Mini-Preview: Gophers vs. Buckeyes

I suppose I should write a preview here.  Can't imagine why, so it'll be short. 

Ohio State is one of the best teams in college ball, but as long as William Buford keeps playing with his head up his rectum and continues to not bring his jump shot to the games they are vulnerable.  The problem is they aren't exactly vulnerable to a team like the Gophers.  Even if Buford fell off the bus getting to the arena and broke his face off and couldn't play they'd still be a prohibitive favorite.  They are one of the best defensive teams in the country, and for an offensively challenged Gopher squad every point is going to be a struggle.  I did read somewhere yesterday that Ohio State's guards and big men struggle with ball screens (I think it was on Grantland.com), but unfortunately the Gophers don't really have the guards to take advantage of that.  Something to keep an eye on, because if the Gophers manage to stay in this one it's going to take having at least one guard (Dre Westbrook?) and at least one forward/center (Rodney?) running the pick-and-roll to near perfection.

Offensively there is also a tiny bit of good news.  The Gophers biggest weakness, as we all know for years and years, has been giving up too many open 3-pointers and Ohio State is a terrible shooting three-point team, especially with Buford apparently shooting left-handed or something.  But that's it for good news.  I have no idea how they're going to handle Sullinger with one guy who is too passive and one guy who is too clumsy and slow.  I fully expect we'll see a large dose of Andre Ingram tonight because Ralph and/or Elliason will be on the shelf with foul trouble.  I do hope Rodney Williams matches straight up with DeShaun Thomas, because I would actually love to see that matchup and see how Rodney fares.

So if the Gophers figure out a way to limit Sullinger, get some offense out of Ralph, Rodney can slow Thomas, and they can use ball screens to get in the lane and get good shots, they can hang.  I'm not expecting any of those things to happen.  I expect to see Aaron Craft and company be all over the Gopher guards in the half-court, causing a turnover-fest, and I expect them to feed Sullinger the ball where he will either score or find an open teammate for a shot when they double him.  Whether or not those shots go down will decide if this is an easy Ohio State win or a complete blow-out.

Ohio State 68, Minnesota 52

Week in Review - 2/13/2011

There are no word about the Gophers, or at least nothing more than a throwaway line here and there, in the below post.  Mainly because they didn't play this weekend.  I ripped off about 1,200 words after the loss to the dirty dirtball Sconnies, and I don't really feel the need to do it again when nothing has changed.  Plus there was only one comment left after that post where I poured out my heart and thoughts and so you asshole don't deserve any more.  You're lucky I post at all.


WHO WAS AWESOME

1.  Kentucky Wildcats.  I'm now starting to think that worrying about Kentucky being a young team and/or having a less than elite in-game coach doesn't really matter because good god thee guys are just not fair.  What did Kentucky do this week?  Well, they demolished their top contender in the conference by 20 (Florida, more on them later) and then went into Vandy, a pretty tough place to play, and beat the Commodore, probably the third best team in the conference.  They've got unstoppable inside scorers (Anthony Davis, Terrence Jones), three-point shooters (Doron Lamb, Darius Miller), slashers (Jones, Michael Gilchrist), shot blockers (Davis, Jones), and lock down perimeter defenders (Miller, Gilchrist).  Their "weak link" is point guard Marquis Teague, and he'd be the best player on 90% of college teams.  Just sick.  I have no idea how they're going to lose in March.

2.  Austin Rivers.  He's still got too much of a tendency to go one man show, and when he has the ball on the break you know he's taking the shot 80% of the time, but holy crap was Rivers awesome against North Carolina.  29 points with 6 three-pointers and everyone was big, including the game winner right in Tyler Zeller's stupid face.  Reading what some fans of both teams have written and this might be the "best" win by Duke in this rivalry, coming at Chapel Hill versus one of UNC's most talented squads, at least in recent memory.  And they basically did it because Austin Rivers' decided to breakout.  I think going pro after this season will be best for everyone involved because Rivers game is an NBA game and he's struggled trying to adjust playing within the constraints of a tight system rather than, "go get 40 Austin", but man, he is the real deal.

3.  Wichita State Shockers.  I don't usually like to talk about the Missouri Valley on account of it sucks so bad, but Wichita's win over Creighton this weekend was truly a thing of beauty.  See, at the beginning of the year Wichita was supposed to be this year's MVC darling, a team with a shot to knock off some good squads, have a successful conference season, and roll to an easy at-large bid with a chance to make some noise.  Then they lost to both Alabama and Temple in Puerto Rico and everybody was like, meh, while Creighton raced out to a 21-2 start and has everyone's darling Doug McDermott and was like Lindsay Lohan stealing everything Rachel McAdams had.  But then Wichita went to Creighton and completely destroyed the Blue Jays and no Creighton has lost three straight while Wichita can put this win with their win over UNLV and good computer numbers and are probably more likely to make it at-large than Creighton.  So suck on that, Lohan.

4.  St. Louis Billikens.   I'm guessing reading about St. Louis doesn't exactly rank in the top 5 of anybody's favorite things to do list, but it' rare you see a team take care of business like they have and have jumped from the lower-mid bubble to near the top of it.  The Billikens won on the road this week at both St. Joe's and LaSalle, two teams in contention for the Atlantic 10 crown, and now sit at 8-3, just a half game behind Temple, and that followed up a week where they beat St. Bonaventure and Dayton, two other teams towards the top of the A-10.  Their non-conference strength of schedule is awful (213 in the country) but they do have win over Washington, Oklahoma, Boston College, and Villanova - not exactly the 1927 Yankees but a better lineup than the Gophers' can show.  And they're trending up.  Fully expect Majerus to finally be back in the big dance.

5.  Cal Bears.  Ye, the Pac-10 is still horrible and yes, there's a good chance it's a one bid conference, but that's exactly what makes a team actually going out and doing something worthwhile notable because nobody ever does it in this league.  The Bears went on their road trip through Southern California and won at both USC and UCLA (their RPIs are 228 and 121, but remember it's the Pac-10 so we're on a different curve here).  This now brings them to 10-3 and 20-6 overall, and at least getting near the middle of the bubble.  Oh, and in case you're wondering Justin Cobbs had 28 point and 10 assists in those two wins.  (Also noteworthy:  Oregon also was 2-0 this week.  Devoe had 29 points and 7 assists.)  It's so funny I'm going to stab myself in the ankle with the bayonet I have sitting next to the couch.


WHO SUCKED

1.  Florida Gators.  Bit of a rough one for the Gators and those who at one point listed the Gators as a sleeper Final Four team.  First, on Tuesday, the had a big chance to make a statement going into Lexington to play the #1 Kentucky Wildcats and walked out 20-point losers, and then on Saturday they took a home gimme win vs. Tennessee and somehow ended up losing by five.  Actually I shouldn't say somehow, because it's pretty obvious than when a team is as dependent on the three-pointer the way Florida is (6th in the country in % of points coming from behind the line) when the shots aren't falling they're screwed.  The Gators 17-56 from behind the arc in those two games, significantly worse than their season mark of nearly 40%.  And a special shout-out to Erving Walker and Bradley Beal, who, along with Kenny Boynton, are basically the entire team and were 1-11 from 3 against Kentucky and 2-11 against Tennessee.  That reliance on the three makes them both a threat to make a run in March and an early upset candidate.  Guess I'm going to have to guess right.

2.  William Buford.  Buford actually had a pretty good game earlier in the week against Purdue (29 points on 10-17 shooting) which hurt the narrative a bit but he's been absolutely awful lately other than that game, and saved one of his worst for their big loss against Sparty, shooting 2-12 with 3 turnover (to 1 assist) for a grand total of 4 points.  Looking back, outside of that game against Purdue the last time Buford shot 50% or better in a game was the first game of 2012, and he's shot 29-104 in those games, and has had 29 turnover versus 21 assists.  Ohio State is really good and are absolutely a title contender, but if Buford doesn't get it figured out there's no way they're getting past the sweet 16. 

3.  Baylor Bears.  I still like these guys a lot, but after they lost to both Kansas (at home) and Missouri (on the road) this week it might be time to take a harder look.  Because they've now been swept by both those teams, and considering there are only three really good teams in the Big 12 (with apologies to Iowa State) that means that Baylor hasn't had a good win in quite some time.  There's no doubt they're still a very good team with the resume to prove it (wins over Kansas State, Miss State, West Virginia, St. Mary's, BYU, and San Diego State), but there are alarm bells ringing all over the place after those two sweeps.  Worth noting that Perry Jones scored 5 points against Kansas on 1-8 shooting and 4 points on 2-12 shooting against Missouri, which means he's only broken double digit scoring once in four game against these two teams.  I'm going to go ahead and not do anymore research and just assume he's a choker in big games.  Join me, won't you?

4.  The Grammys.  I'm thrilled they chose to award the Foo Fighters with basically every award they were up for, but I can't forgive them for slighting Wiz Khalifa for best rap performance and song.  You're seriously going to give the Grammy to Jay-Z and "Mail it in" Kanye for Otis over the masterpiece Black & Yellow from Wiz and give the other one to some collaboration with like six singer/rappers?  Joke.  I suppose I should just be happy it was nominated, but it should have won, but the politics of not giving a grammy to such a power collaboration probably made this inevitable.  The grammys used to mean something and be about the music but, much like when they stopped eating the groundhog in Punxatawney, we live in a sissified society.  Shame.  Check it:


5.  Murray State and Harvard.  I'm going to lump these two schools together because they both have an outside chance at an at-large berth, both stumbled this weekend (Murray lost to Tennessee State or Tech I'm not sure but I'm not looking it up and Harvard lost to Princeton), and both should probably do everything they can to win their league.  Harvard still looks pretty good with only one Ivy loss, and now that I look apparently Murray State is a lock to get an at-large according to ESPN so maybe I'm stupid.  I'm sorry, but how exactly are they a lock?  Even at 21-1 their RPI is 57 (Gophers are 54, FYI), Strength of schedule is 292, and non-conference strength of schedule is 132.  They only have four wins over the RPI top 150, and the two best are over Memphis and Southern Miss whose RPIs are top 25 but everyone know they suck.  One more conference loss and I say ship 'em to the NIT.  Plus maybe then I'll get to see them live at Williams' Arena, score!


Oh, and in case you're wondering if you missed him, no, I didn't write about Jeremy Lin because oh my god will you people shut up.

Weekend Review - 03.28.2011

 What a retardedly stupid nonsensical and awesome tournament this has been.  I can't remember ever having this much fun watching.  Nearly every game close, and essentially completely impossible to predict.  At this point I'd bet there are more people with zero final four teams correct (including your president - suck it, commie) than even have one, and although I'm sure there are a handful of people who have two correct I'd be pretty shocked if I know anyone who does.  Every year it sucks when this tournament ends because it's always the most fun sporting event to watch, but this year it's going to be even worse.  Doesn't help that the Twins are speeding towards mediocrity even faster than usual, but I won't dwell on that know.  Plenty of time to talk hardball after next week.

WHO WAS AWESOME

1.  Virginia Commonwealth Rams.   Hard not to recognize a team that went from the First Four round to the Final Four, and a team that had the "experts" wringing their hands and bitching non-spot about how they shouldn't have gotten a bid (check the records and you'll see that I said they should be in multiple times - point me).  Since you're about to get force fed more happy fun stories about VCU than you can handle I'm going to tell you a semi-funny story from Chicago instead.  As most bars do at this time, the Dayton bar where we spent an inordinate amount of time had a bracket on the wall and an employee would hand write in each winner.  This bar clearly had a female employee do it, because on the line where you would write the winner of the Georgetown/VCU game the chick wrote "VCU/USC."  So now I'm picturing a bracket on the wall of the bar with four different winner lines with "VCU/USC" written down.  I don't know, maybe you had to be there but it's pretty god damn funny.

2.  Derrick Williams.  Easily the most impressive player I saw this weekend and I don't even know if there was a second one.  What an absolute monster.  That dunk he threw down against UCONN in the second half where he basically powered through two dudes to throw down would have been the most impressive dunk of the entire tournament, except he eclipsed that one with the monster Shawn Kemp NBA Jam style slam he had against Duke.  And it's not like he's a one-dimensional, Trevor Mbakwe dunking machine.  He can shoot from the perimeter, rebound like a mofo, and he's excellent with the ball around the basket.  I don't know what kind of NBA career he might have because I don't watch until the playoffs because I'm not retarded, but Williams is/was an absolute college beast.  Probably has a huge crank, too.


3.  Matt Howard.  If Williams blew me away with his awesomeness, Howard blew me away with his improvement.  Last year he was basically a chubby disaster against good teams and, although I don't want to say he single handedly lost the championship game against Duke, but he was so badly outplayed by Brian freaking Zoubek and looked so ridiculously out of place in that game that it's really just a testament to the brilliance of Shelvin Mack and Gordon Hayward that the championship went down to the wire.

Now, however, he's lost a bunch of that babyfat, added a jumper with 3-point range to his game, cut way way way down on his fouling, and is absolutely brimming with confidence.  Which he should be because he's playing great.  He's played some very good front courts so far this tournament in Old Dominion, Pitt, and Florida, and even the dainty Jon Leuer can be a challenge, and he's played well on both ends of the court against all of them.  Last year's version of Howard would have gotten killed by Florida's super athletic dudes, but this year Howard scored 14, grabbed 5 boards, and most importantly only committed three fouls so he was able to play 40 minutes.  His numbers might not jump out an grab you, but if you saw him this year and last you'd see what a massive improvement he's made, and he's a big, big reason Butler is heading to the Final Four.

4.  Jeremy Lamb.  All season long the one thing UCONN really needed was a second scorer to take pressure off of Kemba Walker who, despite being completely awesome, is not unstoppable despite what the media and announcers decided to make their running story (12-25 and 7-17 shooting in the two games this weekend doesn't make him unstoppable, it just makes him a high volume shooter and scorer).  Lamb really stepped up, scoring 24 against San Diego State, tying a season high and was basically the whole reason UCONN won that game, and then following it up with 19 in the win over Zona.  I still think he's a bit soft, but he's only a freshman so he can either take the good path and toughen up a bit and end up a pretty high level player and scorer, or he can go on about his business as he is, having games where he scores a ton and just as many games where he's nowhere to be found.  I say that second thing like it's a bad thing, but I should point out that even that version of Lamb would be the best player on the Gophers, and it wouldn't even be close.

5.  Kentucky Wildcats.  Well I'm flabbergasted.  It's rare of me to misjudge a team this badly.  Actually strike that, because I think team's are better than they really are all the time, but it's rare that a team I think is terrible ends up doing something stupid like going to the Final Four.  Calipari is a terrible game coach and a terrible game planner, generally winning games by having the most talent, almost in spite of himself.  This year's Kentucky isn't all that talented, at least from a Calipari's most talented team perspective, so I figured an early exit was inevitable.  Shocking that I got something wrong in this year's tournament I know, but apparently Brandon Knight is a lot better than I thought.  Much, much better than Brandin Knight, who, of course, played for the world's most chokiest program in history in the Pitt Panthers, the same most chokiest program who I inexplicably chose as my national champion.  Next year I'm not even filling out a bracket, it's getting too embarrassing.  It's like if Stephen Hawking called you to hook up his tivo.  From an understanding how to do it perspective, I mean.  Not the whole "I have no movement in any of my limbs" thing.


WHO SUCKED


1.  Wisconsin Badgers.  As enjoyable as that loss was for Gopher fans and white people haters that had to be brutal for Badger fans.  Really, I mean if you lose a buzzer beater game it sucks like getting punched in the stomach by a large black man who was just helping you find your glasses in a snowbank sucks - quick, painful, unexpected, but the pain subsides quickly.  It sucks to lose that way, just like it sucks to lose to a team that just blows you away because they're so much better or playing so well at the time, but you can live with those losses.  The way Wisconsin lost, however, has got to just gnaw away at you for a long, long time.  Butler gets credit for shutting the Badgers down, but in reality they didn't do much.  It was simply Wisconsin missing open shots.  Over.  And over.  And over.  And over.  In the mid-first half Jordan Taylor was fouled on a three-pointer and missed the first two free-throws, and that basically summed up the night.  And I loved every damn minute of it.    

2.  Jimmer Fredette.  Did you get a chance to watch the Jimmer?  Freaking amazing when he has the ball, right?  Amazing shooter with unlimited range and a hair-trigger release, ability to get buy a defender off the dribble and get into the lane, an excellent eye to find open teammates for easy hoops, and just amazing body control.  Really an impressive player with the ball.  But did you happen to notice him when he doesn't have the ball?  I've never seen a lazier god damn player in my life.  He does one of three things if he doesn't have the ball:

1. Stand there
2. Clap his hands and call for the ball.
3. Run directly at his teammate with the ball and clap his hands while calling for the ball

That's it.  That's the entire repertoire.  My favorite though is any time he passes the ball and it doesn't directly lead to a shot for this teammate he immediately follows his own pass, naturally while clapping and calling for the ball.  There's a reason nobody on this team every gets an assist other than Jimmer, and that's because he either shoots, creates a shot for somebody else, or immediately demands the ball back.  Honestly I was pretty unimpressed, and I watched all four of his games in this tournament and they were all the same.  Add in a level of defense that would make Blake Hoffarber turn red with embarrassment and he might be the most overrated player since Adam Morrison.  If this guys wins National Player of the Year it'll be a travesty and, frankly, should probably spark off some race riots.  But that's pretty much my answer for everything.

3.  Duke Blue Devils.  hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha oh my god that was so awesome.  It was like, all of a sudden Arizona realized, "hey, these guys are a bunch of nerds.  More athletic nerds than the Northwestern dorks of course, but still nerds.  And we aren't, so let's kill them" and then suddenly a dunk contest broke out and pasty white dorks and Jalen Rose's favorite type of brothers were their props.  They could do the entire one shining moment montage just from dunks from this game.  I think if Duke was playing a women's team that night those broads would have been running and jumping all over there heads.  Or maybe a lay-up line would have broken out instead.  I guess that's more realistic.

4.  William Buford.  Outside the Wisconsin duo of Jordan Taylor and Jon Leuer, I'm not sure anybody looked crappier than Buford.  Here's my impression of his game against Kentucky:  clang clang clang clang clang clang and so on and so forth.  Like Billy Ho once said, "I'll tell you what. Why don't we take all these bricks and build a shelter for the homeless, so maybe your mother will have a place to stay.  And your sister, too.  I want your mother and sister out of my house."   Damn Will, you just got played by a slow, white, geeky chump.  What do you mean, black ball?


5.  Colton Iverson's transfer.  Of all the red flags jumping up around the program regarding player defections this one has to be the worst.  The rest can all be rationalized away if you are looking for a reason to do so:  Royce White was a bad egg, Justin Cobbs was homesick, Paul Carter's sister was sick (ok so that one was pretty legit), Devoe Joesph is a selfish player who only cares about himself, and on and on.  If you want to have blind faith in Tubby you didn't have to try to hard.  For me, however, this one is a stunner and, frankly, makes me more than a little concerned.

I mean, what exactly is the reasoning here?  Iverson can't possibly believe Tubby is holding him back from a professional future playing ball, so what possible rationale could he have for leaving with only one year left to play?  It's not like a playing time issue makes much sense either, because of his style of play, body type, and just overall gangliness he's not going to suddenly jump up to 36 minutes a night no matter where he goes.  I just don't get this one.  Colton would have been my last guess at a player who would be transferring out.  I fear there are some real issues with this program, and I'm starting to think this year may not have been rock bottom.  If Colton can leave, anybody could.  What if both Mbakwe and Rodney end up leaving?  Or hell, anybody else, I don't even know any more.  I just know that I'm suddenly more fearful than ever that Tubby's style of coaching isn't just not winning as many games as we'd hoped but is now actively pushing players out.  Let's just move on to baseball so a different team can let me down.


And since we're almost to baseball season (preview of some sort coming soon, maybe even this week), here's the team Snake and I put together in our fantasy baseball draft.  I don't know about you, but looks like a championship to me.

C - Miguel Montero, Arizona (do you realize there are like 3 good catchers?  And we weren't getting stuck with freaking Wieters again.  I've done that dance twice).
1B - Billy Butler, KC (fat doubles machine)
2B - Rickie Weeks, MIL (counting on last year NOT being a career year)
3B - Evan Longoria, TB (so sexy he'll steal your girlfriend)
SS - Starlin Castro, CHC (please don't suck)
OF - Mike Stanton, FLA (not the middle reliever.  We're buying the hype)
OF - Austin Jackson, DET (how about just a little plate discipline?)
OF - Delmon Young, MIN (no points for fielding)
Ut - Jason Kubel, MIN (got him very, very late.  Decent upside)
SP - Jon Lester, BOS (could win 25)
SP - Justin Verlander, DET (looking even more unhittable this year)
SP - Clay Buchholz, BOS (I guess we're all in on Boston)
SP - Madison Bumgarner, SF (hoping his rough spring doesn't mean anything)
RP - Jonathan Papelbon, BOS (like I said)
RP - Joakim Soria, KC (Will probably end up saving 85% of KC's wins)
RP - Drew Storen, WAS (we can't have Strausberg, so we'll take his little buddy)
Bench - 1B Justin Smoak, SEA (Of course)
Bench - SP Michael Pineda, SEA (we hit it big with Leake last year, might as well try again)
Bench - RP Chris Sale, CHW (already unhittable, just needs to get the closer gig)
Bench - SP Carl Pavano, MIN (steady enough)

CHAMPIONSHIP!








RIP Paul.

Game Preview: Minnesota Gophers vs. Ohio State Buckeyes

As a famous computer programmer once said, "Hold on to your butts."

Of course, he also got eaten by a velociraptor, and that's probably a good metaphor for what is likely to happen to the Gophers on Sunday in Columbus, because these guys have stomped on basically everybody, and the Gophers haven't looked good competent since Puerto Rico.  I mean, really.  They have no weaknesses.

Stats wise (via kenpom.com) they are scary.  They are the #2 team in the country (behind Duke).  They have the 3rd most efficient offense (behind Duke and Pitt), and the 2nd most efficient defense (behind Kansas).  They don't turn the ball over (11th) while turning you over constantly (2nd).  They don't let you get to the line (1st), grab a ton of offensive rebounds (24th), while never letting you get an offensive rebound (24th).  They shoot very well (5th in effective FG%), both from 2 (56.2% - 8th) and three (39.9% - 22nd) and share the ball well (54th).  The only weakness you can find in the stats is that they don't get to the line much (269th), and are only slightly above average at shooting free-throws (69.2%).  They aren't the best at defending the three pointer (allow 33.1%, slightly better than the national average), but against a team like the Gophers will only one shooter, that doesn't matter?

So statswise things look bleak for the Gophers, but how about the eye test?  Inside they have the size to deal with the Gophers' big men with Dallas Lauderdale and Jared Sullinger, with Lauderdale bringing the defense, Sullinger the offense, and both grabbing a shit-ton of rebounds.  Lauderdale on his own would give them fits, but Sullinger is just so unbelievably good he could swing the balance of a game on his own.  His stats are very similar to our own Trevor Mbakwe's, and they're built similarly, but the big difference between the two is footwork and technique.  While Mbake's game is almost solely built around his strength and athletic ability, Sullinger has that plus great footwork, which leads to a lot of drop-steps into layups, and the ability to hit a jumper once in a while.  I fully, fully expect this to be Mbakwe's worst statistical game this year, because I expect Sullinger to get him in foul trouble early and keep him there.

If that's not enough, their three wings - William Buford, David Lighty, and Jon Diebler - are offensive weapons as well.  Diebler is the best shooter in the Big Ten, not only does he hit a high percentage (51% this year) but he also shoots at a high volume, and because of his height and athleticism (which still isn't great but is better than Hoffarber) he can get open more often, not to mention with all the attentions his teammates take away from him he has more chances to spot up.  Meanwhile Lighty and Buford are essentially two mini-Evan Turners and clones of each other - they do it all.  They can both handle the ball, both can drive, both can score inside, both can shoot from both three and mid-range, and both play excellent defense.  Any team would be lucky to have one of these guys, and the Buckeyes have both.

And just in case you were hoping that their one question mark coming into the season (point guard play) might have developed into a weakness you can forget it.  Freshman Aaron Craft has acclimated himself quickly, ranking third in the Big Ten in assists (4.9 per game) with a 2.5-1 assist-to-turnover ratio and shoots better than 50% from the floor.  Yeah, they're just fine.

And if you're thinking they don't go very deep and only play seven guys so maybe getting somebody into foul trouble would help, you're wrong.  First, as mentioned before, they don't really commit fouls.  Only Buford and Craft have fouled out for OSU this year (once each), and neither Sullinger or Lauderdale have been in foul trouble much if at all.  Second, even if somebody fouls out, they still have all those offensive weapons I mentioned above who can just step in.  Third, I haven't even mentioned DeShaun Thomas, a highly regarded freshman who is averaging 11 points per game in just seventeen minutes and is looking like another Turner/Lighty/Buford type, so him playing more minutes probably isn't necessarily a good thing. 

Lastly, if you're hoping simply to catch the Buckeyes napping and not giving a full effort, Iowa already did that in their last game, leading into the second half, and Ohio State pulled out the win so I wouldn't expect them to come out slowly again, especially since this time they are playing at home.

If this all makes it sound hopeless that's because it is.  The Gopher defense isn't good enough to handle all Ohio State can throw at them, and I can't figure out how the Gophers are going to score any points against one of the toughest defenses in college ball, especially one whose only weakness is three-point shooting, something Minnesota can't exploit.  The first unit may hang in there, but the second unit is going to get absolutely destroyed.

Ohio State 84, Minnesota 58.

F the Buckeyes

That's a terrible post title, but I couldn't really think of anything else because I'm so damn tired.  Seriously, I'm exhausted.  I probably have mono.  Or AIDS.  I haven't had any gay sex lately or hugged Magic Johnson, so it's probably not AIDS. 


1.  Is Ohio State more of a "final four" team like you said, or "not a top 100" team like Dawger said?  It should be obvious at this point that any time Dawger and I disagree, you just take my side and you'll be good, and this is just another example.  Since the Gophers beat them at Williams, they have won at Purdue, vs. Wisconsin, and at Iowa and lost at #12 West Virginia by 6.  The team's RPI this year is 41, they're ranked 14th by Ken Pomeroy's numbers and 20th and 24th in the two polls, and are 12-3 when Evan Turner plays.  I'll admit "final four team" might be a little bit strong, but "not a top 100" team is just plain old ludicrously stupid.  Much like everything else that comes out of Dawger's mouth.  You can still get them at 75-1 to win the National Championship.  I recommend you throw a $5-spot on it.

2.  So just how good is this Evan Turner?  If you can get past the fact that he turns it over a ridiculous four times per game he's pretty damn good.  His 18.4 ppg ranks third in the Big Ten.  His 9.9 rebounds per game ranks first in the conference, and his 5.5 assists ranks second.  He's also tied for fourth in steals per game at 1.7 and is twelfth in blocks at 0.9 per game.  All this while shooting 55%, good for fourth in the Big Ten, and he's a guard.  The team is 12-3 with him, including wins over Purdue, Florida State, and Cal, and is just 3-3 without him with a loss to Michigan.  He might legitimately be the best player in college basketball this year, and if he hadn't gotten hurt would be a legit National Player of the Year candidate.   

3.  Tell me about the rest of guys, but be quick about it.  I don't have all day. Fellow wings David Lighty and William Buford are basically knockoffs of Turner, and both can carry the team if they need to.  Lighty scored 18 in the second-half alone this week against Iowa, and Buford played his best game of the year last weekend against West Virginia with 22 on 9-13 shooting.  Jon Diebler is the only player in the conference with more three-pointers made than Blake Hoffarber this year, shoots 44% behind the line, and has hit five or more threes in a game seven-times already (and can get his own shot).  Finally, manning the paint is Dallas Lauderdale, who is an offensive retard but leads the conference in blocked shots and is a pretty intimidating force in the middle - good thing the Gophers don't have anybody who can drive into the paint anyway.  

4.  How is the post-Al Nolen point guard thing going?  Well Justin Cobbs has been a non-factor.  He played just four minutes against Michigan State because he was way, way, way, way too freaking hyper resulting in two turnovers in those four minutes.  In the next game against Northwestern he played better, putting in 12 minutes of work and getting almost nothing on his stat line, good or bad.  I didn't notice him for his good play, but didn't notice him for bad either.  Devoe Joseph had a great game against Michigan State with 16 points and 7 assists against just 1 turnover, but kind of disappeared against NW with just six points and four turnovers.  So, in a word, pretty uneven.

I'm encouraged because both Joseph and Cobbs have shown flashes the past two games, but they'll need to play even better if there's an NCAA bid in the future.  Ohio State doesn't match up well against quick point guards because there best guys are bigger wings and their only "true" point guard is a gigantic douchebag.  I just don't know if either of our guys would be classified as a "quick" point guard.  As usual and in every game the rest of the year, point guard play is going to be a huge key.

5.  This would obviously be a huge win for the Gophers, is there any reason to believe?  Not really.  Ohio State is almost as good defensively as the Gophers, but are a far, far better offensive team - one of the best in the country (16th in offensive efficiency).  They can thrive either in the halfcourt or in an up-and-down fast-paced game and have not only the best player out of the two teams, but maybe the best two or three.  I'm hoping the Gophers can keep it close to the end and find a way to sneak a win out somehow, but I think a blowout is more likely (and not the good way).

Ohio State 74, Minnesota 62.