Butler, Thur. Dec. 29, 7pm, FS1/970AM

I hope Lovett decides to stick it out another year. Team could be pretty good.

+1

I think the nucleus of Ponds, Lovett, and Ahmed is pretty strong. Not incredible. But a very nice place to start from.
Simon and Clark can only help.
But the big improvement has to come from Owens and Yakwe, and Brown if he's here.
 
The atmosphere at CA was a walk down memory lane. Packed house and highly engaged crowd.

I remarked to my buddies at halftime that this is the type of game that we need to win - one in which we are not overwhelming our opponent thru lights out shooting. We competed for 40 minutes and hopefully learned what it takes to win in a conference like the BE.

One other observation - Lovett didn't look like a kid thinking about leaving. He was into it and constantly trying to get the crowd revved up.

Oh and by the way - Ponds was incredible.

Great night!!!!!
 
Was sitting on other side of court so thought Willie may have been a prospective recruit. Great crowd tonight. Ponds is uncanny with those underhand scoop finger rolls. As much as some get on Bashir for selfishness we don't come near winning without his 19 pts and we need his offense as we are not exactly loaded with scorers. On to bigger and better things against...DePaul? Actually we better not take them lightly as they will be hungry for a win after coming close against Nova and will have a home crowd that might approach triple figures (if the whether is nice).
 
Obviously an exciting game and a great win. The atmosphere at Carnesecca was absolutely as good as it gets.

One observation I made was that Lovett is clearly not 100% healthy. He is just not moving as quick and agile as he had in the beginning of the season. Hopefully whatever is bothering him doesn't linger.

Finally got to see some more Williams. I have to imagine he has now played his way into the rotation.
 
So great to be back on campus tonight to see the game. Ponds is unreal. He is so smooth. Crowd was great. I thought a bit quiet in the first half but when things got tight in the 2nd half it felt like we finally had a home court advantage.

Say it with me.....WE'RE IN FIRST PLACE!!!
 
Just got home after some post-game celebrating. Great great win, especially on the heals of the Cuse clobbering. CA was rockin! Hard to believe that we pulled this one out. Butler had some chances to put us away, but we didn't let them. Can't say enough about Shamorie. Not only is the kid an incredible talent, but he has ice flowing through his veins. He's completely unflappable. Always fun sitting among the usual cast of character; Paultz, Weatherman, OLV, etc, and nice meeting Johnnyfan and Johnnyfan Jr. after the game. Onward and upward!
 
Just got home after some post-game celebrating. Great great win, especially on the heals of the Cuse clobbering. CA was rockin! Hard to believe that we pulled this one out. Butler had some chances to put us away, but we didn't let them. Can't say enough about Shamorie. Not only is the kid an incredible talent, but he has ice flowing through his veins. He's completely unflappable. Always fun sitting among the usual cast of character; Paultz, Weatherman, OLV, etc, and nice meeting Johnnyfan and Johnnyfan Jr. after the game. Onward and upward!

Pleasure meeting you as well, Monte. Icing on a great win. See you soon.
 
Easily the best SJU game I've been to at Carnesecca.

Great crowd, great poise, great energy. Ponds is the truth!

Money well spent, hopefully this boosts us for the future. Tons of calls didn't go our way and we made it a priority to right the ship and overcome those obstacles.

We won a game where we only had 5 assists, total. Unreal.

Also, maybe with this being a road game it probably said a lot... but Butler being ranked #13, I wasn't very impressed with them. Aside from Savage, I think the rest of the team was extra regular. I was surprised their coach didn't play Savage more than the 17 minutes. Was wondering what the deal was with that.Nothing jumps out at you, maybe their moving the ball if anything.
 
Easily the best SJU game I've been to at Carnesecca.

Great crowd, great poise, great energy. Ponds is the truth!

Money well spent, hopefully this boosts us for the future. Tons of calls didn't go our way and we made it a priority to right the ship and overcome those obstacles.

We won a game where we only had 5 assists, total. Unreal.

Also, maybe with this being a road game it probably said a lot... but Butler being ranked #13, I wasn't very impressed with them. Aside from Savage, I think the rest of the team was extra regular. I was surprised their coach didn't play Savage more than the 17 minutes. Was wondering what the deal was with that.Nothing jumps out at you, maybe their moving the ball if anything.
Was at the game also and it did seem like we weren't getting the calls but the final tally was like 25 on Butler and 16 on us so maybe it wasn't that bad and we just got caught up in rooting for our team thought did think we drew a couple of charging calls that were not made.
 
Just got home after some post-game celebrating. Great great win, especially on the heals of the Cuse clobbering. CA was rockin! Hard to believe that we pulled this one out. Butler had some chances to put us away, but we didn't let them. Can't say enough about Shamorie. Not only is the kid an incredible talent, but he has ice flowing through his veins. He's completely unflappable. Always fun sitting among the usual cast of character; Paultz, Weatherman, OLV, etc, and nice meeting Johnnyfan and Johnnyfan Jr. after the game. Onward and upward!
Agree on Shamorie, cool cucumber, completely unflappable. Remind you of another freshmen who will remain nameless so as not to offend the uninitiated? ;)
 
You cannot place a high enough value on learning how to win.

For years we've watched SJU teams snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Last night, no one would have been surprised at a close loss. Big plays when it counted, and ylu can throw out the stat sheets when you do that.

Scary moments: Good call to foul when we were up by 3 in the closing seconds but we fouled way too early, in the backcourt with 6.7 seconds left. Grabbing the rebound and running with the ball looked like a miscalculation of time remaining.

As i said after the LIU loss, Millin has taken the teins and is coaching end to end. Win or lose, he is doing what you have to do even while learning on the job. He is coaching with confidence and the team is responding. Perhaps not coincidentally Mullin has turned the corner sligtly agead of his team.
 
You cannot place a high enough value on learning how to win.

For years we've watched SJU teams snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Last night, no one would have been surprised at a close loss. Big plays when it counted, and you can throw out the stat sheets when you do that.

Scary moments: Good call to foul when we were up by 3 in the closing seconds but we fouled way too early, in the backcourt with 6.7 seconds left. Grabbing the rebound and running with the ball looked like a miscalculation of time remaining.

As i said after the LIU loss, Millin has taken the teins and is coaching end to end. Win or lose, he is doing what you have to do even while learning on the job. He is coaching with confidence and the team is responding. Perhaps not coincidentally Mullin has turned the corner sligtly ahead of his team.
 
Ponds is the most talented player we've had here since Artest. His only limitation seems to be his size, tho he plays bigger than he is.
 
First win over an opponent ranked this high since 1983! To put it in perspective, I was a sophomore at that time...

The key distinction being AT CARNESECCA (Alumni Hall). Obviously several victories over top 10 teams at MSG - G'Town, Duke...

I watched the game on DVR after getting home from dinner with the wife and friends (my son wen to the game with a friend). They repeated that stat a couple of times and while I might have missed it, I did not hear them qualify it by saying on "campus or at Alumni Hall/CA either time.

Great win. We were getting updates while at dinner. Did not play a great game but got the win which is the sign of a team learning how to do so when everything is not going right. Shamorie with some huge shots and Lovett's baseline jumper to tie it, as RAF would say "Onions".
 
Butler is just a bad matchup for us. Ditto Creighton. Unless and until we have truly superior talent overall, well-coached teams with established systems (especially motion offenses) and good players are likely to expose our weaknesses. Certainly a Syracuse-esque WTF is always possible (that game was fun to watch, but it was kind of "the perfect storm" and you can't count on that happening too often), but I wouldn't get my hopes up too high for this one.

Aaayyyyy
 
Attended the game last night, as an earlier post mentioned biggest win and most exciting since beating Pitt at msg a few years ago.

Ponds is dynamic!
 
Great win!

Lot of guts from kids and staff. At least 2 times in the second half was thinking "that may be it" and they came right back. Down 10 with just over 10 to go. Closed on a 25-12! Nice to be on the right side of that and says a lot about character of team, especially so young in first Big East game for many.

We didn't play our best game of the season, but we absolutely played our most energized and complete 40 minutes and big things can happen when you do that.

The biggest difference for me in those last 10 was that we struck the perfect balance defensively - sped Butler up just enough to get them out of comfort zone, but not enough to give them gimmes. Turned Chrabascz into a ball handler in the open floor by doubling away from him, and this seemed to take him out of his rhythm and make it tough for Butler to get into their offense. Really great stuff.

As LMF and others have noted Williams has to play. He gives you energy, defense, and rebounding, and seems comfortable shot-making inside 10 feet. May struggle against the biggest teams in conference but that likely doesn't make him any different from the rest of the team. He does the best job of any of our bigs of not getting blown off the block. Digs in and gets position. A role, but an important role and one we need.

Wideman got his but kudos to our bigs overall holding 45 and 30 to 17 combined on 8-25 shooting. They are averaging over 30.

Ahmed was an absolute stud defensively last night. He may continue to be overly aggressive attacking the hoop, but there are worse qualities to have and the staff seems to be addressing. The kid plays incredibly hard on both ends and has brought a lot of consistency on offense (double figures in 10 of last 12 games) which we obviously need. I enjoy watching him play.

If you're looking to feel a little extra optimistic, I had us around 9-5 right now, which I thought would be a great place to be at this stage. I had us getting there a wildly different way, but in the end the main difference is Del. St./LIU. After Minny and Bahamas and PSU, eliminate those 2 and we'd be in a pretty good spot right now.

Lastly, didn't realize Duke joined the conference! Feel better saying this after a win so it's not sour grapes. Know the totals were 23-15 in our favor, but what a poorly officiated game. Butler got a lot of extra on both ends and couple of obvious calls in key spots (travelling, over the back) not whistled. Glad we came away with it because this would have stung extra.
 
I think we did a better job on Chrabacz in the second half not being drawn into his turnaround shooting motion. He did that a few times in the 1st and drew an extra contest from our bigs which left butler players open underneath for an easy pass and layup. We stayed home defensively and forced him into an uncomfortable shot or kick out. Glad our guys recognized that and adjusted.
 
Lastly, didn't realize Duke joined the conference! Feel better saying this after a win so it's not sour grapes. Know the totals were 23-15 in our favor, but what a poorly officiated game. Butler got a lot of extra on both ends and couple of obvious calls in key spots (travelling, over the back) not whistled. Glad we came away with it because this would have stung extra.

Agree with the rest of your post entirely. On this point, my take is that CM spends a whole lot of every game talking to the refs. Last night he clearly got on the wrong side of at least two of the three refs, and it showed up in the calls and non-calls. There were some make-up calls in there also, but on balance his effort to work the refs backfired last night. Something to watch going forward.
 
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