Another Chance to Beat a Ranked Team

[Diehard Pony]

Let's all hope that Dement's unattractive string ends at 22 with a win over #17 Purdue tomorrow!

<small>[ 12-20-2003, 08:49 PM: Message edited by: Diehard Pony ]</small>

[Mustangs35SMU]

We can not! play like we have been if we want to beat Purdue

[Charleston Pony]

beating Purdue at their place is not likely, but it sure would be nice to compete with them. We played a good 25 minutes against Wake. I'd like to see us play 40 minutes against both Purdue and Okla State, but I'm still not sure we have enough horses to beat either one of them. Let's just not embarras ourselves.

This team is very inconsistent and doesn't appear to have the depth to play a solid 40 minutes of defense. The problem with playing tough D is that it tends to wear you out and hurt your offensive production. We need to find some guys who can score off the bench. That's what these non-conference games are all about.

[Diehard Pony]

CP, I agree with almost everything you said. The only point with which I differ is the inference that non-conference games are not as important as conference games. That would be true if we played in the ACC or or the Big 10, but since we don't our non-conference games are where we determine if we are going to see post-season or not. We could be the WAC season champion and very easily not see post season play, depending on how we did against non-conference foes, especially those with high RPI's.

I realize that we could still go by being the WAC tournament champ, but that always seems to be our only hope by mid way through the season. Let's hope this year is different.

<small>[ 12-20-2003, 12:58 PM: Message edited by: Diehard Pony ]</small>

[Charleston Pony]

my point was that you have to determine early in the season who can contribute because by the time you get to conference play, it's critical to make your best showing. In conference play, every game counts towards seeding in the conference tourney, and winning the WAC tourney is the only guarantee this team has for post-season play. Now, if we drew 9000 to Moody every night, we'd have played in the NIT last year at 17-13. I still look for 17-13 out of this year's team, as well and I'm afraid we are still a year away from being a post season team. Hope I'm wrong.