Navy's starting lineup - they only need 4My apologies, dear readers, for the....shall we say...concise previews lately. This will be another one to that effect, but starting next week I'm going to kick things back into gear and bring these entries back to their glory days. Until then, everything you need to know about how to sink Navy's ship tonight after the jump!
- Chris Harris. Chris Harris is a force. Chris Harris is a beast. Chris Harris is the leading scorer in the Patriot League, and has been all season. As Bill so eloquently said before, when Chris Harris realized teammate Kaleo Kina graduated, he simply decided to double his scoring output to compensate. While we were busy teaching Holy Cross a lesson in basketball on Saturday, Navy was coming from behind to beat their archrival, Army, in Annapolis on the back of roughly 30 points from Harris. It's totally possible to shut Harris down. We shut down Kyle Roemer at Colgate fairly well, and we shut down Devin Brown of Holy Cross during the second half beautifully. Chris Harris is neither of these guys, however. I say if we can keep Harris to roughly 15 points, we can win this game. I doubt the Midshipmen can win on the back of leading scorer #2, Jordan Sugars, alone. But we need to be on him like flies on a camel. Why? Watch Chris Harris make an insane shot at the buzzer to beat Quinnipiac earlier this season:
- Consistency. One of the biggest reasons I know this is a young team is the Jekyll/Hyde effect. We played a really complete game vs. Holy Cross. Lumpkins, Vlad, Hendra were forces. McCormack, Munoz, and Hill had solid games. Everyone hustled, everyone played well. We kept turnovers down and killed them on the boards. We've done that before this season, and then turned around and lost unimaginably easy games directly afterwards (Depaul, then UMBC at home, for instance). If we can play like we did against Holy Cross, I think we can put together our first win streak of the season. If we let Mr. Hyde rear his ugly head, however, there a snowball's chance in hell of us downing the 9-11 Midshipmen this evening.
- Blue Crew. I'd like tho think that on Saturday the Blue Crew was a crucial sixth man. While the great crowd might not have been the be-all-end-all game changer, I definitely think that they energized our guys and helped ensure all pistons would be firing for all forty minutes. I'd really like to see another great crowd, although it isn't Phil Bender. Let's show Navy how BLUE a REAL American can be!
- Experience. I'd just like to highlight that the Midshipmen are running a fairly experience squad with a number of seniors. A solid win against them will prove that our young team can stand toe-to-toe with anyone in the League, and that will be a huge confidence boost.
- First Round Tournament Game. It was recently asked on this blog what the chances of us hosting a first-round Patriot League tournament game would be. I'm going to wait until after tonight's game to reserve final judgment, since if we can string together a win streak tonight I'd say our chances are decent. We've never failed to finish in the top-4 of the Patriot League before, and my fingers are crossed that that won't be broken this year.
- BB&T Classic. I'd just like to take this opportunity to complain again how Navy gets to participate in the BB&T Classic at the Verizon Center, while we haven't been invited in a number of years. Just one more reason I want to see a win tonight.
Let's Go Eagles,
Josh
Honest Question: Will there be more students at the game or in the Tavern watching the State of the Union (assuming they will show it in the Tavern)? My heart wants to say the game, but my head says the latter.
ReplyDeleteHere is my own good and ugly:
ReplyDeleteGood: Vlad, stayed out of foul trouble, made his shots and in particular free throws.
Lump:
OK: Riley: 4 got 4 but no rebounds, at 6'11" he should get 5 rebounds by accident.
Bad: the rest
Luptak: 22 minutes 3 pts.
McCormack: 26 minutes 4 pts.
MUNOZ: 25 minutes 1 pt
Nick: 27 minutes 2 pts.
Wilson/Fisher 9 minutes 0 pts
Hill: 20 minutes 0 pts.
Total 129 10 pts.
The equivalent of almost three people and 10 pts. Stop Vlad and the rest can't score. Two shooting guards (Joe Hill/Nick) take 4 shots in 47 minutes? The ofense from the others needs to pick up....
I respectfully disagree with some of your analysis, Anonymous. Riley was definitely a good - Jones praised him highly in the post game press conference and it was him, not Lump, that was picked as the second player to address the media with Vlad. I honestly am SHOCKED at some of your bad picks, particularly Danny, Joe, and Simon. It's not all about points. Danny was a great floor general tonight (3 ast, only 2 TO, and 3 steals). Joe and Simon, despite only scoring four pts combined, played damn good defense on Harris throughout the game. Nick and Luptak could've been better, but I'd say the only REAL bad thing about this game was a) the officiating crew was pretty terrible and b) we need to stop turning the ball over.
ReplyDeleteI think Nick Hendra was really stung by those two travelling calls against Holy Cross. They were both mysteries. And both of them occurred on the perimeter without much pressure.
ReplyDeleteIn this game, it seemed as if he was haunted by those calls. So afraid of being called, he was being oh so careful. He certainly wasn't about to make a move to the basket.
Hopefully, he will be able to shrug it off, because we need him to take his moments. Not to force the issue if nothing is there, but to move well without the ball so when he sees an advantage, he can take it.
We wound up with only Vlad feeling comfortable enough to put the ball on the floor in a forward (as opposed to lateral) manner.
Aside from Vlad scoring, another very good game for assist totals. Some real fine teamwork. Unfortunately, too much inhibition on offense also leads to turnovers.
I was very glad to see Riley look at the basket. he doesn't have to shoot, but he shouldn't pretend it doesn't exist.
And.... I still love it when Lump gets the ball at the foul line. He is such a good passer. It only happened twice, near the end of the game, but each time it led to a basket.
Thanks for the great comments here folks, I may synthesize some of this into the post later!
ReplyDeleteIt's not all about offense but you can't have 3/5 of the players on the floor not even be threats to score and not even be threats to take shots seemingly. Stop Vlad and Lump and the rest can't step in. 4 shots from 2 players in 47 minutes. C'mon that is not going to win against good teams who can make the right adjustments as we have seen in the out of conference games,
ReplyDelete