Quick Thoughts On Oakland and the Draw

Agreed pretty much down the line.

I don’t think Oakland is going to beat us, but it’s a travesty of epic proportions that this team, with all it accomplished, doesn’t essentially have a bye into the second round and then get a 7/10 type game, and instead has the Pac 10 tournament.

When I initially heard about our seed I thought perhaps Rick or Deloss had gang banged a tournament selection committee member’s wife or daughter. When I saw the lol idiocy of this bracket I will instead chalk it up to abject stupidity and incompetence, as opposed to an axe to grind against the horns.

Still, other than Colorado and Tech not getting in, we were the most hosed team in the actual tournament. Disgraceful job by the committee

Pac 10 champ, not pac 10 tournament. Sorry.

I actually feel confident about this game, but I’m damn near depressed about having to face Arizona in the next round. That’s a good basketball team. They’re well coached, they have a superstar in Derrick Williams, and they’ll guard us.

Arizona will not guard you. They’re Bayloresque on the defensive side of the floor. I would not worry at all about scoring on Arizona.

But they can score on you. And I don’t think I’d want Thompson on Derrick Williams, because he’s a driver, gets to the line at will and would have Tristan in foul trouble all night.

Good work, as always.

I feel better about this matchup now, but there was a clear game plan throughout most of the last month and Barnes seemed to ignore it. How this team performs in the tournament is going to end up mostly on their own attitude and approach. If they wear the 4 like a chip, only half-listen to coaching and just go play, then it could be fun.

My enthusiasm for the tournament took a blow yesterday, but it was softened by listening to Bilas rip the committee & bracket.

Hip, they’ll guard us compared to what Oakland is going to do. And yes, we can’t have Thompson on Williams or Benson for long stretches. At some point you’d think he’d get some star treatment, but it hasn’t happened yet.

If Texas gets any coaching at all, any at all, they don’t lose to Oakland

Matt, thanks. I agree about the coaching thing but I also think legs play a big part. I thought we looked much better in the Big 12 tourney on both ends and I’m pretty sure that had to do with rest. I’m not going to count the KU game because no one can beat that team when Brady Morningstar and Taylor play over their heads like that and your best interior player gets saddled with foul trouble.

Saw Oakland’s conference tourney game on ESPN3, and I’m with Trips, Benson is good, but he’s not THAT good. He’s 6’11, somewhat athletic and somewhat skilled, which makes him a monster in the Summit League. But he’s not anything close to a lottery pick, and there’s no way he should be able to handle Thompson on either side of the floor; he’s got a real high center of gravity and he’s pretty easy to knock off balance.

I’d compare him to a Tony Battie / Hilton Armstrong type; he’ll be a late first-rounder / early second-rounder and he’ll be a ten-year NBA player, but he’s not exactly a world-beater or anything.

The game I saw it looked like Oakland ran more of their offense through Hamilton, their 5’11 175 point guard. He’s fast and he can shoot, but Balbay and Joseph should be able to contain him.

Could Oakland beat us? Yea. Should they? No.

“Oakland is going to let us catch it where we want it and they’re going to let us drive the ball, so Hamilton, Brown, and Thompson can get it to the rim if we don’t settle for jumpers.”

Put Balbay in that camp. The guy can slash to the rim. Might pass off when he gets there, but he can attack it. I think sometimes CoJo feeds off that too – he’ll watch Balbay get to the rim, then give it the ol’ college try himself.

I never have a clue what JCB will do. Guy’s a nutjob. He can ball though.

I’ll channel Yogi Berra here to say you can tell by watching that Joseph takes the lead in pushing the ball. He doesn’t take it all the way much, but they at least try to get in position to do that, and it makes sense.

The spacing on offense, though…. what’s that smell?

Oakland over Texas. Both the University and the City of

Oakland smack that didn’t involve the mention of a gat…nice.

I think Memphis has a decent shot of knocking off Zona. Cats have sleeped walked some this season and the Tigers are playing with house money. Horn fans can stick around to stir up some 12 seed magic in Tulsa.

Memphis sucks. They’re going to get run.

Where exactly is the City of Texas located?

Memphis has a lot of talent but yeah, they suck. Arizona sucks too though. Oakland is the toughest of the 3.

“What’s the capitol of Texas?”
“Austin.”
“WRONG Commie, it’s Houston!”

Arizona is 67th on KenPom defensive ratings and that’s only because they have an odd outlier in that they are ranked 2nd in 3pt FG defense. It’s something that the stat geeks have been pointing at all season. Arizona is 280th in the country in 2pt FG defense. Just awful.

2nd in 3pt FG D and 280th in 2pt FG D? If there was ever a game that called for the Bob Knight shot fake behind the arc….sounds like this team will go flying past you into the bench.

It tells me that no one in the PAC 10 can shoot it.

I’d like to see J’Covan make a big contribution in this game, but rotating back on D is far from his strong suit and well need to do that after every offensive possession.

5-12 upsets are among the most common in this ritual. Don’t count Memphis out for that reason, even though AU is the better team on paper.

“It tells me that no one in the PAC 10 can shoot it.”

It means that when Arizona played teams that shoot the 3 well, that team shot the 3 poorly against them. When Arizona played teams that suck as shooting the 2, that team did really well on 2 pointers.

That stat has been that way for months so it isn’t just Pac 10 play. I would say the 3pt shot stat is just a random outlier and the 2pt defense is a legit issue.

Red Dawn ref FTW.

dick — That’s a weird stat b/c Arizona is a pretty athletic team. They should be at least decent defensively. Texas/Arizona is the game of the second round if both teams take care of business round 1. I was at the Memphis/SMU game where Papa Dia dominated the Tigers’ front-court, so I really can’t see them beating Derrick Williams.

Now that I think about it, Arizona does kind of remind me of Missouri, in the sense that they’ll let you shoot so they can get the ball back. They live for run-outs and they’ll try pull-up threes.

Texas does have the defensive mindset that can frustrate Arizona. They’ll itch to shoot after 20 seconds.

“When Arizona played teams that suck as shooting the 2, that team did really well on 2 pointers.”

I hope GJ’s 15 ft jumper is listening.

Trips,

That is why I put up the link yesterday. When I looked over the Oakland schedule, they looked like a good team, but not a team that screamed upset. We need to take care of the ball and play smart, but we do have the talent to win.

The angst on here seemed a little overdone. However, we shouldn’t be a #4, and we shouldn’t be playing a good team. The committee was lazy and incompetent.

Total in this game is 154 which is a track meet by most standards, and Loyola Marymount pace by Texas Standards. So if we’re 10 point favorites, Vegas thinks the game is going to be 82 to 72. Personally, I’d bet the under. As a benchmark, the UNC vs. Duke total was 148 and both those teams can score. That game went way under.

java, I watched the Michigan State-Oakland game and the Oakland-Tennessee game, so I guess I got exposed to the best games they’ve played. Benson was excellent, and they seemed to hit just about every open three. Welcome to last Saturday, if that’s the case.

But if I’m Oakland, I suppose I’m concerned about Thompson making Benson do things defensively that he’s not used to — either guy could get into foul trouble. Maybe Thompson, the better athlete, has the edge there. And Texas has the best defense in the country, and pressured the three-point line all season. They can hurt Oakland where they are strongest.

And where Texas still has Pomeroy’s top-rated defense, Oakland ranks 200th. They just need to make good shots, because they should get them.

I think your Key 2 is a great point, but I doubt we implement it. Not a great history of exploiting issues like that under Barnes. I do think Wangmene will be a good defensive matchup on Benson and expect Barnes to give Wangmene the minutes to see what he can do. Wangmene does seem to have improving confidence, although he will always struggle with hands of stone.

The matchups that really concern me is when/if we’ll face a big, physical playmaker at guard. Balbay or not, I think that’s our achilles.

do y’all remember that guy Sydmil Harris? I found out tonight that he speaks 5 languages.

UNBELIEVABLE! go horns.