Doggydaddy's Den: DoggyDaddy's Dailies 2/8/2016

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Here is my UConn/South Carolina Pre Game Report.

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Funny play in the Louisville/Notre Dame game. Mariya Moore made a post move in the paint. As she turned she barely touched the defender, Madison Cable. Cable went flying backwards to the floor. Moore was so surprised that no defender was there when she faced the basket she didn't know what to
do. She finally just shot the ball and made the basket. It was great to see the flop not get rewarded.

Both teams came into this game on a 15 game winning streak and undefeated records in the ACC. And it was a great game to watch. So much young talent on the court.

Notre Dame came back from as much as nine points in the first half and seven in the fourth quarter to make a game of it, tying the score at 55 with seven minutes left in the game. The game went back and forth with the teams exchanging the lead several times. With two minutes left, Cable received a pass from Huffman (who had traveled with no call) and hit a HUGE three pointer to give ND a four point lead they would never relinquish. They ended up winning 66-61, closing the game out at the foul line.

I like this Louisville team. They have a lot of talent and it's very young talent. I really like their RS junior guard Briahanna Jackson. She is going to be a great one.

ND is still ND. Smart, tough and confident. They really struggled in this game but found a way to win against a very good team. It was another poor three point shooting effort for ND, who was leading the country in three point percentage. Over their last 5 games they have shot 4-14, 2-16, 6-19, 6-17 and now 2-9. That's 20-75 for 26.7%.

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So, I was watching the Tennessee at Teas A&M game to kill some time before the Super Bowl started. And it was an interesting game. The first half was a typical SEC game. Lots of turnovers and missed shots. Ugly but competitive. The Aggies were up 30-29. Another game where the first team to 60 wins?

Tennessee's Kourtney Dunbar, a three point specialist saw some first quarter minutes and hit 3-4 threes in under three minutes. You would think that A&M would have known that she pretty much only takes threes.

Tennessee dominated the third quarter behind Reynolds, Carter and Russell who scored 8, 8 and 6 points for all of Tennessee's 22 points. They held A&M to 10 to take a 51-40 lead. Tennessee was on their way to their third straight win and a possible move back up in the rankings.

The Lady Vols held on to all of that lead and with 4:46 on a Russell offensive rebound and putback, Tennessee had a 59-48 advantage. Twenty seconds later, A&M turned the ball over and with that and a commercial break, Tennessee had the ball and an eleven point lead with 4:26 left in the game. Not even the self destructive Tennessee team could blow this one.

On the next possession, Tennessee ran down the shot clock 20 seconds before Jordan missed a jumper. Little used senior Nia Moore pulled down an offensive rebound and Tennessee ran another 12 seconds off the clock before Carter missed a jumper but once again Moore grabbed an offensive rebound. I'm sure the A&M fans were going nuts! 17 more seconds ran off the clock before A&M fouled and Tennessee once again had a fresh 30 second clock. This time they ran off 26 second before Nared missed a jumper. Believe it or not, the rebound dribbled to Moore for her third offensive rebound on this possession. A&M only allowed 7 more seconds to run off the clock before they fouled Tennessee.

So...here we go. Tennessee was able to run off a minute and 20 seconds and still had a 59-48 with 3:05 remaining and they had the ball. They inbound the ball to Reynolds who dribbles for a couple of seconds coming off a screen and inexplicably she takes a 12 foot jumper with only 3 seconds off the shot clock. I can't even begin to understand why she did that.

A&M got the rebound and the Aggies quickly dribbled down the court for Williams to score and get fouled. The three point play brought A&M to within 8.

It was at this point that Tennessee imploded. Over the final 3:02, Texas A&M outscored the Lady Vols 12-2 to force the game into overtime. Turnovers, missed shots, offensive fouls. With 40 seconds left, a two point lead and the ball, Texas A&M's Jordan Jones took an offensive foul from Nared and paid for it. She was on her back for a few minutes before the carried her off in a stretcher. It looked like some kind of head injury. She was in a lot of anguish. I read that she was sent right to the hospital for overnight examination. I'll post more when I know more.

A&M, shaken but not bowed had a chance to tie and they did with 5 second left on a rebound and putback by Anriel Howard. At this point A&M was going into OT without their best player in Courtney Williams who had fouled out and their terrific point guard Jordan Jones. But the momentum and two time AA Courtney Walker was on their side. Walker scored ten points in OT
to lead the Aggies to an improbable 75-70 win over the crestfallen Lady Vols.

One more incredibly selfish performance by Diamond Deshields. If you watch her closely on defense, you see zero effort. Totally lazy defense. And in her ineffective 17 minutes she found a way to put up a team leading 16 shots making only four and going 0-5 on threes and didn't have an assist.

Her body language and facial expressions show no passion whatsoever. She teases with the rare exceptional play. But something is missing. She seems sad. It has to be having a big impact on this teams play.

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I'm pretty sure that Duke had the worst quarter in WCBB this season against No. 16 Miami. Now, I know that they were missing their best player, Azurá Stevens, who missed her second straight game while dealing with a torn plantar fascia in her left foot but.......

They scored TWO points in the second quarter on two free throws.

They had 5 turnovers. They missed every shot from the field. That's 0-15. That includes 0-6 on threes. They also were only 2-6 from the free throw line.

The numbers for the half are not much better.

11 points on 4-33 from the field. 0-9 on threes. 3-8 from the three throw line.

Amazingly the exact same group of players scored 25 points in the third quarter.

They lost 61-53, one more nail in the coffin for the 17-8 Duke team in getting into the NCAA tourney. I hope they don't get in over a team like Temple!!!!

GO OWLS!!!

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From David in Naples

Napheesa Collier is having an excellent freshman year, despite commentary to contrary. She has played in all 22 of UConn's victories and is averaging over 19 minutes per game. Collier is 1st on the team with 51 offensive rebounds and 2nd with 33 blocked shots.

Collier has scored 162 pts for an average of over 7.3 per game. She is close to 55% from the field and an incredible 91% from the charity stripe. Her 35 steals exceed her 28 turnovers. She is the only Husky, besides Stewie, with more steals & blocks than turnovers.

Napheesa is just a freshman and the best is yet to come..!!

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So, Tennessee lost. AP poll's No. 23 Tennessee lost. 1-1 for the week. Now 14-9. Will they finally drop out of one or both polls? Well, here is the data.

The bottom 5 in the top twenty-five has been incredibly fluid this year. Much more fun than the top ten movement. Here is how they did this week.

No. 20 Oklahoma was 1-1 losing to No. 25 Oklahoma State and beating unranked TCU.
No. 21 Missouri was 0-2 losing to unranked Georgia and No. 11 Mississippi State
No. 22 Florida beat No. 12 Texas A&M.
No. 23 Tennessee was 1-1, beating unranked Arkansas and losing to Texas A&M
No. 24 Washington was 0-2 losing to unranked Oregon and No. 9 Oregon State
No. 25 Oklahoma State was 2-0 beating No. 20 Oklahoma and unranked Texas Tech

In the "receiving votes"
West Virginia won both their games.
George Washington was 1-1
DePaul won both their games.

So, how will the voters vote this time around?

While it's never easy, some decisions are no brainers. Starting at No. Twenty
Oklahoma lost a game and should move down.
Missouri with two losses this week has to move a least out of the top twenty five.
Florida beat No. 12 and should move up to 20.
Tennessee lost and should move out of the top twenty five.
Washington lost twice and shouldn't get any votes.

Three teams out. Three teams move in.

West Virginia comes in. Do does DePaul. Not GW.

So, what is the new bottom five??

No. 20 Florida
No. 21 Oklahoma State
No. 22 Oklahoma
No. 23 West Virginia
No. 24 DePaul
No. 25 ??????

Do they only move Tennessee down two spots? I say yes!!! They are the best 9 loss team in the country.

Seriously, can you see this happening? I'd vote for TEMPLE. GO OWLS!!!!!

We will find out at 2:00 Monday.

I'll do something similar after Monday's games.

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So, without further ado!!!

Ladies and Gents, DD looks at the news........