Well I hope everything is okay and that life gives you some respite on occasion.
Hang in there and keep grinding man. 
I was late to watch the game and only finished it tonight. I have been hard on the selfish play of Emery and I must give him credit for lots of hustle against UVU. He still has the maddening lapses of judgement on offense, but defensively in was much improved vs UVU. I knew that Bryant was not feeling well and has issues recovering from surgery on his knee. This loss had nothing to do with him. I thought Beo was hurt and not going to play … then he is sent into the game by Rose with one minute left??? You have got to be kidding. Colby L took and made his only three attempt. Other than Emery, we are having a terrible 3 pt year. Beo and Colby L are super accurate 3 shooters. Haws doesn’t rebound, doesn’t play a lick of defense, has crazy passes, doesn’t shoot well from 3 … he can drive, but doesn’t do much of it. What he is in the lineup to do? Childs is just learning and even with his mistakes, he is at least equal to Davis. He is more productive per min on the floor than Davis. Some of you get on his defense, but it is substantially better than Kyle’s D.
Time to go back to the drawing board and get a starting lineup that is defensively oriented. I hate to say it, but based on Haw’s body of work this season he should start games on the bench. Guinn or Beo need to start in his place… LJ is another defensive liability. Oh boy. Fortunately Calvert and Toolson weren’t on the UVU active roster, BYU would have lost by 30. Off the subject, but who decided to not recruit the Toolson kid from LP and now at UVU and offer Zach Frampton a scholarship???
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When you have 6 top 100 ESPN recruits recruiting isn’t the issue. The issue is something else. There were times this team has looked great before the Valpo game. The Valpo loss wasn’t that big of a deal. When you turn your roster over like BYU did and have a close loss to a good senior laden team early in the season it is nothing to panic over. The loss to UVU is a bad loss but still no reason to panic. The talent is there and now it is up to the coaches to get the best out of the talent. I doubt BYU has ever had a deeper and more talented roster. Right now there are great parts but the sum of the parts isn’t so good yet.
Guys who keep harping on the recruiting are clueless as to this group of players.They are plenty talented enough to win a bunch. BYU will never be able to recruit the same type of players as Kentucky and there is no reason to waste their time and efforts and lose out on the type of players they can realistically expect to sign.
Scheduling UVU is a lose lose situation for BYU. It does nothing for you if you win and you have everything to lose. I suspect the guys walked into that game thinking it was an easy win. Losing to UVU reminds me of losing to some of the WCC teams over the years. Other than Gonzaga and St. Mary’s a loss to any of those other WCC teams at home is inexcusable and a road loss to any of them should be a rarity, like once every three years or so. Every year they drop a few WCC games they should never lose. I don’t get it because Rose always won the games he was supposed to win in the Mountain West conference and you can’t tell me that Loloya, and Pepperdine are better than Wyoming and Colorado St.
Relax guys, not even out of November and everybody seems to be jumping ship. Haws hasn’t played any basketball since high school, Childs is fresh out of high school and none of these guys have played together a whole lot in recent year. They could still be very good before the end of the year. Call me an optimist. It is just my nature.
Good post aro. Posts that use common logic, instead of assumptions based no body of evidence, detracts from the credibility of the posts. I wish I had a crystal ball and could see how every player would perform before we all have to go through watching the growing pains. Unfortunately we don’t, so we get to rely on coaches who probably know a great deal more than those of us who sit around thinking up silly posts. I’ve watched every minute of every game this year. I didn’t forsee a loss to Utah Valley or seeing Haws struggle after impressive preseason games or Mika playing 50% of each game with foul trouble. This team has tremendous potential, if Rose can coach them into playing together and unselfishly. Haws has tremendous potential once he gets the mission rust off and acclimated to college ball. I hope Beo develops into an outstanding player, but that isn’t a proven fact by any stretch. I don’t have the luxury of seeing these kids practice but there are 4 or 5 coaches that do so I’m guessing they are not going to be consulting with posters on this board, who should be playing:)just a guess
It wasn’t just Nielsen either. Toolson stuck it the BYU players to. If TJ Haws doesn’t step up soon when Bryant recover from the sore knee Haws will be sitting the pine a lot.
I agree with much of what you say. But had they read mine and a couple of others about Neilsen, Mika could play his heart out and we wouldn’t miss a step bringing Neilsen. Of course, the question is would Neilsen have gotten rid of the bean pole body had he stayed at BYU. I’m guessing not.
Agreed. Bryant’s shot has been hampered by his injury.
A “bad” loss? 114 points and you call it a bad loss? No Reed, it was a terrible loss. Once again, people are accepting of something that is unacceptable. This isn’t church…
I’m just curious here, was Jimmer a top 100 recruit? How about Brandon Davies? I don’t think they were heavily recruited… recruiting is more than just top 100, but hey at least we’ve got that mythical HS national championship right?
Yeah, and his body looks like he is still in high school. He will get pushed around, he will get frustrated and he will react like a high schooler… more to come.
They have been practicing together for a long time and they are all from Utah so they have seen each other play for years. There is a high level of familiarity, don’t forget about the LP3… oops I wasn’t going to mention that anymore.
That doesn’t sound real optimistic, maybe guarded optimism and it includes the phrase “could still”… a version of woulda coulda shoulda, the BYU mantra.
I appreciate your “optimism” and have always respected your opinion. I don’t agree with a lot of it this time. BYU was down 2 at halftime and gave up 54 points. There is NO reason or excuse for giving up 60 in the second half and losing by double digits to UVU. Even if this BYU team was one of the weaker teams (not possible with top 100 recruits on the floor) we’ve seen, there is still no excuse. But, as is always the case we have to listen to every excuse available… “it was a trap game” “they had nothing to win and everything to lose” “they didn’t try” “they were lazy” “they didn’t play defense”, etc.
I’m not sure what else to say. I didn’t like the Valpo loss, but I was okay with it. This loss is not okay. That is all.
The reality is you want to blame everything about this loss on BYU and I’ll agree there is a lot of blame to spread around, you might want to try giving a ltitle credit to Utah Valley, because if they shot unbelievably like that every game, they would probably beat every team in Utah. Not sure if you are continually ragging on Lone Peak or all the people that were giving BYU a free pass to the final four because of three top 100 coming from Lone Peak, but if it’s the school -good luck with that one-kind of like the officials conspiracy
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Why is it everyone wants to play above their pay grade when it’s BYU? I think it’s Satan’s fault. He gives teams the wickedness to beat the lords university. Of course, it could be leprechauns too. That 3 point shot at the buzzer at halftime was unbelievable! Maybe it was zombies. It just couldn’t be that Pope recruited some top transfers. A few from BYU.
I’m with you. They not only shot extremely well, the ran their offense well too. Their defense was excellent too. Even though we scored 101 points they double teamed Mika and frustrated our offense from playing inside out and swing the ball. They were in our passing lanes.
It’s easier to blame people than give people their just due. It’s just part of life-not going to change until the next life when everybody gets their justice. Sports really isn’t that tough to figure out. It’s usually the things you fail to do combined with the good things your opponent does in the case of losing. Basketball is harder to predict than a lot of sports-you know that. If your team gets in a zone-they are hard to stop. That’s why there are so many upsets and highly seeded teams get sent home early. In the case of BYU, by the end of the season you can better tell about the team by the body of the work, not one or two games. In the end people just like to play the blame card.
A voice of reason, Thank you Reed. Valpo was a senior laden team. UVU will serve its purpose to get these youngsters attention. BYU will work on what to do when our bigs get double teamed, our guards got an earful about their hero ball and lack of defensive effort. Like I said, if this were to happen late in the year, I would be seriously concerned. Go Cougs.
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I think the two keys moving forward are 1) to play man to man defense and actually put some effort into it,and 2) to keep Mika out of foul trouble. Our entire team looks different with him in there because NO ONE so far can stop him one on one in the post, and he swats or changes at least 5 shots in the paint per game. If Mika plays 32-34 minutes against Valpo, we win going away. If Mika plays 32-34 minutes vs UVU, we win that game as well. We were blowing Valpo out early, and it was all Mika. Against UVU they doubled him every time he had the ball, and he STILL scored 22 points in 26 minutes and DIDN’T MISS A SHOT. When he sits, it’s like the defense has an extra defender out there, and with Haws and LJ and Bryant unable to hit the broad side of a barn lately, we are reduced to Emery going one on one (which isn’t always bad). I don’t think Emery is playing hero ball. I think he knows that with Mika out, a forced shot by him is better than almost any shot from a bunch of guys who are ice cold.
Hmmm… I think it is Emery and his hero ball that is creating some of the problem.
Team chemistry is a huge part of the game. Emery was the leading scorer against Valpo, wasn’t he? Well, good for him, I’m sure he hopes to keep that going. Every team in the wcc is slowly learning what it takes to beat BYU because now there are two teams that have done it. Princeton didn’t know yet, that is why they lost to BYU. Valpo figured it out and used the officials to their advantage. UVU formulated a recipe and did it as well.
Part of being prepared is watching game film, analyzing that game film and coming up with a game plan. Pope did that, Rose didn’t think he had to. The student taught his teacher, right “grasshopper”?
Reed may be the voice of reason that I agree with most of the time, but nobody is acknowledging what a bad loss that was. It is the kind of loss that will require some tough wins to make up for. It is the kind of loss that can keep BYU out of the dance if Gonzaga and St. Mary’s make it and the tourney only takes two teams from the wcc, a very likely scenario.
It seems as though the delusions and denials just won’t go away.
Ya I don’t think Emery is doing hero ball. No one can score or shoot well so he’s doing what a leader does, take over the game. Mika is riding the pine and Haws is stumbling all over the court. What do you want him to do?
I don’t know, what did Jimmer do? He carried a less talented team to some pretty impressive wins and did what needed to be done to easily win against the weak teams and beat some really good teams.
If Emery wants to be Jimmer then that is what he needs to do. Jimmer was not a ball hog or a glory hog. He did what he did because he could and knew it. Emery needs to be a leader and taking over the game means doing what needs to be done to WIN the game. Did he rally the team to play better defense? Did he help their confidence by encouraging them? Did he take good shots in the flow of the offense or was he just chucking it up there? A leader rallies the team to victory.
You remember Jimmers Senior year. Emery is a sophomore. Maybe you shouldn’t try to measure Emery to Jimmer anyway. Completely different players and talent. Emery did what he could do. But the other 4 didn’t respond. And that isn’t because Emery is a ball hog.
Yeah… I need to cut him some slack.
He was great tonite… 3-15 from the floor with 3 assists and 3 turnovers.
What is it that you like so much about his game?
Both he and Haws are over rated. Mika is the only one of the 3 that is legit.
By the way, did you see that St. Mary’s destroyed Stanford?
He is the one that is trying to be Jimmer…
He put up 15 shots tonite and made 3 of them… and he put up 16 vs. Valpo and made 5. He shot the ball 28 times vs. UVU, twice as many as UVU’s leading shot taker and had 37 points (which helps his scoring average) but his team lost.
That is the definition of a ball hog or black hole as some would call it. It is also an example of him trying to be Jimmer, getting those scoring numbers as high as they can be. I don’t want to be a naysayer but somebody needs to help keep some perspective.
I think it’s reasonable to say that Emery is forcing shots at times because TJ has been worse than terrible, Guinn is not good enough to score consistently, Davis will disappear for long stretches, Childs rarely creates his own shot, LJ is a bricklayer, etc etc. I think Emery finds himself doing too much because most of these other guys are doing too little. It’s like Mika and Emery are our only two real threats with the ball in their hands. TJ has to come around because he has the talent to get his own shots, and that will help Emery tone it down a notch.
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