@Rutgers, Fri. Nov. 16, 7pm, BTN / 970 WNYM

[quote="fordham96" post=302579][quote="we are sju" post=302571][quote="fordham96" post=302568][quote="we are sju" post=302562][quote="fordham96" post=302559]Couple of things.

1)Remember when Zach wrote that article in early spring talking about how the SJU roster coming back (assuming Ponds came back because he had just declared) had the chance to be the best since 1999 Final 8 team . Except he wrote that BEFORE SJU had landed LJ and Heron. Which shows you he actually didn't know what he was talking about. Because LJ and Heron are clearly the difference makers along with Ponds on this team. They were brilliant tonight. The freshmen Williams, Roberts and Earlington are going to struggle to get any burn against good competition. And that is why the recruiting has to pick up. They need to get more out of their freshmen.

2)Their overall team speed and perimeter talent is legit. I don't expect to make 15 threes every night but they have ballers outside the paint. I didn't care that Rutgers made a lot of 3 against their first 2 opponents, they haven't faced talent like SJU has on the perimeter. SJU was going to make them guard them all over the court and that made it difficult for them.

3)Now the downside. Again Rutgers is picked to finish dead last in the Big 10 for a reason. They have a lot of holes. SJU is going to eventually face teams that will exploit their weaknesses. They will face teams that can go inside and out and will make some early 3's that will force SJU to stay honest on perimeter. Keita will need to come back and help. I don't see Roberts or Earlington developing fast enough to help.[/quote]


On the downside note we won by 20 really w/o Ponds doing much. I agree about fools gold threes and talented big teams giving us a problem. Just think winning dominantly w/o our best player having a normal game does kind of balance the other stuff out.[/quote]

I love Ponds I am just not sure how much better he is than Heron or even LJ. My point is they all are not going to score 25 points each night. So the tradeoff for Ponds scoring 8 was both LJ and Heron accounting for over 50 themselves. So I don't see it so much as a bright spot that they won despite Ponds' light load tonight.[/quote]

Ponds driving the ball is still our best shot IMO. Thought was a real good sign he did not force while LJ and Heron went crazy[/quote]

My point is they probably need to get 55-60 points each night against tough competition from LJ, Heron and Ponds to win. The ultimate distribution of those points is not important to me (meaning next game could be Ponds with 25, Heron with 20 and LJ with 15) I mean Ponds scored tonight 8 tonight but that is with Heron scoring 27 and LJ scoring 23. That is 58 combined for the 3 of them. If Ponds scored say 15 more tonight don't think the other two would have had the same numbers it would have probably come at the EXPENSE of the other two not in addition. Now when they win a game against a solid team and say BOTH Heron and Ponds score less than 10 then you have something That probably means Mikey Dixon stepped up big time off the bench.[/quote]

I get your point. I like LJ and if we are still including him with the other two by BE time than we really will be good. At this point in time I still have Ponds / Heron as needing to get 40 combined no matter what for us to win.. Which is why winning convincingly w/o Ponds going off was a really good sign. I just need more than 3 games before I trust LJ with the other 2.
 
Figueroa obviously had ball a lot. Zero turnovers is so impressive in addition to his scoring. Only three games, but he seems to be one of most prepared, poised and heady Juco kids I have seen in a while. Usually it takes JC kids a season to calm down and rid themselves of bad habits.
 
[quote="Mike Zaun" post=302308][quote="Paultzman" post=302304]Down to 2 point favorite. Bet the rent on the Johnnies. :)[/quote]

Maybe if the rent were in a small town in Idaho or North Dakota...wouldn't advise it in NYC/LI/Westchester ;)

These next few games IMO will tell us if we have any real chance at the tournament or if it's more of the same. These are bottom barrel F5 teams in Georgia Tech, Cal, and Rutgers. Would be nice to show clear separation from them but I'm pretty nervous. How about we finally blow Rutgers out and do the opposite of what's expected in a positive way? I keep waiting for our obvious talent advantage to show against some of these less talented teams, but for some reason it seems the talent discrepancy doesn't matter when we run into well-coached teams. Let's hope our coaches prepared the team.[/quote]

Thanks to the team for reading this and taking the suggestion! Man that felt good and I love eating crow! Delicious. We always knew we were the more talented team and that was blatantly obvious tonight. The antidote to size is speed and passing. Much better 3PT defense with hands up in their faces. The crazy part is that Rutgers got blown out and that's with lots of lucky shots that went in. There was one 3 that went in late in the 2nd half for them that literally hit the corner of the rim and rolled in somehow. Lots of iffy foul shots also went in for them among others. We finally started making the extra pass and it paid off! Lots of passing and guys moving without the ball. We will not shoot like this every game, but it's nice to see a blowout over a bum program like Rutgers that has given us such anxiety the past decade or so with all the close calls. I was pleasantly surprised tonight. Hope the guys got some confidence from it.
 
[quote="Paultzman" post=302598]Figueroa obviously had ball a lot. Zero turnovers is so impressive in addition to his scoring. Only three games, but he seems to be one of most prepared, poised and heady Juco kids I have seen in a while. Usually it takes JC kids a season to calm down and rid themselves of bad habits.[/quote]

It’s truly a testament to Matt to land him. I can’t figure out how how nobody had tabs on this kid and he was totally under the radar. He was a killer today...
 
I'll say it once again, where would we be without Heron on this team? Absolutely a great get in Fiquroua. Still waiting to see something from Dixon .I may be wrong but watching Roberts in the waning minutes warrants some more playing time, especially after losing Keita. Trimble did not have a good defensive game tonight.. A lot of confident shooting tonight. Simon has to have better control on his drives to the basket, concentrate making layups rather then wild hook shots. .Nice victory Redmen. Next win on Monday against Cal.
 
[quote="Amaseinyourface" post=302589][quote="fordham96" post=302584]Just remember in mid April SJU had neither locked up. Those two SAVED the recruiting class and may save this season.[/quote]

All the more reason not to write off a recruiting class until all the dust has settled.[/quote]

Touche but Heron is an anamoly, a ready to go high major stud who did not have to sit a year after he transferred. That is not going to happen often if again.
 
College hoop is all about guards and athletic wings. We have a top 5 backcourt (including Simon). We dominated the guard play and Clark & Fig were outstanding. And Anytime you have 18 assists & only 10 turnovers you have a great shot at winning. Great win !!
 
Neither watched on TV nor listened on radio so interesting perspective reading all 31 pages of posters insights, observations. It does appear that this was an:


Excellent win and
our starting 5 can be tremendous.
Anyone of the “fab” 5 (lol) capable of spearheading a W.
Amazing how some still need to negatively critique.
Nice to feel the excitement in fellow posters
Seems there will be other similar nights to relish
Finally, I appreciate those posting links to game coverage e.g NY Post & Jersey papers and - what are they called - the other short references, whatever...I do remember 3 professional baseball teams in our City and reading the box scores in the Daily Mirror and Herald Tribune - yes once New York’s Newspapers
so I am “old” (experinced lol) enough not to need the latest tech fashion :)
Give me paper and a pen!
Go St. John’s
And to all a good night
 
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Great game tonight. Sat behind the Rutgers bench and they were not happy. They came on with an overestimation of their talent and ability.

We shared the ball really well and obvoiously hit our threes at a high rate.

Biggest takeaway for me is more evidence that Heron is a real stud. He consistently abused whoever covered him.
 
Yes the Rutgers board is comical right now. They thought they were beating us handily even before the Keita news.

Seton Hall board, as usual, is equally delightful. An entire thread devoted to the game. It's not Chris and Matt's fault that Heron or LJ didn't have an Uncle willing to accept a job from that snake Willard. They hate Mullin over there because his bowel movements get more attention than their consecutive tourneys.
 
[quote="Rob" post=302610]Yes the Rutgers board is comical right now. They thought they were beating us handily even before the Keita news.

Seton Hall board, as usual, is equally delightful. An entire thread devoted to the game. It's not Chris and Matt's fault that Heron or LJ didn't have an Uncle willing to accept a job from that snake Willard. They hate Mullin over there because his bowel movements get more attention than their consecutive tourneys.[/quote]

Hall's best team in many years lost last year @ Rutgers. They have to be thinking about that while watching our performance.
 
Can we now officially shut up about the exhibition game we played with them last year?

Given the choice between winning that game, and this one... well, there really is no choice, is there?
 
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[quote="Section3" post=302609]Great game tonight. Sat behind the Rutgers bench and they were not happy. They came on with an overestimation of their talent and ability.

We shared the ball really well and obvoiously hit our threes at a high rate.

Biggest takeaway for me is more evidence that Heron is a real stud. He consistently abused whoever covered him.[/quote]

If you were at the game could you go into more detail of the goings on behind the bench? Did you interact with the Rutgers fans? Did you enjoy their refreshment concession? Were there other St. John's fans there? TIA!
 
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[quote="SJU61982" post=302613]Can we now officially shut up about the exhibition game we played with them last year?

Given the choice between winning that game, and this one... well, there really is no choice, is there?[/quote]

Yes, you may officially shut up since you were the only one who brought it up.:p
BTW, is the URI exhibition still in discussion since we were at full staff?
 
[quote="fordham96" post=302584]Just remember in mid April SJU had neither locked up. Those two SAVED the recruiting class and may save this season.[/quote]

Those two might help us with next years recruiting class, if we impress those elite 19 recruits this year.
These two could be the turning point for Mullin as coach here.
Every great coach has that one year that it all started to click for him, could this be Mullin's?
 
[quote="Rob" post=302610]Yes the Rutgers board is comical right now. They thought they were beating us handily even before the Keita news.

Seton Hall board, as usual, is equally delightful. An entire thread devoted to the game. It's not Chris and Matt's fault that Heron or LJ didn't have an Uncle willing to accept a job from that snake Willard. They hate Mullin over there because his bowel movements get more attention than their consecutive tourneys.[/quote]

As opposed to this board which is pretty much comical all the time. Or haven’t you noticed the hate for Mullin here? Rutgers is too big for us, best shooting team in the country, they have a real coach!! Oh, sorry, after watching them they stink!! But hey, we were really lucky that Heron and Figueroa fell out of the sky to us. Sorry, but any criticism of other boards is disingenuous to me with the clowns that dominate this one.
 
[quote="Logen" post=302624][quote="Rob" post=302610]Yes the Rutgers board is comical right now. They thought they were beating us handily even before the Keita news.

Seton Hall board, as usual, is equally delightful. An entire thread devoted to the game. It's not Chris and Matt's fault that Heron or LJ didn't have an Uncle willing to accept a job from that snake Willard. They hate Mullin over there because his bowel movements get more attention than their consecutive tourneys.[/quote]

As opposed to this board which is pretty much comical all the time. Or haven’t you noticed the hate for Mullin here? Rutgers is too big for us, best shooting team in the country, they have a real coach!! Oh, sorry, after watching them they stink!! But hey, we were really lucky that Heron and Figueroa fell out of the sky to us. Sorry, but any criticism of other boards is disingenuous to me with the clowns that dominate this one.[/quote]

I effing hate myself for now looking forward to your posts. Either you've become enlightened, or I have, it more likely we are just in agreement lately.
 
[quote="Logen" post=302624][quote="Rob" post=302610]Yes the Rutgers board is comical right now. They thought they were beating us handily even before the Keita news.

Seton Hall board, as usual, is equally delightful. An entire thread devoted to the game. It's not Chris and Matt's fault that Heron or LJ didn't have an Uncle willing to accept a job from that snake Willard. They hate Mullin over there because his bowel movements get more attention than their consecutive tourneys.[/quote]

As opposed to this board which is pretty much comical all the time. Or haven’t you noticed the hate for Mullin here? Rutgers is too big for us, best shooting team in the country, they have a real coach!! Oh, sorry, after watching them they stink!! But hey, we were really lucky that Heron and Figueroa fell out of the sky to us. Sorry, but any criticism of other boards is disingenuous to me with the clowns that dominate this one.[/quote]

There are always those few here that will always come out with a lecture after a St. John's win to castrate and castigate anyone who ever spoke negatively about coach Mullin. I need not list them as they will become obvious in the next few hours.
You may have missed the last 20 years while in your coma but Mahoney, Jarvis, Roberts, and especially a guy named Steve Lavin all suffered "fans" criticisms before our favorite son came to save the day. One infamous fan. Yes the one with the clown face actually made a cottage industry on his private blog to hate, hate and hate Steve Lavin some more.
He chose to sut down his comical site because it became obvious that not including the COACH in his sardonic commentaries made his blog unreadable.
All those coaches did a great job. St. John's University, a heartless money grabbing institution, fired every one because the unappreciative fans on this site, Johnny Jungle, Holy Land of Hoops, and especially Big East Boards, unduly influenced their decision. Just think, if it weren't for the haters on this site in particular, Mike Jarvis would have a banner hanging in Madison Square Garden now having surpassed the greatest coach in school history.
You're right. Discussing the coach is very comical because it alone can lead to their firing.
 
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