uneblinstu's postgame chatter : vol 17; ed 17-Rutgers

[CanadianHusker]

Just now, brfrad said:

Worster with a solid game. 10 points, 7 boards, and 5 assists.  With 1 questionable turnover.  Where Bailey reaches over the end line and takes the ball out of his hand.

Exactly! That’s what I thought it was right away! Good thing Bailey didn’t travel after that! 

[B-town hoopsfan]

When you don’t do the little things well you lose to beatable Iowa on the road and Rutgers at home.  Not sure if we turn this thing around or not, if defense is gonna be a question mark might have to Get GG back in the rotation for some more floor spacing on offense atleast 

[hhcmatt]

LLLadies Night

[brfrad]

10 minutes ago, CanadianHusker said:

Exactly! That’s what I thought it was right away! Good thing Bailey didn’t travel after that! 

Live, I didn't think much of it.  I thought Rollie had made a poor decision.   I rewound it and it was obvious.

[nuhusker7]

5 minutes ago, hhcmatt said:

LLLadies Night

Was there actually anything about it? I didn’t see anything and assumed they (smartly) scrapped the thing 

[Huskerpapa]

I didn't think I would be saying this; but man our defense is atrocious.   We will struggle to win games if we don't get our poop in a group.  And oh yeah, certain players can't be on the floor if you can't make free throws.  Sorry, but true.

 

Yeah sure, they have two super freshmen...so what, you can't leave them to double team.  You have to stay on them.

Edited 18 hours ago by Huskerpapa

[brfrad]

19 minutes ago, cozrulz said:

 

Baffling how we consistently lose shooters.  Plus most players can hit a wide open three.  Defense allows too many threes and needs rethought.

 

Thought the offense looked a bit better with movement tonight.

More than that.  It was letting Harper get to the middle of the floor and going to work on us down the stretch.  We needed to force him baseline.

 

Forcing Rutgers to take 29 3's is a good plan.  Some of those are by a 6'10" player with a step back, hand in his face draining them.

[cozrulz]

8 minutes ago, CanadianHusker said:

The crowd didn’t seem too excited tonight either. I wonder how much that played into it. They need the students back. 

 

I thought they were pretty quiet but...  Gary missed a front end which we rebounded when Nebraska was up 4.  Then Brice lost the ball for an easy two the other way.  A 6-point lead with 4 to go would have been pretty big, the crowd would have been a factor.

 

2 games now we haven't been able to close.  Now sitting 2-4 instead of 4-2.  You now pretty much have to split the next two games, then do it again.  We would still be ok going into February at 4-6.  Stealing the first one at Maryland would be huge.  We have no room for error now.

[Faux Mike Peltz]

I thought the crowd was pretty dead a lot of the night. Just when it wanted to get going, Rutgers answered and took them out of it. We need the red zone back. My section was full of guys throwing back beers and talking loudly about the cheerleaders they wanted and weren’t paying any attention to the game.

I think our lack of foot speed got exposed a bit tonight. Rutgers bigs were faster and more athletic. We had more size, but didn’t use that to our advantage. Why hit the transfer portal hard and bring in three big men who are big bodied, only to double team the post every. Single. Possession??? Doubling Martini down low only to leave the projected 2nd or 3rd pick of the draft wide open to shoot? Makes zero sense. 

[HuskerBB]

1 hour ago, CanadianHusker said:

I wonder if it was the screen they set on him on the last play. I can’t go back and replay the last part, but I wonder if it was a legal screen. 

It wasn't on the screen - which may have not been good but you are never going to get that call.    It was at the end of the play - Bailey hit him with his arm in the face - but it was a basketball play not intentional.    He got up and walked off with a towel on his nose/mouth.   Looked like he will be fine. 

[HuskerBB]

As mentioned above - key was not capitalizing on two chances to extend the lead to 6 when we were up 76-72.   Then Rutgers went on like a 9 point run - but I don't think that happens if we score to go up 6 and keep the momentum and wake up the crowd.

 

Crowd was really dead all night.   Not having students there was part of it.  The other part is that weeknight late starts are crowd killers also.    Think we have to deal with the same thing next week as well - at least the last part.   Students should be back then which will help.

 

Mentioned above that Rollie had a solid game.   I guess I agree that it looks that way from his boxscore line.  But I thought he made a number of bad decisions with the ball.   Can remember 2-3 plays where he missed getting the ball to wide open teammates and one possession toward the end he took a bad shot.    Not saying we have a better answer as Uhlis struggled in the few minutes he got in the first half as well - but I certainly expected more out of Rollie than I think we are getting.   We really miss having multiple players who could hit 3 point shots - outside of Brice and Connor this team really does not have any reliable shooters.

 

Mainly in the first half there were too many possessions where Brice is probably too deferential to teammates.   Multiple times he passed up shots to get the ball to Gary or Berke for a similar shot.   We need Brice to maybe be more assertive from the outset - but it is also true that teams are really focusing their defense on him and daring the rest of our team to beat them (which is obviously a sound strategy).  

 

Still some time to save the season - but this was a tough loss to overcome.   I do think Rutgers is better than their record - apparently lost a few games while Harper was out.   Harper and Bailey are both very good - but certainly this is a game we should have won at home.

 

 

[ReidStag]

Gonna need more from Berke 0 pts, 3 rebs, and 2 assists in 21 min and 0-4 from the field.

Need to get him going

Sent from my SM-S908U using Tapatalk

[basketballjones]

7 hours ago, cozrulz said:

Baffling how we consistently lose shooters.

It’s not to me!

When you’re constantly pre trapping and doubling the post you’re gonna face teams who’ve figured it out. Especially after year 2.5 of being in this system. 

[demone]

5 hours ago, ReidStag said:

Gonna need more from Berke 0 pts, 3 rebs, and 2 assists in 21 min and 0-4 from the field.

Need to get him going

Sent from my SM-S908U using Tapatalk
 

 

A larger question: is he even capable of getting going at this level? I'm starting to have significant doubts.

[millerhusker]

Just not a very good team right now. Certainly not a tournament team. I don't care how talented Harper and Bailey are, that Rutgers team doesn't play winning basketball and their record will show that at the end of the year. 

 

Everything is sooo hard for us offensively. Not just scoring. Getting open and completing passes is difficult. It's like watching Nebraska football. Teams can make us run our whole offense 30+ feet from the basket if they want to. We just don't have enough offensive skill on this team. At all times, there are at least 3 players on the court who aren't a real threat to shoot the ball. That makes it very difficult for Brice to operate. He still needs to protect the ball when we have a second half lead. With a few minutes left we had a 4 point lead and all the momentum, then he gave up a pick 6. I thought that was the most important play of the game. 

 

It's incredibly hard for us to just inbound the ball in BLOB and SLOB situations. But it's never hard for other teams.  Very last play of the game when we needed to foul. Brice's man set a screen on Sam. Brice stood there with the screener, Sam got knocked off balance which allowed Rutgers to inbound the ball and run out the clock. Why not switch everything in that situation? If the roles were reversed and we were the team inbounding the ball, I'd be terrified that we'd turn it over. In fact, I think most of us would almost expect a turnover, 5 second call, or at least have to call a timeout. I guess that's the mark of an average or mediocre team. Everything is harder for you than it is for the opponent. Rutgers looked pretty comfortable last night.

 

Towards the end of the game we went away from doubling the post and stuck with perimeter shooters. I expect to see more of that now. Rutgers averaged 6 made threes per game coming into the game and they made 12 last night. None of their players were a threat to score with their back to the basket. Can't keep letting teams kill us with threes. It works when it works, but it ain't been working lately. 

[TourneyBound]

8 hours ago, hhcmatt said:

LLLadies Night

I knew the home court winning streak was done when they announced this promotion along with the shirt...

[Tallbaby21]

Our formula for winning was get to the line, make free throws and force teams into threes they don't want to take. Now we just get to the line. I hate double teaming non threats so much. 

[hhcmatt]

9 hours ago, nuhusker7 said:

Was there actually anything about it? I didn’t see anything and assumed they (smartly) scrapped the thing 

 

Not really other than having D-Wayne always have a sangria in his hand

[KarlHessEatMy....]

Brice is our main guy but I feel like the last few games he is out there with not a lot of energy. 

 

You see him make a silly play and then he doesnt hustle back to try and make up for that bad play. 

 

Just something about him seems a little off even if he does get his points. 

 

I was kind of hoping he would of put Gavin in in that 2nd half for a little bit. Thought maybe with it being his old team that he could of possibly brought us a spark. A lot of times a  guy will play better against their old team. 

 

[hhcmatt]

Notes from UNL

 

• Nebraska lost for the first time at home since Dec. 3, 2023, and lost at home for the first time in a Big Ten home game since Feb. 28, 2023. The Huskers entered the game with a school-record-tying 20-game home winning streak.
• The Huskers scored 82 points, the sixth time in nine home games this season they have scored more than 80 points.
• Brice Williams had 21 points and Juwan Gary had 20 points. It marked the third time this season that Nebraska had two players score 20 points in the same game and the second time this year that Williams and Gary each had 20 points in the same game.
• Williams posted a 20-point game for the eighth time this season and for the 24th time in his career. Gary had his second 20-point game of the year and fifth of his career.
• Overall, Nebraska had five players score in double figures. That marked the third game this season the Huskers had five players in double figure.
• Connor Essegian (12) and Andrew Morgan (11) each scored in double figures off the bench.
• Essegian shot 4-of-7 from beyond the arc to record at least four treys for the fifth time this season.
• With 11 points on 5-of-9 shooting from the floor, Morgan is five points shy of reaching the 1,000-point mark for his career.
• Rollie Worster had 10 points, seven rebounds and five assists. It marked his first game as a Husker with at least 10 points, five rebounds and five assists.
• Braxton Meah had six points and six rebounds. His six rebounds tied his season high while his six points marked his third-highest output of the season.

[HB]

10 hours ago, hskr4life said:

Hawaii seems like a millennium ago. UCLA seems like ages ago. Oh how quickly the turn tables.

That didn’t turn as much as people think.  Those teams in Hawaii were bad, and those wins were nice but. Nothing to be elated about.  

[HB]

10 hours ago, CanadianHusker said:

And this is combined with not getting loose balls or rebounding!!! Even if the offensive and defensive strategies suck, they could still play the hardest. But that isn’t happening either. We appreciate teams that work hard. But not only are they being exposed on both ends, they don’t seem to want to be a hard nosed team with an edge, even though that is their supposed identity. SMH. I sure hope they can turn things around. 

A lot of those loose balls were not lack of effort, but lack of talent.  We have a lot of slow guys.   Flat out an unathletic team.  Often that characteristic is balanced by high level skills including good shooting.   But we have a few non-shooters in the top 8 also.

 

It was a horrible matchup for Berke last night.  A total mismatch of speed and quicks.  

[HB]

9 hours ago, cozrulz said:

 

I thought they were pretty quiet but...  Gary missed a front end which we rebounded when Nebraska was up 4.  Then Brice lost the ball for an easy two the other way.  A 6-point lead with 4 to go would have been pretty big, the crowd would have been a factor.

 

2 games now we haven't been able to close.  Now sitting 2-4 instead of 4-2.  You now pretty much have to split the next two games, then do it again.  We would still be ok going into February at 4-6.  Stealing the first one at Maryland would be huge.  We have no room for error now.

Brice getting stripped again, like at the end of regulation at Iowa, was huge.  They get a runout, 4 point swing.   He needs to get stronger with the ball, or don’t do that stuff.

 

[LNKtrnsplnt]

12 minutes ago, KarlHessEatMy.... said:

I was kind of hoping he would of put Gavin in in that 2nd half for a little bit. Thought maybe with it being his old team that he could of possibly brought us a spark. A lot of times a  guy will play better against their old team. 

 

Yes but we were 0-2 in guys having good games against their old B10 team so far. 

[GhostOfJoeMcCray]

In November-December our defensive rank was 9.

In January it's 191.