Fouling

[Shox21]

Going to show what little I know about fouling.

We have had 9 conference games to date - 3 losses and 6 wins. For the entire 9 games, we have fouled 22 times more than our opponent (159 to 181), but over 9 games that doesn't seem like an excessive amount . In our three losses we fouled 25 more times than our opponent (9 more fouls than CU, 7 more than Drake, and 5 more than IlST). -- In other words, cut the fouling and we win.

I am NOT complaining about the officials because I think a lot of the fouls are legitimate. But it just seems like we get a foul assessed against us for something our opponent two minutes later do and don't get called for. Is it that once you get the reputation for fouling the refs just "go with the flow" and call them even more?

Brue Haertl said last night on Sports Sunday that "all they [WSU] had to do at Drake was defend and they win." Marshall puts a great deal of stock in solid defense so you won't convince me he is not teaching how to defend without fouling. So where's the problem? Is it in the gray matter in the player's head, or is it they get lazy and without constant effort you get sloppy and the fouls come?

[RoyalShock]

Saturday was an anomaly, since our defense was sub-par, and part of the reason I think the officiating was horrible. But generally, due to our aggressive defense, we're probably going to get 1-3 more fouls per game than our opponents.

We can say "foul less", but if it means backing off our defensive intensity then the gains received from fewer fouls will be offset by fewer steals and more made shots by the opponents.

Having said that, we always seem to commit several dumb fouls per game. By dumb fouls I'm referring to silly reach-ins in the back-court, over aggressiveness after a turnover, and over-the-back calls when boxed out. I suppose you could throw in leaving your feet on a head-fake and fouling (I'm referring to you, Mr. Kyles).

We have a few players who need to understand that you can't make up for a mistake by trying to steal the ball.

IIRC, when SIU was in their thug-ball phase, they had the depth to absorb the extra few fouls (though they probably should have been called for more). But I don't remember them committing the stupid fouls. That's a sign of a well-disciplined team, IMO.

[pie n eye]

Agreed, RS. We have at least 4 turnovers per game that stem from frustration, lack of sense, laughing gas, jay leno..who knows but they're not incidental fouls from playing good defense. These types of fouls (and for that matter turnovers) also seem to occur at the worst times like when we are getting back into a game, had a big turnover or made a big stop. In reality I suppose these things are likely to happen considering the games are still played by human players instead of robots, but that doesn't make it any less frustrating to watch.

I will say that I honestly believe there is some kind of officiating conspiracy against either Garrett Stutz himself or just tall people. It really just doesn't seem like the guy can catch a break when it comes to fouls. On one end the guy gets mugged by 3 defenders while shooting- no foul. On the other end he's standing straight up with his hands while 5'6 guard drives madly into the lane, jumps head and shoulders first into Stutz and somehow the whistle is blown.

Oh yea, just remembered while typing this, I'm sure it's somewhere on the game thread but does anyone remember a foul against Durley in probably the last 5 minutes of the game? He got the ball down low, missed a shot a shot through what I felt like was too much contact, fought for his own rebound, missed another shot due to even more contact at which point a Drake player got the rebound and a foul was immediately called on Durley. When I watched the sequence in real time I thought there was no way Durley fouled, if anybody it was Murray reaching in from the back. When they showed the replay there was definitely no contact that would have warranted a foul on either player. Maybe had no effect on the game at all but it sticks out as a time we were called for a phantom foul. And sometimes I think we are called for quite a few of those.

[pinstripers]

I remember that JT sequence, and I remember it exactly that way.