A beautiful thought. .... me ... I will still offer my season tix up to folks when I am not there in hopes of getting them more involved with Bobcat hoops.

All the years I had parents tix the student ushers blocked me from getting down to talk to Bobcat boosters. I had to get pretty good at figuring out how to work around that in order to visit with friends and fans pregame.


THe game was very good. The difference today was in the execution of the scheme and the crispness of passing. That ball whistled today and popped when it was caught. No lazy passes. When that happens the sets work and the opposing defense has no chance of disrupting the play. A good passing team will have their way every single time. That bounce pass through 4 defenders across the key to Jon was beautiful. WOuld like to see a slo mo of that on a highlight reel.

Bean really came to play today. Executed well and save for a little looseness withthe ball at the end of the first half really showed us what he has to offer. Could be a killer 1 -2 punch with ST. DIfferent teams take away different strengths ....good to have 2 players who have different approaches.

Setty got a couple of bad foul calls. A charge followed by a block and I thought neither was consistent with what I have seen called this year. His 4th was because someone lost their man and let penetration happen....

Wadley put the ball on the floor.....like a freight train down the lane. WOW!

The 3 ball was going down today for everyone unforced and in rythym and then Nick on the sideline with the dribble through and  step back had the defender picking up his shorts.

Much bigger margin than I expected from UE team that has been pretty good this year thus far. Talked with DJ's mom and dad after the game (ballentine) .... that was a tough loss and they have Murray on the road next. SO far we are winning the Valley.

Ndour is going to be interesting to follow with this injury... that yelp that came out of him on the floor was pretty blood curdling.

Made it home in time to see Muncie Central take apart Yorktown... cats win on all fronts today. bearcats bobcats and tomcats (go Trimble)

Oh Yeah....

the best part of today other than the passing is how fast this team pushes the ball up the floor EVERY chance it gets. One muffed pass in  the 2nd half  contrasted how flawlessly they advanced the ball the entire day.

^ This also.

This team is so active, running, gunning, pushing at every opportunity. It is SO fun to watch (especially since it's working well)

Knowing JC's earlier teams, I expected Ohio to slow down considerably and be a slow/sluggish but punishing team. We're faster than the Groce teams I think. Never ever thought this would be the case. Very pleasant surprise, given how quick on the feet the defense needs to be to not get fouls called on them.

Remember last November when we started off 6-0 and Ivo looked like he was going to give DJ a run for MAC MVP?

those were good times.

I get into the discussion a lot about what is my favorite sporting venue and my answer is always the same.  I have sat in Duke student section for a Duke-Maryland game, I have been to a World Series game and I have been to several NFL playoff games.  My second favorite venue was Alex Ovechkin's first playoff game against the Flyers at Verizon Center which was by far the loudest sporting event I've ever attended.  The event I will probably think of most fondly was an early season game at Wrigley Field against the Pirates.  We had horrible seats down the left field line behind a pole.  We sat in our seats and commented to each other about the pole when the fans in front of us said that we should try to find open seats behind home plate.  Sounded like a great idea so we did it. We ended up about ten rows back which was amazing....that was until the usher showed up and said that we were in somebody else's seats.   Then he said..."Why don't you try those?" as he pointed to two seats in the front row.   I would love to have footage of our faces as we went from "I hope we aren't getting arrested" to "This is the greatest place on Earth."      That was my thought when I read the earliest post about "protecting my seat."  Protecting it from what? 

 

Our guys were locked in from the start and the primary defense was very good. As I recall, not many fouls were called on either team early. Maybe teams are adjusting to the new emphasis and defense is improving -- primary and help. It seems like we got some good deflections from help defenders when Evansville attacked the lane.

Ricardo and Bean did a very good job containing Balentine -- it doesn't take much for him to get a shot and Evansville screened hard for him. In my opinion, Nick has always been a very good help defender. Travis has shown sound fundamentals and as Borna pointed out last week Stevie has played solid defense. 

I was also impressed with how our bigs were able to hit the offensive glass and still get back on defense if we didn't get the board. Jon Smith was phenomenal with this yesterday.

Both teams took pretty good care of the ball yesterday, so rebounding and holding the other team's shooting percentage down was even more important.

It helps when we are shooting well, but this kind of effort and focus will pay dividends on days/nights when we are strugging from the field. That day is coming and I look forward to seeing how we grind out wins. I think this group can do it. Last year' s team set a very high bar in MAC play -- 7-1 on the road which I think is the best percentage in a long time and maybe most road league wins ever.

I agree -- Protecting from what?  I totally understand if you're talking about Miami, Akron, or Kent games.  In this case, we're talking about a game when there were 9500 empty seats.  IMO, by the time the under 4 rolls around at games like that, it should be a relative free for all, and people should be encouraged to move closer and make more noise.