When you see the top seeds lose in the first weekend, more times than not its because they run into a team that shoots out of its mind from 3. Today we ran into a team that had its best shooting half of the year in the first half. A guy who shoots 34% on the year went 4/5 with his second most makes of the year in just the first half. We played very solid D and gave them very few open looks, but their 6-10 kid was just shooting over us and hitting them. A lesser team would have tightened up and been rattled by that shooting performance. Bruce made great adjustments at the half and our defense was stifling well beyond the 3 point line which limited them to 4/14 from deep after hitting 8/13 in the first half. Our guys are battle tested and played exactly as they had for months prior to locking up the SEC title and #1 seed against UK. The question coming into today was could we lock bad in after weeks of meaningless games and the answer was an emphatic yes. Many or even most 1 seeds over the years would have lost this game against a team with a great 5 that shot out of its mind from deep.
Tough day for all the CBM haters who hoped he would play poorly today so they could crow about how right they have been. Him taking over the game to get us the lead in the second half was they key to this victory. Very fitting that CBM had one of his best games of the year today after the Yale loss to knock out in the first weekend last year. If he had not gotten banged up, this would not have been tight down the stretch as he was completely unstoppable prior to that. Great to see him come back into the game so he should be fine next weekend.
Just as he has done repeatedly this year, Haad answered the bell on the biggest stage. Leading the team in scoring with 23 is the best sign coming away from this one that we have all the pieces in place to continue this run through next weekend. When Haad plays like he did today, we will be nearly unstoppable.
Denver was also clutch today with a super efficient 15 points on only 8 shots. As well as he shot the ball, his defense was one of the keys today as he helped us lock down the perimeter in the second half. His drive for a 3 pt play late to put the game on ice is type of clutch play championship-contending teams need from their guards.
After weeks of people melting down about how terrible the team had become, hopefully most feel better after this one. We were in a unique position locking up the #1 seed 3 weeks before selection Sunday. Not playing a meaningful game for the better part of a month is not something most teams experience. If Creighton had not shot out of their minds in the first half, this would have been a route as well as we played today. Getting a very tough test from a good team today and passing it with a double-digit win was the best case scenario though. A 20+ point blowout would have left us going into next weekend having not played and won a meaningful close game in a month. Now our guys should feel very confident after a week to prepare for Michigan. We certainly know their PG well which I think will work to our advantage.
Tough day for all the CBM haters who hoped he would play poorly today so they could crow about how right they have been. Him taking over the game to get us the lead in the second half was they key to this victory. Very fitting that CBM had one of his best games of the year today after the Yale loss to knock out in the first weekend last year. If he had not gotten banged up, this would not have been tight down the stretch as he was completely unstoppable prior to that. Great to see him come back into the game so he should be fine next weekend.
Just as he has done repeatedly this year, Haad answered the bell on the biggest stage. Leading the team in scoring with 23 is the best sign coming away from this one that we have all the pieces in place to continue this run through next weekend. When Haad plays like he did today, we will be nearly unstoppable.
Denver was also clutch today with a super efficient 15 points on only 8 shots. As well as he shot the ball, his defense was one of the keys today as he helped us lock down the perimeter in the second half. His drive for a 3 pt play late to put the game on ice is type of clutch play championship-contending teams need from their guards.
After weeks of people melting down about how terrible the team had become, hopefully most feel better after this one. We were in a unique position locking up the #1 seed 3 weeks before selection Sunday. Not playing a meaningful game for the better part of a month is not something most teams experience. If Creighton had not shot out of their minds in the first half, this would have been a route as well as we played today. Getting a very tough test from a good team today and passing it with a double-digit win was the best case scenario though. A 20+ point blowout would have left us going into next weekend having not played and won a meaningful close game in a month. Now our guys should feel very confident after a week to prepare for Michigan. We certainly know their PG well which I think will work to our advantage.
