Played much harder and smarter there the last 7 minutes or so to go into the break only down 2. MC’s zone is beatable if the Tigers just find some patience, pass the ball, and take the shots that are there for them.
It sure would have been nice for MH to play our actual starters while Merrimack went on, like, a 16-0 run with 5 clumsy TOs.
All I can say in MH’s defense is that he may be taking a page out of James Jones’ book this season by using the non-conf to prep for Ivy play. Despite my fantasies to the contrary, this team is not getting an at-large bid. We’ve been burned in the past by lack of depth, so I suspect he wants to get Hicke, Byriel, Scott more minutes even if it costs us 2-3 games in non-conf.
It’s not a coincidence that Jones’ Yale teams always seem to overperform in Ivy/ILT games while MH teams tend to do the opposite.
Good point. It can be painful to watch but he does need to build the bench.
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Good simulation of Ivy play, playing in a high school gym after a long bus ride. Tigers up 6 after some much smarter play to start the half.
Byriel does have 2 threes and 4 rebounds today. So maybe it’s working for him.
Good start to the half - Merrimack’s zone is stopping Lee’s drives, but daring our guys to shoot jumpers is just fine with us.
It was really that 4-5min stint without Lee/Pierce/Abdullahi on the court that cooked us.
If Byriel can hit his share of open shots, clog the middle on defense, and give 5 hard fouls a game, he’ll deserve the playing time he’s been getting.
Byriel rewarding MH today. Nice passes in the zone and rebounding solidly.
Unfortunately for Huggins, the emergence of Abdullahi as the Kellman-style dunker who can play physical defense makes Byriel the natural complement at center.
52-44 lead but it ain’t over yet. Still some bad TOs on offense and Lee just isn’t himself.
Lee just isn’t finishing anything at the rim… but his 3pt shot is still true.
Teams make #1A on the scouting report and manhandle him on defense - making a lot harder to make contested layups through contact.
I honestly think he just needs to shoot a lot more 3s - beautiful stroke with stepback moves that get hiim separation whenever he wants. And when teams overplay the jumper, then attack the hard closeouts to get open layups.
ALLEY OOP FOR MALIK
This team needs to learn to take greater advantage of Abdullahi’s freak athleticism. He could WIN a dunk contest. Use that to get multiple dunks in transition per game.
I agree with you. He get’s bumped every time he drives and is just not getting the calls. His little pull up for a short jumper was a thing of beauty. More of that and shooting from three.
He has a deep bag of finishing moves, but against physical defense (and in the NBA), his bread and butter needs to be his jumper.
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Mitch putting in 3 freshmen a little early - up 13 with under 2min left.
Definitely feels like a James Jones approach this season.
WHEW. 68-57 win.
Horrific, embarrassing first half. Infinitely better second half - the first half of basketball this season where our guys came down with most of the 50/50 balls (i.e. not counting the uncontested rebounds due to Merrimack’s zone).
It’s clear that they did NOT learn from the Loyola-Chicago loss. But they may have figured out something today. A little toughness on defense and confidence on offense go a long way.
Also, that way too early victory cigar lineup has solidified my “James Jones” coaching theory. Unlike previous years, MH seems to be risking non-conf losses to foster a deeper bench for Ivy play.
Character building win. Tigers go down 14 in first half after a blizzard of senseless turnovers but steady themselves and pull away for the win. I’ll take it. On to Myrtle Beach.
This team could go 3-0 or 0-3 in Myrtle Beach.
Why is it so hard for MH teams to put together 40 minutes of max effort? They need to be down double-digits to start fighting for rebounds, taking care of the ball and cutting hard to the hoop.
Unless it’s March Madness, MH teams play at half-speed, half-focus for the first 20-25 minutes of the game.
I couldn’t watch the game live on Sunday, so I watched the replay.
Good but not great win.
Best commentary: “First meeting for these two programs in BOTH their histories”. Yeah
Not terrifically risky to put some subs in when up by 13 with less than 2 minutes in. Mitch saw the flow of the game and knew his subs’ abilities. He could always have pulled them out if disaster strikes immediately (and it didn’t).
Nice to have some bench player get some time both for morale reasons and being nice reasons, as well as for we-might-need-them-sometime reasons.
It all worked.
Probably took a while to look through both teams’ record books.
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Just watched the replay. It’s a lot easier to be sanguine when you know how it turned out, but I thought it was a pretty good overall performance. The half-court D was solid, aided of course by Merrimack missing some open treys.
All the turnovers on offense were caused by having to deal with Merrimack’s unusual flat 2-2-1 matchup zone. In instructional videos they call this a “no-threes” zone, so the way that the Tigers clobbered it from outside while still getting some great inside looks off cuts and interior passes without ever facing it before was pretty impressive.
I love Davis’s moxie out there, Lee showed good patience, and Pierce was his usual all-around great self. Byriel played well, Abdulahi played great except for some foul issues, and Peters played another solid game. Can’t complain too much about MH trying to figure out the right rotations and develop depth. Jack Scott still looks a little rusty, Huggins needs more minutes in a row to get rhythm, and the Hicke/Happy/etc tail of the rotation also hasn’t seen enough time in a row to get a feel for what they can do. But the bigs are much better than I feared preseason.