Philly Gym Rat (The Perry “QM” McMullin Story)

[PointGuard]

Go for it. I don't want to post any of my results tonight anyway (even though I did play some games).

I like the suit that's begun against the NCAA by players who don't feel it was right for the NCAA to let Electronic Arts use the players' likenesses (faces and uniform numbers) without the players' consent or any compensation. I'm sure the NCAA got money from EA but it was not what EA would have had to pay if it had had to pay the individual players.

[Wayne23]

The next time the NCAA acts in the players' interest will be the first, or at least the first in several decades.

[PointGuard]

Game #16; Jan. 10, 2016: #24 CSU Bakersfield Roadrunners (12-3, 1-1) at Houston Baptist Huskies (8-7, 1-1)

The Huskies’ SF Aaron Renn (last season’s Great West Freshman of the Year) is scoring 18.2 ppg but is putting up a lot of shots to get those points. So we’ll hope he continues to hit a low percentage of his shots and not double team him unless he gets hot.

We struggled early, and trailed narrowly until midway through the first half. Jerell Brown picked up 2 fouls in the first 5 minutes of play. Our defense smothered the Huskies and we began hitting our shots during the final 10 minutes of play and we gradually extended our lead until the halftime buzzer. We left the floor with a 40-25 lead as we hit 50% of our shots while Houston Baptist only knocked down 27% of theirs. Mitchell Jarmond scored 12 to lead our scoring.

Although Houston Baptist began shooting better in the 2nd half, we maintained a double digit lead throughout most of the half and re-established a big lead as the half drew down.

Final Score: CSU Bakersfield-76, Houston Baptist-60. CSU Bakersfield season record: 13-3; Great West record: 2-1 (3rd place tie).

Scoring leaders: Jrl Brown-18, Evans-17, Jarmond-12.

Rebound leaders: Saunders-6, Pastner-5, Evans-5.

Assist leaders: Durham-4, Bryson-3.

Player of the Game: SG Jerell Brown-18 pts, 4 reb, 1 assist, 1 steal.

Coach’s Pat on the Back Award: SF/SG Marcus Evans-17 pts, 5 reb, 1 assist.

Other notes: We hit 49% our FG attempts. The Huskies improved their shooting in the 2nd half and finished by hitting 39% of their shots. We out-rebounded Houston Baptist 31-28. Both teams turned the ball over 14 times. Uncharacteristically, we got more 5 more free throws than our opponent and scored 10 more points from the line. We scored 28 points in the paint to 8 for the Huskies.

[PointGuard]

Game #17; Jan. 13, 2016: North Dakota Fighting Sioux (6-10, 0-3) at #24 CSU Bakersfield Roadrunners (13-3, 2-1)

Three minutes into the game we held a 10-0 lead. We expanded our lead to as much as 18 points in the first half, hitting 56% of our shots compared to North Dakota’s 36% shooting, controlling the boards 18-12, and having a 7-4 turnover advantage. We held a 45-28 halftime lead. Jerell Brown and Marcus Evans both scored 9 points for us.

We slacked off in the 2nd half and let North Dakota creep to within 6 points before waking up and re-establishing a commanding lead.

Final Score: CSU Bakersfield-73, North Dakota-53. CSU Bakersfield season record: 14-3; Great West record: 3-1 (2nd place tie).

Scoring leaders: Durham-18, Evans-13, Jrl Brown-11, Bryson-9.

Rebound leaders: Jarmond-6, Evans-6, Saunders-5.

Assist leaders: Durham-4, Jrl Brown-4, Jarmond-3.

Player of the Game: PG Randy Durham-18 pts, 4 assists, 3 steals.

Coach’s Pat on the Back Award: PF Mitchell Jarmond-6 pts, 6 reb, 3 assists, 3 steals.

Other notes: Even though we played poorly through much of the 2nd half, we still finished the game by hitting 47% of our shots. North Dakota hit 38% of theirs. We pulled down 33 rebounds to the Fighting Sioux’s 29. We forced them to turn the ball over 23 times while we made 13.

We climbed to #22 in the Media Poll and made it into the Coaches Poll also at #24. Our RPI remained 9th best in the country.

[PointGuard]

Thus far Jerell Brown, Randy Durham, and Marcus Evans have each been named Great West Conference Player of the Week once.

[PointGuard]

Game #18; Jan. 17, 2016: #22 CSU Bakersfield Roadrunners (14-3, 3-1) at Seattle Redhawks (14-3, 4-0)

We take on the league-leading Seattle Redhawks. Seattle’s 3-2 zone may give us problems. Their SG Adam Givens is scoring 26.9 ppg. He is hitting for a high percentage and has games of 45, 42, and 38, so we will need to keep him from lighting things up.

Both teams shot well in the first half (52% for us, 50% for Seattle), but we held a small lead throughout most of the half and went to the break with a 40-35 advantage. Jerell Brown scored 15 and Randy Durham added 10 for us. Adam Givens scored 14 for Seattle.

We held our lead until Seattle crept ahead 56-54 with 7:25 remaining. Seattle then lept ahead 67-56 with 4:15 to go as our shots weren’t falling and the refs were awarding Seattle with repeated trips to the line. We cut their lead to 3, but Seattle scored inside with 31 seconds to play to give them a 70-65 lead. We fouled and they made both shots to put it out of reach. Our 3 pointer with 4 seconds left meant nothing. We dropped 2 games behind the league leaders.

Final Score: Seattle-72, CSU Bakersfield-68. CSU Bakersfield season record: 14-4; Great West record: 3-2 (2nd place tie).

Scoring leaders: Jrl Brown-27, Durham-17.

Rebound leaders: Jrl Brown-9, Saunders-6, Jarmond-5.

Assist leaders: Durham-9.

Player of the Game: Seattle’s SG Adam Given-24 pts, 5 reb, 3 assists.

Coach’s Pat on the Back Award: PG Randy Durham-17 pts, 3 reb, 9 assists, 2 blocks.

Other notes: We lost our shooting eyes in the 2nd half to finish the game hitting 46% while Seattle hit 48%. We turned the ball over 15 times and Seattle had only 11 turnovers. The big difference in the game, though, was that we were whistled for 17 fouls, but Seattle got only 7 called against them. That meant we went to the line 6 times (hitting 4) and Seattle paraded to the line 22 times (hitting 16). That 12 point advantage was our destruction.

[PointGuard]

Game #19; Jan. 20, 2016: at CSU Bakersfield Roadrunners (14-4, 3-2) at TX Pan American Broncos (6-12, 1-4)

Argh…a second straight conference road game.

We dominated the first half. First we completely controlled the boards, 24-9, including pulling down 12 offensive rebounds (which was critical since we only hit 36% of our FG attempts). Next even though we turned the ball over more than I liked (7 times), we forced the Broncos to make 10 turnovers. Additionally our defense held the Broncos’ shooting to 33%. Finally, we got 16 trips to the line (sinking 13) while the Broncos only got 9 foul shots (making 8). We pulled away to a couple 18 point leads and finished the half ahead 41-26. Jerell Brown tossed in 14 points for us.

We increased our lead to 25 and then continually rotated subs into the lineup. TX Pan American shot better in the 2nd half, but the game was never in doubt.

Final Score: #22 CSU Bakersfield-83, TX Pan American-65. CSU Bakersfield season record: 15-4; Great West record: 4-2 (2nd place tie).

Scoring leaders: Jrl Brown-23, Evans-12, Calton-12.

Rebound leaders: Calton-6, Saunders-6, Evans-6, Jrl Brown-6, Durham-6.

Assist leaders: Benjamin-4, Durham-3, Evans-3.

Player of the Game: SG Jerell Brown-23 pts, 6 reb, 2 assists, 1 steal.

Coach’s Pat on the Back Award: PF Awvee Calton-12 pts, 6 reb, 1 block.

Other notes: Both teams hit 42% of their shots, but we got many more attempts since we dominated the boards 43-20 and had a 17-13 turnover advantage. We scored 34 points in the paint and had 21 second chance points.

[PointGuard]

Jerell Brown’s statistics show that even though he continues to score well, his FG% remains low (39%) and it’s being dragged down by his particularly low 3-point shooting this year (29%). I’m concerned that this will keep him from being a high draft choice and will limit his success in the NBA, so I again call him in to discuss this.

I again suggest that he work more on improving his driving to the hoop. He’s unconvinced, but grudgingly agrees to work on it.

[PointGuard]

Game #20; Jan. 24, 2016: Utah Valley Wolverines (11-8, 4-2) at #22 CSU Bakersfield Roadrunners (15-4, 4-2)

The two teams are playing for sole possession of 2nd place. Josh Brown hasn’t been playing much, but his play merits a start at center, so Mark Saunders will be on the bench to begin tonight’s game.

We clamped down defensively the entire first half, holding the Wolverines to 23% shooting and forcing them to turn the ball over 8 times. We only hit 37% of our shots, but that was good enough to hold a double digit lead through the latter half of the first period and head off court with a 29-16 advantage. Marcus Evans scored 9 points to lead our scoring.

The 2nd half mirrored the first as we won easily.

Final Score: CSU Bakersfield-61, Utah Valley-40. CSU Bakersfield season record: 16-4; Great West record: 5-2 (2nd place).

Scoring leaders: Jrl Brown-18, Evans-14.

Rebound leaders: Jrl Brown-8, Jsh Brown-5, Saunders-5, Jarmond-5.

Assist leaders: Durham-3.

Player of the Game: SG Jerell Brown-18 pts, 8 reb, 1 assist, 3 steals.

Coach’s Pat on the Back Award: SF/SG Marcus Evans-14 pts, 1 assist, 2 steals.

Other notes: FG%: 38% for us, 28% for Utah Valley. Rebounds even, but we held an 18-12 turnover advantage.

[PointGuard]

Game #21; Jan. 27, 2016: Chicago State Cougars (13-7, 3-4) at #22 CSU Bakersfield Roadrunners (16-4, 5-2)

We’re looking for some payback for the 67-50 drubbing we took against the Cougars earlier this year. After reeling off 3 straight wins to begin conference play, Chicago State has lost their last 4 games with anemic offense. Amazingly their RPI remains 38th best in the country (not sure what to make of that…maybe the RPI computer is having problems, but since two of those losses were against Seattle and New Jersey Tech, that could possibly be why their RPI remains solid). I tell the guys to play tough because Chicago State is likely to be focused on getting a win to turn things around.

We turned 7 Cougar turnovers into a 17-4 lead with 11:44 to go in the first half. We let that good fortune slip away as our offense went to sleep and with 5 minutes to go, our lead was down to one. We pulled away, but our foul shooting (4 for 11, we missed the first shot of 3 straight 1-and-1’s in the last 90 seconds) kept things close (31-27) at the end of the half. Chicago State outshot us (46% to 38%) and out-rebounded us (20-16), but turned the ball over 15 times (to our 5). Marcus Evans was our top scorer with 9 points. I blistered the players at the half about their lackluster performance.

Jerell Brown scored our first 9 points of the 2nd half to give us a 40-31 lead. We also came out attacking the boards. Chicago State then made a run to take a 46-45 lead with 9:15 to play. We began hitting our shots again and jumped back on top 53-48 with 4:06 left.

With 2 minutes on the clock our lead was down to 3. Awvee got a tip in with 1:40 on the clock to make the score 55-50. Chicago State hit two free throws to make the score 55-52 with 1:29 left. We brought it up court and Jerrell took a pass just to the right of key and canned a jumper giving us a 57-52 lead. Another foul against us, another 2 points for the Cougars with 59 seconds to go. The Cougars fouled quickly. Michael Curry missed the first of a 1-and-1 and Chicago State rebounded and called a time out.

Chicago State hit a 3 with 26 seconds to play to knot the score at 57-57. I called a time out to settle down the team and have them hold onto the ball until the last few seconds. We threw the ball away with 10 seconds left, and the Cougars worked the ball around and then inside for their center to drop in a 7’ jumper off the backboard with 1 second on the clock.

Final Score: Chicago State-59, CSU Bakersfield-57. CSU Bakersfield season record: 16-5; Great West record: 5-3 (2nd place tie).

Scoring leaders: Jrl Brown-21, Evans-13, Calton-11.

Rebound leaders: Calton-9, Jrl Brown-7, Saunders-6.

Assist leaders: Durham-5.

Player of the Game: Chicago State’s PG Gerald Woods-12 pts, 8 reb, 4 assists.

Coach’s Pat on the Back Award: SG Jerell Brown-21 pts, 7 reb, 2 assists, 4 steals, 1 block.

Other notes: We shot poorly (38%), got out-rebounded (39-34), made 6 fewer points at the free throw line (we only converted 7 of 15 at the line and missed several front ends of 1-and-1 opportunites), and got out-shot from beyond the arc (40% to 14%). The only place we excelled was turnovers where we had a 22-12 advantage. We deserved to lose when we couldn’t turn that kind of turnover advantage into a big lead at home.

Jerell Brown played an outstanding game both offensively and defensively, and Awvee Calton attacked the boards well and scored well. But not much positive could be said for the rest of our team.

The loss dropped us 2 games behind league-leading Seattle.

Our RPI dropped to 10 and we slid to 23rd in the Media Poll and 25th in the Coaches Poll.