Official WSU vs VCU Game Thread - NCAA Tournament Second Round

[jocoshock]

I think there's a legitimate chance Stutz could take your challenge. I am blown away that anyone is complaining that he stinks. He was first team all valley!

Garrett probably will. We are all better for his wearing our colors the past 4 years..

[shockmonster]

Stutz biggest liability is that he has no athleticism, especially from a standing position. He does have a little bit of athleticism when he has a running start as shown by his dunk a few games ago.

His liability on the defensive end against quick big men gets him in foul trouble limiting his ability to get going on the offensive end.

Nobody is perfect. You may be fat and ugly. Now's the time to leave the Seniors alone and look to the future.

[Rlh04d]

I think there's a legitimate chance Stutz could take your challenge. I am blown away that anyone is complaining that he stinks. He was first team all valley!

Pretty sure the words I used were "above average."

I made a comment, you disagreed with it out of context, I clarified. I'm done with the issue.

[shoxlax]

Garrett's best basketball is still ahead of him. He will make six figures a year playing this game somewhere. To top it off, he will be a better person than most on this board, including myself, ever thought of being.

[shoxlax]

Nobody is perfect. You may be fat and ugly. Now's the time to leave the Seniors alone and look to the future.

You're kinda grouchy tonight but I like it.

[tw805]

Pretty sure the words I used were "above average."

I made a comment, you disagreed with it out of context, I clarified. I'm done with the issue.

I don't see the context or nuance argument. So you're glad to see an above average player no longer playing for the Shockers? I'm sorry, but I cannot understand that line of thinking. And "above average" doesn't get you first team all-Valley. I will concede that the light only seemed to come on this year, but I'm sure as hell not happy to see him go. 7 footers don't grow on trees. (Insert joke that it's because they are trees themselves here.)

[KC Shox]

Garrett's struggling, he's probably replaying over and over in his mind that he missed the last shots in the ISU red and VCU games that would have sent the game into extra frames. Losing your last two games of your college career while taking the last shot for your team in each of them is not something easily forgotten. I hope he does, that's a burden he needs to let go. This was a team loss.

[forevershockerfan]

Let's be real and understand something about Stutz. Without him this Season, we don't win the Valley and we don't Dance. I will really miss all the rebounds, points and assists he gave us this Season. Actually, I wished he would have played 30-35 minutes last night. Yes, his shot was off. However, we got hurt on the boards in his absence. Stutz and Rags were both 1st team All-Valley players and both earned that honor.

[jocoshock]

Watching the KU - Detroit game. Seeing lots of missed bunnies, poor shooting, turnovers,etc from both teams and from their big men.... GS seems to have a lot of company in this tournament....

[LoneStar48]

KU's starting to play like I wish we would have last night.

[ShockTalk]

Let's be real and understand something about Stutz. Without him this Season, we don't win the Valley and we don't Dance. I will really miss all the rebounds, points and assists he gave us this Season. Actually, I wished he would have played 30-35 minutes last night. Yes, his shot was off. However, we got hurt on the boards in his absence. Stutz and Rags were both 1st team All-Valley players and both earned that honor.

fsf, not one to have ever countered a post of yours, but I think that's being a bit unfair to Hall. Yes, he played almost twice as many minutes, but he did have 8 rebounds (5 offensive), 4-7 shooting, and 10 points. With your logic, maybe Cotton should have played a lot more than 7 minutes. He had 5 rebounds and 4 points in his short stint.

Also, Hall's minutes were HCGM's choice. If he was saving Garrett because of fouls, he saved him too much, as he ended up with only 3 for the game.

[LoneStar48]

fsf, not one to have ever countered a post of yours, but I think that's being a bit unfair to Hall. Yes, he played almost twice as many minutes, but he did have 8 rebounds (5 offensive), 4-7 shooting, and 10 points. With your logic, maybe Cotton should have played a lot more than 7 minutes. He had 5 rebounds and 4 points in his short stint.

Also, Hall's minutes were HCGM's choice. If he was saving Garrett because of fouls, he saved him too much, as he ended up with only 3 for the game.

We talked about that last night; why not use Stutz earlier, regardless of the fouls? The Shox had a chance early in the second half to control the game, and Stutz might helped do that if coach left him in.

[shox1989]

We talked about that last night; why not use Stutz earlier, regardless of the fouls? The Shox had a chance early in the second half to control the game, and Stutz might helped do that if coach left him in.

I for one thought at the time that coach was leaving Stutz on the bench way too long. At one point I was wondering if he forgot about him.

[forevershockerfan]

fsf, not one to have ever countered a post of yours, but I think that's being a bit unfair to Hall. Yes, he played almost twice as many minutes, but he did have 8 rebounds (5 offensive), 4-7 shooting, and 10 points. With your logic, maybe Cotton should have played a lot more than 7 minutes. He had 5 rebounds and 4 points in his short stint.

Also, Hall's minutes were HCGM's choice. If he was saving Garrett because of fouls, he saved him too much, as he ended up with only 3 for the game.

I concur about Hall getting his due minutes last night and was pleased with the game he played. When Hall and Stutz were in together, we seemed to really rebound well. One thing I like about Marshall is he plays the correct Shockers the correct amount of minutes IMO. Last night, I still would have liked Stutz in more than he played, even though his shot was off. However, what really hurt was the 5 minute stint the 1st half when we were scoreless and ended up 9 behind at the half. Then at the very end, they made 2 big shots and we had no answer. It just seemed like we played into VCU's hands last night and their swarming D. had it's causes and effects. I look for Indiana to beat them.

[WSUwatcher]

I actually understand the sentiment you've expressed, Rlh, because I've felt the same way myself at times over the years about this or that Shocker -- usually, although not always, a member of the baseball team, which is probably no surprise, simply because there are more of them.

But even if I agreed with you about Stutz, which I don't -- personally, I wish he could return as a redshirt senior, because I think he'd be even another notch better than he was this past season -- I think I've learned by now that it's just plain ungracious to make such an observation at a time like this. Give it a rest for awhile. Garrett had a bad offensive game against VCU, quite possibly his worst of the year when you consider that he missed nine shots in just 17 minutes (eight even if you discount the final desperation heave). That's a lot of misses, and one can certainly argue that it's better not to shoot at all than it is to shoot a lot and miss 80% of the time, because if you aren't missing all those shots, some teammate will probably take them instead and can scarcely fail to make more of them. But Stutz was hardly alone in underperforming offensively in that game, and even a guy like Toure Murry, who provided one of WSU's all too rare respectable lines, had his "oh, no" moments as well. The team as a whole also underperformed a lot on the boards, especially the guys not named Stutz and Hall, which was extremely untimely. Plus, it's a safe bet that no Shocker feels worse about the outcome; one would expect nothing else from a genuine competitor, because such folks tend to exaggerate their contribution to losses while not getting overly exuberant about their production in victories.

There's a lot of disappointment out there right now, as there should be. For me personally, this empty feeling of a premature end ranks right up there with some notable baseball debacles, such as the CWS losses to Arizona State in 1988 or LSU in 1996, or the more recent regional losses at home to Oklahoma State in 1999 or to Arkansas and Oklahoma this century, in all of which WSU snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. But the sun will rise tomorrow, and at least we don't root for Duke or Missouri (or fellow #5 Temple, which drew a much easier #12 than WSU did). So try to take the high road, okay?