I'll Be a Son of a Shark

[CoachC]

Thx, Wayne.

[CoachC]

Larry: 8 in a row, coach! What can you tell us about VMI?

Gary: The Keydets have been struggling on the road, but have been terrific here at home, going undefeated thus far this season, with easy wins over Arizona St. and USC. They've made this not a nice place to play. Their struggles on the road have mostly been on the offensive end. They are heavily perimeter oriented, but don't shoot the 3 especially well, so we will stick with the zone in the first half and see how it goes. Defensively they have been very good all year, especially here. We have our work cut out for us. If Pac 12 teams can come in here and get man-handled, so can we. We need to get everyone involved in the offense again. Last game we relied too heavily on Ike. Our offense is most effective when we have balanced scoring, especially when O'Conner establishes an inside presence for us.

Offensively in the first half we shot a cool 40% but with O'Conner more active inside we did get to the line 17 times. Now we (mainly Godzilla) need to start making more of them. I felt they got into the seams of our zone a little too much in the first half, so we probably will play more man in the 2nd half. We held our own on the boards though, and turned them over 12 times At halftime we lead 32-24.

Our defense wasn't as good in this one, but we did get balanced scoring which usually bodes well for us. We outrebounded them 30-27, 11-6 and turned them over 19 times with 8 steals. We were able to withstand a 2nd half run by the Keydets to pull out again in the final minutes

Jeffers had a fine all around game 20 pts, 3 asts, 6 rebs, 2 stls
Felts added 18.
Battle had 15 pts, 4 asts and just 1 turnover in 25 minutes
O'Conner was just 5 for 11 at the line but did still get 9 points as he was more active on the offensive end in this one.
Brown and Moore did their usual thing on the boards and on defense and Sheals gave us 8 quality minutes again off the bench.

We win our 9th straight in a snake pit

Final G-W 76 VMI 67

[CoachC]

Jan 12: at 4-0 we are in first a game up over the Big Blue Chickens and 2 games up over the 8 teams tied at 2-2.

We are 9th nationally in assists, 2nd in turnovers, and 7th in forced turnovers.

Turnover differential remains our calling card.

[Tim Moungey]

Turnover differential remains our calling card.

Interestingly enough, this is the core principle of Jestorball at the PB level, particularly ball security. If we're not leading the league in fewest turnovers surrendered, I tend to get very grumpy.

[CoachC]

Me too, Tim. Even when I'm coaching under my own philosophies I detest turnovers with a passion.

[Wayne23]

TOs drive coaches nuts, the hoops equivalent of bases on balls.

[CoachC]

Larry: A little early yet perhaps to call this a huge game, but a win tonight over the Chanticlers does give us a 2 game lead in the conference standings.

Gary: Yes, it's hard to call any game this early in the conference season a must win. But we've gone 10-0 here at Porter Arena, and it's very important for us to keep that going. It's nice to finally have most of the student's back as well. We're encouraged by the support the program has been receiving this year from students and the community. We want them to leave here every time, happy and excited and to keep the support growing.

Larry: about 3200 expected tonight in attendance. Bigger crowds than this program has had in quite a while.

Gary: Indeed. Still not close to a full house, but enough of a crowd to be aware of them.

Larry: The Chanticleers like to run the floor and are 2nd in the league in scoring. How do we match up?

Gary: They do like to run the ball, and on the half-court they try to move ball around a lot and get shots for McIntyre and Eyres. They also lead the league in steals and are second to us in forced turnovers, so taking care of the ball is going to be important for us tonight, because that's a big part of their game. We've been winning games largely because of turnover differential, and we need to continue that to be successful. We also need to do a good job on the boards. They are last in the league in offensive rebounding, but as you know defensive rebounding hasn't been a strength for us. We need to get to the defensive boards tonight, create some fast-break opportunities, and not let them have 2nd cracks at the basket

Larry: The paper in Myrtle Beach is a bit upset with you for constantly referring to the Chanticleers as "the Big Blue Chickens".

Gary: Yeah, well. I wonder what their SID says when people ask him what a Chanticleer is.

Larry: I asked him.

Gary: and..?

Larry: He said it's a Big Blue Chicken.

Gary: Well, there ya go!


Neither team shot the ball well in the first half, but we out rebounded them 19-12,5-2 and turned them over 12 times on 6 steals for a half-time margin of 38-26.

Even better defense, and some great shooting in the 2nd half allowed us to run away and hide. With a 29 point lead we emptied the bench with about 7 minutes to go and gave some guys a chance to do something, and a few at least tried, which was encouraging. With so many DNPs among them you'd think they'd be chomping at the bit.

For once none of our top 7 players had to play more than 27 minutes.

Felts led 19 pts, 5 rebs
Battle added 15
Jeffers 11

O'Conner would have easily had a double double if we had any reason to leave him in, but wound up with 8 pts, 10 rebs.

Sheals once again provided some quality minutes off the bench while the game was still being contested. Now we just need to find someone on the perimeter that will allow us to rest that part of our rotation a few minutes a game.

Final:

G-W 85 CC 61

[CoachC]

Jan. 15: at 5-0 we are 2 games up on the 5 teams tied for 2nd at 3-2.

Our RPI has now risen to 41st.

[CoachC]

Larry: Picked 11th preseason, not much has been expected from the Eagles this season.

Gary: No, but they do have a winning home record, and don't turn the ball over much. As always we can't take a night off on the road and expect to win.

We came out flat on both ends in this one, and did a poor job on the defensive boards. We played a bit better as the half continued but we find ourselves trailing at halftime 29-34.

We never looked good in this one, and didn't manage to get it together enough in the 2nd half ever to make a serious run.

Felts had 18, Jeffers 19 and 4 steals but did not shoot the ball all at well.

Nobody else stepped up offensively, and with O'Conner and Battle both getting in serious foul trouble in the 2nd half, our small margin of error with such a short bench evaporated completely.

Disappointing loss and our worst showing in over a month.

Final:

G-W 62 Winthrop 71

[CoachC]

Jan. 19th: Gilchrist was moaning about how he's a better point guard than Feeley and deserves minutes. I called him in and told him if he ever got to the point he could play better than our ball boy he could run his mouth. Until then I expected him to keep his big trap shut or risk spending the rest of his senior year as a non-athlete student.