Great first half shooting. Kafusi looked reasonably good, Fisher was on, Kyle was steady, Winder hit his shots and Haws was generally Haws. Toolsen put in some good minutes also.
Second half not so good and indicated some question marks.
Noted that SF D moved out to and beyond the perimeter - the entire team, just keeping one guy back. BYU, I thought, handled it very poorly the entire second half, constantly trying to dribble around the D as all four guards would just stay outside. No cuts, no getting the ball into the middle, no quick passes to get in behind that really stretched out D. I thought we should have been able to get a bunch of layups out of that defensive alignment but we got nothing inside out of it at all. What is it with everyone just liking to dribble around outside of the 3 point area? With the lane that open, surely we can do better than what we saw in the second half.
The game really deteriorated once all starters were out. I realize they don’t play in game situations a lot but that second unit looked really lost and confused out there. Neilsen continues to unimpress in this group and needs to be on a serious strength and wait building program. Halford hustles but is still a turnover liability every time he brings the ball up court. Bartley also didn’t seem to be with it tonight and as always, Worthington looked just like Worthington. At this point, these guys just don’t seem to be getting better as the season moves along and it would be nice to see that change for the better.
I’m just concerned that we can play this kind of perimeter ball and put up big numbers against inferior teams but that this style of play will not work nearly as well against better teams like Gonzaga or anyone other team we might meet in the tournament.
One more thought on the game tonight. I thought we played pretty good D the first half tonight, but the second half was not good at all. I hope that was just a case of being up 30.
Deteriorated? We were up be 30 when they left the game with nearly 5 minutes left and we still won by 31.
I didn’t see the game but Neilson scored. Others off the bench scored. I don’t know why you think any team could shoot 74% for the whole game. And also continue making 11 of 15 three point shots rate.
We won big in the cracker box gyms. Something we could not do last year even with the great Mika. Yes, Rose needs to re-teach the zone offense. But, all-in-all, we are doing very well in away games. Now, can we do it at home?
Kaufusi has improved a lot. Neilson played well tonight. Worthington should be coming off the bench now. Bartley should play more. Toolson is getting a lot better. Nixon is playing better. Hopefully his shots will start going down more. Halford is up and down. He was down today and Rose sat him. But, te two prior games he played well.
We scored 42 in the second half and that’s fine, but it wasn’t smooth play like the first half - not talking about points but just overall play. Their D adjustment bothered BYU for much of the second half, including the starters, and I really think we can improve on how we respond to that kind of a change in strategy. Weaving around 25’ from the hoop to get open three’s with four guards is fine, but when the defense comes out in mass to that distance, there have to be lanes open to the hoop - and BYU seldom accomplished that and I thought that made the second half not as good as it should have been.
As for Neilson, Bartley and Nixon, if you didn’t see the game, how can you say they looked better? They didn’t and if you see the game on tape, you’ll agree. Once they came in, the game bogged down pretty drastically for BYU on both ends of the floor.
Not worried about the team one at all. We just made to WCC teams look like high school teams. My only concern going forward would be how does this team play when our long shots don’t fall. KC and Winder seem to be able to drive inside at will so I guess I shouldn’t be too concerned.
Nice win all the way around. Still need to work on aggravating turnovers. I actually think the defense has gotten better using the 4 guard format. Too many people were taking advantage of Worthington’s slow feet. Also the ball movement is much better with the four guard approach. I thought this game would be much closer than it was as I thought the SC game would be closer too. Every win on the road is a good win but this domination should create confidence moving forward. I’m not really sure who you would consider a great ball handler or even one as good as Carlino was last year and this could be a problem against really athletic teams. Road games against St Marys and Portland will be interesting and of course Gonzaga is going to be out of reach unless BYU can shoot 65%. The Zags have too many good inside players and generally play really smart basketball or they end up watching the game. The key for BYU is getting each player the shot where they excel and playing good defense. If they do can accomplish those two things they will be in the NCAA’s with Gonzaga winning the league.
Unfortunately I didn’t get to watch either game. I simply missed the SC game on New Year’s day and then I don’t get ROOT sports so I missed the game last night. I wasn’t happy about missing either one, let alone both of them… Is that an oxymormon or something?
I guess I was surprised, not so much that they won, but how big they won. It seemed like the other teams in the league were more competitive last season, even though BYU was a better team last year IMO. Where these 30 point blowouts are coming from I have no idea. It’s like there is Gonzaga at one level, BYU at the next level and then the rest. I saw some of Portland vs. Gonzaga and the Pilots made a good run at the end but couldn’t sustain it. I was a little bugged when I thought the officials slowed their run with some timely calls in GU’s favor but I am probably just overly sensitive to that.
I think Portland will give BYU trouble and SMC too but that is it. I think BYU loses 2 or 3 more conference games and finished second, just like always… the only way they beat GU is if the Zags have an off night and BYU plays one of their best games of the season. I still think the refs are too nice to GU… but I’m trying to get past that feeling.
I need to watch the games this week to get back up to speed.
One thing I miss is sparring with guys… this format doesn’t seem to facilitate that very well. It was fun!
I had a long reply to you and hit a key and lost it…
I agree with your take typically, didn’t see the game, so will take your word for it on what happened. I’m not like the grasshopper who thinks he knows how a game went without watching it. The outside shooting has been incredible the last two games, thus the big blowouts. I wonder what will happen when those shots aren’t falling? or when a team plays tough perimeter D and dares BYU to go inside?
That still concerns me.
I guess we will have to wait and see but I am skeptical. They need balance and they need guys like KC who aren’t afraid to go to the basket and draw a foul or make a strong play.
Disagree. We were with Gonzaga all the way until Pango went off. It wasn’t the bigs that won the game. It was that guard we couldn’t defend at the end.
It’s hard to spar Jim when it’s impossible to know who you are responding to in this format. Perhaps that is by design to keep Floyd from exploding irrationally
Your assessments are way off. We weren’t blown out by GU. Our 4 guard offense works and that is giving us better defense causing turnovers and easy buckets. Our guards are shooting in rythem now and it shows up in shooting percentages.
As I recall, we got pounded by GU and other excellent teams last year. This year, we had chances to win against several top 20 teams. Yes, if Mika was playing, we could be even better with the 4 guard offense.
blah blah blah… with them all the way to the end until Pangos went off. You could say that about any loss to this point. Yeah, BYU was with them until whatever happened. That isn’t the point. The point is that if you have an inside game, or at least the threat of one, the team is more balanced and more effective. If you don’t think the inside game of Gonzaga helped Pangos at some point in the game then you don’t get it.
Is it easy to see who I am responding to?
This thread has potential but we can’t tell who is responding to who because the format is all funky…
But what can you say about a 31 point beat down with the entire bench on the floor? Biggest observation was balanced scoring where USF “D” could not focus on just one or two of our guys. Plus Kaufusi just gets better every game. Agree we need more power and scoring from our bigs but they are young so they will get there.
