Quickzips

Just what we need.

At some point pride has to take over a little bit here. Buffalo isn't doing anything fancy, the Zips are just standing around with their thumbs up their rear ends.

I have no idea what I just watched. It didn't look anything like an Akron/Buffalo game. Heck it didn't look anything like a MAC game. I guess I'm happy that we scored 42 and are still in the game, but then again we scored and we are down at the half.

Definitely passes the eyeball test.

Zips found a way to beat a below average (and to be fair below average is a massive improvement over the NIU teams of the past few years) opponent at home under far less than ideal circumstances. You look at the rotation last night and there were really only 3 guys (Tree, Q and Kretzer) who have proven that they can play at this level. The rest were either unproven freshman who have shown some ability but need more polish (Johnson and Cheatham) or guys who have been varying levels of disappointing to this point in their careers (Betancourt, Evans, Ibitayo and Forsythe). Right now we are basically just on life support trying to get through the next couple of weeks until Reggie and Nick get back and hoping we aren't too far down in the standings at that point. Tree was an absolute beast last night. Even more so than usual. Every time we needed him he put the team on his back. We are going to need that to continue to have any chance at winning games. Q to a large degree continued his recent disappearing act. It is pretty clear (at least to me) that the extended minutes at PG are holding him back from playing his overall floor game that he excels at so much. The two early fouls didn't help anything either. I thought the PG's did a fairly decent job last night. Melo had some early turnoveritis, but came back and played a reasonably good second half. Evans had probably his best game in a long time. For once he wasn't settling on just standing around the 3 point line. He actually started to take his man off the dribble and it seemed to relax him to a degree. The keys for the Zips over the next two-three weeks: 1) Tree must continue to beast at a level we haven't seen from him before 2) Q has to come back into form 3) They have to limit the points off turnovers (either by limiting the turnovers, which is unlikely, or getting back good in transition) 4) Someone outside of Tree and Q has to step up each night to provide a reliable third scoring option (last night it developed into Evans in the second half) 5) Defense, defense, defense

You can say a lot of things about the Zips right now. They turn the ball over too much. They run hot and cold shooting the ball. They get lazy on defense at times. But the one thing they will bring into the stretch run of the season and the conference tournament is a whole ton of experience closing out close games. They haven't won them all (see Can't), but they've figured out a way to win a lot of them.

So tonight the Zips: Shot 32% from the field, Shot 13% from 3, Watched the bench put up a combined stat line of 2 points, 3 rebounds, 4 assists, 2 steals, 4 turnovers, 1 for 9 from the field and 0 for 7 from 3, and they still won. About the only guys who had good games for us tonight were Harney and Tree (both played very well by the way and both put up double doubles). I don't think I've ever seen a team that runs as hot and cold from 3 as this years Zips. Two weeks ago against this same team in Ypsilanti we were scorching from behind the arch. Tonight we took some of the worst 3 pointers I've ever seen. We weren't just missing by a little bit, we were flat out jacking up bricks. Thank god enough of them careened off the glass in the right direction for Tree or Harney to clean up the junk and get a few put-backs.

How the Zips pulled that one out is beyond me. We gave Eastern every opportunity to win that game and the Eagles just pissed it away at the end. Perfect example of one team losing a game more than the other team winning it. I don't know what has happened over the course of these last two games, but we need to get back to playing the way we did a couple weeks ago.

What in god's name is this lineup? Diggs, Kretzer, Cheatham, Johnson and Forsythe. Did KD suddenly forget that it is a little difficult to get touches in the post against a zone???

Take Can't lightly at your own risk. This is a rivalry game and their backs are against the wall. Another loss here and the path to even getting a first round home game in the tournament is shaky at best for them. My guess is that they come out amped up for this one. On the other hand, if the Zips can jump on them early it wouldn't surprise me to see them fold. The way their psyche has to be right now, I can't imagine them being able to come back from a 10+ point deficit.

http://www.cleveland.com/sports/college/in...t_river_default Apparently, according to Elton, the Zips need to take a page from OU's book and be a more balanced program. Never mind that: The Zips have beaten the Bobcats in 4 straight meetings including an overtime win in Athens a few weeks ago. The CMU team that OU beat last night, the one they had to come from 18 down to beat, at home. Yeah, the Zips beat them on the road less than a week ago and lead most of the way in doing it. The "solid" post player, Jon Smith. Yeah, he averages 7 points and 6.5 rebounds a night and has only scored in double figures 4 times all year (once against mighty Heidelberg). Stevie Taylor, the "solid" point guard, averages 8 points and 3 assists per night while turning the ball over 2 times per game, shooting below 40% from the field and below 60% from the free throw line. Ohh, and a quick look at the standings in the MAC East, Akron (6-1), Ohio (5-2). But let's not let a little thing like facts get in our way shall we. I know our PG play isn't good, but this article is pretty ridiculous.

There are really two separate issues here. One is student attendance, the other is the AK Rowdies. I can't speak much to student attendance overall, but the Rowdies really need to be disbanded. They had a chance to be something special a few years ago, but too many years of poor leadership, poor planning, poor marketing and overall cliqueness has killed any momentum they might have had. Make one big student section (somewhere in the JAR) that is open to students on a first come, first serve basis. The only requirement is that you have to be wearing an Akron shirt.

Thought about this one a lot the last couple days. First off a point about our fan base. A few years ago we were all over the Can't State coaching staff and administration for being the program of multiple second chances. We railed their handling of Chris Singletary and others on that program who had consistent on and off the court problems. Now, as a fan base, we seem largely ok with the idea of Akron being the new program of second chances. I'm not saying we should shun Alex and never welcome him back. I'm not saying we should roll out the red carpet for him. But we can't have it both ways. What Alex did from a legal standpoint was far worse than anything that ever happened at Can't. If we wanted those guys at Can't to be punished more severely, we can't back off with Alex. Assuming, for argument sake, that Alex does come back next year, as others have already pointed out, you can't assume that he will be the same player he was a year ago. Alex was well known in his time here for poor conditioning. I can't imagine a scenario in which he would come back in anything close to game shape. Even Quincy Diggs, who was a well known gym rat, took the first third of this season to get into game shape after coming off a year away. Given all of that, the idea that Alex might come back might explain a couple things. It might explain why we haven't filled our one scholarship for next year. It might also explain why Alex is still spending time in NE Ohio instead of heading back home to Puerto Rico. (I'm sure he has a huge target on his back with law enforcement after what went down). The other thing to consider here, not that it should be a determining factor, but Alex coming back would really make for an unbalanced scholarship situation next year. Presuming he would come back on scholarship we would be looking at graduating five scholarship players at the end of 14-15 (Alex, Nyles, Deji, Harney and Tree). That is a lot of turnover in one year. We've done it before, but it is still a lot of turnover.

This team continues to win games (and win them on the road at that) despite its flaws. Most teams if they go on the road and shoot sub-50% from the FT line and turn the ball over nearly 20 times would expect to lose by double digits. Not the Zips. They somehow find a way to win despite all of that. The biggest disappointment for me right now has to be Nick Harney. I can live with our bad FT shooting and our shaky PG situation (although Betancourt seems to be settling down and playing better of late). Those things weren't going to improve in any significant way in the middle of the season. Nick on the other hand is regressing in a big way. I honestly can't think of a player in the last 10 years who has left me more disappointed than Nick Harney. The kid has all the talent to be a high level contributor on this team, but he just doesn't seem to care. There is absolutely no passion to his game, and it actually seems to be getting worse.

Orr should have been fired a year ago. Nice guy. Not much of a basketball coach.

Zips can't keep anyone for CMU out of the lane. I'm pretty sure I could dribble drive on our defense in the first half. KD has to be laying into these guys in the locker room. Just a pathetic defensive effort. On offense we are getting anything we want as long as we don't turn the ball over (which we did a lot). Reggie, Q and Tree in particular are abusing these guys.

I'll take our crummy picture over this horrendous choppiness any day.

Zips close the game 7-8 from the FT line. That was sure a sight for sore eyes.

Right now our best lineup is Melo, Diggs, Kretzer and Tree.

And Harney is hurt.

I've counted about 5 turnovers by Harney so far.

And the Zips come out of the halftime locker room sluggish. The inherent dangers of stretching out to a big lead in the first half. Its too easy to think you have it wrapped up and take your foot off the gas. Hopefully KD can get their attention with this timeout and we can put a stop to this EMU mini-run.

Harney with a SC top-10 nominee.

So far Eastern's zone has been just what the doctor ordered for the Zips. I don't know about you guys, but I could sure stand to see a good ole fashion beatdown produced by the Zips tonight.

We can overcome a lot if Diggs is playing well. Today his shot is way off. Hence we are struggling.