Past, Present, and Future
By Clark
Fosler
 A
few different topics for today: all hopefully relevant,
but none with enough substance to justify a column on
their own. Let’s get started.
The Past
I bet a lot of you thought that
Nebraska might have the worst Big 12 Tournament
record. I know I did. As it turns out, the Huskers
all-time 4-11 mark is second worst in the league. Give
yourself a gold star if you knew that Texas A&M had a
1-11 tournament mark and are the only team to never win
a game on Thursday.
Three teams, Kansas (1-0), Oklahoma
(3-0) and Oklahoma State (5-0) are undefeated in
Thursday action. Missouri has won more games on Thursday
(8-2 overall) than any other team. Give yourself another
gold star if you knew that Colorado has the second most
Thursday wins, going 6-3 in first round action, but 0-8
in the quarterfinals.
Nebraska, with its 2-8 Thursday
mark, enters the tournament as the number seven seed.
Seventh seeds have gone 10-11 overall in the Big 12
Tournament, but never advanced beyond the semi-finals.
This year will mark the third time Nebraska has earned a
number seven seed. They have lost in the first round the
two previous times.
While the tenth seeds have posted
just a 7-11 overall mark, one of them has made to the
championship round. A third gold star if you knew that
it was the Missouri Tigers in the inaugural Big 12
Tournament back in 1997 that advanced from the number 10
seed all the way to the championship before losing to
Kansas. The number seven seed they beat that year?
Nebraska.
As a team, Nebraska has never
scored more than 72 points (the 1997 loss to Missouri,
by the way) in fifteen tournament contests. In fact, the
only two times the Huskers have topped 70 points have
both been against the Tigers. They have shot 50% or
better from the field just once and better than 40% from
beyond the arc only once. Those both occurred in the
same game, a 71-64 win over Missouri in 2006.
The Huskers have dished out more
assists than turnovers just four times, been
outrebounded in nine of the fifteen games and have been
held to sixty points or less seven times.
All that, and I am still optimistic
about Nebraska’s chances on Thursday!
The Present
How many of you want to go back and
watch the road losses to Kansas, Kansas State and Iowa
State again? Well, the idea of watching those games
again has to date, been enough to keep me from
completing the plus/minus numbers for the season. Oh,
that and the fact that a disembodied trailer full of
Chevy 350 engines kept me from seeing the first eight
minutes of the Nebraska-Colorado game on Sunday.
At any rate, here are the
plus/minus numbers that I have gotten completed.
|
PLUS/MINUS |
at Crei |
vs ASU |
at WKU |
vs RUT |
vs ORE |
vs KU |
at COL |
vs BAY |
at KU |
at MIS |
vs ISU |
at KSU |
vs TT |
vs MIS |
at ISU |
vs KSU |
at A&M |
vs OU |
at OSU |
at TEX |
TOT |
CON TOT |
NON CON TOT |
|
MARIC, ALEKS |
-20 |
19 |
-7 |
11 |
13 |
2 |
7 |
2 |
|
4 |
6 |
|
13 |
-2 |
|
4 |
-5 |
9 |
-13 |
-1 |
42 |
26 |
16 |
|
ANDERSON, RYAN |
-15 |
19 |
6 |
11 |
4 |
-21 |
-8 |
-1 |
|
13 |
13 |
|
12 |
-7 |
|
0 |
8 |
17 |
-15 |
-2 |
34 |
9 |
25 |
|
HARLEY, STEVE |
-7 |
8 |
-2 |
3 |
4 |
-4 |
-13 |
7 |
|
10 |
1 |
|
5 |
-7 |
|
5 |
6 |
14 |
-12 |
10 |
28 |
22 |
6 |
|
STROWBRIDGE, JAY-R |
5 |
-8 |
-8 |
20 |
5 |
-4 |
-3 |
1 |
|
0 |
8 |
|
|
1 |
|
5 |
-1 |
8 |
-7 |
-9 |
13 |
-1 |
14 |
|
HENRY, SEK |
-10 |
-1 |
-5 |
18 |
10 |
-14 |
-5 |
0 |
|
5 |
7 |
|
-7 |
-4 |
|
6 |
6 |
4 |
-11 |
8 |
7 |
-5 |
12 |
|
SALOMON, COLE |
|
|
|
|
|
0 |
-3 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
4 |
-2 |
4 |
-1 |
0 |
2 |
2 |
0 |
|
DAGUNDURO, ADE |
-2 |
19 |
-3 |
3 |
-7 |
-9 |
6 |
-13 |
|
2 |
4 |
|
-6 |
3 |
|
-3 |
4 |
17 |
-4 |
-15 |
-4 |
-14 |
10 |
|
MILLER, COOKIE |
-14 |
28 |
-9 |
-9 |
2 |
-15 |
3 |
-1 |
|
5 |
5 |
|
3 |
-8 |
|
2 |
0 |
|
|
|
-8 |
-6 |
-2 |
|
BALHAM, CHRIS |
-2 |
9 |
-5 |
-2 |
0 |
-14 |
-3 |
-4 |
|
6 |
-3 |
|
-5 |
-7 |
|
6 |
11 |
9 |
-2 |
-3 |
-9 |
-9 |
0 |
|
VELANDER, PAUL |
-4 |
-13 |
0 |
|
11 |
-13 |
-1 |
-2 |
|
-6 |
-3 |
|
21 |
-8 |
|
|
2 |
7 |
-6 |
-2 |
-17 |
-11 |
-6 |
|
PING, SHANG |
7 |
-15 |
0 |
3 |
-9 |
-3 |
0 |
|
|
-10 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
-27 |
-13 |
-14 |
|
TEAM |
-12 |
15 |
-7 |
12 |
9 |
-21 |
-4 |
-2 |
|
4 |
8 |
|
11 |
-8 |
|
7 |
6 |
18 |
-14 |
-4 |
18 |
|
|
|
TEAM W/O MARIC |
8 |
-4 |
0 |
1 |
-4 |
-23 |
-11 |
-4 |
|
0 |
2 |
|
-2 |
-6 |
|
3 |
11 |
9 |
-1 |
-3 |
-24 |
|
|
Pretty interesting that only two
players of note (sorry Cole) improved their numbers in
conference play: Aleks Maric and Steve Harley. It’s
possible that the inclusion of the three road games
might push Cookie Miller higher, but we’ll see at a
later date.
And The Future
Replacing Aleks Maric will be THE
priority come next season. I added a line to the above
plus/minus chart that shows what the Huskers did when
Aleks Maric was not on the floor (the team w/o Maric
line). While I do not have near as many plus/minus
numbers from last year, I am pretty sure the ‘team w/o
Maric’ line was ALWAYS negative. That there are a number
of games, conference games mind you, when the team
managed to gain ground with the big guy on the bench is
at least moderately encouraging.
That’s it for now. My prediction
for Thursday: Nebraska 78, Missouri 70. If you make it
to Kansas City for any of the games and take in some of
the night life (or afternoon life) outside the Sprint
Center, I’ll be the bald guy with a Corona in my hand.
Clark Fosler is a columnist for
Husker Hoops Central. He also covers the KC Royals and
Nebraska Basketball for the Most Valuable Network. He
can be contacted at
clarkfosler@huskerhoopscentral.com |
