What is going on? Start off with great defense running away with the game and then like another 6 minutes of no one scoring. Back to days gone past. Is this going to be that one bad game that knocks us out of the NCAA?
Per Pope’s end of game interview what is going on is he is concerned that the defense is not making plays. It sounded like he is mostly satisfied that the team is actually getting their assignments done on D, but unlike the offense the players have not bought in to the point that they are within the defensive scheme changing enough, caring enough to change, to actually make good strong defensive plays.
IF the team plays as badly tomorrow as they did yesterday, and there is no reason to think they will do better at this point in the season, they will get skunked on their own court.
SMC is no Pepperdine.
SMC will play a strong defensive game.
SMC will not have the offensive lapses.
Bennett will have some ideas on how to change things up at the half to get his boys playing even better.
BYU will be a distant third in the WCC standings.
Pope’s boys need to play their best defense of the season, and they haven’t played good defense in a month…not likely to change tomorrow.
They won by 27 points against a team that only lost by 5 at Gonzaga so I think you are being a bit overly negative. I don’t see how anybody can say they played poorly. Pepperdine is not a bad team. I think BYU beats St. Marys and if they don’t I will be incredibly disappointed. St. Marys isn’t that good this year. BYU nearly beat them on their own home court without Childs. Yes I expect a win. ESPN gives BYU a 70% chance of winning. I think they know better than some alarmist fans who are upset that BYU only won by 27 points. Every game is different. Some games are played fast and loose and some are half court games. I think BYU beats St. Marys because they are better than St. Marys regardless of the type of game it is. I think you are overrating St. Marys. They aren’t as good as they have been in recent years.
BYU played good defense against Pacific, on the road, a week ago. Against San Francisco they did not play good defense. Last night the defense was good enough to win by 27. It isn’t true that the defense has been poor for the last month.
I can see what Pope is talking about. A great offensive effort against Pepperdine. If BYU is to be good defensively, it has to be team defense. Haws will never be a good defender and everyone except Child’s and Barcello are a half step slow, so it is important to make your rotations and switches on time, which they failed to do several times. I’ve seen very few mistakes made by Pope this year, but one last night was sitting Haws and Toolson at the same time. BYU lost their offensive continuity and Pepperdine went on a 16-0 run and were back in the game. In the 2nd half they regained their momentum and increase their defensive intensity. I see BYU coming out strong Saturday and Childs having a big game along with Toolson and Haws. BYU win
Wow! Calling him an alarmist fan? I think he has some points. We are not stopping anyone at the basket or from getting to the basket. Oh, we start out good but then fall apart at some point in our helpside defense. And, I don’t like giving these players the baseline. They score on us every time taking away the helpside.
Also, we are having some sever droughts in scoring letting teams back into the games. We have long periods of not scoring tomorrow we will lose. 107 points is a lot. But what if we aren’t that hot tomorrow and have a couple of long stretches of no scoring?
Look at the minutes played last night. I think Pope was trying to rest players as much as possible for Saturday’s game because we did get out to a big lead early.
Harding’s knee is looking stronger. He was moving better and for the first time in a while dunked the ball. If he’s feeling good, he will be more effective tomorrow. Seljaas has to be more consistent shooting. 3-7 is okay but he had those 4 misses in a row during that 16-0 run. That can’t happen. I think he needs to shave 
St. Marys is a game BYU should win. They didn’t play poorly last night. Every game is different and every game has changes in momentum.The only concern I see is letting teams go on big runs.
I said alarmist because he all but predicted a St. Marys win over BYU after BYU beat a team that only lost to Gonzaga by at 5 at Gonzaga. We all have our anxiety over games because we are fans but the the facts tell me BYU should win. They might not but they should. I guess if BYU hadn’t lost focus for awhile in the first half they would have won by 40. Sometimes when you jump to a big lead early you lose some focus and then other team picks up momentum. It still turned into a blowout.
That is the concern. Last two games we went on long periods of scoring droughts. We can’t do that against St. Mary’s. We get sloppy when we get big leads early and turn the ball over and stop playing solid defense. Can’t have Haws and Toolson out at the same time if at all possible.
BYU is winning games the way they did in Rose’s best years. They are smoking hot on offense and barely adequate on defense.
Earlier in the season, the team looked like they were getting better on defense. Admittedly they are better now than they were last year. But they are still far from good.
Pope has been talking about how bad the team’s defense is for much of the season. He is right.
He is rightfully proud of how well the O is playing. But as he and the players said numerous times earlier this year, before they started losing nearly every other game, when shots are not falling the team can still put in the effort and play good defense and win games.
They have not…which is why they have lost 3 out of their last 7 games. Nobody would say a team that is 4-3 is playing well.
The offense is: the defense is not.
They need to step it up. Play consistently or they will end up playing extra games at the end of the season against sub-par teams, tiring them out before they play the teams that will can reasonably beat them. The formula for winning the conference tournament title is to be one of the teams that gets a bye, play on fresher legs, play better defense until, if ever, the shots in Vegas start going in…tired legs, extra games can only be avoided with playing better defense starting against SMC.
Well, the problem is allowing big runs where we aren’t scoring any points. SF game was. 21-0 run against us. Yesterday there was another run where we didn’t score. Stop those and we won’t lose tomorrow.
Now Harold
27 point win and BYU sets a record 17 made 3s. Pope let this game be a race between a Corvette and a Hummer. The Vette won.
well said, Reed. The SMC game will be a slow down meticulous typical Bennett game…until BYU hits its trademark 3s and SMC can’t match the fire power. Barcellos on Ford. Fitts can and usually gets into foul trouble with Nixon taking charges.
Very perceptive, I would also add that Ross had to sit early and Haws-Toolson sitting when Ross came back in the game. Pepperdine can hurt you at the line while getting your studs in foul trouble, not the case last night but Pepperdine will nick good teams just watch.
Great win, expected win and it sets BYU up nicely.
One last thing. The San Fran win was simply at home team with 2 guards getting red hot. Shebazz was a 6th or 7th in rotation, not even a starter and he hit 100% of his shots. 32 points, Fluke, never happen again. SF would of beat Gonzaga that night. Fluke.
They play Gonzaga at SF, I predict that Shebazz shoots SF out of the game with bricks cause that’s what happens when a bench players has a hot night. will be interesting to watch.
And the answer is…ding ding ding…Shebazz 1 for 6 from 3land