I'll Be a Son of a Shark

[CoachC]

12/16 The pimply student reporter with the bad haircut, the halitosis, and the ugly girlfriend who smells like limbergher cheese comes knocking on my office door the next morning.

Coach, you've won two in a row now? How do you account for this sudden and unexpected success?

"We stopped listening to twits like you" and I slammed the door on his pimply face.

[Wayne23]

Hahahahahahaha!

The Coach knows how to Coach. Kicks their butts after a win, not after a loss. It's WAY more effective.

[PointGuard]

Hey Grumpy, congrats on the 2 wins.

[CoachC]

ty, pg! and yup wayne, not that i've had any opportunities to do it before this! lol

[Wayne23]

lol'ing again, Coach.

[CoachC]

Oh, I'm deliberate. I played with 4 and 5, trying to see what worked best, even went to 6 occasionally, but unless I'm trailing late it became clear that my team does much better at 4, generally speaking. But 3? Really? If you think that will work I can give it a try. My next game is against a team that shouldn't be competitive with me so it's a good time to experiment. The fact that my starting PG is down with an injury also makes me want to slow it down some. But first... a nap!

The year I won it all with my Bradley team i was starting the games with a 3 tempo too, and also hated it. The team was nothing close to the ideal team for my philosopy which was run and press. But I had huge talent in the front line...(i think 4 post players from that team were drafted in the first round of the nba, and at least 3 of them were in contention for Norton), and was thin and talented at the perimeter. Going slow temp kept my perimeter players in the game and made it impossible for anyone to keep up with my studs up front. Sounds very much like the kind of team you have now.

[Wayne23]

It is like my team. My bigs are younger (all except one), and their talents are developing. I played at 3 for Clemson and it worked pretty well. Just about to try it against Virginia, who are a little better than Clemson.

[CoachC]

This is the first time this season we've played in a building bigger than ours. There's a couple thousand maybe here in attendance. The Catamounts don't look like much on paper, but they are at home and wanting to get a thumping by St. John's out of their system, so it'll be tough to win.

In the first half we shoot not very well(43%), play poor defense allowing them to shoot 54% from the field and yet somehow take a 40-37 lead into the locker room. I tell them to considerate a gift. We need to play much better on the defensive end in the 2nd half if we have any designs on winning this one.

Our defense in the 2nd half is much better, although we've renewed our 2nd half love affair with the turnover, coughing it up 9 times after having just 3 at the half. We have a 5 point lead and the ball however with 2:35. We just need to bring it home. They tie it with a 3 point play with 46 seconds left. Woods misses at :34. They turn it over at :15. Lemeke throws it out of bounds with :09. *sigh* Williams blocks a shot with :02...overtime...again.

Overtime 68-68. We get the opening tip, West has is stripped. Evans blocks a shot at the other end. Wests misses a jumper in transition. He intercepts a pass at the other end and finds Brown for a slam on the break. 70-68. They tie it again on a rebound basket. Woods throws it away..13 TOs now since intermission. Brown blocks a shot and we get the team rebound. Woods hits a jumper, 72-70. They hit a 3 for the 1 point lead. Lemeke misses the front end of a 1 and 1. They score 72-75. We take time out with 2:03. Lemeke misses a three out of the timeout, Evans rebounds misses, West rebounds... says "here you go" to the guy guarding him and hands him the basketball. They score a lay-up on the fast break, down 5 with 1:32. Lemeke has a pass stolen. THey dunk it in transition. We take our final TO at 1:09. Woods misses the 3, we look to foul. They split them. Woods misses another 3. They hit two more fts at :27 and it's all but over.Woods misses another 3 and we call off the dogs.

final in OT; 72-85. 15 Tos after intermission, outplayed in every aspect of the game in overtime. Not much else to say. We can't close out games.

Woods has 19 on a bad shooting night. Lemeke added 13( but no assists and 5 TO in 27 minutes), Evans 10. West had 13 off the bench in a good effort. We had a miserable 6 assists as a team, (not counting the times we passed to THEM for a basket. We are very good at THAT)

[CoachC]

12/18 Rob Woods is named Big South player of the week. Good for him, he deserved it before now.

In practice today I began with a lecture in the locker room. I say, "Today we are going to discuss a new concept before hitting the floor." I write on the whiteboard and underline it. "It's called 'The Pass' I realize that most of you are unfamiliar with this concept, but I do see a couple of you shaking your heads and saying to yourself, "I know what a pass is". But no, I'm afraid you've misunderstood the concept based on what I've been seeing. A pass is where you give the ball to a guy on YOUR team, in an attempt to get closer to a good scoring opportunity. Passing to someone wearing a different colored uniform than you does not count, and there is where I think the confusion lies. In fact passing the ball to the other team is frowned upon, and not considered very good strategy. Am I going to fast for anyone?"

[CoachC]

Finals are now over, and this is our last non-conference game of the season before the kids get a couple of days off for the holidays. Hopefully Santa brings them all velcro hands for Christmas.

The Mavericks like to run and have a dangerous scorer in their 2 guard Carrington. They get a lot of points off their bench. They don't shoot well, which I'm sure we'll fix for them, but are excellent at the free-throw line, so we have to keep them off the stripe. They've beaten George Washington and Seton Hall, and have a road win over Drake, so they can play a little bit.

We play horribly at both ends of the floor and are our usual sloppy selves with the basketball. We have the slightest of edges in rebounding.

We trail at the half 26-31.

In the 2nd half, we play horribly at both ends of the floor and are our usual sloppy selves with the basketball. We get beaten on the boards and send them to the line 16 times in the half.

Mysteriously we somehow manage to lose.

Final 51-64

I'm running out of ideas.