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I also think they need to adjust to teams running them off the three point line. Their offensive flow appears to be out of whack. And thus they are not stepping into their shots naturally. They still have time to figure it out before Cleveland.

Today on ESPN's home page is an article: Jay Bilas' The top 68 teams in men's college basketball For those that have an ESPN+ subscription, the link is below. https://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/insider/story/_/id/43905236/the-bilas-index-vol-ii-top-68-teams-mens-college-basketball-2024-25 For those that don't, the article has the Zips at 60 and Miami at 61.

Scott has been our most consistent player during MAC play. He seems to have really embraced his role as leader of the second unit. He also is usually in at the end of the game.

Came here to say Athletics did a fantastic job yesterday. Great giveaway, ceremony was awesome, the video they put together was really cool, we had a spotlight for intros - seriously, I don't know who is behind the renewed energy or if it's a collective effort, but they're doing a hell of a job this season.

I agree with one caveat- whomever decided to play music during Groce and Enrique’s speeches at the halftime ceremony should be flogged.

The game has a 6:00 P.M Sat. starting time and is being nationally broadcast on ESPN 2. I hope there is a big crowd at the arena when the Zips used to fill the Ozone over a decade ago. The Zips can hopefully bring their A game and show to the nation that we are a talented team. Maybe a good showing on national TV and the nations longest winning streak can get us that elusive one vote in the national polls.

I think a 14 game winning streak is like a set of rose colored glasses. They make us think we should win every conference game and win them all by double digits. During an 18 game conference schedule, teams will have stretches of sub-par play, which has been us the last few games. In other years, those would have been the head-scratching losses others have mentioned. Fortunately, we were able win them. This team needs to watch the video, regroup, and be ready for the Kittens on Saturday.

Another player deserving some praise tonight is Amani. The Zips switched a lot on screens tonight putting him on smaller faster guards and he did a great job.

Great point. He is a streak shooter. Meanwhile, Scott has really shot the ball well the last 2 games and has filled this gap. I am amazed at how much better he is playing this year. Not only is he shooting better but ten times better attacking the basket.

NIU did a great job anticipating our passing lanes to prevent the quick ball movement we normally exhibit. Conversely, Akron did a very poor job going through anything more than just the motions. I would imagine the PSI in the game ball was much lower at the end of last night's game than it normally is. We dribbled the crap out of that thing and, to no surprise with very little success. Gotta get back to the unpredictable off-the-ball movement into the open space behind the defense.

Big game, I know Ohio isn't at the top of their game right now, but it is still a game in the convo on saturday night. This would be a huge one to get that 15th consecutive 1-0

he thinks there are 60 better teams

We won the rebounding battle, (surprisingly) were better at the FT line, committed 2 more turnovers than NIU. We were only 5-21 from three. seth 1/6 tavari 1/3 bowen 1/5 sharron 0/2 nate 0 attempts 24% is below our average clip for threes. We make just 3 or 4 more it makes a big difference. We didn’t make shots in the first and weren’t completely letting it loose in the second. To me it seemed like we knew we could win by doing what we did, so that’s what happened. It wasn’t pretty but it’s better to “learn from a win” Gotta work on moving the ball more and getting more of those open looks we are accustomed to. We had some open looks today, but we not as many as we would’ve liked

I think there's enough tape out there now too to enable the competition to craft a game plan. They also now aren't sneaking up on anybody and they're getting every team's best efforts. I'll give the NIU coach credit for getting his kids to play hard despite their tough stretch.

Put him in.

Enrique got called up to the Pacers and chartered into Fulton in the first half to get here.

Row 1 wins the Piada!

Massive crowd with a buzz too. People actually want to be here.

The first words my wife said to me at 6:55 am this morning - "It's Enrique Freeman Day!"

For those who don't know, Nolan works under the name AO1 Creative. He is the entire package behind our sudden explosion of social media content in the last year or so. Truly a special talent and I'm glad we're partnered with him.

Which suggests we would be an at-large entry in the NCAAT but for all the auto-bids. I suppose we would have to rank in the mid-40s to be an actual at-large.

probably the biggest challenge in the MAC yet

Probably had this in the drafts from last week lol

The team that lost back-to-back to directional Michigan's. I guess ESPN just hires anyone these days.

How is Miami #61???

I think it's more simple. We missed a lot of open 3s tonight

That’s funny. You just beat me to the Amani subject @clarkwgriswold, but with a different take. Hat tip to Amani, he’s turned into a real good shot blocker.

Constructive critique. Thank you.

Here are the standings as listed on ESPN.com. We've locked up a top 5 seed and hold a three game lead over Miami (plus the tie-breaker). That being said, there is more work to be done.

He’s steady!

Lots of good with Shammah on the floor tonight.

Miami goes down at Eastern, 76-66.

That last play where the ball was bouncing on the ground and 3 Akron players just watched and a Norther Illinois player picked up the ball and took it up for a layup is just indicative of how this team is approaching the game tonight. They know that Northern Illinois sucks and just going through the motions. And that is why it is a close game. She need to play hard to win.

This is awesome. Going from Akron to literally play in an NBA game.

Congrats Enrique!! Now win this thing.

Speak about playing down to the competition. Everything is looking bad for Akron. Terrible shooting and some bad defense and turnovers. Need to right the ship in the second half.

Worst stretch of play in the MAC thus far this season.

Best crowd of the year so far.

Zips need to retire Enrique’s jersey every week. Big home crowd already!

Sad to say, but my wife did not even recognize who Enrique Freeman is. The family had to do an immediate intervention. She can accept cards and limited visits, but no phone calls, at the Zippy Home for Tranquility and Serenity. If you see her say hi and be kind. She has a lot of inner Zipness to awaken. As for me and the family, we are too busy to visit tonight. We'll be at the JAR.

She's a definite keeper!

No, it's an institution of Higher Learning, not a Business. And treating educational institutions as if they are businesses is what has led to their decline. I mean, we can equate athletics to this. The amount of debt accepted by the U to expand athletics when you couldn't ever actually be competitive in it (football) is one of the biggest blunders in the history of the University. But it's fine, we'll just continually cut the people who do the real work of the University (educating students) and balancing the budgets on their backs, so administrators can make absurd salaries padding their resumes so they can move onto something more lucrative somewhere else and fund their yachts. It's sick, and the fact that you can even attempt to defend it is sick.

Do you think the Zips are feeling the pressure of the winning streak or is it just a bunch of guys who are not used to playing a whole season wearing down at the end of the season? This was the worst game we have played all season.

Shammah Scott hit the shot of the game. We shot 23% from 3. Our outside shooting has gone south. A lot of the long distance shots were not even close.

The shot was waived off after review. Toledo holds on to win.