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spot on. And i could see trey starting if Tai doesn't improve by next year. I love the way we talk about real people who sweat & bleed like they're disposable like Klenex. Take one, use it up, discard it and look, there's another one to use up. I understand boards need things to talk about & us fans can't develope the personal relationships that players & coaches do, & sometimes typed words can be misconstrued, but man can some posts sound cold.

Did my post get deleted? One thing for sure: I am not good at detecting sarcasm on the boards. Either way, it is one of those things where I am still a Husker fan at heart, but as a Northwestern student, I have to be cheering for Northwestern at their games. But, I never cheer AGAINST the other team, especially when that team is Nebraska. And indeed, I was cheering for Nebraska's baskets and good plays, as some others had mentioned too.

8-0, Dreaming of unbelievable run. 7-1, Ecstatic. 6-2, Damned happy x 2 5-3, Not out of the realm of possibility. 4-4, Minimum expectation. 3-5, This can't be happening. 2-6, Why do I fall for this? 1-7, Get me a beer truck. 0-8, Steady shots of Jaegermeister.

Ready for a bold and premature prediction? Two years from now, as we are conversing about how high of seed we are going to receive in the NCAA's, we are going to be darn glad we have a kid coming off the bench who's not afraid to get in someone's jock. Benny's a weapon, fellows. Very limited offensively? Sure. There's all different types of weapons though, and Benny is worth his 160 lbs in gold as a perimeter defender. The more he continues to improve as a ball handler, the better. In the next two years, if the kid gets better at hitting a jumper, he will be a good role player on a pretty good team.

Curiosity took over again. I wanted to take a look at how we're faring in Big Ten play in terms of how long we've been able to hold onto a lead and whether that has an impact on the results of the game. Results? - We've lost every game where we couldn't lead for 6 minutes in the 2nd half (drought-related?) - That Penn State loss really stings (but that Indiana win "makes up for it") - That Michigan game was ugly (as we already knew) - If we never had a lead in the 1st half or never had a lead in the 2nd half, the result was a loss - We are 4-2 when we improve our lead time (2nd half v. 1st half) - We are 0-3 when our lead time in the 2nd half is less than the 1st half - Every game (minus Indiana) with less than a 10 minute lead resulted in a loss - Average lead on the road (13:11; 8:25 excluding PSU); average lead at home (16:52) Just some random observations. But this does really reemphasize the whole "win the first x-minutes, then the next x-minutes" mentality. What are your thoughts?

IF we could get a couple guys that could knock down a jump shot consistently Parker would be great, penetrate and kick it out. That also said, he is not the only liability we have on the offensive end.

While we are on the subject of rules, it continues to absolutely astound me that each team can use their own brand of basketball for games. I know it has always been this way, and apparently is the same for football, but it just blows me away. Maybe it is just me, but one basketball can have a completely different feel from another type of basketball. If a player or team practices every single day with one brand of ball, and then is handed a different brand of ball for game day, that seems like a huge advantage to the home team. Personally, people spend all this time talking about crowd noise, traveling, etc, as pitfalls for road teams, but I think the different ball can be just as big, if not bigger, issue. From what I understand, NW uses UnderArmor basketballs. Seriously? Was it an indoor/outdoor ball? Give me a break. If you watched close, you could actually see the NU players seeming for have a difficult time even bouncing the thing. Heck, why not just use one of those "rubber' balls that we all played with growing up as kids. If I were a middling program that knew it could never compete, I would buy the crappiest ball I could find and practice with it every single day. That would give that team a huge advantage during games. Anyway, one other questions i have off this is, does NU practice with the brand of ball that is used by the opponent in the practices leading up to a road game. If trey don't, then this is a serious oversight. NU has a huge budget, so buying 3 or 4 "alternate" sets of basketballs is not even going to cause a minor dent in the budget (and yes, I know they would need to buy 20+ balls of each). Anyway, that is my rant for the day.

I also hate that he stands the entire game, makes noise, AND stays for the entire game. The nerve he has. He must have learned these things from Northwestern.

We need the fans at PBA to show up big for this one. Every home game from here on out is absolutely critical.

crap. Voted this one down on accident.

Reads like he went to the Husker football fans school for kids who can't basketball good and want do do other stuff good too.

Obligatory response to that article

I sure hope this game sells out. There are still tickets available on huskers.com. I know it's a late game on a week night, but this team deserves an arena packed to the gills (something that has only happened 1-2 times this year). My wife is 39.5 weeks pregnant, or else I would be there! Go Big Red!

1. Hilliard was a HORRIBLE basketball player and an even worse teammate. 2. No 3. No 4. Biggs was a me first, I need to get my shots guy. A coach can't let a guy like that continue to get away with doing his own thing and still have the locker room won. So, you're wrong on all four.

It is a stupid argument to run him off anyway unless you have a 4 or 5 star replacing him. One of the big problems with Doc's teams was having no player consistency. It seemed like we had 6 or 7 new guys a season. With that came no team chemistry and ending up with lesser players than those that had been replaced. If Miles wants to have this program great he needs guys that have been around to show the new guys his expectations. He certainly shouldn't have to spend a lot of time going over his expectations when veteran players are already leading the new guys. Even the guys on the bench have a role. Look over there after big plays and timeouts. Those guys are the first to get the guys on the court fired up. Also we probably don't want to have to fill 4 or 5 scholarships. At least not until we can get that many quality recruits committed. It seems Miles would have a better shot at better players with the less he has to fill. That means he doesn't necessarily have to just settle on a guy.

Obviously we could. But my goal is to make the dance each and every year. So you can be damn sure I am going to be paying attention to what is needed to make it. Doesn't mean I think will, but I want to be aware of what is going on. And it makes no difference whatsoever what we are worried about anyway. It is what the team is worried about that matters. This nonsense about the fans having to only worry about the next game is ludicrous IMO. +1,000. So sick of people telling me I can't talk about the past and can't talk about the future. If all we are allowed to talk about is Illinois and the next game, this message board would be pretty dang boring.

Every time we do this it ends up being a nightmare. You are correct that the second half of the season sets up well. Now we have to do something we haven't been able to do in over a decade and that's FINISH! Not picking on you here, but I've seen this sentiment a lot lately and had a thought on it. My thought is that even though NU as a program has been unable to finish in the past, we have to remember this is a new coaching staff, new players, and new feeling around the program (greatly upgraded facilities, etc.). While it's easy to fall into the habit of proactively punishing this team for the "sins" of the past, almost no one coaching or playing with the team now gives a damn that NU just missed in '08 or '11 or whenever because they weren't involved directly. So hopefully they won't be limited by that feeling of doom with past "close but no cigar" situations and continue to play with confidence.

It's ok, Noah, you can have two loves at the same time. You must not watch the Bachelor enough.

Losing to us in February was the dagger to Iowa. That gave them their 3rd loss outside the Top 100 in a year where they finished 63rd in SOS. They also finished the year with only five wins in the Top 100. For comparisons sake, we currently have one loss outside the Top 100 and are 14th in SOS. We also already have four wins in the Top 100, including two in the Top 50. Our 2013-14 résumé closer resembles the 2012-13 Minnesota and Illinois than it does 2012-13 Iowa.

Similar, yes. But any ball that is FIBA approved is gonna fall within the size and weight parameters. That doesn't mean different branded balls will have even close to the same feel. The Nike ball dribbles way differently than the adidas or Wilson ball. They feel way different. In football, it doesn't really matter since the offense that chooses the ball is the primary handler unless there is an interception or another turnover by the defense. And the defense isn't used to handling the ball anyway. This obviously isn't the case with basketball where both teams are going to handle the ball equally. I'm serious. Go to scheels and handle and dribble every different ball they have. The Nikes have more of a hard 'shell' and feel 'thinner'' while some of the Wilson NCAA balls have a 'squishier' feel, a softer feel to its surface. They will handle, feel, and dribble way different.

This might be the most dangerous of the next three home games.

Dangerous club. They are more than capable of walking into our building and winning. I don't think they will, but they certainly have as much or more talent as we do.

By the way: First time we've won 4 of 6 conference games since 2011 If NU defeats Illinois, it'll be the first time we've won 5 of 7 conf games since 2004

Posers who didn't make the trip to NW stay out. How awesome was it to watch our boys get their first road win? Real fans travel. Holla

Ohio State comes through and Minnesota beats Indiana. T-8th with Indiana as of now with the tiebreaker in our favor. If Wisconsin loses at home to MSU tomorrow, we are playing Illinois on Wednesday to move into a T-5th. Then we have possibly the easiest schedule of anyone to finish the year. Will this be the year we finish? Probably not. But they've got the opportunity right in front of them.

Another liverpi scenario (rpiwizard.com). This time I had us winning out at home, stealing a road win at Illinois, and losing the other 2 road games. With this scenario it predicts our RPI will finish at 49. So...take care of business at home and get the bonus points for stealing 1 more road win.

10 is what it will take.. but it has nothing to do with "being Nebraska". It's about losing to a terrible UAB team on a neutral court. Agreed. Winning on the road at Michigan St would be about the only scenario where 9-9 gets us in the NCAA.

Yeah 123 I get it but why bitch about it now? Won't we know at the end of the year? Guess what I'm saying is they are here now so I am happy with that. If at the end of the year they leave because hey want to or are shown the door so be it. Not going to complain about some KID who is willing to come here and play for my team, not even going to see his short comings. Just me.

According to some on this board we will have what 5 openings next year? How about we just get behind who is here right now and not worry about dumping some guys later? Too much of a fantasy league mentality for me. Just my $.02 worth nothing more, nothing less.

Always have been...he has improved his handles and he is our best on ball defender. He is a good change of pace guard. He needs to continue to work on his game, but he is a good role player for this team.

Valentine would have called it a charge. Expanding on that thought, I noticed too that the Northwestern mascot was allowed to get WAY too close to our guys on their inbounds plays a couple of times. Seems like if the man taking the ball out tried to run the baseline he might have run into the mascot. I'm not sure that should be allowed. Valentine would have called a charge.

It was definitely confusing and tearing me down the middle. I was impressed with both teams making sure that the game was always within reach, but both teams really struggled with the offense. First to fifty indeed won. And my helmet for Nebraska-Northwestern games is not my original hard hat, but a custom-made one with Nebraska on one side and Northwestern on the other.

My guess is Kamler knows its Noah and just wanted to flip the dancing fool some crap.

Benny played excellent on-ball D today.

Once again, the tale of two halves. The first half was fugly. Flat out terrible. That is at least three games in a row...we need to get outta that funk. The second half was much better. Again, good adjustment. But the difference in intensity was amazing. - Benny played well. He shouldn't replace Tai, but he provided a defensive shot in the arm. - David Rivers played well. He is getting just about the right number of minutes. - Tai was okay...remember, he is playing PG and is attempting to master the US game. It continues to be a work in progress. - Shavon was a bit hit and miss. Overall, a good game, but dude, you have to hit your free throw. - Leslee is hurting. Sorry, you can tell. Hopefully he can provide valuable minutes down the stretch. - Nathan...kind of a non-event. But what a wild three point shot. Wowser - Ray did okay. Good defense, very, very spotty on the offensive side. - Walter...nice game my friend. His shooting was what we needed. Thank you. He is never going to excel in the post, but thank goodness for what he brought to the floor today. - Terran forced himself into a good game today. He struggled, but he came through sufficiently enough to carry us to a road win. Again, not very darn pretty. Yet we did what we had to...and on the road, that was sweet. By the way...Noah, what did you think? I saw you in the Big Red helmet; but I caught you cheering both ways...and I know that is what you are all about, not a negative nellie, rather a supporter of your team...Had to be a bit confusing for you today

I almost thought this game was going to turn into a Penn State 2.0.

THIS

I don't care right now how ugly it was, we won.

Getting sucked into it again, I see.

4-2 in the last 6 games with 5 very winnable games left in our final 8.

Says the guy whose out to get Eichorst because he's not Tom Osborne. Ron you seem to be very very bitter. Osborne is not coming back!Eichorst has earned plenty of criticism on his own, without regard to who is predecessor was. Hopefully he will grow into the job and ultimately turn out OK.You can make that claim for just about any AD, hell...the same could be said about Tom Osborne when he was first hired as AD telling Bo which assistants to keep and being a cheapskate with recruiting resources. Eichorst atleast has started to open up the checkbook which is needed if NU wants to get back to winning football titles. The only group not giving Eichorst a chance is Ron's tradition coalition group because they know Perlman hired him without Osbornes consent. Eichorst hasn't been perfect, and probably never will be perfect but i do see that he never had a chance with this group. Of course, Pederson the guy who everyone hates...and rightfully so...was given two thumbs up by Tom Osborne before he was hired. There may be that group out there (T.O. loyalists not giving Eichorst a chance), but I assure you that's not where I'm coming from. In fact, I think there is a group of people who thought it was time for TO to fade off into the sunset who support Eichorst because he is new and not TO--without regard to how he is actually doing the job. 13, you are a great poster on this board, but is there a chance your views on Eichorst are colored by some lingering disdain for Osborne? Sounds a little like it when you hammer him for getting it wrong (like many others including myself) on Pedey. I have spent a considerable amount of time in his presence, and have been disappointed to this point. He is nicknamed "The Ghost" by many for being so publically non-existent. He is a manager rather than a leader, to this point. I am amazed that someone can generate a 7 figure salary with his lack of talent in public speaking and interacting with people. I will say he is much better one on one than trying to stumble his way around a speech or a simple walk up to a table of 8; where his lack of ability is mind-boggling for a person in his position. Last night at the baseball banquet was another classic example. No one even knew he was there until he snuck out the door, inappropriately attired once again. He stayed in a corner, and had no interaction with the tables full of boosters. This happens frequently. There are different styles that can work in this visible job, but he needs to show at least some recognition of interacting with fans, boosters, and his own coaches (his management structure is such that no coaches report to him, it is all through intermediaries. It is difficult for a coach to even get in to see him). Having said this, after a few years there will be a track record on hiring coaches. If he is good at that, all will be pretty well. But the early returns on his leadership aren't good. But sorry, we've gotten off of basketball on the basketball forum....

Says the guy whose out to get Eichorst because he's not Tom Osborne. Ron you seem to be very very bitter. Osborne is not coming back! Eichorst has earned plenty of criticism on his own, without regard to who is predecessor was. Hopefully he will grow into the job and ultimately turn out OK.

People are looking at me wondering why I"m laughing

That's what Mrs. Icedragon said.

Care to elaborate?

I'm not terribly surprised they've got something like this, though. They used to have a dude named Colonel Mustard write "columns" after the football games and they were awful! That guy wrote like my eighth graders.

Report cards in the form that rhyme Would probably take a lot of time. Could you would you guard a shot. Could not, would not score a lot. Can we win on Saturday? I do not like those games away.

Uhhmmm thinking this guy is a Dirk disciple.

Funny how we've gone from "he's a selfish player, coach needs to sit him" to "what are we going to do if he leaves early for the NBA?" We need more games to watch/dissect. Off days are brutal for our psyche.

If he's good enough to go and get drafted, no way I'd fault him for leaving early to do that. That's an opportunity to fullfill a lifelong dream. It's also good for the program to show you can make it to the NBA from here. That hasn't been done in a long time. I'd love it it if he stuck around for another year (or two), but dang, if he's that good, more power to him. Also, it's not uncommon for an underclassman to declare for the draft and go undrafted. He'll have to weigh that as well.