[NU Sports] Hoops, etc.

[SjT (Stephen J. Truog)]

>   .02:  Our inability to bang with the big boys, especially after Thompson's
>arrival, has been perplexing.  With DD and MT, I thought we'd do a 180 from
>where we've been the last few years. Not.

That's been part of the problem - when's the last time Thompson played?
Between the suspension and injury, it's been a long time since he's been in
an NU uniform on game day. He wasn't comfortable in the system to begin
with and then to lose so much of this year.

The good thing about that has been Scott's development - he's much more
like the Carmody Center at Princeton with his 3-point shooting and hustle
(some nice steals today) -- but he still is too thin to bang in the Big Ten.

>If we can bail out an NIT bid and or a winning record, some sort of
>incremental gain will have been achieved.

I'm not sure the NIT takes us even if we do slip over .500 -- they didn't
last year. Besides, there are gonna be some big names missing the big dance
that will get in ahead of us. In the Big Ten alone, the top three are locks
(and hopefully will be given better seeds than the committee shafted them
with last year), but it's gonna be tough to get a fourth. Ohio State is
making a nice run, but Minny's gonna need a serious run in the league
tournament to make any kind of a case and Indiana's early schedule with
that young team just killed 'em. And Iowa is out unless they get a miracle.
So chalk 3, maybe 4 Big Ten teams in the NIT ahead of us. But we'll see.

I dunno - looking back, maybe the sour taste of the Hawaii game had us
looking to hoops with too much optimism. Thompson wasn't going to come in
and be a perfect fit right away, and it appears he hasn't made as much of
an effort as you'd hope either. Hopefully he'll be healthy and have a
better attitude about team rules next year. We also underestimated Jitim's
loss and who would step up. And then those early sloppy losses killed us -
and  those PSU/OSU losses in league play really stung. Maybe we can end
strong ... but we dug an early hole. The biggest thing, IMO, is that we use
this as a learning experience. We do have everyone back and aren't that far
from 17-19 wins if we get our act together.

>   Closing:  no chatter about Coach Roy's blurb about a home and home vs.
>Nevada in football (06 and 07) ?
>   I don't like it.  Teams from the WAC/MAC/Conf.USA etc.; we need 2 games in
>Evanston, 1 at their place. Especially Nevada, who draw worse than us!

I agree - maybe a home-and-home with UNLV for the Vegas trip:), but Nevada?
These are those gotta-win games we need for the postseason, and having as
many on the road as at home doesn't help much. Not much of a draw game for
a September day in Evanston either. If we're giving away home-and-homes to
anybody, I'm sure NIU would have jumped at the chance and at least that
creates some regional interest and puts people in the seats.

GO CATS!!!
-SjT


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