Shockers v Notre Dame Game Thread

[Veritas]

I hate to say it but I think those team is very over confident and it’s gonna come back to hurt them more than just last night. I see shades of the 2006-2007 team that got way too big for their britches after a few decent victories and didn’t even finish above .500.

The two teams are not remotely similar, and neither is the situation.

[Shaqness]

After a couple of rounds of some eats this weekend, I figured I would check back in.

My fear for this game was that the Irish were going to kick our arse. So, leading 13 at half time and losing by 1 is a slightly irritating, but palpable result. I think this team has yet to play well for 40 minutes, and is still learning. There are certain players I am questioning right now, but I can't rag on them too much. The game plans haven't been flawless, but unlike a few posts on here, I am not blaming Gregg. I still think there is time to improve our team, and, boy, do we have a team. People already change their shorts thinking about our front court. We don't even have Markis, yet!

[wheathead]

Who was it who used to always say, “I’m not worried”. It’s time to say it.

[WstateU]

It was SubGod22... “I’m not worried” either.

[wheathead]

Nm

[Walker]

It's marathon, not a sprint. Okay, it's basketball but still a long season ahead. Frustrating because we beat ourselves more so than anything ND did but I still feel great about this team because 3G and staff will fix these deficiencies. I especially feel good knowing we've got one the best players in the country coming back in a few weeks. After seeing Arizona and some of these other "top teams" over the past few days, I'm not worried.

[ShockAzs]

One thing that's really in my craw, is we still didn't beat Mike Brey.

But like others have said, we are a damn good team, going to be GREAT. We don't have one of our best players yet, and we still controlled the game against a very tough and gritty team with 2 all American candidates. Seriously, we shouldn't even be close to any ledge.

[Aargh]

I think the problem in this game was in the first half...of the Cal game. 11 turnovers and some incredibly lethargic play.
That led to having to press the entire second half just to stay in the winner's bracket.

In the pre-game thread several posters were concerned about playing 3 games in 3 days. Everybody in the tourney had to play 3 games in 3 days, but only one team was required to run a full court press for 20 minutews. That put that team at a disadvantage Wednesday.

Morris has a history of unnecessary fouling when he's fatigued. Morris had 2 ill-advised fouls. Decision-making and execution are affected when a player is tired. There are several examples of poor decision-making and execution in the second half. I contend that decision-=making and execution got worse as the second half progressed.

Notre Dame had a stroll in the park to get to Wednesday. The Shox had a war (of their own making) Monday night.

Here's how I look at it:

McDuffie = Out
Shamet = not 100%
Reaves = not 100%
SHJ = Still adjusting to the Shox and D1.

ND = fresher legs
WSU = Less fresh legs

Even with all that, if you play those last 19 seconds 10 times, I think the Shox win the game 8 times. This just happened to be one of the times a close game wasn't won.

With all the things stacked against the Shox, they just barely lost to a top-15 team, that's likely to end up as a top-10 team. I know it was tough to lose a game that way, but that shouldn't cloud our judgement to the point where we only remember the unfortunate things and plays that cost the game, instead of remembering the hard work and great plays that put the Shox in a position to win the game.

[Aargh]

Spam filter ate another post that wasn't remotely close to Spam. Let me try to paraphrase my post.

I think the game was lost in the first half against Cal. The sloppy play and 11 turnovers led to pressing for 20 minutes in the second half to stay in the winner's bracket. In a 3 games in 3 days tourney, you don't want to have to work that hard in the first game. I think fatigue was a factor. ND had a stroll in the park to get to the championship game. WSU had a war of their own making to get there.

[FlyingWheat]

AFTER the ND loss, Ken Pomeroy's rating has the Shockers at #3! https://kenpom.com

Anyone know if he’s factoring the MM injury?

[Dan]

It’s what the committee would call a “good loss”

[Windiwu]

Evidently KenPom updates as each game is played.. It's back to 4 now. Still... Notre Dame is at 12 so I guess losing to a team not far off from your own doesn't hurt so bad. I think most of us agree it wasn't so much the loss but HOW it was lost. I have little doubt MM would have made the difference even if only the point the front court would have had 5 more fouls to spread.

[Signman]

Pomeroy has a built in dampening effect that I believe gradually wears off till about the first of the year. It's designed to prevent great swings in the ratings. Sometime around mid-December early January he takes this off and it becomes raw objective data only.

[another shocker]

what hurts is it's a game they really should have won, so that would have meant a lot of cushion leading into.. next week at baylor, a very, very tough proposition.

[SHOCKvalue]

We need another game to be played.