by Aargh » December 5th, 2010, 9:45 am
WSU returned the entire front court from last year, but so far the front court looks worse than last year's version. If the coaching staff can't find a way to make even 1 of 4 front court players improve from year to year, then I don't see a lot of reason to think they will be bale to teach Orukpe how to play basketball.
Demetric Williams looks better than he did a year ago, but nowhere near how he looked at the end of last year.
Even with all of WSU's experience, WSU had a So or a first-year trfr attempting to bring the ball up the court when SDSU made their run. In a 3-minute stretch, they managed to get the ball across half-court twice. Both times, Durley shot early in the shot clock - once from 3 and another from 17'. Panic and a need to be the "hero" hurt WSU last night. Get the fouls under control, and the combination of players that gave up the run won't be on the court.
Of all the bad things about last night's game and WSU's season to this point, WSU has played 74 solid minutes against top-20 teams either in true road games or neutral courts. A 3-minute stretch in each game sunk the effort in the other 37 minutes of the game.
Play 40 minutes and get fouls under control and WSU is about where they were expected at the beginning of the season. SDSU scored 11 more points on FTs than WSU. So far, WSU is one of few Valley teams with no unexpected losses.