GovMan on Region 2 .. 3A

[GovMan]

Just some random thoughts after night one of boy's action:'

 

William Blount - didn't play very smart, especially at end of game. Will have to play MUCH better to beat Bearden. Nevertheless, ususally a good sign when "you play bad and still win."

 

Bearden - good grief!!! Great team effort. They're highly motivated. Very, very quick. Most impressive performance of any team in round one. Can't be considered an underdog against Blount.

 

Powell - must have had an awful night. First time I had seen them play all year. Their press was powerless against Bearden ... Bulldogs scored many lay-ups off of beating press. Might not be fair to say they were "overlooking" Bearden, but they sure didn't look ready to play.

 

Oak Ridge - lone hope for District 3. Good balance on this team. I'm sure they'll key on Humphrey, but MHS proved against Clinton, they are capable of having others step up.

 

Clinton - gave Maryville a great game ... but once again, Maryville didn't play very well and still got the W. Beaman was impressive ... can't believe I haven't heard more about him. I must have been living in a cave or something.

 

Overall -- someone earlier had said they thought Dist. 3 played better D than Dist. 4 -- someone should have told Powell that.

 

Great statement for District 4 ... still the dominant district of the two in boy's basketball. Still predicting an all District 4 Regional Final.

 

Bearden could be the dark horse. If Blount is able to build a good lead on them like last time ... they better finish them early and not let them be hanging around at the end of the game.

 

Todd Helton should spring for Central a "new, larger gym." If Maryville and WB were to end up in the finals Friday, I don't know where all the people are going to go.

 

GovMan

[Guest Grider]

I'm with you Govman...on every point for once. I'll say this though, if Bearden plays like that they become much more than a dark horse. I'm becoming a Bearden fan as we speak. They're playing with so much heart right now that it's tough to cheer against them. What a great story: lose your star and the rest of the team responds with a run in the postseason. I'm proud of those boys. Having said that, I'll still cheer for the Rebels if they get matched up.

[chill]

Awesome game last night b/w Maryville and Clinton. I really thought that Clinton played good enough to win. They held Humphrey in check for the most part. The shots he hit were unbelieveable. Beamon and Morris played solid, but Witt had trouble finding his shots against Maryville's size. Clinton was at their best when they pounded the ball inside to Morris and Freeman. I thought AJ played one of his better games. He was good on defense and found the open guy when they fed him in the post. Clinton should be formidable next year, but I thought they would be this season. Maryville and Oak Ridge will be a war......

[Guest Grider]

Whoever said that all of the MHS fans would be surprised at what Clinton brought to the table was right. I can't wait to see the MHS/OR game.

[redandblack63]

Watch out for the Bulldogs they are on a mission!

[Guest Grider]

I too would like to hear some commentary on what happened to Powell. All I've heard on here all season is how great they are. I mean, I know that Bearden played off the charts tonight, but .... Anyway, one of the Powell fans told me that Powell hadn't played so poorly all year.

Oh, and about the Clinton game....with about a minute to go, they trailed by three and went for a three. Why not pound it in to the big man, try for two and then stop the clock? I think that call hurt their chances of winning significantly. But it was a really good game, and with that young talent Clinton should be a very tough team in the near future.

[chill]

Grider you're exactly right. Morris was unstoppable all night. I was sure they would pound the rock to the big man. The questionable charge call late in the game hurt, but Morris scored on the next trip. What's up with Maryville sneaking Lee to the FT line when Stout was supposed to be shooting. Should have been a technical. What's funny is that I've seen Clinton pull that same move plenty of times. Also, Dye was the only freshman that played significant minutes for Clinton. Borum logged less than 1 minute the whole game and was pulled after he missed a 3 in the corner. Great game with Beamon winning the head to head vs Humphrey, but Maryville winning the game......

[mocs30]

On the subject of Powell. Powell overlooked Bearden because Powell beat them so easily a few weeks ago when Bearden still had Cruze. Powell figured it would probably be a cake walk and some of the players were talking to me about who would be the better second round match-up for Powell between Karns and William Blount when I got to the gym. I asked if they were going to have to play Bearden first and they looked at me like, "well of course," but they were already thinking ahead. Because of that, Powell was not ready to play and Bearden's fast start caused Powell to panic like you've never seen a team panic. Bearden pressed and this was Powell's press break: Throw it into a post who throws it back to the point guard Lucas, and then everybody else run to the other end of the floor and leave Lucas hanging out to dry with two or three men on him. It was not coaching, those kids knew what to do, they just panicked. Once Powell finally settled down, Bearden had around a 15 point lead and they were playing with confidence. Powell tried harder for awhile but Bearden was never put into a situation of having to worry about whether or not Powell could come back. This was the epitome of a snowball game. And it's a shame to because Powell had a nice team. The guards played like crap, so did Ogan and Seely. It was just a really bad night all around for them.

[Rebels01]

I will agree that Beaman won the head to head matchup with Lee last night. The Beaman kid played an incredible game, I was very impressed with him, but the fact that Lee scored only 1 point in the second half can kind of be misleading. He only shot the ball 2 times the whole second half and did a great job of moving the ball to the open man and getting his teammates in position to score. With all the attention on Lee, the rest of his team finally stepped up and I think that is exactly what this team needed at this point in the season. Last Friday night, the other guys couldn't step up, but they did last night. Let's hope this is the start of a trend that will take them to state.

[Guest Grider]

Chill-

I loved that trick MHS tried to pull in sneaking Lee to the line. With all the confusion and the amount of time it took to figure out the call, I was sitting there thinking that they should put the franchise on the line to shoot. Just about that time I saw hotrod Nelson make the motion for Lee to shoot....AND WE ALMOST GOT AWAY WITH IT! It was a lot of fun for me to see those other guys step up so that Lee could just distribute the ball and relax a little bit. I mean, I love it when he blows up 13 points in about 4 trips down the court...but the W is more important. And if they want to go on, those guys are going to have to play that way. I do hate that people will say that the other guy got the better of the matchup, because, as has been mentioned already, Lee didn't shoot much at all. And I can only think of one time he really got stopped, the other times he just chose to distribute. Oh, and a big thanks to Govman for posting his thoughts on everything since I had to miss the WB game. Appreciate it bro.

[Edited by Grider on 3-5-03 1:44P]

 

[GovMan]

The one thing I would remind Coach Nelson of--and any other coaches that attempt and even succeed at the "switch the foul shooter" trick ...

 

"Cheating is cheating ... whether you get caught or not."

 

I went through this last year with a team my daughter was on. I'm sorry if I sound old fashioned or like I'm preaching but ...I won't want my kids to learn from their coaches that it's ok to be dishonest. Just my two cents worth. Stepping down off my soap box.

 

Gov

[mocs30]

You're right Govman, that was dead wrong IF (and that's a big if) Humphrey or Nelson was trying to cheat and there is no excuse for it. It was wrong when Travis Ford was doing it at Kentucky, and it was wrong last nightif that's what was going on.

[Edited by mocs30 on 3-5-03 3:20P]