caveman

Hannah scoring -2.5 shooting% -.03 3PT% -.013 reb -1.1 per contest asst. -22 TO +5 steals -11 season long Kate scoring -2.4 shooting% -.041 reb -1.1 per contest ast. +2 TO +0 blks. -21 steals -4 season long I know stats don't tell the whole truth, but they don't lie. Yeah I'd say player developement is and issue. More of an issue, at the start of the season they really did look out of condition. NOW FOR THE REAL BOTHERSOME STAT. our whole focus last season was improving rebounds, so how did we do? -2.2 per contest and our opponents are +1.1 Every player needs to improve. The coaching staff needs to evaluate the things they are doing and yes they need to improve.

loss would put us 8 to 9 and a win would put us 6 or 7. The worst would be 7 as we have 3 tie breakers.

I am going to have to agree with SM. I would actually go bolder, but cannot do it with the substitution pattern and it is as simple as right hand left hand. Right now we have really 1 person ( Nicea) that finishes on the left side with any consistency and she really does not call her number enough. Sam Haiby gets to the rim and is great at finishing, but what happens when her right hand is taken away. What Iowa did defensively is mark the two shooters on the floor (Liegha, Hannah and Taylor), which ever 2 were on the floor at the time and take away the right side penetration from Sam. Miss Bourne finishes equally on both sides, but more importantly she finishes right side right hand, left side left hand. This should also profoundly help Sam Haiby as now you cannot send extra help to take away Sam's right hand. Sam will probably also become a consistent 8-12.

Just a few notes 1) the ex-husker landed in the right place. Twerking before the and taunting the crowd after the three. They would not be allowed by a husker coach, but coach B. loves the primadonna crap. That being said I would love in husker red she does play well. 2) the crap the big ten officiating lets stars get away ie. Gusty does them a total disservice to them. The ref was watching allowed 4 clear walks that ended in buckets and at least a half dozen hooking calls. To her credit you make refs make a call and you do not change til they do. Q: what happens in the ncaa tourney when they actually call it. Kate could not close on the mid cause she'd have gotten beat to the bucket. Ashton was over matched both physically and skill wise. Did anyone else notice Mershon shut her down reasonably well. ( very encouraging for the future) 3) Q2 shot selection sucked which cost us the game. I know we got blown out in the 4th, but our margin of error is too small to have chop wood against a team that good in the 4th. They just pressed to hard more experience would help here. 4) we needed Liegha's shot to fall. She got good looks her shots just didn't fall. It happens. Keep on shooting Liegha it'll drop.

Super excited for this. I plan to be and hope everyone else is. I predict a close game. Think our best chance is getting under their point guards skin. The former huskers temper prone mentality is the best way to keep Gusty out of the game.

Both our ball movement and shooting have been better lately. Our defense is still suspect, but a bit of that is coaching. We seem to change up when things are working. I think we over think things, when we should just KISS it. We have to get after the boards in this one. If we reduce the deficit from last time by at least half, I like us to win this one.

Wow these onesided refs single handedly caused a 10 pt run

We played zone in the first half and played pretty close. Also I thought the ball movement in the second quarter is as good as I've seen all year from this group. Not sure what planetary alignment was used to think we could match up playing man in the third quarter, but I digress. Not sure we're as far as everyone thinks we are. We really do need a point guard badly and that is not a knock on either of the two we use at point. One is a converted 2 ( 7pts., 7to's and a technical is not going to get it done from and the technical was brought up cause the point has to be a leader and example). The other converted combo guard ( 1asst. and 3 to's also not going to get it done). The other thing really needed is a mid game, we need the to be able to get defenses to collapse to get room for both the shooters and posts. That being said, I did see Nicea make a couple good pull ups and Liegha has all the tools to shred teams in the mid. Finally we need a defensive identity and the attitude ( swag) that comes with it ie. ( we're removing the three point line from your game or you come into our beloved paint your getting hammered). A a pg and a bit of tude and I think we're in the mix.

Comparing Yori to Williams is impractical. Yori had more coaching experience than Williams. Last year was Coach Williams first time to the tourney. Higher expectations, bigger conference much more scrutiny than she has ever had. I think she is the right coach and she has a good staff, but just as a Freshman there is going to be a learning curve envolved. What is our defensive identity, how do we manage expectations, how do we manage a power 5 that now knows how to scout us? Remember a couple things, last year we over achieved ( we weren't as good as we played). Last year we set up for more success because of an easier schedule ( we went from 100 SOS to 25 SOS), by the way this is a lot of wood to chop especially when you're trying to catch 4 freshmen up to speed and play a major role. Too much success too quickly can also be a bad thing, cause it can cause unreasonable expectations and put too much pressure on a team that's not really ready for and in truth I'm not sure the coaching staff was ready to handle it and the pressure of not living up to those expectations. We are on the right track.. Why do I say that.... We are and have been able to compete in all but 2 games, which is by the way why this is so frustrating. I really think it will turn around next year big time. The players will be better and just as if not more important the coaching staff will have grown quite a bit from this season.

I am mesmerized by the lack of energy we play defensively in the second quarter. It has been an eye sore all season long. Starting the third quarter twice Kate was guarding point 27 feet from the rim and no one was filling the lane. Have idea how or what we were defending for half of the third period. Here's your open lane without obstructions please drive. Finally was it me or did the refs seem to have it in for Nicea. Seriously fouled on a made lay up. I was cheering for the and one opportunity only to find out they called the most BS traveling call I have ever seen. Two of the fouls they called on her were also complete BS. Sorry you had witness that Actualfactual. Lastly we used dribble penetration to attack the rim in the first, back half of the third and fourth periods and we won that. Sports 101 make the opponent stop what is working. We should have stayed with throughout the game.

I could not agree more with this assessment. Miss Helms #126 and Miss Brady #107. Both seem to be high character types, which tells me great team mates and quality role players. Miss Bourne is probably the star power in this class. When certain words like world cup and MVP are used together to describe an incoming recruit my ears perk up just a little bit. When other words like trained with KG are used, I pretty much assume that there is some toughness involved. Since they only play with one ball, I do not want 5 over hyped stars coming in on the same class. That being said I'd love to see a high profile point guards name on any list of in coming recruits.

I'm not really going to hold my breath expecting a win. I really thought they would have it together and be really tough by this time of the year. In truth they seem to be going backwards at this point. Hoping the last two games were one step backwards and two steps forward is right around the corner, but the complete lack of rebounding and defense suggests to me that the effort is not there. Without effort there really is no pulling together. Oh well the only thing we can do is cheer loud and hope to help them push through.

4th point: we never really get out hustled in the 4th period. We seem to not understand playing 4 quarters. We'll get you later seems to be the mentality in the first 3. What's worse is that starters play with too scared to make a mistake syndrome, or rather not playing to win, but playing not to lose. 1st point: I heard 3 years of the same with Haliegh Sample. That being said I like Verbeek as well. To me she's got too much fight to keep her out of post scrum.

I really have a hard time believing that our 6'5" starting center had 0 rebounds. The winning stat line 2pts, 6 reb, 4 asst. and 6 steals. Nicea comes up big with the hustle numbers. Sam 16pts. all attacking vertically including the two that iced the game. Great job Sam. Taylor 3 of 5 for 9pts. including the game tying 3. Leads the nation in 3pt shooting pct. we really need her shooting more. Anyway my random thoughts on the game.

Freshmen 34 and starters 22. Actually it was much worse than that. Taylor scored 11, so 4 starters minus her scored 11 points. By my count that's 2.25 per head. Something is very off with Hannah. On the year she's shooting 31 percent. Assist to turnover ratio is less than 2 to 1. I know she's better than that. Right now I'd start Brown, Haiby, Mershon, Eililey and Kissinger. We'd be small, but we'd have 3 shooting above 40 percent behind the arc. Sam can get to the rim and get the defense to collapse. Mershon is the best we have at boxing out. So I agree with most of what Longtimefan said. Even though Nicea starts out tentative on offense she is too valuable on defense to not start.

Help on the dribble penetration was waaayyy tooooo sllooowww. Thus the guards playing undisciplined, left open shooters. Long story short we burned inside, outside and lets be honest Miss Charles was going to burn us on the mid regardless, she is that good on the pull up.

I am not sure anyone could sing me a happier tune than the one you just sang

They play 8 consistently though 1 of the only plays around 7 minutes.

As always Iowa is an offensive juggernaut and as always no respect for defensive play. We can get them, but I still think we are not quite seasoned enough to beat Gustafson and co. If stick together and keep learning/ playing roles we will be real tuff by seasons end. I think we only have a chance if Hannah shakes out of her funk and starts being Hannah. In the mean time I could not be more pleased with how Nicea has stepped up.

right now I see the big red winning 7 or 8 games. We could win more if we find some type of offensive identity and we raise the energy level on defense. How do we have a 55% shooter from 3 and we're only getting 4 looks a game. Sam great at finishing at the rim, but can she dish. Our post has a nice falling away shot, but does not seem to want to attack the rim. Off the bench our other post attacks the rim but does make some freshman mistakes. Seriously we have great pieces no identity on offense, which is why we start great and lose games second and third qtr. . We get off game plan and go to individual habits. 4th we battle back and fall short. Critical plays at critical times who is going to make them. Defensively our effort depends on offensive successes. We do not increase efforts when the ball is not falling. We should build identity on the defensive side first, the ball will eventually fall

This is the second game in a row our starting point guard's turnovers and assists are equal. Hannah was 6 asst. 6 to's last week and 3 asst. 3 to's this week. This week she did have 11 pts. where as last week she only had two. This is unacceptable for a three year starting point guard. I am still befuddled with what's going on with her. Last year she played sooo great and this year she pedestrian at best. Wonder if the early injury was worse than we are letting on.

save for a few really errant and ill advised passes, great effort. game ball to Verbeek who by the way kept us in good shape early. it pleases me that every player contributed, but the thing that most pleases me is Kate getting back on track.

OMG 7 boars in 6 minutes seriously loving Verbeek right now

would really like to see our starters get it together this time. last game we were pulling away with Taylor and the 4 freshmen and kept pulling away with Nicea and the 4. we put our starters back in and KU pulled within 2. we put 3 freshmen back in and won by 6. this will some up the whole story freshmen (+9,+9,+15,+4) starters (-9,-9,-2,-1,8) in terms of hustle that would be 37 to negative 13 some observations: Hannah looks to be pressing too much and playing too little. she needs to just relax and play. Kate is playing like she's hurt. shots going away from the basket rather than towards the basket. twice she set picks and bailed, when the defender got close to contact. that suggests soreness to me. i have seen both of them play much, much better

Offensive output woes do not really bother me. Creighton hanging 74 is scary. 3 starters down, they should be lucky to hang 40. Our team defense is sad. Also the energy really problematic. We need to match the other teams energy level. Right now they'd struggle matching that of a morgue. Also this team needs some serious conditioning. At least enough to play a minute out of 10 hard.