The shutout possessions

[MUCrisco]

1st Possession: Matthews drew a foul on a drive.  On the reset, James curled of an off screen by Hayward.  The screeners defender helped on the curl which left Hayward wide open on the roll.  However, he was not ready for James' pass.

On defense, we wre switching on all off screen's, and Barro got lost in the switching which left their big man open.  However, we get a steal.

2nd possession: James turns it over on the steal. 

On the 2-3 zone, we got caught staring at the ball and gave up a layup behind the defense.

3rd possession: Fitz missed a 3 but we got a reload.  On the ball screen, they play James for penetration, which left him open at the ft line for a shot and missed.  Barro gets a stupid over the back foul.

Matthews gets beat backdoor.

4th possession, James found Burke in penetration while drawing the help defense.  Bruek gets fouled.  Burke misses two FT's.

Hayward gets beat on the drive from the elbow, and the help defense was late.  The help was not in good position.

5th possession: James loses it on a drive.  Jump ball.  He took on a double team.  Burke doesn't finish on a nice ct on an inbounds play.  The outlet pass by Mich St does not connect.  However, Fitz does not hustle for the lose ball and dribbles out of bounds.

They throw the ball in the post and we foul.

James contests a Morgan sho-t and he misses.

6th Possession: James passes ahead Matthews on the wing.  He dribbles towards towards the middle, even though the post up was open.  He kicks it to Hayward who shoots it 2 feet beyond the line and misses it. 

Fitz constest a Morgan shot and he misses.

7th possession: Missed what happened on offense as CBS was going around the horn.

In our 2-3 defense, we again got caught staring at the ball.  Hayward was playing in the middle of the 2-3 zone.  I wonder how comfortable he is in that position.  He got caught too high and we got beat for an alleyoop behind the defense.

8th possession: james penetrates and finds Hayward on a nice dish.  As Homer would say,"He missed a no footer" and he does not finish.

Another good man to man defensive sequence.  Mich St gets called for a moving screen.

9th possession:  Mich state is really sagging in their help defense.  There are no lanes for penatration.  Matthews tries to penetrate and gets enveloped by the help.  He kicks to Kinsella who looks awful this time on his outside shot attempt.

Another good defensive stop.  However, Fitz gets a silly foul on the rebound.  Mich St then runs over James on their inbounds play and gets a foul.

10th possession: Cubillan is striped by his own defender on a drive.

Mich St throws a silly behind the back in transition and throws it away.

11th possession:   Hayward gets stripped on the drive by a help defender.

On defense, the Mich St post does the Murf step drag towards the middle, drop steps and misses his shot.  On the rebound, Mich st fouls.

12th possesion:   James takes an ill advised 3 point shot and misses.

On defense, Nietzel gets open on a moving screen and hits a 3 with 11:34 left.  Crean calls time out and MU trails by 11.

13th possession: Izzo goes zone coming out a timeout and it confuses Marquette.  I'm not sure if they are even in an offense that they normally run.  They are in a 4 out 1 in set.  Do they think MSU is playing man?  The ball is never reversed while Cubillan and Matthews play catch on the right side.  What is even more puzzling is that no one is posting up.  I think Lott is waiting for the ball to get reversed because he is in the short corner on the other side.  Matthews forces a drive and turns the ball over.

On defense, MU gets beat on the same exact play that Nietzel hit his three.  The ball gets reversed and the post sets another moving screen.  However, there is no contact, so there really isn't a foul.  The defender tried to step around instead of fighting through the screen.  Joseph hits a 3.

14th possession: MU runs a high pick and roll.  However, MSU does not respect our shooters and they are still sagging in help defense. The lane is clogged and the roller is not open.  Finally, James finds an open Cubillan in the corner.  His defender, Nietzel, was sagging and helping on penetration which left David open for a 3.  Shutout is over with 10:18 to go in the first hald.   14-3 MSU

[Mayor McCheese]

wow... impressive... I still wonder what would have happened if on that first possession Hayward would have handled James's pass for an easy 2... I think the game would have been completely different   

[maxpower773]

yeah...wow. nice job. for how poorly this game looked, msu didn't play a whole lot better than us tonight. just count how many layups or "zero" footers we missed in the first 10 or so minutes, this game could have been very different.

[muwarrior87]

i saw when hayward didn't handle that pass and thought the same thing. It could have turned out a lot different had we hit a couple of those layups.