 |
| "Bad ass" understates this photo |
Outdoing Thursday's 17-assist effort, the team had better than 3-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio Saturday, dishing out 19 dimes while giving up a season-best six turnovers. Or in other words, it was a hell of a team effort. If the team can play with that kind of chemistry the rest of the year, we just might actually turn some heads.
Really with the way the team came out tonight, and how they essentially looked in control for almost the entirety, this game wasn't ever in doubt. And certainly not after Mitch Bruneel had anything to say about things either. Basically the Aggies won this game in every statistical category except the turnover battle. Rare will it be the case that you can lose the turnover battle with only six TOs, but winning in shooting percentages, rebounds, assists, steals, blocks and points will have to do for now.
Not much else to really say about this game before getting into the individual props, so let's get on with it, eh?
NOTES
- Mitch Bruneel's hot streak tonight was the kind of thing that even the likes of Brian Green and Stavon Williams would have to at least give up a golf clap for. After failing to appear in his first game of the season against Hawaii, Bruneel went nucking futz to make his case for some more minutes down the stretch. And the team could absolutely use him, especially if he's playing like he did tonight. San Jose seemed to think they could ignore him out on the wing, and he taught them a harsh lesson there.
- Jordan Stone had another solid game of providing a defensive and rebounding presence in the middle. If he and Bruneel can provide a combined 25 minutes of solid play each game, that puts USU's team at nine-deep rather than the the seven-deep it seemed they were for a while.
- Preston Medlin dunked... AGAIN!!! Oh, and had 15 points, five rebounds and four assists. Anybody wondering if his numbers still stack up with Jaycee Carroll's sophomore year, Pre-Med's 3-point slump from the last couple weeks dropped him back in that category, and he's still a bit behind in scoring average, although rapidly catching up. Everywhere else, Medlin has Carroll beat. Carroll had Nate Freaking Harris (greatest Aggie ever, BTW) to take pressure off of him down low too.
- Brockeith Pane really tempted me to dub him Player of the Game with his 15 points and six assists. It's the six assists that I love most out of that. The 5-of-13 shooting is not the most desirable of things though. Still, he rocked it tonight.
- While Medlin dunking is still a rarity, and something I never expected to see much of, seeing Pre-Med throw an alley-oop to Pane nearly made my head explode. Holy crap.
- Four players... FOUR, scored 15 points or more Saturday. That has not happened since Dec. 31, 2008 against Wyoming when Gary Wilkinson, Jared Quayle, Tai Wesley and Tyler Newbold pulled it off in an overtime thriller. I'd check when the last time it happened in regulation was, but Wayne's World is on HBO, and I've missed enough of it already while looking up that stat.
- Ok, I lied... Finding the next one didn't take long. It was Wilkinson, Wesley, Newbold and Jaycee Carroll in the first round of the 2008 WAC Tournament against San Jose State.
- Pane, Medlin and Danny Berger combined for 14 assists and only three turnovers. I don't want to settle for being "just friends" with that statistic.
- I've got a witness who can vouch that about four minutes before the tip-off, a certain Sagebrush Spot author predicted that tonight was going to be one of those "going off" kind of nights for Kyisean Reed. Mitch Bruneel nearly stole that spotlight, but in the end, 21 points on 7-of-9 shooting, eight rebounds, three blocks and an assist earns you Player of the Game. That was all in only 22 minutes! If USU can get that consistently from Reed, that would REALLY suck for opposing teams.
Player of the Game: Kyisean Reed
Kyisean had an absolutely ridiculous amount of And-1's in that game. It was insane.
ReplyDelete