Auburn Report Card by 001

This win put us in the driver’s seat! We now own at minimum a share of the SEC West championship. One more win and we will win it outright. The guys played one heck of a game last night to put us in this position. Rhodes played his heart out for this one. He had 30 points (career high), 9 rebounds, 2 blocks and only 1 turnover. But give everyone credit for this win. All of the starters were in double figures in scoring. Yes, I know that Auburn was out manned, but they have been playing really good basketball with their short bench. And they are well coached. Auburn ’s Quan Prowell hit a career high in scoring with 31 points. In fact 4 of their 6 players were in double figures. But be that as it was, we still beat them in all categories except free throw shooting where they beat us 76.9% to 75.0%.
OFFENSE A
This game was similar to the Ole Miss game where we put it all together. Shooting was outstanding for our guys. We were 16 for 27 for 59.3% in the first half and improved to 17 for 28 for 60.7% in the second half giving us 60.0% for the game. A new standard for State. For the game, we scored 16 points off of offensive rebounds. This was great! We turned the ball over 6 times in each of the halves for a game total of 12. This also is great for this team. In fact, Rhodes only turnover came just 17 seconds in the first half. Everybody that played gave productive minutes for our team. All of our starters shot in double figures lead by Rhodes with 30, and Gordon with 20. Turner was the only bench player to score with a 3 pointer. But Brian Johnson had an offensive rebound and an assist to Varnado for a dunk. Although we got somewhat lackadaisical in the first half, we came back in the second half with more grit and energy and played much better. Our 3 point shooting was much better in this game going 11 of 23 for 47.8%. And last, but not least, we shot the ball well from the charity stripe at 75.0%. This type of offensive play can win you a lot of ballgames.
DEFENSE A-
State played a very good defensive game tonight. The only player we had no real answer for was Quan Prowell. He was 7 of 10 from beyond the arc and had 20 points at half time. We did however do a better job on him in the second half limiting him to 11 points. We switched from man defense to a 2-3 zone at 15.35 minute after a media time out in the second half and held him to just two 3 pointers. Making this defensive change was a wise decision on Coach Stansbury’s part. You could see the disruptive power it had on the Auburn team. Also, on the defensive end of the court, we pulled down 26 defensive rebounds to Auburn ’s 16 offensive rebounds. Even with their scoring 78 points in this game, we held FG percentage to 39.4% for the game.
ASSIST TO TURNOVER RATIO A
In this game, our assist to turnovers was almost 2 assist to 1 turnover. We finished the game with 22 assists to 12 turnovers. Gordon had half of our turnovers, but also had 6 assists. Several of his assist while driving the lane were things of beauty because each turn out to be slam dunks.
REBOUNDING A
We again won the rebounding war collecting 36 to their 29. This was not quite as good as the first time we played them, but was adequate. Stats showed we pulled down 10 offensive boards and scored 16 points off them. This is very, very good. We also out rebounded our opponent on the defensive boards 26 to 16. Rhodes and Varnado both came up 1 rebound shy of getting a double-double.
3 POINT SHOOTING A
What more can be said about this category when our guys shot 47.8% from beyond the arc. Compare this to the South Carolina game when we shot just 27.8%. This type of 3 point shooting can win against about any opponent we face. Kudos to the team for this performance.
FREE THROW SHOOTING A
I was proud of the way our guys stepped up in this area of their game. 12 of 16 for 75.0% from the charity stripe. This just adds icing to the cake for State. Rhodes hit 7 of 8 and Hansbrough was perfect at 3 for 3. We need to stay in this shooting range for the remainder of the year for our overall success. Free throw shooting practice is paying dividends now.
OFFICIATING B
I should most probably give this category an A-, but just couldn’t bring myself to do so. The officials did allow the players to play. There were 3 or 4 instances where people got hammered under the basket without a foul being called. But a no call is better than having a foul called against us. The primary reason for this grade is I just can’t tolerate Doug “Showboat” Shows as a ref.
OVERALL A
Since I don’t use the officiating grade in the overall score, State gets an A. This game was very similar to when we beat Ole Miss in the last perfect game I scored an A. Coach Stansbury always talks about find the guys finding a way to win. In this game, they didn’t have to find a way to win. They won it heads up with beautiful basketball play.

P/S…If you will go back and read a column I wrote on February 5th, What's in the future for the Dawgs now?, you see a forecast I did for the remaining 9 games at the time. I now feel that with the way our Dawgs are stepping up to their potential, we have a very good opportunity for a victory at Florida this coming Saturday. Go Dawgs!!!

MSU 89 AUBURN 78

Upon arrival at the Hump, the pregame atmosphere felt very lackluster. You could just sense that the game was going to be closer at times than expected. Prowell had an amazing game for AU. Congrats to Charles for a career high of 30. If they would have feed more he could have had forty plus. Charles had no competition, most all of his shot where in the paint. He was not forced to use his fade away shot. Congrats to the dogs on locking up at least a share of another west title. I think we can win on Saturday. LSU will not be the team we opened the SEC with. I think we can win 2 of next 3 and improve our seeding drastically. Win 2 and think we get at least a 7. Win 2 of next three and then win 1, about the same, win 2 maybe a 6, win the tournament and I think we get a 5. We'll at this point its just dogspeak. Go Dawgs!!!

One extra note, I noticed that Romero Osby was decked out in maroon last night now that his season is over. It was a beatiful thing!

1 Corinthians 16:13 Be on your guard; stand firm in the faith; be men of courage; be strong.

Game Day Articles

From the DJ: link

From the CL: link

The Auburn Game

Here is a great preview by secsports.com :
MISSISSIPPI STATE BULLDOGS (18-8, 9-3)Having surpassed last year's regular-season totals for overall wins and SEC victories with two weeks remaining in the regular season, the Bulldogs return home to play host to Auburn mid-week before heading back out on the road for a Saturday contest at Florida. State has reached double digits in home wins during all 10 seasons that Rick Stansbury has been at the Bulldog helm. The Bulldogs have claimed 12 of the last 14 series meetings with Auburn. With a current seven-game series win streak at home over Auburn, MState has prevailed in those seven prior Starkville meetings against AU all by double figures and by an average margin of 21.3 points per home win over the Tigers. MSU has won 11 straight home decisions against SEC West competition dating back to the 2005-06 season. The Bulldogs have clinched their fifth winning SEC season during the Stansbury era, having previously posted four straight winning seasons in SEC action while making four consecutive NCAA Tournament appearances earlier this decade (2002-05). State is bidding to reach twin digits in SEC victories for the third time during the Stansbury era (14-2 in 2003-04 & 10-6 in 2001-02). Ranked second in the nation in blocks as a team (8.23 bpg), MSU enters the week with 214 blocked shots and now needs nine swats to sit a new single-season school standard for blocks for the second straight year. Also standing second nationally in field-goal pct defense (.366) after limiting South Carolina to just 31 percent shooting on Saturday, the Bulldogs have held 16 of their 26 opponents to less than 40 pct field-goal shooting.

Matthew 25:23 "His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!'

USC Report Card by 001

Boy was this an exciting game to grade. It was really a game of firsts for the Dawgs. It was the first time we won at the Colonial Center , the first time we have put up 3 free throws to send a game into overtime the first time that Carolina had lost to an SEC West team and it was the first time that Jarvis Varnado has taken a charge in his MSU career. But it was a great win, especially in the manner that we won the game. Three pressure packed free throws to get it into overtime and then losing Gordon 12 seconds into the overtime, with Varnado already on the bench. In comes Phil Turner off the bench and his first shot attempt is a made 3 pointer. Man, it doesn’t get anymore dramatic than that. Charles Rhodes played like the man he is and the man that all of us want to see every game. He had 24 points, 9 rebounds, 3 turnovers and 3 assists. Those kind of numbers help you win lots of games.
OFFENSE B
We struggled on offense, but in the end found a way to win the game. Overall, this was one of poorest shooting performances. We were 9 for 24 for 37.5% in the first half and 10 for 22 for 45.5% in the second half giving us 43.4% for the game. We were able to collect 9 points off of 10 offensive rebounds. What really hurt us were the 19 turnovers we had in this game. Our offense has to pick up for the remainder of the season.
DEFENSE A-
This was a key area for us winning this game. Our guys held Carolina to their lowest shooting percentage of the season at 30.8% and one of their lowest point totals of the season at 56 points in this game. They probably did the best job of defending Devan Downey (Bob Cousey Award finalist) that has been done on him all year. He played 43 minutes in this game and was held to 6 of 18 including 3 of 9 from 3 point range.
ASSIST TO TURNOVER RATIO D+
We fell down in this category again. We had 19 turnovers to 14 assists. Carolina picked up 26 points off of turnovers. That’s darn near half of their total points for the game. Carolina on the other hand had 11 turnovers and we only garnered 5 points off their turnovers. It is imperative that we protect the ball better from this point on.
REBOUNDING A
Again, we out rebounded our opponent 42 to 36. Mike Holmes for Carolina gathered in 13 rebounds in 27 minutes of play and was their main man. On the other sides of the coin, Vanado had 12 rebounds and Rhodes was one rebound shy of a double-double in the game. This is a category we need to keep going for success.
3 POINT SHOOTING C-
We only made 5 of 18 3 point shots in this game. However, in this category, there were two 3 pointers that stood out from the rest. First was the missed 3 by Hansbrough when he was fouled and then made the 3 points from the charity stripe to tie the game, and then Phil Turner’s 3 pointer. coming into the game cold in overtime, and knocking down a 3 pointer to put us up by 5 points.
FREE THROW SHOOTING A
Although the overall free throw shooting wasn’t all that good at 10 of 15 for 66.7%, it was Ben’s 3 at the end of regulation that helped us win the game. It’s hard to put a statement together about FT shooting for this team because in the morning shoot around and practice, they were hitting FTs as well as you ask them to do.
OFFICIATING B
I felt two of the officials, Tom Eades and Mike Thibodeaux called a pretty darn good game. However, Patrick Evans slammed us hard with his calls. His calling infuriated me to a large extent.
OVERALL B
With no intent to take away from our players, because they played a heck of a game in front of a large, vocal and hostile crowd, I personally have to attribute this loss by Carolina to Coach Dave Odom. With 7 seconds left in the game and holding a 3 point lead at 50 to 47, he should have had a player foul one of our guys before a shot was taken. Sure we were in the double bonus, but that would have still left us short even if we made the two. But I’m still proud of the toughness our guys showed in finding a way to win this one.

MSU 61 USC 56

What can you say. Maybe Iceman? Great job Ben!!!! What an ugly game. I'm just about speachless. Two things in overtime, Phil's 3 and Elgin's rebound, huge, huge. Lets hope the friendly confounds of the Hump will get us out of our shooting slump. Great game Charles. If we win the West by 1 game, we owe to Ben. I can't handle those types of games. Did everyone else about pass out with that ending. Let get home and take care of business on Wednesday. Go Dawgs!!!

New Footage of Osby

Check out some new video on Mr. Osby:
http://mefeedia.com/entry/romero-osby/6768885/

Moss Point 56, Northeast Lauderdale 55
In South 4A, Dandy Dozen senior Travis Rasco scored 15 points to power the No. 3 Tigers (30-4). Dandy Dozen senior Romero Osby, a Mississippi State signee, had 22 points for the Trojans (24-11).

We Had No Answer

Just back from the Tad Pad. We had no answer for the rebs tonight. They brought their A game tonight and the dogs were rattled at the half. They played like they were a 17-0 team with a national ranking. Jamont tried to take over the game at the end, but just couldn't do it. Several thing doomed us. They attacked the basket at will, out rebounded us, we didnt shoot well and just looked like a tired team at times out there. Warren got his touch back tonight. We had two runs in the second, but just couldn't stop them. The rebels had all the celeberties out tonight. Shepard Smith and Eli were in attendance. We just have to swallow this on and move on. USC is a must win on Saturday. Lets put this one behind us and move on to Carolina.

Off to Enemy Territory

I'll be making my first trip to the Tad Pad for a bb game tomorrow. I expect the rebels to give us as much hospitality as we gave them in Starkville. I think we can take care of business, but there are so many tangibles that go into a rivalary game. If you plan on going let us know here. Here is a good preview compliments of secsports.com : http://www.secsports.com/index.php?s=&url_channel_id=3&url_article_id=10481&url_subchannel_id=&change_well_id=2

I think it will be a close game or we win by 15+, I'm not feeling much in between.

Ezekiel 18:9 He follows my decrees and faithfully keeps my laws. That man is righteous; he will surely live, declares the Sovereign LORD.

Future Bulldog?

His name is Deandre Hersey and he is from Reform, AL. From a fellow blogger who doesn't want to be named. Check it out here: http://www.cdispatch.com/articles/2008/02/12/sports/sports02.txt

http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/article/20080206/NEWS/261965761/1015/NEWS

Could he be a possible replacement, won't know until April.

Interesting: "Wallace said Hersey has a 7-foot wing span and shoots 73 percent from the foul line. He scored 33 of his team’s 56 points in a game against Class 5A John Carroll.“He’s scoring right at 40 percent of our points,” Wallace said. “As far as what he means to this basketball team, he’s rock solid. He’s not a selfish individual. He does his job for his teammates every single night.”Hersey didn’t play AAU basketball during the summer. He stayed around home and volunteered for a church-sponsored program to improve the community. Wallace said Hersey is active in the Fellowship of Christian Athletes."

ARKANSAS REPORT CARD by 001

No one on the staff or team would dare say it, but this was a must win game for us. We have the harder future schedule than does our closest opponent. When you look at the stats for this game, you will see that they were pretty evenly matched with two exceptions. Arkansas made more field goals than State, but State made more free throws than Arkansas . And that’s really where we won the game. AT THE CHARITY STRIPE.
When your key player is held to one field goal and only 9 points in the game, you have to say we played an outstanding game with everyone else picking up their game. This win definitely gave us the advantage in the SECW race. Now it’s up to us to hold that lead through the remainder of the season. If you have the opportunity this week, come out to cheer the guys on at Oxford .
OFFENSE A-
Except for a short period in the beginning of the second half when we allowed Arkansas to overcome a 15 point deficit, we played great ball. We made 26 of 54 shots for 48.1%.
Even with Arkansas blocking 7 shots and making 8 steals, we still won the game. Our passing was good overall and our guys moved very well without the ball for most of the game. Towards the end of the game, they did stand around more. But in the last 2 minutes of the game, they did start moving better. Surprisingly, our last field goal came 4:54 mark in the game. From that point on, we only attempted one shot and that was a 3 point attempt by Stewart at the 3:00 minute mark. Every other shot we took in this time frame was free throws. We made 9 of 12 free throws and that is what won this game for us. Rhodes had an outstanding first half with 19 points of our 47 first half points. He finished the game with 24. Also, a tip of the hat to Elgin Bailey who quietly in 11 minutes pulled down 3 rebounds and scored 8 points. Jamont came close to a triple double with 9 points, 8 rebounds and 8 assists.
DEFENSE A
Nothing more needs to be said about our defense yesterday. We won that football game! Or rather it looked like a football game at times because the striped shirts allowed a lot of banging and knock downs that no whistle was blown on. Seriously, our guys did played good defense. They were active all over the court. We pulled down 22 defensive rebounds, caused 14 turnovers, had 6 blocked shots and 7 steals. We are now at the point that anytime Jarvis blocks a shot, he is setting a new record. He now had 114 blocks on the year. I must admit that Arkansas did better offensively than most teams we played this year. They came away from the game shooting 46.0%. But we still won. Beverly, who we all know is a great player for Arkansas was held scoreless the last 13 minutes and 54 seconds of the game. That in itself speaks for our defensive effort.
ASSIST TO TURNOVER RATIO D
This is the same grade I gave us in the last game. Yesterday, we had 10 assists to 14 turnovers. In most games that could be costly. But in this case, other aspects of the game overcame this deficiency. Although Gordon had 6 turnovers, he did have 8 assists. Of interest to note is that our bench players only contributed 4 turnovers. The other 10 were between Gordon and Stewart. I think we will see improvement down the road in this category.
REBOUNDING A
We out rebounded Arkansas by 5, 38 to 33. I gave this an A because most of the Arkansas big men are seniors and should have done a better job than they did. I think this was a direct reflection of the way our big men stepped up. Jarvis again had a double-double with his 10 rebounds and 10 points.
3 POINT SHOOTING B
This area of the game could have been better if Jamont hadn’t tried so hard. He was 0 for 4 in this game. However, we ended up in pretty good shape hitting 5 of 13 for 38.5%. Not quite as good as the last game where we shot 43.5%. We have the shooters and this will show improvement down the line.
FREE THROW SHOOTING A
Same as last game. What more can be said when you hit 23 of 29 for 79.3%. That gives us 46 of 55 for 83.6% over the last two games. In this game, the winning edge came from free throws, especially in the last 3 minutes.
OFFICIATING D
This has to be one of the worst called games in the Hump this year. There were times when our game looked like a football game. This game was called by Mike Stuart, Mike Nance and Ron Groover. Remember these names. I hope I never see them in a game again.
OVERALL B+
I was hoping for a grade out of an A today, but it didn’t come out that way. But this win went a long way towards making this a successful season for our Dawgs. We now have the clear lead in the SECW and are 2nd in conference play to only Tennessee . We now need to protect this lead Wednesday at Oxford . Go Dawgs!!!

Hard on the Heart

The game yesterday was hard on the heart. Myself, like most of the fans in the Hump were emotionaly drained upon our victorious exit. There is only one way to describe it, the dogs just gutted it out. I don't care to see Arkansas again this season. We have never matched up very well against their current lineup and we could struggle on a neutral court. That was one of the most physical games I have seen played at the Hump in awhile. One thing I have been very impressed with this season is the dogs ability to break the press. Barry and Charles just outhustled the hogs down the court in the first half. FT's was the difference and our recent turnaround is nothing short of amazing. As I watch every passing game, I like Elgin's play more and more. The most entertaining part of the game to me was watching Hill trying to get position against Elgin, it was not happening. As most saw, Ravern has some serious athletic ability. One last comment, Jamont's blocks to end the last possesion of the game was fantastic. Up two with six to go. I'm sticking to my guns with a 4-2 finish with 21 wins heading into the tournament. I sure the team would agree with me in not being on the bubble heading into the tournament would be nice. Next, off to Oxford. I'm heading to the Tad Pad on Wednesday and I'm looking forward to heading into the heart of enemy territory.

Romans 10:17 Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.

Osby at the 4

It seems that Osby would be a natural at the four position and could create some major matchup problems. Here are some of Mr. Osby's quotes confirming that: http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080216/SPORTS06/802160351/1117

"Osby said MSU coaches have told him he'll have a chance to fill Charles Rhodes' shoes next season but with more of an inside-out role than the Bulldogs' senior big man."

Could be just what we need to fill the absence of Charles.

1 Corinthians 15:14 And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith.

How The West Was Won

How was the west won? We might be able to find out come Saturday at 3 PM. Since the TN loss, our focus as fans has shifted from daydreaming of an overall title to taking care of the west. I heard a stat that the last time the Hogs won at he Hump was when Nolan was at the reins back in 2000. Which seems about right, b/c it seems we win about as often at Bud Walton. Everything will be laid out on the line on Saturday and we should see a much better showing than the last matchup. This is the first of 3 home games remaining that are must wins to make the big dance. So, just how will we match up tomorrow? I just can't see everybody on the team including the cheerleaders sinking 3's like last time. I don't see it being a blowout like last season. I think we win, b/c we are a much better team with Ben on board. We have been able to adjust when someone went down throughout our first winning streak, but make no bones about, Ben will be that 3rd option we will need down the stretch. Arkansas has not proven themselves on the road yet. A 2 game lead in the west after Saturday would be a big advantage. I think their advantage as always will be in the paint. Our backcourt will have to carry the load. Hint, hint, Mr. Hansbrough. It will be a good one, hope all that are able will be there. Go Dawgs!!!

ADDENDUM TO AUBURN REPORT CARD

ADDENDUM TO AUBURN REPORT CARD It came as somewhat of a surprise that no one has made any comments about something I have complained about in my report cards. And that is Offensive Rebounds. OR is a direct result of a missed shot by a team. After doing some further analysis of the play by play stat sheet, I have come up with the following. As I said above, an OR is the direct result of a missed shot. In this game, we had 23 misses and Auburn had 45 misses. We ended up with 12 OR and Auburn had 14 OR. To draw a better relationship to this, we had 34 DR to Auburn ’s 14 OR. That equates to us having almost two and half rebounds to their one off their board. Furthermore, their 14 OR only produced 7 points and three of those were free throws because of fouls. By the same token, Auburn pulled down 13 DR to our 12 OR. This is almost equal. But we did get 11 points off of the OR. Six of which were free throws because of Auburn fouls. I hope this makes more sense to you. I made this additional analysis after something Doug said in comment 7 to the original post. Another thing that I didn’t point out in the original post was points off steals by either team. We ended the game with 6 steals for 5 points while Auburn had 13 steals that they converted into 21 points. Let us hear from you via your comments

Talent Coming to A Hump Near You?

The Jackson area is loaded with talent for the 2010 & 2011 classes. Take a look:
http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080211/SPORTS06/802110317/1287/SPORTS&referrer=NEWSFRONTCAROUSEL

Two players to keep an eye on:
Dundrecous Nelson, Murrah
5-10, sophomore (22 points, 5 rebounds, 4 assists)

LaQuinton Ross, Callaway
6-8, freshman (17 points, 8 rebounds, 2 assists)
Ross could be a top five player in the nation in this class.

You might think freshmen, Class of 2011, but Stans has already been on them a year by the time they are high school freshmen. Thought you might enjoy.

Auburn Report Card by 001

This game was hard to write a report card because you found yourself applauding them one minute and cussing them the next. The game was ragged with mistakes on both sides of the competition. State did an excellent job in most categories with two exceptions. They became lax and had 24 turnovers. Eight of these by Gordon. However, he wiped this out scoring 24 points, passing out eight assists and pulling down a team high of eighteen rebounds. But the free throw shooting that we have been fussing about improved dramatically. We were 23 of 26 for 88.5%. By far our best FT shooting over the previous three or four years. The final outcome, 83 to 64 improved us to 16-7 overall and 7-2 in SEC play. This kept us in the lead of the SEC West. And our next game is with Arkansas , presently in second place in the SEC West.
OFFENSE B+
I would have given us an A in this category except for two aspects of the game. Turnovers (24) and offensive rebounds (12 vs. 14 for Auburn ). As outmanned as Auburn was in this game, we should never have allowed them to pull down more offensive rebounds than we did. But our shooting in this game was great. We knocked down 25 of 48 attempts for 52.1%. That type of shooting will win you a lot of games. We also went 10 of 23 on 3 pointers for 43.5%. And then made 23 of 26 attempts from the charity stripe for 88>5%. I just hope this type of shooting holds up over the next 3 or 4 weeks as we move towards the end of the regular season. Our starters ended up with 76 of our 83 points. I will say that I was a little disappointed that Coach Stansbury didn’t give our bench more playing time in this game.
DEFENSE A
What can I say? Although Auburn was outmanned from the get go, we did do a number on them. Our guys held them to 23 of 68 attempts for 33.8%. This is two to three percentages points better than our average. We also pulled down 34 defensive rebounds to their total rebounds of 27. We held them to just 6 of 25 attempts on 3 pointers which equates to 24.0%. Kudos to Jarvis Varnado for his 6 blocks which set a new season’s record for State, eclipsing Erick Dampier’s record of 106. Jarvis now has 111 swats for the year. We also had 6 steals in this event. I think the intimidation factor of our big men, especially Varnado and Rhodes played a large part in our defense in this game.
ASSIST TO TURNOVER RATIO D
Before writing this, I had considered giving this category an F. But that would probably been a bit harsh. Fourteen assists to 24 turnovers will lose a lot of games down the road. Auburn ’s mid-court double teams on Gordon should never have happened if Jamont had kept his mind in the game as long as his body was in there. Stewart also had some lapses in that he had four turnovers to go with just one assist. This category has to improve and improve constantly down the schedule.
REBOUNDING B+
Although we out rebounded Auburn 46 to 27, we still could not top them in offensive rebounds. They had 14 to our 12. With out big men playing down low, this should never have happened. Conversely, we did have 34 defensive rebounds to their total 27 rebounds.
3 POINT SHOOTING A
It’s nice to have Hansbrough back with his 3 point shot. We made 10 of 23 attempts for 43.5% from behind the arc. This type of 3 point shooting can win you a lot of games. We were 4 of 10 in the first half and 6 of 13 in the second half.
FREE THROW SHOOTING A
This is a grade that I never thought I would possibly give this team this year based on what they have done in the past. They went 23 of 26 for game. 14 of 15 in the first half and 9 of 11 in the second half. This just shows that the guys are capable of good free throw shooting. Now we will wait to see if there is consistency in this category. Let’s hope so.
OFFICIATING B
The officials let the men play the game. To my old and inexperienced eyes, I detected no bias in the calls made in this game. I would love to see this type of officiating for the remainder of our games.
OVERALL B-
Two areas of the game kept us from grading out higher for this contest. Turnovers and offensive rebounding. I think we should see better results in our next game, especially in the turnover category. We have to, because we already know that Arkansas will be pressing us from he very start of the game. AIN’T it nice to see the results of what practice can do for you in some areas such as free throws. Onward and upward. Go Dawgs!!


ADDENDUM TO AUBURN REPORT CARD It came as somewhat of a surprise that no one has made any comments about something I have complained about in my report cards. And that is Offensive Rebounds. OR is a direct result of a missed shot by a team. After doing some further analysis of the play by play stat sheet, I have come up with the following. As I said above, an OR is the direct result of a missed shot. In this game, we had 23 misses and Auburn had 45 misses. We ended up with 12 OR and Auburn had 14 OR. To draw a better relationship to this, we had 34 DR to Auburn ’s 14 OR. That equates to us having almost two and half rebounds to their one off their board. Furthermore, their 14 OR only produced 7 points and three of those were free throws because of fouls. By the same token, Auburn pulled down 13 DR to our 12 OR. This is almost equal. But we did get 11 points off of the OR. Six of which were free throws because of Auburn fouls. I hope this makes more sense to you. I made this additional analysis after something Doug said in comment 7 to the original post. Another thing that I didn’t point out in the original post was points off steals by either team. We ended the game with 6 steals for 5 points while Auburn had 13 steals that they converted into 21 points. Let us hear from you via your comments

MSU 83 Auburn 64

Great win for the dogs. Jamont scored some points and put up some stats, but he had some ugly turnovers. The difference in the game was Ben, he could be the difference down the stretch. And not to forget, great free throw shooting. One of the best rebounding games we'll probally have this season. Our lead sets up nice in the west over the next 7 days. Arky plays at TN on Wednesday and we play the hogs at home on Saturday. We could have a 2 game lead in the west by next Saturday night. No matter who it is, road wins are huge. Enjoy the break, root for the Vols on Wednesday and see ya next week at the HUMP for a big one. Go Dawgs!!!

Game Day Articles

From the DJ:
http://www.djournal.com/pages/story.asp?ID=265604&pub=1&div=Sports

From the CL:
http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080209/SPORTS030102/802090319/1079
Bailey getting some props.

How will we do against the small lineup? I hope we react better than UM did. We need to root for the rebs today. Hogs loss and dog win put back alone atop the west. The games are back to back on the FOX networks today. Settle in and Go Dawgs!!

Signee Update

Dee Bost
Hargrave 90 South Kent 68
Dee Bost scored 21 points and had 5 assists.

Hargrave 89 US Naval Academy (USNA)
Hargrave was led by Dee Bost with 20 points and a team high 7 steals.

Hargrave 127 Virginia Tech 59
Dee Bost scored 14 points.

Hargrave 84 Massanutten 54
Dee Bost scored 16 points and had 3 steals.

Romero Osby
NE Lauderdale 59 Quitman 52
Romero Osby 23

Wayne County 60 NE Lauderdale 49
Romero Osby 15

Laurel 43 NE Lauderdale 58
Romero Osby 26

Kemper County 47 NE Lauderdale 65
Romero Osby 34
Season Avg. 23.38 ppg

Mark 2:5 When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, "Son, your sins are forgiven."

Alabama Report Card by 001

Mississippi State won this game to go up 15-7, 6-2 SEC and regain the lead in the SEC West. Our guys played just well enough to garner this win. It was a game of short runs by both teams. We would play well for a while and then go brain dead for a while. Same with Alabama . The officiating didn’t help either. There were times when I thought they were playing football on the court and officials let it go, especially Tom Eades. Our free throw shooting was pretty good until the last minute of the game when we starting missing. Overall I guys did a nice job of keeping us ahead from after the first 16 minutes of the first half until the final buzzer. Several things stand out from this game. Stansbury got his 200th win. We swept Alabama for the first time since the 1998/99 season and three straight over ‘Bama since the 1984/5 season.
OFFENSE B-
As I said above, we played just well enough to win this one. We had some 3 point shooting that was timely to either put us ahead or lengthen our lead when tied. Gordon had a djouble-double17 points and 10 assist. Up until the last minute of the game, we were shooting free throws respectably. We had four players in double digit scoring and ended up with four blocked shots. But Varnado did alter some shots. Ben Hansbrough was a welcome sight and proved his mettle with 10 points. Ben’s first 3 pointer came at a very opportune time. We were leading 9 to 8 and his shot put us up 12 to 8. It is just that we found ways to stay ahead of Bama and win the game. The biggest down side of our offense was offensive rebounding.
DEFENSE B-
I don’t think our defense played with the same energy that Bama did. Whereas Bama was playing in your face and bumping, our guys didn’t play with that same degree of energy. And if they did, they were called for fouls. However, we collected nine more defensive rebounds than our opponent. Several times on turnovers and fast breaks, we had guards that stayed with the opponents and caused them to miss lay ups. We also had six blocked shots. I would have sworn we had more from just watching the game. I felt we did a good job of defending the 3 point shot also. Bama was just 7 for 21 in that category. Our guys did a pretty good job getting Bama into foul trouble too with Hendrix fouling out in the last 48 seconds of the game.
ASSIST TO TURNOVER RATIO B-
Because of going brain dead from time to time, we had more turnovers than we would like to see with 13. That was offset by the number of assists we had. In this game we had 16 assists to the 13 turnovers. Gordon had 10 by himself. Although the stat sheet shows Varnado with only one assist, I would have sworn he had three from just watching the game. We still need to work on the turnovers to try and keep them in the 9 to 10 per game. That would help us tremendously in the second half of the SEC play.
REBOUNDING C+
This improved over the previous two games. We out rebounded Bama 41 to 38. We had 34 defensive to Bama’s 25, but fell short on the offensive end, getting beat 13 to 7. We desperately need to improve in the offensive rebounding category and sooner rather than later.
3 POINT SHOOTING C
We fell down somewhat in this category, going 6 for 20 for 30% overall. We were 4 of 11 for 36.4% in the first half and 2 of 9 for 22.2% in the second half. The saving grace in this area was when the 3 points were made. On at least 3 occasions they stopped Alabama runs. Stewart was 3 for 8 and Hansbrough was 2 of 5.
FREE THROW SHOOTING C
We shot free throws well up until crunch time when Bama was fouling our guys in the last minute of play. In the first half, we were 3 of 4 for 75%, but only managed 12 of 18 for 66.7% in second half. Although get only got two attempts each, Bailey and Hansbrough were both perfect at 2 for 2 from the line. In the last minute and a half of play, we only made 6 of 12. We still need work in this category.
OFFICIATING D-
I almost gave this category an F, but decided not to for several reasons. The officials were letting the guys play and two of the officials (Mike Nance and Anthony Jordan) called a pretty decent game. But Tom Eades (Head Official) should have sat on the Bama bench during time outs because he was Alabama sixth player on the court the entire game. Of interest to note, during a dead ball situation Anthony Jordan ran the length of the court to get into “Got Fried’s” face and they had a heated exchange. I felt for a moment he was going to throw a “T”, but he didn’t.
OVERALL C+
I think we played fairly well in this game, but not with the energy that is necessary to win all of our future games. We just need to continue to improve in some areas of the game and we can still end up with a very good season.

MSU 73 ALA 66

We'll still have our say in the west. Great game for Jamont 10 assits, 17 pts, 6 rbs. Charles with 17 pts and 9 rbs. Sweeping bama goes along way toward a west title, not an easy task. Good to have Ben back. Go Dawgs!!!

WHAT’S IN THE FUTURE FOR THE DAWGS NOW?

With the loss to Tennessee , State is now 14 and 7 overall and 5 and 2 in conference. So where can we go from here? We have 9 games left in regular season, plus the SECT. Of the 9 games remaining, 5 are on the road and 4 at home. We have Alabama (2/6), Arkansas (2/16), Auburn (2/27) and LSU (3/8) at home. We have Auburn (2/9), Ole Miss (2/20), South Carolina (2/23), Florida (3/1), and Vanderbilt (3/5) on the road. It is my personal belief that we have to win 6 of these games if we want to make the NCAA tournament. If we are to win that many games over the remainder of the regular season, we are going to have to pick up our play. Everyone is going to have to give a 110% of themselves to get it done. The three losses that I forecast are Ole Miss, Florida and Vanderbilt. All on the road. I think the NCAA selection committee looks at who is playing well towards the end of the season and if we can accomplish the above and then win one or 2 in the SECT, we make the big dance, otherwise, it’s the NIT again. To me, going to the NIT is like kissing your sister instead of your lover. Just not worth it. How do you feel about the remainder of the season? Let us hear your opinion. -001

Sorry for the absence Late Report Card

I got what has been going around and haven't opened the labtop since Saturday morning. Its a little late but I wanted to run it anyway:
TENNESSEE REPORT CARD
This was a game that was played out in 38 seconds. That’s when State called a time out trailing Tennessee 73-71. They brought the ball back down court and Chism was fouled by Gordon at the 34 second mark. Chism missed his free throw and Rhodes got the rebound. Gordon brought the ball down court and fed the ball to Benock who was unguarded in the corner. Benock froze with the ball and didn’t take the shot and then traveled with the ball for a turnover. The rest is history. We lost 76-71 because we had no recourse except to foul and they made the free throws. We played really good the first 7-8 minutes of the game and the last 3 minutes except for the final 34 seconds. Somewhere in between, we played pretty mediocre. We did have 3 or 4 players that played some good ball in this game. And Benock played decent defense but was somewhere out in left field on offense. He took no shots, had one offensive rebound, and had two assists and four turnovers.
OFFENSE C
We missed Ben Hanbrough this game. Benock was a star in the Ole Miss game, but failed to show up for offense in this one. Rhodes played a decent game with 15 points on 4 of 9 field goals and 7 of 8 from the charity stripe. He also had 10 rebounds and 5 blocks. But he did turn the ball over 5 times. Gordon and Stewart had decent games on offense. Just not enough in the middle part of the game. After shooting just 34.8% in the first half, we came back in the second half and shot 58.3% for 46.8% for the game. That topped Tennessee , who shot 41.3% for the game. However, they shot the ball 63 times to our 47. One other interesting thing to note is we had 4 players out of 9 that played 30 minutes or more while Tennessee had no players out of 11 that played 30 minutes. In scoring we lost 24 to 20 in the paint,18 to 8 on points on turnovers, and lost the bench points 24 to 11.
DEFENSE B-
Overall I thought our guys played pretty good defense. You already knew that Tennessee had some good 3 point shooters and they proved it this game. Four of their starters hit 10 of 21 for the game. Our worst defense was on second chance points where they had 18 points. We caused them to turn the ball over 13 times, but by the same token, we turned it over 16 times.
ASSIST TO TURNOVER RATIO D
We came out again and reverted to our old ways in that we 10 assists and 16 turnovers. Gordon did have a positive ratio here with 6 assists to 4 turnovers. Rhodes had 1 assist to 5 turnovers and Benock had 2 assists to 4 turnovers, including a game killer at the very end of the game.
REBOUNDING D
We lost the rebounding battle to Tennessee by 10 at 42 to 32. Rhodes as the only starter that had more than 4 rebounds, as he had 10. Our starters had 22 rebounds against 17 for our opponents. But our bench let us down in this category also.
3 POINT SHOOTING B
We beat Tennessee percentage wise in this category 47.6% to 42.9%. However, because of the number of shots they took, they made 2 more 3 pointers than we did. Kudos to Stewart for knocking down the 3 pointers at the end of the game to get us back into contention and brimstone to Benock for not taking a shot the entire game. I suppose Riley must have gotten a bad case of freshman jitters in this game.
FREE THROW SHOOTING C
We ended up making 17 of 29 for 58.6% for the game. Whereas Tennessee was 12 of 18 for 66.7% for the game. But they did make them at the end when it really counted. We have to improve in this area or fall flat on our collective faces in the remainder of the season.
OFFICIATING F
This was the poorest officiating I seen in a game this season. I’m still trying to find out what the Technical foul on Bailey was all about. Touch fouls and no calls were as bad as I have ever witnessed.
OVERALL C-
We lost…All the grading in the world can’t take that away. We had some bright spots and some very dull moments. I think the dull moments were much more vivid that the bright spots.

Game Day Articles

From the CL, with a Scotty twist:
http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080202/SPORTS030102/802020324/1287/SPORTS&referrer=NEWSFRONTCAROUSEL

From the DJ:
http://www.djournal.com/pages/story.asp?ID=265122&pub=1&div=Sports

This game could make or break all the sucess we had in January. Win were back in the top two in the SEC, lose and were back fighting to keep the west lead. It could go either way, I hope the team that played UM comed out.

Acts 11:24 He was a good man, full of the Holy Spirit and faith, and a great number of people were brought to the Lord.