sutomcat
No recent Cali or Iggy awards; Mr Irrelevant
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- Aug 15, 2011
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Sat up close to the action tonight thanks to a mysterious and wonderful benefactor. Thanks M & W B. It was also an opportunity to sit next to the great and powerful OE, who knows his hoops. Always a pleasure to do that.
No students, no dance team, no cheerleaders, no SSS, not even a HS band to be found. The NA was sung by a student from Bville who is a freshman at the Crane School of Music at Potsdam. He looked like Beiber but sang like Pavarotti. Impressive pipes young man.
Looking at the Seton Hall team in pregame warmups, I was not really impressed with their physical attributes. Lots of smallish players without a lot of muscle development. I think a lot of them are young, but still, they need to hit the weightroom hard and bulk up.
Once the game began, it was clear that they were badly outmatched. Our guys were bigger, stronger, faster and tougher. We seemed to beat them to every loose ball, jump higher than they did, run right by them, jump over them, etc. Everyone contributed all the way to the 10th guy, but in that first half, no one set the tone more than the big guy from Brazil. He has been a good shotblocker all season but tonight, he played like he was possessed. Went for the block as hard as he could every chance he could, all out, all the time. A lot of the shots he blocked he could have just caught, or deflected straight in the air so he could get them. Someday, I think he will learn to do these things. But tonight, he was all about intimidation and domination. When he had a chance to block a shot, he blocked it as hard as he could. Swatted some balls with vicious force.
The Seton Hall players looked shocked, then got really timid about challenging him. Pope, the leading scorer and rebounder in the conference in preconference games, was a complete non factor in the first half. He finally got the ball in good position at the end of the half, when up hard to dunk the ball and got the ball smashed in his face for his efforts. Man, if Melo plays like he did tonight the rest of the season, he will be playing for pay next season for sure. Doesn't matter if he is still really raw on offense (but clearly filled with promise). Doesn't matter if he still isn't rebounding that well. When you block shots like he did, and defend the paint with that mentality, you can play with the big boys.
It looks to me as though working with the ultra intense Mike Hopkins might just be speeding his development. He was still getting better before the change, but I think Mike is motivating him really well right now. Lots of high 5s and slaps on the back from Hop when Fab comes to the bench after a TO. Good stuff.
What else? KJ didn't have a big night scoring, maybe was a little off shooting 3s. But he didn't sulk, he didn't force shots and try and get his points anyway. Really worked his butt off on the defensive end, did the best job I have ever seen him do providing weak side help and doubling down on the ball when it got down low. He has been a liability on defense in the zone throughout his career but not any more. He is really playing well on defense right now. Unusual for a senior to be so selfless. Sets a great example for the rest of the team and this might be one of the reasons this team is so unselfish.
Towards that end, there were some great moments in half court sets where the ball rotated around, never touching the floor, through four or five players, each passing up a good shot to get someone else a better shot. Classic textbook passing to beat a zone defense. Impressive stuff...not just the point guards can pass the ball on this team.
SHU tried to play us man. Disaster. Too many small slow players who couldn't cover any of our guys. They were forced to go to the zone. But this was no SU zone. They gave us 3s all night long (we didn't hit many but thankfully, we didn't try that many either). The thing is, we were able to get the ball inside and dump to someone next to the hoop or just get an undefended layup a disturbing number of times. Dion, Scoop, even Brandon, MCW and KJ did a nice job here. The concerns about our half court offense continue to decrease in recent games.
Of course, we got a lot of steals and a lot of easy transition baskets again, as usual. Dion as usual led the way, but Scoop was very effective slapping balls away and honestly, everyone seemed to get a hand on a couple of balls every other possession. It was almost like it was the men against the boys.
Props to JS who did not shoot well from the outside but played good defense, was okay on the boards and got some baskets in the paint and in transition, continuing to show a new maturity and more developed overall game than he has shown in the past.
Thought Brandon and Dion both were bothered some by their thumb injuries. Dion was fouled hard and used his bad hand to brace himself as he landed, tweaking the bad thumb. As he winced in pain and flexed his hand, Scoop's dad yelled at him to stop his crying. Family support is key around the holidays.
Dion continues to get the biggest ovations and most love from the crowd. He is quickly becoming the most popular Orangeman in a long time. Probably have to go back to GMac to hear the ovations and buzz you hear when Dion has the ball or does something spectacular (which is pretty darned often these days).
We match up well with Seton Hall. They are not a good rebounding team, don't have much in the way of big guys and they really struggled to finish in the paint against our zone. Didn't shoot well from the outside either until the walk-ons came in. I almost felt bad for them when they had it on offense, so wary of taking it inside to challenge Melo, so wary to take a 3 and possibly get it blocked, so wary of passing the ball in the paint and possibly getting it knocked away.
This was not a bad team that we destroyed. Pope and Theodore are solid, experienced players who have done a lot of damage in league play. While they don't have a lot of help right now (this team is going to be really bad when they are gone), they have enough to be competitive against good teams, and up to this point in the season, they have played well. It is a great sign to blow out a pretty solid team like we did, where our 2nd team players continue to play at a high level, clearly better than their 1st team players.
This team is very good and it is getting better. Again, the defense was the key and again, it was consistently outstanding. We have made some adjustments rebounding in the zone and were not hurt that badly tonight on the offensive boards (I thought we hurt them badly on our offensive boards, as usual).
Fun team to watch. They could be pretty special when all is said and done.
No students, no dance team, no cheerleaders, no SSS, not even a HS band to be found. The NA was sung by a student from Bville who is a freshman at the Crane School of Music at Potsdam. He looked like Beiber but sang like Pavarotti. Impressive pipes young man.
Looking at the Seton Hall team in pregame warmups, I was not really impressed with their physical attributes. Lots of smallish players without a lot of muscle development. I think a lot of them are young, but still, they need to hit the weightroom hard and bulk up.
Once the game began, it was clear that they were badly outmatched. Our guys were bigger, stronger, faster and tougher. We seemed to beat them to every loose ball, jump higher than they did, run right by them, jump over them, etc. Everyone contributed all the way to the 10th guy, but in that first half, no one set the tone more than the big guy from Brazil. He has been a good shotblocker all season but tonight, he played like he was possessed. Went for the block as hard as he could every chance he could, all out, all the time. A lot of the shots he blocked he could have just caught, or deflected straight in the air so he could get them. Someday, I think he will learn to do these things. But tonight, he was all about intimidation and domination. When he had a chance to block a shot, he blocked it as hard as he could. Swatted some balls with vicious force.
The Seton Hall players looked shocked, then got really timid about challenging him. Pope, the leading scorer and rebounder in the conference in preconference games, was a complete non factor in the first half. He finally got the ball in good position at the end of the half, when up hard to dunk the ball and got the ball smashed in his face for his efforts. Man, if Melo plays like he did tonight the rest of the season, he will be playing for pay next season for sure. Doesn't matter if he is still really raw on offense (but clearly filled with promise). Doesn't matter if he still isn't rebounding that well. When you block shots like he did, and defend the paint with that mentality, you can play with the big boys.
It looks to me as though working with the ultra intense Mike Hopkins might just be speeding his development. He was still getting better before the change, but I think Mike is motivating him really well right now. Lots of high 5s and slaps on the back from Hop when Fab comes to the bench after a TO. Good stuff.
What else? KJ didn't have a big night scoring, maybe was a little off shooting 3s. But he didn't sulk, he didn't force shots and try and get his points anyway. Really worked his butt off on the defensive end, did the best job I have ever seen him do providing weak side help and doubling down on the ball when it got down low. He has been a liability on defense in the zone throughout his career but not any more. He is really playing well on defense right now. Unusual for a senior to be so selfless. Sets a great example for the rest of the team and this might be one of the reasons this team is so unselfish.
Towards that end, there were some great moments in half court sets where the ball rotated around, never touching the floor, through four or five players, each passing up a good shot to get someone else a better shot. Classic textbook passing to beat a zone defense. Impressive stuff...not just the point guards can pass the ball on this team.
SHU tried to play us man. Disaster. Too many small slow players who couldn't cover any of our guys. They were forced to go to the zone. But this was no SU zone. They gave us 3s all night long (we didn't hit many but thankfully, we didn't try that many either). The thing is, we were able to get the ball inside and dump to someone next to the hoop or just get an undefended layup a disturbing number of times. Dion, Scoop, even Brandon, MCW and KJ did a nice job here. The concerns about our half court offense continue to decrease in recent games.
Of course, we got a lot of steals and a lot of easy transition baskets again, as usual. Dion as usual led the way, but Scoop was very effective slapping balls away and honestly, everyone seemed to get a hand on a couple of balls every other possession. It was almost like it was the men against the boys.
Props to JS who did not shoot well from the outside but played good defense, was okay on the boards and got some baskets in the paint and in transition, continuing to show a new maturity and more developed overall game than he has shown in the past.
Thought Brandon and Dion both were bothered some by their thumb injuries. Dion was fouled hard and used his bad hand to brace himself as he landed, tweaking the bad thumb. As he winced in pain and flexed his hand, Scoop's dad yelled at him to stop his crying. Family support is key around the holidays.
Dion continues to get the biggest ovations and most love from the crowd. He is quickly becoming the most popular Orangeman in a long time. Probably have to go back to GMac to hear the ovations and buzz you hear when Dion has the ball or does something spectacular (which is pretty darned often these days).
We match up well with Seton Hall. They are not a good rebounding team, don't have much in the way of big guys and they really struggled to finish in the paint against our zone. Didn't shoot well from the outside either until the walk-ons came in. I almost felt bad for them when they had it on offense, so wary of taking it inside to challenge Melo, so wary to take a 3 and possibly get it blocked, so wary of passing the ball in the paint and possibly getting it knocked away.
This was not a bad team that we destroyed. Pope and Theodore are solid, experienced players who have done a lot of damage in league play. While they don't have a lot of help right now (this team is going to be really bad when they are gone), they have enough to be competitive against good teams, and up to this point in the season, they have played well. It is a great sign to blow out a pretty solid team like we did, where our 2nd team players continue to play at a high level, clearly better than their 1st team players.
This team is very good and it is getting better. Again, the defense was the key and again, it was consistently outstanding. We have made some adjustments rebounding in the zone and were not hurt that badly tonight on the offensive boards (I thought we hurt them badly on our offensive boards, as usual).
Fun team to watch. They could be pretty special when all is said and done.
