they never trailed against TN or Georgia ... the 'Dawgs tied us at 12-12 midway through the first half, but we built leads against both teams and never fell behind. Those two teams gave us trouble in the regular season, so that to me says a lot. Against Kentucky, we were not dominated. The final margin is a bit misleading, IMO. We simply missed too many FTs and several wide-open looks from 3. We were outclassed, out-sized, and beaten by the better team, but I did not see us back down from the challenge. We had that game in single digits in the 4th Q, and we had stretches of that game in both halves where we outplayed them.
Throw in the fact that BP and Madden had rough SECTs, and it says a lot about the strength of this TEAM. Michael Qualls had a solid SECT, as did Alandise Harris, and I think those two are the toughest Hogs on the team. I thought Anton Beard had a solid tourney and appears to have snapped out of his 5-game slump at the end of the regular season. I think Bell is playing his most consistent basketball of his career. Babb made real contributions and gave us a glimpse of what kind of player he can be for us down the road. Even Jacorey settled things down and started contributing positive plays.
We rebound the basketball better than I thought we would, and that's going to help us. Defensively, we've been good at times but inconsistent, however, now that we're out of league play where teams are familiar with us, I think our style can create lots of turnovers -- and we know if we force 15 or more, we're hard to beat. We've got the best player from the SEC and one of the best in the country in BP, and because he is a skilled big, we've got at least one match-up advantage against most teams. And with Qualls, we've got a guy who is going to drive the ball and get to the FT line. We're starting to look like a team that can make a run against anybody. Now that we're in survive and advance mode against the best teams in college basketball, I think we've got the kind of team that could play into late March.
This post was edited on 3/16 8:30 AM by Sir Dennis Eeatin-Hog
Throw in the fact that BP and Madden had rough SECTs, and it says a lot about the strength of this TEAM. Michael Qualls had a solid SECT, as did Alandise Harris, and I think those two are the toughest Hogs on the team. I thought Anton Beard had a solid tourney and appears to have snapped out of his 5-game slump at the end of the regular season. I think Bell is playing his most consistent basketball of his career. Babb made real contributions and gave us a glimpse of what kind of player he can be for us down the road. Even Jacorey settled things down and started contributing positive plays.
We rebound the basketball better than I thought we would, and that's going to help us. Defensively, we've been good at times but inconsistent, however, now that we're out of league play where teams are familiar with us, I think our style can create lots of turnovers -- and we know if we force 15 or more, we're hard to beat. We've got the best player from the SEC and one of the best in the country in BP, and because he is a skilled big, we've got at least one match-up advantage against most teams. And with Qualls, we've got a guy who is going to drive the ball and get to the FT line. We're starting to look like a team that can make a run against anybody. Now that we're in survive and advance mode against the best teams in college basketball, I think we've got the kind of team that could play into late March.
This post was edited on 3/16 8:30 AM by Sir Dennis Eeatin-Hog
