Hereafter

[Wayne23]

12/3: We're trailing early. Up 2 after 10. Mini-run. Up 16 at the midpoint. Up 25 with 10 to play. Maxx, Sims, and Hart are getting the points. Akpo has been in foul trouble all night; his first poor game.

104-80. We were a scoring machine! 18, 10 for Hart, 23, 2, 5 for Maxx, 19, 7, 2 for Sims, 18, 1, 7 for Smid.

8 TOs, which makes me very happy. They had 21. 51.4% shooting.

Akpo played 21 minutes before fouling out and had only 4 and 3.

We were able to score both inside and outside.

Flip Hart hurt his back. He may miss a game, but no more than one. Blen will be back for our next.

#25 ranked, 5-0 Miami is here next. They are strong at 1 and 5. Of course our C is hurt! They have as good a D as anyone in the country but they really haven't played any good teams. This one shapes up as a tough match up and they are favored by 1 ½, even on our court.

We passed the radioactive rock at it's closest proximity yesterday. We've been changing course away from it for months but it is so large, and it emits so much radiation, that all humans on board had to spend 36 hours in the most heavily shielded portions of the ship- the bridge, the holo chamber, and the crop growing bays. We got some residual radiation, but it was minimal and everyone should be all right.

The photos and videos will prove very interesting to those who study these things.

[Wayne23]

12/7: We take an early lead. Up 11 after 10. We're hot! Up 8 at halftime. Getting close. Up only 4 with 10 to go. Late mini-run!

70-58. Good win against a ranked team! 16, 4 for 6th man Jon Blen, who played a lot because Flip Hart was not quite at 100%. Best bench play of the season. We shot 48.2% to their 40%.

Off to the Golden ST Classic. We're the #2 seed and we face Auburn, 2-4. This is a team we should beat. We average 19 more points, 8 more RBs.

I attended our very first Human/Android commitment ceremony. Elton Sams works for me in stats. He decided to have the ceremony with the Melly XR27, the Android he has been living with for some time. Again, I don't understand it, but he seems happy, so why would I not be supportive.

Androids, again, are very like humans. To me they are just a tiny bit “off” from being totally human, and I can always tell, before I look at their eyes. But lots of people say they wouldn't know a human from and android except for the yellow pupils. There is a group working to give androids the same eye color as humans. That has been voted on once by the Council, about 3 years ago and it was voted down, 9-3. I voted against but I have an open mind on the issue.

[Wayne23]

12/9: Early lead. Up 6 at the half. We take over. Up 23 at the break. Trying to keep my guys focused in this blowout. Up 19 with 10 to play. Akpo is back!

90-67. I emptied the bench for the last few minutes. 20, 8 for Akpo, 15, 5, 4 for Maxx, 13, 9, 3 for Hart. The other 2 starters each had 10. Good bench play.

+9 RBs, a season low 7 TOs. 10 threes. We didn't shoot that well but we took 27 more shots. 20-2 on 2nd chances.

Our 2nd big off the bench, Sam Milt, sprained a wrist. He'll miss about a week and a half.

It's #3 seed Tulsa, 7-1, in the semifinals. All 4 top seeds won. Tulsa has played a weak schedule and we should beat them. They do play very good D, however so we'll need to find the open man.

There has been zero info about the huge radioactive rock. I asked in Council.

The Chair said, “Don't ask.”

“Oh come on! It's a rock. Okay, a weird rock.”

“Really, don't ask.”

“I AM asking.”

“The information is on a 'need to know' basis.”

“This makes no sense. The Council has a need to know, by definition.”

That set off a long, heated discussion with most Council members demanding information about the rock. The Chair and the researchers on the Council tried to hold fast to sharing no info.

I'd had enough. “I move that the Council be given all relevant information.”

“Out of order.”

“Challenge!”

My challenge was upheld by a vote of 8-4.

“Jeff?'

“The huge radioactive rock shows evidence of not being... natural.”

WOW!!!

“Made by some sort of life form?”

“There's no way for us to know that, but it appears to be manufactured.”

“Some sort of weapon of war?”

“There's no way for us to know that.”

“Manufactured by who... or what?”

“There's no way for us to know that.”

“It seems to me that we've encountered other 'mysteries' on this trip... We left Phobos in a huge hurry. Nothing was said about it. We left Callisto in a huge hurry. Nothing was said about it.”

“Classified information.”

“I move that the Council be informed of any relevant information related to the sudden departures from Phobos and Callisto.”

“Out of order.”

“Challenge!”

“Jed, you don't know what you're asking.”

“The hell I don't! We have a right to know and I am more than a little upset that information is being withheld. I move we vote on the challenge.”

“Okay, okay. That won't be necessary. Jeff?”

“We don't really have any concrete information except that in both cases we saw evidence of … manufactured items. On Phobos it was something that looked like a storage unit. The robots we sent couldn't open it.

“On Callisto it looked like … well we couldn't figure out what it was, but it was definitely not natural.

“The rock had something that seemed to be an engine driving it through space. The rock turned to face the probe and fired something that obliterated it. We got the other two probes the hell out of there and sent them into space in a direction completely opposite to where the ship is. We thought we saw evidence of the rock sending something after the probes. We've not heard anything from them and we think they've been destroyed.”

Pandemonium would be a good word to describe the reaction.

“I'm going to adjourn this meeting. I know there are all kinds of questions but I think we need a cooling off period. There is absolutely no indication that the ship is in any danger-”

“The hell there isn't! If we saw the rock, the rock must have seen us!”

“Maybe, but we have no evidence that we're in danger. Meeting adjourned until 7:00 tomorrow evening. We'll try to answer all questions at that time. In retrospect we should have done that all along. Meeting adjourned.”

And that was that.

[Wayne23]

12/10: Down early. Down 8 after 10. Shooting .278. Up 1 at the half. Shooting .333. Up 6 with 10 to go. Took a while but we're in charge now.

90-77 but it was close most of the way. Akpo didn't get going until the 2nd half., but wound up with 19 and 13. 17, 13, 3 for Hart, 16, 2, 5 for Smid. The bench played well again.

+17 RBs, which was huge, but 16 TOs. They shot much better but we took 12 more shots. We won it with 9 threes (to 6) and 19-26 from the line to 9-13. 15-0 on 2nd chances.

#4 seed St. Joe, 5-4, shocked #1 seed Villanova by 4. They have a solid bench and a good PG, but we're better everywhere else. We score 15 more per game (#1 in the country in PPG). We're ranked #15 as of today's poll, NET #6.

The Council meeting was pretty hot, as expected. I'll summarize:

LOTS of questions about what we found, what we know... The answers were that we don't know any more than what was said last night. We have found no other artifacts, no messages, no “litter”... Security does not feel that we are threatened by the huge rock or by the discoveries on Phobos and Callisto.

Sherry Mickeals, Department Head for Waste Management, asked a really good question, “So, what I'm hearing is that we have pretty compelling evidence that we are not the only intelligent life in the universe. What do we do with that knowledge?”

The answer was basically that we remain alert, look closely at every body we explore, large or small, keep our options open, be ready, but don't act out of panic or too much haste.

Makes sense to me.

[Wayne23]

12/11: Early lead but they fight back. Up only 2 after 10. Akpo is hot. Down 1 at the half. I go to max D. They're hitting 3s we're not. Mini-run puts us up 8 with 10 left. We take charge late.

86-72 and the tourney title. 18, 11 for Akpo, the tourney MOP, 15, 12 for Hart, 14, 3 for Blen, 12 for our #3 guard, Hal Huss, 10, 5, 4 for Maxx, who is not scoring they way we expected him to, but his D is very good.

+13 RBs, 12 TOs. We won it at the line, 31-44 to 12-19. Other teams foul us a lot because we're quick, and hard to defend- thus #1 in PPG. We owned the paint.
We're 10-0, #15, NET #6. And we've played some good teams.

Next should be a laugher, 1-7 Cal-Poly here. They're our home and home opponent but they won't be next year. If we play our game we won't have a problem.

[Wayne23]

12/13: Early lead. Double digit lead. Up 14 after 10. Up 18 at halftime. Up 17 with 10 left. Sims is tearing it up.

85-64. Never a doubt. 27, 11 for Sims, 11, 13 for Akpo, 12, 8 for Hart.

+22 RBs, but 16 TOs. We took 18 more shots and owned the inside.

Sam Milt will be back for our next game. 2 more games before PAC 12 play starts, both against ranked teams, but both here.

#14 Brigham Young, 10-3. This will be our biggest challenge so far. They are very good outside. We score 14.6 more per game and give up 3.6 more.

They have not played a ranked team yet. We shoot better. But rebounding and ball handling stats are similar.

We're #13. I'm toying with playing a lot of 3-2. We'll see how the game goes.

It's nice when everything is going smoothly on the ship. There are always little problems, but recently there haven't been any big ones, and no ship related crises.

[Wayne23]

12/21: We take an early lead and they come back. Playing the 3-2 for now. Up 7 after 10. Up 8 at the half. Up 11 with 10 to go.

83-73. They got it to 4 late, but no closer, and then we stretched it out a little.

20, 9 for Akpo, but he fouled out. 17, 5, 4 for Smid, 10, 9, 4 for Sims, 14, 4 for Hart. Not much from the bench. +14 RBs but yet again, 16 TOs. Damn!

We won it at the line again, 25-33 to 14-17.

Kent Maxx hurt his foot. Out about a week. Not sure how much he'll play in our next one, if at all.

12/27: We're sitting Kent Maxx. He's not ready. Hal Huss will start at SG, and Key Curl will be our first guard off the bench. But we may use SF Jon Blen at SG.

#7 Creighton, 12-2, is here. With Maxx out this one becomes a really tough game. Their Sg may be their best player. Their PF is also very good but we think Akpo is better. They score almost as many as we do and give up fewer. They're 2-1 against top 25 teams. They can really shoot., 50% from the floor, 40.5% on threes. We need a really good game.

[Wayne23]

12/28: They take an early lead. I max out the D early. Down 8 after 10. Down 13 at the half. The missing player is hurting us, and Akpo and Hart are in foul trouble. Down 18 with 10 left.

76-87. We were never really in it. 15, 11 for Akpo, 11, 4, 7 for Smid, 10, 6 for Sims, 10, 7, 3 for Blen.

Only 11 TOs, but they shot 50.9% and we shot 40.7%. That was the difference since we only took 2 more shots. Their bench had 29, 8, 5 to our 18, 14, 4, so bench scoring was big.

We end the pre-conference season at 12-1, #17, NET #15. +15.8 PPG, #1. +10.1 RBs, #2. -4.4 TOs, 12.4. I like it below 12.

#10 overall NET, #3 on O. I'd like to play better D, #70, and I'd like to shoot better.

Akpo leads us with 18.0 PPG, 11.3 RBs, and he doesn't turn it over; but he fouls too much. 13.2 and 7.7 for Sims, 2nd in both. Hart is 12.0 and 6.0, #3 in both. Maxx gets
11.2 and leads in assists, and Smid gets 10.5, 4.1 assists. The bench could give us more.

First in conf. is 8-3 Oregon, here. Their strength is in the back court. Their PG dishes really well, and their SG gets 23.2 per game. We think we have the edge inside. We score 10 more but give up 4 more. Shooting stats are a wash. We average 8.8 more RBs and 2.4 fewer TOs. But they can play and this could be a tough one.

5 of our last 7, 7 of our last 10 PAC 12 games are away. Not good!

[Wayne23]

1/4:2031: Close early, then we take a lead. Up 9 after 10. We've been in a 3-2 so far. Up 7 at the half. Akpo in foul trouble again. Up 15 with 10 to go.

90-80. We stayed in the 3-2 all night. Their Sg had 29 and their SF 19 so I'd say it didn't work, except that we led comfortably almost all the way.

25, 7, 4 for Sims, 20, 8 for Hart, 16, 4, 3 for Smid, 13, 3, 5 for Maxx, 9, 8, 3 for Milt.

Akpo played 14 minutes. He's a senior. He should be playing with more discipline.

+6 RBs, 12 TOs to 20. Once again, we won it at the line, 32-50 (awful!) to 14-22. We usually shoot MUCH better from the line. Probably best to ignore it. I don't want it to get in their heads.

8-4, 1-0 Colorado is here next. Another team that scores outside but their C can get points. On paper if we play our game we win, but we can't take them lightly.

Our sensors have picked up another big rock. This one looks like a rogue planet, about the size of Earth, maybe a little smaller. We'll need to get closer to learn more.

[Wayne23]

1/7: Close early. Down 3 after 10. Turning it over. Switching to 3-2. They're killing us outside. Down 7 at the half. Going man to man. Down 4 with 10 left. A run puts us ahead.

86-78. We had to work for this one. 22, 6 for Sims in only 20 minutes, due to fouls. 18, 6 for Milt from the bench, 13, 2, 4 for Smid. Akpo was sleep walking, 6 and 7 in 33 minutes.

+10 RBs but 16 TOs again. So frustrating! We outshot them and hit 11 threes.

4-9 , 0-2 Arizona, there. They are having a really off year. They have an excellent PG but he doesn't get much help. This is a road game we should win.

The rogue planet is definitely smaller than Earth, but only a little. Too far away to know much nut it is not radioactive and there's nothing obviously dangerous or even weird about it. It will be awhile before we know much else. We're too far away to send a probe.