UNI @ MSU 1/30

[bigdawg]

...and because Weems likes to foul in key situations.

In fairness....at Ind St, Mallet got beaten badly on the drive to the basket and Weems had the choice of either letting a game winning basket go or try to block/foul to make them earn it. The guard did a great job of keeping the ball far away from Weems and flipping it up. In this game, Weems had a great seal on his guy, and bad perimeter D forced Leonard to leave his guy in the corner to flash to the shooter. Weems simply went up for a rebound and the guard coming down baseline slid in front, I don't really know if Weems knew the guy was coming in. I guess Weems alternative would have been to either keep his guy blocked out and let the ball fall to the floor, or let the guy put the ball back in. Weems did a great job both times for the situation he was left in by his teammates, and unfortunately the guy on the other side did his job better. You won't make that statement very often.

Hard to say he did a "great job" considering th Bears would have been better off each time if Weems hadn't been anywhere near the play.

[DieHardMSUFan]

Hard to say he did a "great job" considering th Bears would have been better off each time if Weems hadn't been anywhere near the play.

Interesting take....in both cases if Weems had not been there and reacted, we would have been beat on easy shots at the basket, rather than tough contested shots and free throws. The real take is that the Bears would have been better off if the other guys besides Weems did not allow their man get in to where Weems had to look like the goat.

[JayJ79]

How was that a shooting foul against Weems?

Looked like Moran was trying to tip the rebound back in.

If he was at the basket I could agree. But he grabs the rebound outside of the block and brings the ball down. Weems just takes him down. I don't see how a ref could say he was trying to tip it in.

It's a moot point. Sorry I brought it up. Was just thinking it over and looking at the box score saw that we had only commuted 5 fouls

didn't see the play in question, but from that description, it sounds like perhaps it should have been an intentional foul.

[pawball]

The foul that Patterson made close to the end of the half, an over-the-back rebounding foul with 0.3 ticks left, didn't help Bears either. Think Panthers made 1-2 on it. Bears play very hard for Zo, zero complaints about that. Not often that Zo gets out-coached, but think he was in 2nd half. Bears had opportunities to keep making UNI inbound ball, what with two fouls to give, in final minute, failed to use them, and I didn't care for having Scheer on UNI's 6'9 kid in one of UNI's last possessions. Foul at the end was a shooting foul....Moran was in possession and taking the rebbie to the hole.

Bear fans complaining about refs look and sound whiney on a forum. You can go back through a game like this and pick n choose questionable or poor calls that hurt both teams. Usually the home team gets the better of it, that's the way it is in basketball, and it's been documented, somewhat, from interviews with collegiate and pro refs. Like most fans I go apesheet over what I perceive as a bad call against my team, but when I calm down and check things out by looking at tape, I find that I change my mind as much as have my own opinion reinforced (and it amazes me when my padner tells me that the ref blew a call when we are a good 200' from where the action occurred....otoh, seeing a travelling call ain't that hard from that distance).

Fun thing for Valley fans is we now have a 3-horse race, and that could still change. There's a ton of ball to play. One thing's for sure, imo: nothing's for certain. 4,5,6 seeds can begin licking their chops in preparation for the Valley tourney. Only teams not viable for a 6 seed are ISU(r) and BU (?).

[Aargh]

Well, the good news is that the only team that has the tiebreaker against MSU is MVC Officiating, who has now defeated the Bears both at home and on the road. The call for Moran as a shooting foul was absolutely nonsensical, and that combined with the armbar that Weems fought through to get there and Leonard being abused on the last shot decided the game. Then again, that's the sort of thing that has made this a one-bid conference, and the rest of the regular season is now a glorified seeding exhibition for all Valley teams.

The most amazing part of that post is that it is not sarcasm. I watched the entire game. I thought MSU got a lot of "homer" calls. The officials gave Weems about every possible benefit of the doubt (if not advantage) all game long.

The only calls I saw that seemed to favor UNI seemed to be makeup calls after a really questionable call going MSU's direction. That was a rather well-officiated game, but I thought MSU got a little more than their share of calls - even considering the home team usually gets the favorable calls.

Blaming that game on the officials is not warranted. The Bears appeared to run out of gas and weren't playing with intensity (or accuracy) in the last 10 minutes or so of the game. Tired players make more mistakes, and MSU was called for more violations late in the game than early in the game.

If you want to blame that one on the officials, come up with how the refs forced MSU to run up and down the court instead of just walking. Your time keeper even gave MSU 3 extra chances to rest.