Creighton @ Wichita State

[bluejays89]

Not much to say about the game. I expected a shocker victory and it happened. Was a little surprised that bju was even less athletic than I thought. Shox played horribly on offense and still got the W. I thought bju was an offensive juggernaut? Sure didn't look like it. I was personally more impressed with Evansville. No team in this conference can match the shox athleticism or have an answer for Carl hall, and he's still not 100%.

You're either not very smart or (more likely) trying to bait some Creighton posters but Creighton already beat Evansville by 20 this year, so they are clearly not better.

The IQ chart is apparently a bit out of your reach as well. Your are one of those self appointed analysts who thinks comparative scores hits the nail on the head. You probably predicted a CU ass whooping in Omaha last year because the BJ won earlier in the year in Wichita. How did that work out for you Nostradamus?

It does not take that high of an IQ to see that Creighton is better than Evansville.

[rlh04d]

To keep it as simple as possible and avoid going into shot charts, gained/lost possessions and shooting percentage. Hall had 8 more points, and the difference in blocks lead to a CU 'gain' or a WSU 'loss' of 8 points. Fairly similar numbers to me, again you don't have to agree with me but I don't see those being worthy of a claim that no one has an answer for Hall.

I know that McDermott is the best player on Creighton's team, and he has a very pretty shot.

But I don't like him at all. Echenique is the one guy on Creighton's team that I really, really wish played for WSU.

However, he really needs to learn to control his blocked shots. While I think he's a very good player, his blocks are hollow stats if he just swats the ball out of bounds and gives it right back to the other team. What do those blocks actually do for Creighton? I very rarely see EO for Wichita swat balls out of play, and he has significantly more blocks than Echenique. With 5 blocks in the CU/WSU game, he only gave the ball back to Creighton twice. EO, meanwhile, with 2 blocks in the game, turned the ball over to WSU both times. 5 blocks is a nice stat, but I'm not sure Echenique actually contributed to the game with those 5 more than EO did with 2.

That's my one real complaint about him. I don't know if he just looks better against WSU than normal, but he's the one guy that seems ready to play us every time out (McDermott, on the other hand, has been very pedestrian in previous games).

Some of you shocker posters make it real hard for the casual basketball fan to root for you or wish you well. Is that what you want? That is the sole reason I don't cheer for the huskers anymore either. Wonder what other fans (SLU, XU, VCU) think when they come to this board.

And before you admonish me for certain CU posters, I am already on record admonishing them too.

Can't you just take compliments and move onto the next game without baiting other fan bases? You certainly lead the valley in the baiting category.

In my experience, WSU fans and the program in general were ganged up on here when they were a relatively small continent of the active users. Certain WSU fans decided to fight back, and here we are. If certain fanbases hadn't been as negative to WSU when they had a 10-to-1 fan advantage, there wouldn't be as many Wichita fans on here trolling other fanbases now. You guys earned Coldblooded

[rlh04d]

I would argue that you can't look at a difference in blocks that way because unless CU came away with the ball after the block, it's no different than deflecting a pass out-of-bounds or back to the opponent. I remember my high school coach saying we would not get credit for a blocked shot unless we got possession of the ball as a result of the block. I know at least two of GE's blocks went out-of-bounds and another was retrieved by a WSU player.

Guess you made the same point, better, before I did.

[cu36]

I would argue that you can't look at a difference in blocks that way because unless CU came away with the ball after the block, it's no different than deflecting a pass out-of-bounds or back to the opponent. I remember my high school coach saying we would not get credit for a blocked shot unless we got possession of the ball as a result of the block. I know at least two of GE's blocks went out-of-bounds and another was retrieved by a WSU player.

Guess you made the same point, better, before I did.

I can agree with you about Greg blocking shots out of bounds. A block that doesn't gain a possession isn't nearly as effective. I was simply trying to illustrate that you can make up for not scoring 17 points by taking points off the board. I also posted it to contest the remark that no one has an answer for Hall.

When Greg first came to CU all of his blocks went into the crowd. It's fun to watch, but as you pointed out it doesn't gain your team a possession. From what the paper said, coach had a talk with Greg about using his ability to block shots to control the ball. He seems to have adjusted his defense to control blocked shots, but he swats a few into the crowd from time to time. Now I think that when he blocks shots into the crowd he is doing it with the intention to either intimidate the opponent or fire up the team. I can see value in both, but it's hard to say that losing possessions in a game that was decided by one possession was a smart move.

I respect Hall and think he is a very good player, but as a CU fan I'll take Greg.

[rlh04d]

I can agree with you about Greg blocking shots out of bounds. A block that doesn't gain a possession isn't nearly as effective. I was simply trying to illustrate that you can make up for not scoring 17 points by taking points off the board. I also posted it to contest the remark that no one has an answer for Hall.

When Greg first came to CU all of his blocks went into the crowd. It's fun to watch, but as you pointed out it doesn't gain your team a possession. From what the paper said, coach had a talk with Greg about using his ability to block shots to control the ball. He seems to have adjusted his defense to control blocked shots, but he swats a few into the crowd from time to time. Now I think that when he blocks shots into the crowd he is doing it with the intention to either intimidate the opponent or fire up the team. I can see value in both, but it's hard to say that losing possessions in a game that was decided by one possession was a smart move.

I respect Hall and think he is a very good player, but as a CU fan I'll take Greg.

Yeah, I definitely understand your point. I think Hall's the better player, but then, we would both choose the guys on our teams Regardless, I think the two of them are probably the most intimidating, physical forces in the league. I'd try to argue Hall's value in being the best player on his team, unlike Echenique, but WSU going 6-1 or whatever it was with him gone hurts that argument.

And I can understand the point about intimidating opponents. I'd still rather have the ball, though, and have a team get fired up some other way. If all five of his blocks give Creighton the ball, rather than second chance shots for WSU, I have a hard time imagining we win that game.

It's all splitting hairs, though. I think Echenique's a great player, and he's probably my favorite player outside of Wichita in the league. I prefer gritty, tough play like he and Hall utilize.

[Wufan]

Not much to say about the game. I expected a shocker victory and it happened. Was a little surprised that bju was even less athletic than I thought. Shox played horribly on offense and still got the W. I thought bju was an offensive juggernaut? Sure didn't look like it. I was personally more impressed with Evansville. No team in this conference can match the shox athleticism or have an answer for Carl hall, and he's still not 100%.

I would agree that WSU is more athletic than CU. Overall, they probably run faster 40 times, have bigger verticals and bench more than CU. But this is also a skill game, is it not? Granted athleticism can make up for skill deficiencies, but to say that you can win on athleticism alone is ignorant from a basketball mindset. Seeing as the game was so close at your place, a top ten home advantage if you will, would it not be prudent to suggest that skill-wise CU is also superior to WSU? Personally, I think that WSU is more athletic than CU as equally as CU is more skilled than WSU. It makes for great games when you put the two against each other. I haven't seen much from CU posters suggesting that CU is more athletic but I have't seen a WSU poster admit that there is the possibility that CU is more fundamentally sound than WSU.

Both teams missed shots they don't usually miss. For instance, I would put the entire season on Ethan Wragge making one of the two threes he got in the closing seconds of the game, I am that confident in him and he has shown that those are two very high percentage shots for him. Neither of them went down and CU lost the game. That isn't to say that Ethan lost the game, but I think that everything was even enough throughout the game that I would put my money on Ethan's skill any day of the week.

As for your Carl Hall comment, I have a feeling Greg would argue that he can 'answer' him. From what I have seen, WSU fans like to look at head to head match ups. Carl Hall had 17 points, 13 rebounds and 1 block. Greg had 9 points, 13 rebounds and 5 blocks. They are fairly similar numbers with the blocks being in favor of Greg and the points in favor of Hall. Hall took ten more shots than Greg to score 8 more points and I am willing to concede that if you admit that Greg got more blocks because WSU was taking more shots around the basket, especially due to offensive rebounds. Does this not make the two fairly equal? I think it does. Not trying to say that Greg is better than Hall or vice versa, but to say that no one has an answer for Hall is unfounded.

All that being said, I wish WSU the best of luck for the next 10 games, 11 if you count the BB game, and await the game in Omaha. I have no doubt it will be a good one.

Hard to find much wrong with this post.

[jaybydna]

"In my experience, WSU fans and the program in general were ganged up on here when they were a relatively small continent of the active users. Certain WSU fans decided to fight back, and here we are. If certain fanbases hadn't been as negative to WSU when they had a 10-to-1 fan advantage, there wouldn't be as many Wichita fans on here trolling other fanbases now. You guys earned Coldblooded "


I'm not looking to get into an argument. There are a lot of good and bad posters on both sides. I'll end with an example though. Go read the Xavier or C7 boards. The number 1 argument against Dayton is their fan base. Would I vote to keep WSU out of the C7 conference because of their fans? Maybe not, but I am sure not going to miss some of them if we are lucky enough to get invited.

We never had this with SIU fans, or maybe time has clouded my memory.

[Ricardo del Rio]

We never had this with SIU fans, or maybe time has clouded my memory.

Time has definitely clouded and eroded your memory. When SIU was kicking everyone's butt, most of their posters were off the charts obnoxious.

I am not sure, but I do not believe any of the obnoxious SIU posters of yester year are posting today.

Footnote: "Yester year" is term from the Lone Ranger years.

[rlh04d]

I'm not looking to get into an argument. There are a lot of good and bad posters on both sides. I'll end with an example though. Go read the Xavier or C7 boards. The number 1 argument against Dayton is their fan base. Would I vote to keep WSU out of the C7 conference because of their fans? Maybe not, but I am sure not going to miss some of them if we are lucky enough to get invited.

We never had this with SIU fans, or maybe time has clouded my memory.

All due respect, search "MVCFans" on ShockerNet. Most programs have the same type of fans, and I'm fairly certain that Creighton has just as many trolls as Wichita does. The difference, though, is that a large portion of competent Wichita fans have been disgusted by this forum and refuse to participate on it.

When you drive off the reasonable fans, all you're left with are the trolls. Playing gang-mentality is fun and all when you've got the numbers advantage, but long term, it leaves you with multiple trolls instead of the people who will actually contribute reasonably to a discussion.

As for the expansion argument, somehow I doubt the feeling regarding Dayton's fans on the C7 forums has anything to do with their inclusion or exclusion from the conference.

[C0|db|00ded]

Listening to Fan-of-BJ talk as if they are above the WSU fanbase in terms of behavior and overall posting candor makes me giggle and really strains my personal incontinence barriers. To be safe, I really need to start wearing diapers while reading this forum.


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