I'll Be a Son of a Shark

[CoachC]

Feb 5: The Chickens lost on the road last night to Asheville, giving us a 1 game lead in the standings over Coastal Carolina and Longwood. High Point and the Blue Hose are 2 games back. Should be an interesting race the rest of the way. Despite the win over Presbyterian, our two disappointing road losses dropped our RPI to 62. Longwood is at 78, and Presbyterian at 94 as the other Big South teams in the top 100.

We are still 2nd in the nation in Turnovers at 10.7 despite the ball-handling problems we had on the recent road trip. We are 3rd nationally in assists(16.8), 9th in forced turnovers (17.2), 15th in steals(7.9), and 20th in scoring (72.6). We are also first in the nation in fewest live ball turnovers allowing just 3.5 steals/g by the opposition.

[CoachC]

Larry: Back on the road again. We defeated the Flames 54-40 our place. Another low scoring game this time, Coach?

Gary: Probably, Larry. Liberty plays very good defense but struggles on the offensive end. They like to press a lot, so taking care of the ball and getting our usual turnover advantage will be a big key along with getting some balanced scoring from our offense. We plan to give Sheals a start in this one, and see how O'Conner responds to coming off the bench.

We had perhaps our worst shooting half of the season in this one, shooting just 22.9 % from the field and had to hit a couple of shots at the end to bring it up THAT high. Ike Jeffers was an uncharacteristic 0 for 7 from the field and went scoreless. They went to zone early in the contest, and with us unable to shoot them out of it, they stuck with it the rest of the half. We need a couple of guys to get hot in the 2nd half.

At intermission we trail 21-28.

Our offense continued to struggle in the 2nd half, shooting just 28.6% for the game. Our defense in the second half was outstanding though, and we pounded the offensive boards (rebounding 44-40, 17-9). We turned them over JUST enough times to pull out an ugly win on the road.

Our point guards had a rough time in this game with no assists and 8 turnovers between them. Battle did have 15 points and 5 rebounds however.

Felts led us with 19 pts but took 20 shots to get there.

Jeffers struggled from the field (2-14) and at the line (4-8) but added 9 points, all in the 2nd half.

Sheals responded to his start with 13 rebounds. O'Conner finally showed some life in the 2nd half off the bench and finished with 7 pts, 8 rebs. So for the time being we'll leave Sheals in the starting lineup.

Moore and Brown did their usual dependable job grabbing rebounds and playing defense.

An ugly road win, but any road win is a good one.

Final:

G-W 62 Liberty 52

[CoachC]

Feb 9: The other 4 contenders all won as well last night, leaving the top of the conference race unchanged.

[fondfoat]

Great work Coach.

After reading through your whole thread this morning, you have inspired me to buy the game. So a rookie coach thread coming up

[Wayne23]

Great news. We'll look forward to reading it.

[CoachC]

You'll very much enjoy the game, fondfoat! Good luck!

[CoachC]

Larry: Next to last home game of the season. Looking for the season sweep of the Buccaneers.

Gary: Yes. We need better post defense in this one though. Their center Adras had a career high 20 against us at their place. He's a good player, but he's not THAT good.

We began the half very chilly from the field for about the first 12 minutes before a few transition baskets out of the Amoeba got us jump-started. We also played a little more man in the first half tonight than we have been and the switching defense seemed to confuse them and shut down their offense just as ours starting running.

At the half we lead 37-20.

A very off night shooting for us, just over 38% from the field, but the defense was strong enough to carry us, holding them to just over 36% and turning them over 20 times on 9 steals.

Jeffers provided most of our offense with 27 points, 5 rebs as our onlyplayer in double figures. Moore was exemplary as a role players as usual with 7 points, 3 asts, 4 rebs, and 4 steals. Everyone else contributed something, even if they couldn't get the ball in the basket and we emptied the bench in the last 4 minutes.

Final:

G-W 68 CS 49

[CoachC]

Longwood lost on the road last night, and the Chanticleers lost at home to our next opponent, High Point, giving us a 2 game lead over the 4 teams now tied for 2nd. We and Longwood remain as the only conference teams undefeated at home this season.

Our RPI has rebounded now back to 41.

[CoachC]

Larry: Tough assignment tonight against a very well coached Panthers team that has been red-hot, and that has been doing it without 2 time conference player of the year, Rod Jones.

Gary: Yes, indeed. I have the utmost respect for coach Thompson. And Rod Jones is a very special player. Since he broke his finger in the Presbyterian game they've gone on to win 4 straight, and have likely lost him for the season. Hudson has really stepped up for them in Jones' absence and has won player of the week the last two weeks. He's been most of their offense, but they still haven't been headed.

Larry: We played more man to man last time out against Charleston Southern. Will that continue tonight?

Gary: I think so, Larry, as long as we stay out of foul trouble. I'm sure we'll probably be still playing some 1-3-1, but Hudson demands to be bodied up in man. Hopefully we can contain him as best we can and not let anyone else get away from us. We have to get out of the shooting slump we've been in lately though. O'Conner is still being hesitant to take the ball to the rim, even though we've been doing a much better job of getting him the ball. We've been working with him a lot individually, but he seems to be having a confidence issue right now. We need him. It's hard to win championships without some sort of post presence, and right now we've become very much a perimeter team, which makes it much easier for teams to defend us.

Larry: Good luck, Coach. Let's get our 2nd straight season sweep of an opponent.

We come out for once with a hot shooting first half (62.5%) and it's no coincidence that both O'Conner and Brown were looking to take the ball to the basket, which opened things up for Jeffers and company on the perimeter and got us to the line 16 times. Our defense needs to be better in the 2nd half, but wasn't horrible. We were just +1 on turnovers though, which is usually not a good indicator for us. Playing much more man again our guards stayed out of foul trouble, with only O'Conner and Sheals picking up 2 fouls. Hudson was reasonably contained with just 8 points (6 of them on threes on their first 2 possessions of the game), but they were getting balanced scoring from everyone else.

At the half we lead 44-34.

Our defense just could not get the job done in the 2nd half. Hudson had 21 points, but I will give him credit as we stayed in his jersey all night long and tried different guys on him. Bart King added 16 for them though and that was the difference as we did a poor job stopping him in the post. Their 38 points in the paint was entirely too many Our final turnover differential was still only +1 and when that happens we usually lose. Our shooting cooled down in the 2nd half, but our offense wasn't the problem other than 13 turnovers which was a few too many.

Josh O'Conner at least took something from our individual workouts, however and was taking the ball to the rim better than he has at any time since early in the season and led us with 19 points. Battle added 18, Jeffers 13, and Josh Brown had 8 pts, 8 rebs off the bench. This High Point team is playing with a lot of confidence and determination right now with the loss of Jones. No one is going to want to face them in the conference tournament.

We come up a bit short in this one.

Final:
G-W 75 HP 77

[CoachC]

Feb 16: Coastal Carolina and Longwood both lost on the road last night as well, and we now have a 1 game lead over Presbyterian and High Point tied for 2nd. Coastal Carolina and Longwood remain 2 games out with 2 games remaining.