Monday, February 6, 2023

Doggy's Doghouse 2/6/2023

 












 




GO UCONN!!!!!


I'm mostly taking the night off. Thankfully Phil sent me a great entry!!  

************************************************

Napheesa and her baby at the game 


Napheesa, Ashley Battle, Tierney Lawlor, Kelly Faris
Chrystin Williams, Jen Rizzotti, Sue Bird, Morgan Tuck


************************************************
GAMES

Upset noted with red **


No. 11 Virginia Tech 73 No. 22 North Carolina State 62

**********************************


  
Straight from the Dog

I linked an article with more injury info on Ducharme and Fudd than I've seen anywhere. I'll share a few tidbits and quotes in case you don't want to hit the link.

Geno said her rehab has been going great but still no timetable for her return. 

"We will see what happens in the next week or so, but right now there is nothing you can point to and say there's the date."

And about the game he said - “I told them I feel better at 3 o’clock today than I did at 12 o’clock. Because at 12 o’clock, I didn’t know how we would respond. I knew we would play hard. We’ve been playing hard all year long. I knew we would compete like hell. But I didn’t know who was going to make a big play, who was going to get a big rebound, who was going to make a big shot. I know more now than I did at noon, and I feel better about my team.”

And about Caroline - “It’s progressing to a point where if she can get through a couple of practices in a row now in one piece, then either Wednesday or maybe next Saturday at Georgetown could possibly be a return for her. It’s all a matter of how she responds after the workouts. When you watch her out there and her range is even better than it’s ever been, her release is even quicker than it’s ever been.”

I can't wait until she is back!!!   

********************************************************

Yesterday I went through my logic on how the rankings would come out. I was lucky to get it exactly right!

South Carolina
Indiana
LSU
UConn
Iowa 
Stanford
Utah

I'm better than I thought at this...    

********************************************************
I watched the Tennessee/Mississippi game Monday night and the Lady Vols lost in double overtime 91-90. 

It was a fun but horribly played game. Mississippi State had several chances to put the game away at the foul line but missed time after time. 

Phil did a great job summarizing the finish. 

With about 28 seconds left, and Tennessee down three, Jackson missed a layup. Wynn collected the rebound, and Mississippi State immediately fouled her. Hollingshead made one of two free throws.

Parker rebounded the missed free throw and was immediately fouled by Tennessee which makes sense. Parker gets two and it's a four point game with 26 seconds left. Tennessee takes a timeout and inbounds the ball under their own basket.

So far so good.

Tennessee inbounds and Parker immediately fouls her. While we couldn't hear what her teammates were saying, the commentators speculated that they were reminding her that this was not the time to be fouling and putting them on the line with a stopped clock. Hollingshead Hits two free throws in the lead is down to two with only two seconds elapsed

Mississippi State calls a timeout inbound the ball at their end. Sensible decision.

The inbound the ball with a plan to pass it quickly to eat up as much time before getting fouled but the second pass is to Johnson, who is the worst free-throw shooter on the floor with the season average of 48%. Credit to Tennessee for knowing who to foul although I bet they were just trying to foul the first person they could get to, but Mississippi State has 11 players on the roster with better free throw shooting percentages, including Weber who shoots 92%. Why on earth is she anywhere near the ball? I know, I know she went seven for nine the field but below 50% free throw shooting is atrocious. They only managed to take four seconds off the clock, So when Johnson is one of two, it's now a three-point game with 20 seconds left.

Surprise surprise Tennessee gets the ball to Darby who takes an open three point shot. She missed, but I've got to believe the scouting report says the Darby can hit three pointers.

Mississippi states Parker gets the rebound and she starts to race up the court with Tennessee trying to foul her. Mississippi State has a player further up the court and I would've suggested passing tour to take a couple more seconds off at least, but no she's fouled and goes to line.

She hits one, misses one and Jackson makes a 3 for Tennessee but they were down for so the game ends with the Mississippi state when 91 – 90.

For a Tennessee hater like myself it was frustrating to see Mississippi State miss so many free throws. For the game they were 19-30 and Tennessee got to the free throw line an amazing 44 times making 37.

The refs were just terrible and on one particularly bad call the Mississippi State pulled a Geno and went balistic on the sidelines and got a technical. The Tennessee players was fouled but actually it was the Tennessee player that fouled. The Bulldogs were up 4 at the time and Tennessee then tied it up at the line and had the ball. Crazy.

Tennessee star Jordan Horston fouled out in 18 minutes. That is not easy to do. She added nothing to the Tennessee effort. She had only 8 points and 3 rebounds. 

The Lady Vols had 23 turnovers. And only shot 38% from the field and 5-25 on threes. 

So, now they are 17-9 and have now lost 3 of their last 4. Will they still stay a 7 seed as Charlie SECreme for some reason has them?  

They play Arkansas on the road and a game against South Carolina. With a loss in the SEC tournament they could have 12 losses. And ZERO wins against ranked teams and no signature wins. Not looking good for the Lady Vols.  

 

Sunday was (mostly) a good day


Other than that, how was the play, Mrs. Lincoln?

I know this quip is intended to be funny and arguably a poke at the cluelessness of an observer who overlooks the key point. Well, my family will be quick to attest that my picture shows up in the dictionary next to the definition of cluelessness, so I’m going to plow on and take it seriously.

Before getting into Sunday’s results, I’ll emphasize that I am definitely a UConn fan first, but as I often say when I meet people for the first time, I consider myself a woman’s basketball in general. I’m very interested in the sport overall. With that said, when I’m looking at scores of other games or trying to decide which upcoming games I will watch, and who I want to root for, in most cases, I’m thinking in terms of how it affects UConn. Sometimes that impact is significant and sometimes it’s a stretch, but that’s my framing of how I view other games.

For example, Texas is up to 12th in the ESPN power rankings. I have multiple reasons for being happy about this, but the main one is this makes UConn’s early victory better. At the time of the win over Texas they were ranked number three in the country, and that was one of several high-profile early wins in the season by UConn. However, Texas went on to lose a few games, dropped from 3rd to 19 to 22 to out of the rankings, which took a little off the luster of that early win. Maybe Texas wasn’t as good as advertised, which means UConn’s win might not be as impressive a win as originally portrayed. Texas has been floating in and out of the ratings, moving up to number 25 in week 11, then falling out again and moving back up to number 24 in week 13. 12th position in the power rankings is well above where they are in the polls, and while it appears Texas isn’t deserving of the number three ranking they held when we beat them, they may be well better than the team that dropped out of the rankings.

Iowa stomped Penn State. Massey had them winning by 11 so the win wasn’t a surprise but winning by 43 means they are a strong team. It’s generally good when a team we beat does well (exceptions to follow) for obvious reasons.

Duke beat Notre Dame. Arguably, based on my Texas and Iowa comments, I might want Notre Dame to win to make our loss to them more palatable. But we also played Duke, so when Duke does well, it makes our victory over Duke look good. Plus, Notre Dame lost. While my main thought when looking at a result is how it affects UConn’s standing, there are other considerations. Did I I mention that Notre Dame lost? They were ninth in ESPN’s power rankings and dropped to 10th. By the way, did you hear that Notre Dame lost? Just want to make sure you know.

Maryland crushed Ohio State. I know, a lot of UConn fans love it when Maryland loses, and you can make an argument that with Maryland ranked ahead of Ohio State, you might prefer that the lower ranked team upset the high-ranked team, but it wasn’t too many days ago that Ohio State was looking like a shoo-in for a number one seed. Maryland isn’t really in the running for a number one seed so putting that nail in the coffin of Ohio State’s dreams is a good thing.

LSU had to work to beat a mediocre team TAMU. Early in the season we were making fun of LSU’s weak strength of schedule. They were getting a lot of press for beating up on truly horrendous teams. I get that the media, just like many people (myself included at times), can be lazy and talking about wins by huge margins and double doubles by flashy players is an easy storyline to follow. My concern has been and still is how good a team LSU actually is. They still haven’t beaten a currently ranked team, but they climbed to third place in Massey, and beat Alabama by 38 points. I know, I know Alabama isn’t ranked, but that margin of victory gave me pause. I was happy when they beat Tennessee, because a loss by Tennessee or Notre Dame (did you hear they lost recently?) trumps whatever else it might mean for UConn’s standing. The close call against Georgia and TAMU helped convince me that LSU is a bit overrated.

Stanford is a team that, as noted in the media reports, was penciled in as close to an automatic final four slot. I saw them lose to South Carolina in a game that they should’ve won, and that left me early on with the view that Stanford was solidly one of the top two teams in the nation. Who knows, maybe they were at that time, but losing to Washington in a game they were projected to win by 15 helps convince me that Stanford’s not quite as good as they seemed early on.

And finally, in a game that has absolutely zero impact on UConn in any way, Hartford beat Northern Vermont Lynden Campus yesterday. They were projected to win by 38 and only won by 10 so is a bittersweet quality to the win, but it’s their only win of the season, so worth celebrating. As many know, they are exiting D1 at the end of the season, but it would’ve been very tough to have a winless final season as a D1 team.

********************************************************
UCONN LINKS

Several links are pay sites. Sorry!


*************************** 

Message Boards

UConn Territory - The best UConn women's message board ever!!! 
Vol Nation - Tennessee women's basketball board
ND Nation - Notre Dame women's basketball board
Rebkell - WCBB for everyone that thinks they are smarter than everyone else

UCONN Information



I'm always open for suggestions. Just please reply to this blog or email me at:

doggydaddy.UConn@gmail.com

Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)