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

[PointGuard]

Seattle Redhawks (23-6) vs Seton Hall Pirates (16-12)—Seattle played a good first half, opening a 12 point lead and settling for a 34-29 halftime advantage. But Seton Hall tuned up their shooting in the second half, and together with some help from the refs (11 more trips to the line and 8 resulting points that Seattle got) and Seattle making too many turnovers, took the lead and never looked back. The Pirates cruised to a 73-60 win and a #12 seed in the tournament. Andy Hines scored 26 (he was 8 for 11 from beyond the arc) for Seton Hall. He was matched by Adam Givens’ 26 points for Seattle. Seattle's brilliant season came to a crashing end first in the Great West Tourny and finally in the NCAA play-in game.

[PointGuard]

#4 seed Chicago State Cougars (20-11) vs #1 seed Drexel Dragons(20-11)—Drexel lived up to their seeding by jumping out on top and never giving up the lead. By the end of the first half they led 37-28. Their lead grew to as much as 19 in the 2nd half and Drexel won by a score of 71-57. The only team statistic for which they did not have an advantage was turnovers (18-10). Torrey Smith scorched the nets for 31 points (in 22 minutes of play) for Drexel. Bo Adams pulled down 16 boards for Drexel. Antonio Booker’s 15 points were high for Chicago State. Chicago State goes home but should be satisfied to have had such a good season.

[PointGuard]

Game #31; Mar. 17, 2016: #10 seed Notre Dame Fighting Irish (18-13) vs # 7 seed and #20 ranked CSU Bakersfield Roadrunners (23-7)

It’s been two weeks since we played our last game. The Irish are led by SF J. R. Degala who has scored 19.5 ppg and hauled down 6.7 rpg. Degala is a hard-worker, who was redshirted and then improved his play and statistics each of the succeeding 4 years. Notre Dame employs the 1-2-2 zone defense, which we just haven’t shot well against this year.

Notre Dame brings a huge fan base to the game which almost makes this a home game for them.

Marcus Evans (covering J.R. Degala) picked up 2 fouls in 1-1/2 minutes of play. His replacement, Isaac Bryson, was charged with his 2nd foul at the 15:27 mark. Degala is a freakin’ foul magnet.

Notre Dame held the lead throughout most of the first half, sometimes growing it to as much as 10 points. They hit 62% of their FG attempts. We were called for 11 fouls (4 of our players had 2 called against them) so that Notre Dame was awarded 10 more trips to the line and scored 8 more points on free throws than did we. We also were out-rebounded 18-10. We did achieve a 9-5 turnover advantage. Other than that we were scrappy, so that we finished the half only down by 5 points, 36-31. Even though double-teamed, J. R. Degala scored 11 points. Randy Durham was our leading scorer with 9 points. During the half, I praised the team and told them to just go out there and play defense and box out to control the boards and that Notre Dame cannot continue to shoot like they did in the first have and we will win.

We tied the game at 41-41 with 14 minutes on the clock. We took a 46-45 lead with 10:10 to play. But Notre Dame didn’t buckle. They stuck back and took the lead again and held off every attempt we made to regain it.

Final Score: Notre Dame-66, CSU Bakersfield-61. CSU Bakersfield season record: 23-8.

Scoring leaders: Durham-17.

Rebound leaders: Pastner-5, Calton-5, Jrl Brown-5.

Assist leaders: Durham-7, Jrl Brown-4.

Player of the Game: Notre Dame’s SF J. R. Degala-16 pts, 5 reb, 4 assists.

Coach’s Pat on the Back Award: PG Randy Durham-17 pts, 4 reb, 7 assists, 2 steals.

Other notes: We successfully hampered Notre Dame’s shooting in the 2nd half as they hit 42% of their shots in the 2nd half. We fought them to a virtual draw on the boards in the 2nd half. We forced them to make more turnovers than did we. But…we were unable to shoot well enough to drive a stake in their heart when we made our run midway through the 2nd half. Our downfall was our shooting woes (41% for the game).

So our season is done, but overall it was one for which our players can be proud.

[PointGuard]

Albany-81, New Mexico State-77

[PointGuard]

Oklahoma State-63, Yale-62

[PointGuard]

#1 seed Indiana-84, #3 seed Kentucky-62

#2 seed Michigan-71, #2 seed Duke-63

[PointGuard]

#1 seed Indiana-97, #2 seed Michigan-63

[Wayne23]

Great season, PG.

[PointGuard]

2nd Team All-American: Jerell Brown

Great West Defensive Player of the Year: Randy Durham

Great West 1st Team All-Conference: Jerell Brown

Great West 2nd Team All-Conference: Randy Durham

Great West 2nd Team All-Conference: Marcus Evans

[PointGuard]

Four schools show interest in hiring me to be their head coach, but after careful consideration, I decide to remain at CSU Bakersfield another year. Next year should have a lot of challenges since there will be so many new faces on the team.

Following an exhausting FULL year of recruiting, my 2nd Assistant Coach and recruiting coordinator, Larry McIntyre, informs me he will be retiring at the end of this year.

I promote 3rd Assistant Greg Dye to 2nd Assistant.

I hire 40 year old Jon Carroll as my new 3rd Assistant Coach. He will become my recruiting coordinator.