I Bleed Blue and White

In retrospect, I don’t know why I started flipping around to different games about 5 minutes into the 2nd half of Villanova’s win over Marquette on Saturday. I’ve grown up on the ‘it ain’t over til it’s over’ mantra and I’ve seen far too many comebacks to think any win was a given. Yet, when ‘Nova went up by 20 (and was really having their way) my friend Jeff and I decided to start checking in on some other college hoops happen.

Let’s go back to 1 p.m. I was on my way to run some errands before the game and I’d just watched UConn demolish Georgetown — in the first half. I even tweeted that this one was over, a fact not lost on TheUConnBlog.

And then there came the score — Georgetown 72, UConn 69. I was in utter shock, as was Jeff, a diehard Huskies fan. It was right then I should have realized to immediately switch back to the ‘Nova game, but I didn’t. I laughed at Jeff. And then, around 10 minutes later, the text messages started pouring in. Here’s a sampling:

• Are you nervous yet?
• In my best Steve Berthume voice -  Lazar Hayward…for 3!
• Over/Under on F-Bombs you’ve dropped in the last 10 minutes: 15.5

These all came in pretty much simultaneously, and sent me into a state of complete panic. And as I switched it back to the ‘Nova game, the horror set in. Marquette had closed it to 3 behind 8-11 from downtown in the 2nd half. Dear God.

Luckily, Villanova again staved off the Eagles thanks to a big steal from Scottie Reynolds and two clutch free throws from Antonio Peña (ironically, we’re playing Louisville tomorrow. I don’t want to reminisce about ‘Tone and Louisville last year). Needless to say, I learned my lesson. I’m gonna see these games through from now on.

Some random thoughts from the game:

• I might be jumping the gun, but I think we can remove “Corey Stokes‘ Shooting Ability” from milk cartons everywhere. Brian mentioned this a while back, but with guys like him usually it just takes one game to fix the problems. Hopefully that’s true.
• Scottie Reynolds only took 6 shots. Good that he’s sharing the wealth, bad in that he’s our star player and he needs to assert himself a little more. But he was still solid, minus a terrible giveaway late in the game.
• All of the starters finished in double figures tonight, a very good sign for the balance of this team moving forward.
• Mouphtaou Yarou logged just 5 minutes, but he had a great play where he tracked down a guard from behind on a fast break and blocked the shot, but also crushed the guy with the body, and was called for the foul. It was an impressive display nonetheless.
• Maalik Wayns started off really strong, and then kind of faded as the game went on. He didn’t do anything bad, but he didn’t stand out either. Tough to follow up after his last game though.
• Peña was 5-5 from the stripe. Hey-Oh! Also, I’d like to see us give him the ball on offense more often. His game is pretty nice.
• Two pretty quiet games in a row from Taylor King. I’m expecting big things from him tomorrow though. ‘3-point barrage’ might be in order.
• Brian already touched on it, but our end-of-game management was brutal. I don’t know if that’s the players (it shouldn’t be with Corey Fisher and Reynolds) or if it was Jay Wright (more likely), but we can’t be turning it over left and right and taking quick shots. I know that works early in the game, but when you are protecting a 5-point lead with 60 seconds left, it might behoove you to not start shooting with 20 seconds left on the shot clock.
• Reggie Redding was steady, yet again. With his stats I don’t see him making All-BIG EAST, but it’s going to be a crime if he doesn’t. And I will assuredly go nuts.

That’s all til tomorrow when we travel to Freedom Hall (ugh) to play the up-and-down Louisville Cardinals, and their slut of a coach.