... by the way .... you're wrong.