BigSammyK

Jerome still double dribbled...

5 years to the day since McLemore broke his leg. Let’s stop playing in February 17…

That FIU court though... yikes.

17 hours ago, cole256 said:

This is such an Auburn fan post

Well gee -- imagine that. An "Auburn fan post" on an Auburn fan message board. Weird.

Anyone who likes to claim our guards are too small to compete should go watch what Markquis Nowell did against Michigan State last night. 5'8" and just scored 20 points with 19 assists and only 2 turnovers.

The offense was atrocious but did we make any defensive adjustments to stop Mark? He just straight up shot over anyone we put on him except for one possession where we had Flanagan on him. That blew my mind. They didn’t have another legit scoring threat out there for a solid 10-12 minute stretch. 

Yet another game that we lost in the last 4 minutes of the first half. 

Why take out Broome on that timeout? Don’t understand that one at all. 

They simply did not officiate any of those plays well yesterday. The foul they called on KD when Vescovi hit the three was incredibly soft and that free throw was a massive point. 

He looked great in Israel. I hate this injury for him and this team -- we'd be very different if he could log serious minutes.

Two straight games that we lost in the first half. College basketball is won and lost with guard play and ours just isn't good enough. 

8 minutes ago, NWALA Tiger said:

Fair point. However, I disagree that he is out there for his offense or potential offense.. Nothing I've seen from him lately screams he is the answer to our offensive woes.. With him, it's mostly head down 100 MPH to the basket and hoping for a foul. Also, I said he plays hard on Defense,  not necessarily smart. Big difference 

 

Yeah, I mean, offensively it's obviously not working... but I do believe that's the hope. He averaged 13 ppg two years ago and 12 last year. Seems like defenses have figured him out. I just don't think any coach in the country is putting him out there to play "hard" on defense knowing that he costs us a lot of points.

4 hours ago, NWALA Tiger said:

Cause he plays hard on defense. That's Pearl's mantra for KD.  Play hard on defense... Bull in a china shop on offense.

Disagree. KD is a liability on defense because of his constant efforts to make steals that just aren't going to happen resulting in us having to rotate to cover for him when he ends up out of position. Watch him closely and you'll see that more often than not he's asking for someone to take his man because he's lost position.

He's out there because this offense desperately needs someone that can step up and make plays and I think Bruce is hoping and praying that he could be that guy.

Sure let's play 32 games and then change the lineup. Great plan...

Yes we missed a ton of 3s today but we didn't take a ton of "bad" 3s. Most of the 3 pointers we shot today were uncontested. That's tough on a coach because you don't want to tell your guys to stop shooting when they have wide open looks. One thing for folks to realize is that if we make our season average today we'd have won the game. 

I hate the loss -- but more because it was embarrassing than anything else. We should still get a #2 seed which may actually help us since we'll likely be closer to home.

Here's to some time for guys to practice their strokes, Walker to rest his shoulder a bit more, and let's go get 'em in the Dance.

8 of the top 10 teams lose on the road this week. Gotta love college basketball!

With Arizona and Kansas just losing that means the #2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, and 9 ranked teams all lost on the road this week. Hopefully Gonzaga will do the same. 
 

We may not be a perfect team as we do have some flaws… but guess what? No one else is perfect either. Don’t lose the faith folks. This Auburn team can compete with and beat anyone in the country. On to MSU and Go Saint Mary’s!

5 minutes ago, MaxCohen216 said:

If our guards play like they did tonight, we will be very well rested as the third seed in the nether region of the NCAA.

You really need to stop putting this loss on our guard play because it simply wasn’t. Zep, Wendell, and KD combined for 23 points, 5 assists, 6 steals, and 5 turnovers. 
 

Again, we lost tonight because of our lack of rebounding. Nothing else. 

7 minutes ago, MaxCohen216 said:

Oh, come on.  Wendell took me-ball shot after me-ball shot all game long, while KD did some of the same, plus tried to drive through 5 defenders to the basket.

Guard play is much too erratic to make a deep run in April.  And Bruce just won't stop it.  He freely lets them play me-ball.

We don't have a Jared Harper on the team.

You’re right, we don’t have a Jared Harper on this team. We have a Jabari Smith and a Walker Kessler. Our guard play will improve by leaps and bounds on neutral courts. 
 

Again, we outshot UT. We had fewer turnovers than UT. Sure we may have won if Wendell had a better shooting night but a team will never win a game, let alone a road game, when they’re outrebounded by 23. 

Just now, MaxCohen216 said:

Our terrible, selfish, me-ball guard play sure makes it seems like the sky is falling.

Not to me it doesn’t. We outshot UT today. Sure a couple less turnovers wouldn’t hurt but it was UT’s offensive rebounding (or our lack of defensive rebounding) that lost us the game today. 

We lost this game (a game we were predicted to lose) because of rebounding. If they *only* out-rebound us by 10 we probably win. 
 

The sky is not falling. 

20 hours ago, IronMan70 said:

Them calling it is a separate issue. His arm is inside making hard contact with Kessler's arm, it's a foul.

You see all the open space between Kessler and the basket. Castleton wasn't laying off, he was moving forward and already out to the FT line to meet the drive. That created the open space for Kessler. Instead of driving into the double team and cutting off his passing angle, which was the problem, if Green pulls up on his drive he creates the spacing to get the pass over the taller player. We see it in almost every game.  

Yes, Kermit crying would be great, lol. 

I think what you're not realizing is that Jones beat Kessler to the ball and that his hand is the one on the ball. Kessler's is on top of his. If you're really going to try to argue a foul it could just as easily been said that as Jones was gaining possession Kessler came over the top of his arm and created the contact. There's just absolutely no foul.

As for Castleton's defense: He wasn't moving forward. He started at the 3-point line and started to follow Kessler but then just camped at the foul line to guard any sort of entry pass over his head. I'm telling you -- it was defended incredibly well. Kessler wasn't getting that ball clean no matter how well Wendell plays it.

The UF defender literally has his hand on the ball. It wasn't a foul and, even if it was, no one is getting that call, in that situation, on the road.

And don't get me started on the argument that Wendell should have just lobbed it to Kessler. Wendell is listed at 5'11" (which means he's probably 5'9") and Castleton is laying off guarding the pass. Wendell left his feet literally AS that screenshot is being taken and the pass just wasn't open. It was well defended by UF and we should be moving on to the next one. 

I hope we make Kermit cry tomorrow night!

Some folks need to realize that tourney games at neutral sights are a very different thing than road games in the SEC. My guess, based on how insanely well our fans have travelled this season, is that the SEC tourney and at least the first two games in the dance will feel a lot more like a home crowd than an away crowd.

It's insane how complacent some of our fans have become. We're sitting at 24-3 and lost on the road to a team that was absolutely fighting for their life. That was a bad final possession but that was FAR from a bad loss. 

Did someone seriously just say we should be a #3 seed?? Yikes.