(01-16-2016 10:06 PM)GoodOwl Wrote:  Rhoades:

"I should have called a timeout at the end."

"We got beat by a better team today. I can live with this we didn't beat ourselves. We're a better team than we were two hours ago."

"We gotta use this now as 'hey we raised the bar for our program we gotta use this. We play like this we will beat some."

"Quez has gotten better the last month of the year before and after practice with Coach Meyers. That's what happens when you work. Not a lot of freshman do that this time of year (the extra work.)"

That's Coach Byers. JD Byers.

(01-17-2016 12:03 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  Although our 3pt shooting was low tonight, we still scored 90 points. That's a huge step up from where we've been in many ways, especially considering that it was against a relatively good team in our conference. In the past if our 3pt shooting has been poor, we were done. We are showing signs of developing a multi-headed monster with the question for opponents becoming 'Who do they want to beat them?'

Boy, even one more real scoring threat and we'd definitely have a better W-L record. I know everyone else was scoring but we need a little something from Mency points-wise as well. I see now that although drone did much better stat-wise this game, his interior defense is one answer to the question of why almost every opponent has shot so well against us. That will need to improve.

Glad that MLE was moving more w/o the ball. I couldn't stand a few games ago where it seemed almost everyone was standing in place the whole time on offense except the guy with the ball.

Understandable that Cashaw had not as many points tonight- they had to focus on stopping someone from last game, and he was a target now. Not entirely a bad thing as Evans doubled his 16 points with about 7 minutes in the game to the end.

It's coming along. They show promise. Even Coach Rhoades admitted he should have called a timeout to get organized at the end. He admitted that there were more things he wanted to do at the end of the game, but he immediately recognized his own error, and more importantly, he owned it directly.

How was the student crowd and overall attendance tonight? Didn't see anyone post a pic (Sorry Tiki, but I'm kinda picking on you here, forgive me.)

Get back to work and get ready for the next one. Still a lot of season to go. Let's get rounded into shape and be dangerous come tournament time. UAB will remember we beat them last year and will want revenge. Let's give 'em all they can handle and more!

Yea agree with Walt that Cashaw just missed his open shots. Still a freshman so I don't mind the ups and downs, just keep shooting. Attendance was 2196. Crowd got into it towards the end.

(01-17-2016 12:17 AM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  Cashaw was guarded overly tightly; he was simply missing his shot. He had 3 first half 3-pointers from the corner-- on Thursday he drained all three; today he was long on all 3. The 2nd half he was not moving. It is clear that Coach prefers Mencey's defense at this point, though Bishop is providing us with zero offensive contribution. He had a open dunk today and hit he back of the rim instead. He also had a costly turnover in the 2nd half. Bottom line, we still need to improve our defense, and we even with MLE becoming a more consistent force on offense, we need Egor to find his shot again, as he provides us with a 2nd outside option. I may be making more out of it than appropriate, but I get the sense Egor has lapses on D when he's struggling with his shot.

Thanks for providing that perspective, Walt. I was listening to the radio feed and also distracted by work. Although there is still much to do, I was very encouraged by the overall scoring output. A stepping stone, if not a big one.

(01-17-2016 12:18 AM)bobreinhold1 Wrote:  

(01-16-2016 10:06 PM)GoodOwl Wrote:  Rhoades:

"I should have called a timeout at the end."

"We got beat by a better team today. I can live with this we didn't beat ourselves. We're a better team than we were two hours ago."

"We gotta use this now as 'hey we raised the bar for our program we gotta use this. We play like this we will beat some."

"Quez has gotten better the last month of the year before and after practice with Coach Meyers. That's what happens when you work. Not a lot of freshman do that this time of year (the extra work.)"

That's Coach Byers. JD Byers.

A bit distracted with work tonight while listening. Thank you.

(01-16-2016 11:01 PM)cr11owl Wrote:  Someone at the athletic department needs to get the clip from ASN or owl vision of Marcus Evans' behind the back dunk on the break away and submit it to ESPN for top 10 tonight. Has to be one of the top college dunks of the night.

I hope Coach shows replays of the two or three attempted tomahawk dunks that didn't make it through the hoop. Missing those were real killers.

(01-17-2016 09:26 AM)Da.Owl Wrote:  

(01-16-2016 11:01 PM)cr11owl Wrote:  Someone at the athletic department needs to get the clip from ASN or owl vision of Marcus Evans' behind the back dunk on the break away and submit it to ESPN for top 10 tonight. Has to be one of the top college dunks of the night.

I hope Coach shows replays of the two or three attempted tomahawk dunks that didn't make it through the hoop. Missing those were real killers.

I only remember the Mency one where he was right under the basket and didn't elevate enough to put it down so it went off the back of the rim. The only other one was a Marcus Evans drive and he was fouled because he went up strong. I think our 3 pt shooting vs theirs was the real killer last night. I get what you're saying but with the style we play I think it's fine to encourage the guys to go for some big jams. Its going to get the students to come back AND the recruits to keep coming in and hopefully with better defense and 3pt shooting we will have a comfortable lead and won't remember the misses.

I only remember the Mency missed dunk. Evans has an uncontested dunk where he turned around and put it in backwards. I thought that was dangerous showboating for a very close game. If he had missed that, I imagine he would have been in trouble.

(01-17-2016 10:37 AM)temchugh Wrote:  I only remember the Mency missed dunk. Evans has an uncontested dunk where he turned around and put it in backwards. I thought that was dangerous showboating for a very close game. If he had missed that, I imagine he would have been in trouble.

Yes that's the one that should be on Top 10 today. He also had one where he went up strong on a drive and was fouled. Not sure if he tried to put it in 1 handed because of the foul or because he wanted a big dunk. I convinced 3 other alums who hadn't been this year to come last night and they thought it was great.

If they post a video of Marcus Evan's dunk, I'd share it on Facebook with my alumni friends. I know they would appreciate it.

(01-17-2016 12:03 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  Although our 3pt shooting was low tonight, we still scored 90 points. That's a huge step up from where we've been in many ways, especially considering that it was against a relatively good team in our conference. In the past if our 3pt shooting has been poor, we were done. We are showing signs of developing a multi-headed monster with the question for opponents becoming 'Who do they want to beat them?'

Boy, even one more real scoring threat and we'd definitely have a better W-L record. I know everyone else was scoring but we need a little something from Mency points-wise as well. I see now that although drone did much better stat-wise this game, his interior defense is one answer to the question of why almost every opponent has shot so well against us. That will need to improve.

Glad that MLE was moving more w/o the ball. I couldn't stand a few games ago where it seemed almost everyone was standing in place the whole time on offense except the guy with the ball.

Understandable that Cashaw had not as many points tonight- they had to focus on stopping someone from last game, and he was a target now. Not entirely a bad thing as Evans doubled his 16 points with about 7 minutes in the game to the end.

It's coming along. They show promise. Even Coach Rhoades admitted he should have called a timeout to get organized at the end. He admitted that there were more things he wanted to do at the end of the game, but he immediately recognized his own error, and more importantly, he owned it directly.

How was the student crowd and overall attendance tonight? Didn't see anyone post a pic (Sorry Tiki, but I'm kinda picking on you here, forgive me.)

Get back to work and get ready for the next one. Still a lot of season to go. Let's get rounded into shape and be dangerous come tournament time. UAB will remember we beat them last year and will want revenge. Let's give 'em all they can handle and more!

Student section was full to the left of the BOB and looke like almost full behind and to the right of the BOB. Very nice turnout!

The game was not on live in NOLA, but it was available on Sunday night and I watched it, despite knowing the score. Really solid game by the Owls. If Rice had shot a bit better from 3-pt land, or held Marshall to a slightly worse showing, the Owls would have pulled it out. Rice only going 9/34, with a lot of those fairly open misses, is really what did Rice in. Other than that, I thought the defense was much improved over early-season efforts, the passing was generally crisp (including a number of amazing bounce-passes by Guercy in traffic), and for once the team kept it fairly close the entire game.

Anyone listen to Coach Rhoades's show on Monday night? Did he or the players say anything interesting or worthwhile?

The next two games are pivotal for the team. UAB and Middle Tennessee are 5-0 and 4-1 respectively in conference and also have strong out of conference records (15-3, 12-5). If Rice loses both games on the road they start conference play at 1-6 and 6-14 overall, with only 4 wins against D-1 foes. M. Letcher-Ellis had his best game against Marshall, which is quite promising because Egor Koulechov has really been struggling lately since opponents have been keying on him.

The good news is that Rice stood toe to toe against a team that is 5-0 in conference (9-9 overall) and could have won the game by eliminating some mistakes.

(01-19-2016 11:30 AM)Kayjay Wrote:  The next two games are pivotal for the team. UAB and Middle Tennessee are 5-0 and 4-1 respectively in conference and also have strong out of conference records (15-3, 12-5). If Rice loses both games on the road they start conference play at 1-6 and 6-14 overall, with only 4 wins against D-1 foes. M. Letcher-Ellis had his best game against Marshall, which is quite promising because Egor Koulechov has really been struggling lately since opponents have been keying on him.

The good news is that Rice stood toe to toe against a team that is 5-0 in conference (9-9 overall) and could have won the game by eliminating some mistakes.

CUSA is TERRIBLE this year, #21 in RPI, below the Sun Belt: http://realtimerpi.com/rpi_conf_Men.html

The good teams are not that good and the bad teams are that bad. Unfortunately, Rice is #301 and lost to #327 UTSA. Yuck.

No excuses, just win.

(01-19-2016 11:30 AM)Kayjay Wrote:  The next two games are pivotal for the team. UAB and Middle Tennessee are 5-0 and 4-1 respectively in conference and also have strong out of conference records (15-3, 12-5). If Rice loses both games on the road they start conference play at 1-6 and 6-14 overall, with only 4 wins against D-1 foes. M. Letcher-Ellis had his best game against Marshall, which is quite promising because Egor Koulechov has really been struggling lately since opponents have been keying on him.

The good news is that Rice stood toe to toe against a team that is 5-0 in conference (9-9 overall) and could have won the game by eliminating some mistakes.

Egor's struggles of late are more due to him missing open 3s and not on the defense. He's also stopped driving to the basket, which he was doing earlier in the season. He had plenty of good looks the past two games, but his shot has been off.

(01-19-2016 11:30 AM)Kayjay Wrote:  The next two games are pivotal for the team. UAB and Middle Tennessee are 5-0 and 4-1 respectively in conference and also have strong out of conference records (15-3, 12-5). If Rice loses both games on the road they start conference play at 1-6 and 6-14 overall, with only 4 wins against D-1 foes. M. Letcher-Ellis had his best game against Marshall, which is quite promising because Egor Koulechov has really been struggling lately since opponents have been keying on him.

The good news is that Rice stood toe to toe against a team that is 5-0 in conference (9-9 overall) and could have won the game by eliminating some mistakes.

Marshall is only #157 KenPom, but they seem to be playing better than that lately after starting 0-6. So I agree that they were a good test leading into UAB (#110) and MTSU (#119). 2 tough road games, and showing why Rice's losses to UTEP (#220), UTSA (#328), and North Texas (#302) really hurt any effort to finish in the top half of the conference. Plenty of games against crap teams down the road, but this week will not be easy. Rice currently at #273.

(01-19-2016 11:30 AM)Kayjay Wrote:  The next two games are pivotal for the team. UAB and Middle Tennessee are 5-0 and 4-1 respectively in conference and also have strong out of conference records (15-3, 12-5). If Rice loses both games on the road they start conference play at 1-6 and 6-14 overall, with only 4 wins against D-1 foes. M. Letcher-Ellis had his best game against Marshall, which is quite promising because Egor Koulechov has really been struggling lately since opponents have been keying on him.

The good news is that Rice stood toe to toe against a team that is 5-0 in conference (9-9 overall) and could have won the game by eliminating some mistakes.

Either one of those would be a big upset. Based on Sagarin both of those teams will be favored by 15+ over us -- so would be an upset of roughly the same order as our win over UNM.

(01-19-2016 11:49 AM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  Egor's struggles of late are more due to him missing open 3s and not on the defense. He's also stopped driving to the basket, which he was doing earlier in the season. He had plenty of good looks the past two games, but his shot has been off.

It has been strange to watch from afar. Koulechov was excellent early in the season, but few (if any) of those games were on TV. My impression of him this season has been his games against UTEP, NT, WKU, and Marshall, all of which were shown in NOLA. Other than his FT shooting (combined 17/19), he was not impressive in any of those games offensively (combined 6/26 on 3's with many open misses). Agree that he hasn't been driving much in those games or really even moving around much. It has been nice to see Cashaw and MLE step forward as scoring threats. But if Koulechov can get rolling again, it will really make the team feel much deeper, even if there aren't any more bodies.

Good to see Drone more active as well on offense. Guercy's inside passes to him and MLE, and their authoritative dunks on the receiving end, have been fun to watch.

(01-19-2016 11:58 AM)mrbig Wrote:  

(01-19-2016 11:49 AM)waltgreenberg Wrote:  Egor's struggles of late are more due to him missing open 3s and not on the defense. He's also stopped driving to the basket, which he was doing earlier in the season. He had plenty of good looks the past two games, but his shot has been off.

It has been strange to watch from afar. Koulechov was excellent early in the season, but few (if any) of those games were on TV. My impression of him this season has been his games against UTEP, NT, WKU, and Marshall, all of which were shown in NOLA. Other than his FT shooting (combined 17/19), he was not impressive in any of those games offensively (combined 6/26 on 3's with many open misses). Agree that he hasn't been driving much in those games or really even moving around much. It has been nice to see Cashaw and MLE step forward as scoring threats. But if Koulechov can get rolling again, it will really make the team feel much deeper, even if there aren't any more bodies.

Good to see Drone more active as well on offense. Guercy's inside passes to him and MLE, and their authoritative dunks on the receiving end, have been fun to watch.

Max had a great look for a 3 late in the game at a pivotal point which he did not take and instead passed to a teammate who took a much tougher shot (and missed). He is an unselfish player but this was a time where he had his shot from beyond the arc and he did not pull the trigger.

As far as Koulechov, his inside game usually develops after he hits a few from beyond the arc and teams have to step out to guard him. This gives him the space to attack the hoop. He really cannot break someone down off the dribble.

If anybody has ESPN Insider, Quez was mentioned in one of their top 15 freshmen list. I don't have Insider so I don't know what was written, but it's nice to see us getting some publicity.