I Bleed Blue and White

Kind of a weird game to watch. I was fired up about the game, and at certain parts it was a really close game. But you know what? I was never really worried about what the final outcome would be. We have better players, a better coach, and our fans were taking over The Palestra fight for noise despite being outnumbered. There’s nothing more comfortable than ESPN flashing to Phil Martelli, clearly searching his pea-sized brain for answers, and then an immediate flash to Jay Wright, who is barking out instructions to his team. In HD, the differences between the two are even more stark, if you catch my drift.

TK's willingness to dunk worked here. In the 2nd half, uhhh...nevermind.

But really, what else can you say about this program. This game is always a dogfight, no matter the talent differences between the two. That is how true rivalries are. But were you ever worried that we would lose? Sure, I didn’t love giving up the double-digit lead late in the 1st half, and I really didn’t like how the refs decided it would be beneficial to blow their whistle so much that the game would take 2 and a half hours, have 52 fouls calls, and 78 free throws attempted between the two teams. But I was never really worried about losing the game. And that’s because our program has reached the level where we have heady seniors every year who can will this team to victory when they need to, along with a cast of underclassmen and newbies who are dying to step up into the spotlight and prove themselves. That’s a good recipe for winning.

And even though we all knew it would happen, it does feel great to know that The Hawk Is Dead for another year. Also, great to see the Hawk students get all riled up, thinking they had a chance. Then depression. That was fun. Onto my notes from the game…

• Had a phenomenal time at the Manhattan GameWatch. Talked to a couple of people who read the blog, always nice to meet new people. Overall the atmosphere was pretty solid. Tons of huge HD TV’s everywhere, people definitely into the game and cheering and moaning with every turn of the game. Even though it was “The Christmas Party” it felt more like “The Let’s All Hate St. Joe’s Party.” That was good to see. Only down side was not being able to hear Bill Raftery. I heard some random shrieks and yells that made me laugh though.
• Scottie Reynolds was the man again last night.  Still turning the ball over a lot, but he makes a lot of things happen as evidenced by his 22 points, 8 rebounds, 5 assists and 4 steals effort. Plus 12-14 from the line. As login77 noted in the Jamie’s recap, there was a point in the 2nd half where he looked possessed, Exorcist-style.
• I’m blocking out Taylor King’s missed dunk from my memory. So with that not happening, he played a great game. 20 points and 11 boards, and was just a friggan assassin with those trey’s late in the game. Plus, he really gets the emotional aspect of the game. He gets fired up about everything. There will probably be a point where we say ‘Calm down TK’ but for now, I love it.
• Can’t praise Antonio Peña enough. Before the year we were all hoping for a moderate improvement from ‘Tone. He’s legitimately developed into ‘the man’ down low. I found myself yelling at our team to give him the ball last night, and was not happy when he had to go to the bench for fouls. Nobody could have predicted this season from him.
• We hit 29 straight free throws at one point in the 2nd half. That’s mind-blowing.
• How about Corey Fisher fouling out after not touching a guy. Raf astutely yelled before the replay that it was an awful call and Fisher didn’t touch the guy. Jay Wright proceeded to have blood vessel appear in his forehead. I thought Fish had a decent game. Too many TO’s, not great FG%, but 8-8 from the line and 6 assists. He managed it well.
• Corey Stokes couldn’t buy a bucket, but he did play excellent D again (one of the few who did). I’ll take the D from Stokes right now because last year it was all offense or nothing.
• Maalik Wayns, Dominic Cheek, and Isaiah Armwood all played well in their first Holy War. Wayns was very calm for having to handle the ball as much as he did. Cheek was visibly fired up and aggressive the entire time he was in. Good to see. Armwood has the 18-foot jumper down. When he throws it up, I’m as confident as in him as a TK/Stokes trey at this point.
• Maurice Sutton has hit the skids a little here. He rebounded well last night, but missed a few easy buckets. Interested to see how he handles it and if he can come back and start playing the way he was before.
• Love seeing Reggie Redding sitting behind the bench. You’re almost back medium-sized fella.
• Got real sad everytime they showed Mouphtaou Yarou. What a shitty situation. Stay strong big fella.

…All in all a solid night and a solid win over the assholes…final Big 5 game at Temple on Sunday as we go for the Big 5 sweep…