My Take

[Orangeyes]

Nice write up. Couple points - Rak got boned on a mystery foul and as a result was in early foul trouble in the first half and then picked up an early one in the 2nd. He never really had a chance to get going due to that call at the start of the game.

And I think Grant could do a better job defending the 3 ball. He lost guys a couple times in the first half.

Before the game I told my wife that we needed to stay on #31, wish I had Jerami's cell phone number.

 

[JarHeadJim]

Glenndon thinks the 2nd Picture is HOT!!!

 

[SBU72]

With all the half naked women posts of recent past, Tomcat may have felt the need to do the board's version of Title IX.

which bring to mind a Miley Cyrus quote in the paper the other day. She hopes that this year is the year when they make men cover their nipples in public. In this case it should be the whole chest.

 

[SBU72]

Most extended i have ever seen JBs zone, or at least i have never seen it more extended out on outside shooters. At a couple pts TC was so extended on smith that it looked almost like we were playing a box and one, which i can never remember us doing

I thought more like a 1-1-2-1.

 

[SBU72]

No doubt they cover far more than they ever used to. Some of that is a function of the zone being so good that teams and coaches simply kind of give up and move further and further away to jack 3's and some is that we recruit players for that purpose. Last night we basically guarded the one kid (Smith I think) all the way out to 30' in the second half. JB got after Jerami for not going out on him on that one shot. I'm fine with teams using this strategy against us because even when you have the shooters to do it you're only going to beat us 1 out of 50 that way and you'd still have to be able to stop us.

SU almost got boned again on a late shot clock three on an inbounds. The kid almost put it in from half court!

 

[SWC75]

Just one other comment: Grant is struggling a bit converting short and mid range shots but continues to get better and better on defense, where he is great at providing weak side support and cat quick covering the vast areas he is responsible for in the SU 2-3 and rebounding the ball, where he has emerged as our best rebounder. Looks like a good bet he is going to lead the team in rebounding this year, which is something I would not have guessed in the pre-season.

For another view of Grant's defense, see the General's post above, (or below, as the case may be).

 

[sutomcat]

For another view of Grant's defense, see the General's post above, (or below, as the case may be).

I disagree with the General on this.

I remember 2 occasions when JG could have been held somewhat responsible...and I know JB threw a fit on one of them and yelled at Jeremi about it immediately afterwards. IMHO, you can't reasonably expect a forward to cover a guard on a wing shaded more towards the top of the key than the corner who is shooting from over 25 feet away. That was the case on at least one of them.

Jeremi compiled with JB's request to guard Smith from extraordinary distances from the rim the rest of the game, and did a great job of it, but I think it was a bad call on JB's part. VT took advantage of the yawning gap inside left by this controversial positioning and IMO, it ended up backfiring on SU.

Despite being asked to play out of position for most of the game, Grant made a number of excellent plays coming from the weak side to deflect balls, disrupt shots or just make spectacular blocks. The only wing defender I can remember who might have covered as much ground as JG does in the 2-3 was Hakim.

 

[cliftonparksufan]

If all those things happened at the Dome with the #2 team in the country visiting, we still would have had at least 29,ooo fans there.

People in upstate NY are more hardnosed.