UCONN Nearly Craps Their Pants..

[4everwarriors]

at WTF, Buffalo?

[TallTitan34]

NIT Bound.

[avid1010]

Calhoun can't coach.

[Pakuni]

UConn shot only 61.5 percent from the line. Stupid Calhoun must not be making them practice free throws enough.

[mviale]

This may go without saying, but Dayton is a consistent quality foe.  The A10 also has several quality teams in St Joes, Umass and Temple to name a few. I think we better get off our high horse in assuming that was an automatic win during a holiday break with little fan support.  Dayton will beat us again and we better start respecting teams with traditions like Dayton.

[Mayor McCheese]

They don't have any quality big men... why can't Calhoun bring in the bigs?

[ChicosBailBonds]

UConn shot only 61.5 percent from the line. Stupid Calhoun must not be making them practice free throws enough.

He certainly won't say anything stupid like we don't need to practice free throws because it's like riding a bike, will he Pakuni?  That's the difference. 


By the way, heard today on the Golf Channel that Tiger is not going to practice putting anymore since he's been doing it for almost 30 years.  He believes it's not needed, it's like riding a bike, you never forget. 

[mviale]

Did Buzz say that?

[Pakuni]

He certainly won't say anything stupid like we don't need to practice free throws because it's like riding a bike, will he Pakuni?  That's the difference. 


By the way, heard today on the Golf Channel that Tiger is not going to practice putting anymore since he's been doing it for almost 30 years.  He believes it's not needed, it's like riding a bike, you never forget. 

You were much more interesting when you - I mean, your friends - were likening MU's head coach to a banjo-playing inbred.

Of course, your Tiger remark adds to your insipidty in all this. Buzz, I'm pretty sure, never said he would bar his players from practicing free throws. In fact, they were doing it during pre-game and halftime warmups over the weekend. What he said was that he doesn't dedicate practice time - which, as you know is limited - to it.

I do suspect, though, that if every putt were exactly a 15-footer with no break and no variation in speed, most pros would practice it a lot less often.

But really, we should stop talking about this. It's going to scare off recruits if they learn free throws aren't an essential part of every Marquette practice.

[rugbydrummer]

This may go without saying, but Dayton is a consistent quality foe.  The A10 also has several quality teams in St Joes, Umass and Temple to name a few. I think we better get off our high horse in assuming that was an automatic win during a holiday break with little fan support.  Dayton will beat us again and we better start respecting teams with traditions like Dayton.

Do you really believe that?  Let's think about this -- little fan support? I don't think that's a good excuse.  Quality bball teams can consistently perform on and off home base.  Also: 
Dayton OH:  5.5 hours & 329 miles away
Milwaukee: 1.75 hours & 88 miles away

Yes, there was little fan support, but come on, Mivale, this should have been a HOME game, neutral at worst! Although at times it looked like being @ an Madison away game, I'm pretty sure i'm more disappointed that our team couldn't play more than our fans didn't show up (although that does bother me--I was hoping given the proximity athletics might strike a deal so as to bus down some of our student section faithful.  oh wait, we don't like them right now anyway, i forgot.)

As for the high horse-- um sorry, i think MU was ranked #15 and ..... where was dayton again?  Is it really *unreasonable* to expect MU to sweep that tourney?!  Have some expectations, man!  We should have been better that game, 9/10 times we win that game and we didn't and all of a sudden we are presumptuous buffoons for aspiring to garnish the tournament title.  If we are going to be a perennially formidable ball club, I think we can't afford not to believe that we will establish superiority and succeed.  No one sees themselves losing!!

I think our team should be getting respect (or at least until lately, right now i am < pleased but what can you do). 

[mviale]

Respect is earned. Marquette was overrated and Dayton was underrated.  I think the 2 teams in a best of 5 series would probably go 5 games.

[ecompt]

What was funny about the UConn-Buffalo game was the ESPN guy saying a tough game like this will help them come Big East time. I'm not kidding. WTF? This was Buffalo.

[CTWarrior]

Two things.  First, I logged on to MUScoop this morning 100% confident that this thread would be here.  Every time a good team loses or plays a close game against a crappy team somebody compares them to us and says, "See, it happens to everyone, and you people who are unhappy with us losing some early season game are sky is falling losers."  Well, if we had convincing wins on a neutral court over two ranked teams I'd probably cut us some slack for winning a road game by a lot less than we ought to have, too.

Second, living in CT and owing to the fact that Calhoun came along during MU's dark Dukiet days, I more or less became a fan of UConn and root for them whenever they aren't playing us.  I watch UConn almost as much as I watch us.  Calhoun is like that Benjamin Button character who ages in reverse.  Most coaches have the energy and desire to recruit hard when they first start out and their ability to attract top quality players outstrips their ability to coach them, and over time they get better at coaching but their desire and energy for recruiting players wanes.  Calhoun is the opposite.  When he first got to UConn I couldn't believe how well and together his teams played.  His teams hustled like mad men and did all the little things they could just to compete and were a joy to watch.  I promise you, no team was more fun to watch than the UConn teams in the late 80s and early 90s when they finally had a little talent and were just finding their way as a program.  As time has passed, his recruiting gets better and better (nobody has more NBA players now than UConn) and his coaching gets worse and worse.  His teams are now full of future NBA me-first kids who constantly do stupid things and the concept of team play is out the window.  They will win many, many games because they are so ridiculously talented, but they won't win the big one this year or any time soon.  I don't root so much for them anymore, and maybe that has to do with the fact that they are now our rivals and we have become fun to root for again (thank you Kevin O'Neill and Tom Crean), but I think it is more to do with the fact that they are less of a team and more a bunch of kids who appear to be passing time until they start cashing their pro checks.

[MDMU04]

Two things.  First, I logged on to MUScoop this morning 100% confident that this thread would be here.  Every time a good team loses somebody compares them to us and says, "See, it happens to everyone, and you people who are unhappy with us losing some early season game are sky is falling losers."

Connecticut didn't lose.  They won 68-64.

[Marquette84]

Do you really believe that?  Let's think about this -- little fan support? I don't think that's a good excuse.  Quality bball teams can consistently perform on and off home base.  Also: 
Dayton OH:  5.5 hours & 329 miles away
Milwaukee: 1.75 hours & 88 miles away

Yes, there was little fan support, but come on, Mivale, this should have been a HOME game, neutral at worst! A

The reality is that the average person looks at this from an opportunity standpoint.  

Marquette fans in the Milwaukee/Chicago can get to any of 20 Marquette games with a reasonable (under 2 hour) commute. Plus 20 last year.  Plus 20 next year.

Dayton fans in the Chicago/Milwaukee area saw this as their one and only opportunity this year.  After none last year.  And who knows when the next one will be.  In fact, this is the first game they've played in the area since the 2002 game at Marquette.   So if you're a Dayton fan this is your one and only chance to see a game, perhaps for years, wihtout an overnight trip to Dayton.

It's no surprise their fans would turn out.

BTW, not everybody assumed Marquette would win:
http://marquettebasketball.blogspot.com/2008/11/cracked-sidewalks-predictions-for-2008.html

[CTWarrior]

Connecticut didn't lose.  They won 68-64.

Good point.  Post amended.

[rugbydrummer]

The reality is that the average person looks at this from an opportunity standpoint.  

Marquette fans in the Milwaukee/Chicago can get to any of 20 Marquette games with a reasonable (under 2 hour) commute. Plus 20 last year.  Plus 20 next year.

Dayton fans in the Chicago/Milwaukee area saw this as their one and only opportunity this year.  After none last year.  And who knows when the next one will be.  In fact, this is the first game they've played in the area since the 2002 game at Marquette.   So if you're a Dayton fan this is your one and only chance to see a game, perhaps for years, wihtout an overnight trip to Dayton.

It's no surprise their fans would turn out.

BTW, not everybody assumed Marquette would win:
http://marquettebasketball.blogspot.com/2008/11/cracked-sidewalks-predictions-for-2008.html

Point taken about Dayton fans showing up . . . IDK, IMHO I thought it was a sweet opportunity to see MU play at the Turkey day Tourney.  That being said, it's not as if it were 1st round NCAA in Chicago, at which point i expect a full gold crowd.

Bottom line -- I think for them to lose this game (& by that much) was much less than expected, but I realize that my basketball know-how is not nearly as shrewd as many others', so I will give you that as far as predictions go     Play on!