Quickzips

Didn't get to listen to much of the game yesterday as work kept me away from French and Co. Doesn't sound like I missed a whole lot other than Brett McKnight's obligatory monster game that makes us all salivate over his potential. I have to say, I'm very disappointed by Zeke overall the last two games. Most of us thought the UALR game was a turning point for him, then he goes out and picks up silly fouls two games in a row and is basically a non-factor. I understand the ref situation, but at some point Zeke has to realize we need him on the floor more. Even if it means dialing it back a bit on the shot-blocking. We just can't have him playing only 9 minutes in big games like that. It is unfortunate that the Zips failed once again to rack up the marquee OOC win this season (save for a potential bracketbuster game), but I'm hoping that the silver lining will be a much better prepared Zips program after going on the road for a good deal of the OOC season and taking on some pretty tough teams. The Zips have two cupcakes left on the OOC schedule. Let's get back on track and take a nice two game winning streak into the conference season.

It would be an amazing effort to beat a Big East team when we are playing Miami(FL) out of the ACC.

Well, here comes the big test. The main reason why we are in this tournament. The Miami Hurricanes are a pretty good team this year. They have been in the top 25 in RPI most of the season, and sport a 9-3 record with wins over Ole Miss and WVU. Their only puzzling loss of the year was a 16 point drubbing at Rutgers. Miami pretty well sticks to an 8 man rotation lead by two talented guards in Malcolm Grant and Durand Scott and Sophomore big man Reggie Johnson. Johnson will be a big test for Zeke as he runs 6'10" 303lbs and averages close to a double double each night. Grant is a dangerous long range shooter who takes better than 50% of his shots from long range and hits them at a very nice 46% clip. If he gets it going from downtown, the Zips are in trouble. Scott doesn't take as many 3's, but is plenty capable of knocking them down as he shoots 47% from beyond the arch. Both guards are also capable passers who average better than 3.5 assists per game. If they have one weakness it may be in turnovers as both guards cough it up almost 3 times per game. As a team they don't go very deep with only 8 players averaging double digit minutes. This may come in handy for the Zips with both teams working on their third game in as many nights. Miami is clearly the best rebounding team we will face in Vegas lead by the big man Johnson. If the Zips put up a performance like they did last night against Stetson it could be another long night of watching our opponent come up with two and three possessions every trip down the floor. Zeke, Nikola and Co. are going to have to crash the boards hard if they want to win this one. This is the last chance on the season for the Zips to pull down a big OOC win. Let's get it done tonight!

Not much to really add this morning. The game was a mess because of the awful foul situation. I'm not by any means advocating the refs swallowing the whistles while the game spirals into a fist fight, but that isn't what it sounded like last night. At some point you have to let the guys play a little bit and understand that it is bad for the sport when you, as a ref, take it upon yourself to turn the game into a free throw shooting contest. Kudos to the Zips for closing the game out with a stellar performance at the line. After watching shaky free throw shooting hurt us late in games in previous years it was a welcome relief to see multiple guys step up to the line and close the game out. McNees lead the team in scoring last night, hopefully that performance will help to break him out of his recent funk. Big props to Abreu who continues to improve game by game. 11 points, 7 assists, 2 turnovers and 2 steals is a very good line for a freshman guard in only his 11th game at this level. Guys are starting to expect his passes more and it is leading to better shots for the Zips. Mark my words, by tournament time he will be the straw that stirs the drink for the Zips. If there was one redeeming quality to the foul situation it was the fact that it allowed Nik and Zeke to sit for long periods and got Josh and Dakotah some playing time. We really didn't need Nik and Zeke to win that one, and it will keep them fresher for the game this afternoon. Bring on the 'Canes.

Finally this game comes to a merciful end. Zips win it 72-56 and close it out by going perfect from the line down the stretch. Thank god this one is over. Hopefully they find a better zebra crew for tomorows game.

Zips have hit 8 straight free throws down the strech and have pushed it back to a 17 point lead with a minute to go. I'd call that relatively mentally tough, especially considering the ref situation.

I'm glad I didn't pay for the internet feed cause this game is one of those games that is practically un-watchable. I'm tempted to offer a cash reward to any Zip fan who can manage to steal the ref's whistles overnight. The foul situation is totally ridiculous.

Hard to win a game playing 8 on 5. If the Zips hang on it will be darn impressive.

Zips up 15 at the half. Foul trouble and lots of 3's is pretty much the story for the good guys right now.

Zips big guys in foul trouble. Zeke, Nik and Bardo all have 2.

SHOOT IT ALEX!!!!!!!!

26-15 at the under 8 timeout. Zips have cooled off a bit, but Stetson really hasn't taken advantage and closed the gap. They got it to 6 at one point, but the Zips have it right back up to 11.

Live stats won't load at all for me. I don't know what the problem is.

Zips up 19-8 early. Zips are making it rain from 3. Zips have hit 5 from behind the arch already. Their only points NOT from 3 came on 2 FT's from McNees and a layup by Zeke.

How can a Stetson team that runs this much zone be this bad defending the 3 point line?

Steve McNees sighting. Knocks down his first three of the night. Hopefully that can help get him out of this funk.

No reason at all to complain about this years OOC schedule. Here is where realtimerpi ranks our OOC opponents at this date. Dayton-102 YSU-227 CSU-11 Detroit-171 UIC-203 Temple-16 Minnesota-23 Bethune-Cookman-250 UALR-148 Stetson-200 Miami(FL)-20 UAPB-285 Oral Roberts-152 That is four teams ranked in the top 25 by RPI as of today. Dayton, Detroit, UALR and Oral Roberts are all quality opponents judging by RPI numbers. Even UIC and Stetson aren't terrible. Those games with YSU, Bethune-Cookman and UAPB aren't real good for the RPI, but the hit we take there will be nothing compared to what we get when we hit the conference schedule and have to play Bowling Green (338) twice, Eastern Michigan (342), Central Michigan (286) and Toledo (260).

Short turnaround on this one. The Zips can't sleep on Stetson, despite their record and relative anonymity (I admit to thinking they were the obligatory D-II program that always seems to pop up at these tournaments), they aren't a bad team. This team opened the season by handing Wake Forest a 10 point loss at Wake. Since that time they have struggled, and only picked up two other wins, but they have had a shot in most of their games including a 3 point loss to a pretty good Rice team last night in Vegas. Like UALR, the Hatters bench goes pretty deep as they have nine players averaging double figure minutes. Ridge Graham, a 6'5" sophomore forward leads the team in scoring and rebounding and will provide a tough matchup for McClanahan. Freshman Guard Corey Walden has come on strong recently after sitting out the first four games. He is a dangerous 3 point shooter. The Zips will have to close out strong on him. The Hatters don't have any significant big guys as the only player on their roster over 6'5" who is averaging more than 5 points per night is 6'8" 280lb freshman Steve Forbes who is averaging 6 points per night in about 16 minutes. Their other two big guys average 2.5 points and 30 minutes a night combined. For a team that is as centered on guard and wing play as the Hatters, they are currently shooting an abysmal 26.5% from 3. Like UALR, the Hatters have issues when it comes to rebounding the ball as they are 268th in the country on the glass. Much like last night, if the Zips are patient and diverse on offense and they play good defense on the perimeter this should be a pretty easy win. Hopefully fatigue doesn't end up being too much of a factor and the Zips can go into tomorows matchup with the Hurricanes on a 3 game winning streak.

Thinking about things a little more, I think the starting lineup I'd like to see us go to would have Abreu and McClanahan at the guards, Diggs at SF, Nikola at PF and Zeke at C. I think that would give us a nice balance to the starting lineup along with the size and athleticism to matchup against most any team we are going to face. Then we could bring Daryl, Steve and McKnight as the main three guys off the bench. I know it would seem odd to bring all the seniors off the bench, but you can also look at it as a huge advantage for the Zips as most teams wouldn't be able to bring that kind of experience in with the second team.

Early morning thoughts on last nights performance: Great to hear so many Zip fans made the trip out there. You could hear them on the 1350 broadcast pretty well. I'm sure the arena isn't fully by any means, but I know the team has to appreciate having some decent support out there. If Zeke plays every game like he did last night there isn't a team on the schedule that the Zips can't beat (yes, I include our Thursday afternoon opponent in that). When he stays out of foul trouble and decides to get aggressive going after the boards it adds a dimension to the Zips that few teams can hope to match. Hopefully that was the start of bigger things to come for the big guy. Big props for Alex Abreu. This team is finally starting to figure out how to play off of him a little bit. His line last night (not sure how much I trust the official box score, but that is another story) shows 10 points, 4 assists, 2 steals and 1 turnover in 26 minutes on the floor. KD made special mention in the postgame of one sequence in the first half where Alex got a steal following a Roberts mid-range jumper, he pushed the ball down the floor and had a couple of options with what to do with it, one of which being to hit Roberts in the corner for an open 3. Alex made the pass to the man with the hot hand and Daryl knocked down the 3. That is the kind of recognition and court awareness you need from your PG. Kudos to Alex. Speaking of Roberts, I'll go ahead and say it, of all of our seniors he is playing by far the best basketball right now. I love it when he gets aggressive looking for his shot, not just from downtown but in the mid-range game and driving to the hoop as well. He has some diversity to his offense, and he looks much more comfortable when he's not just camping out behind the 3 point line waiting for someone to set him up. Keep it up DRob. Another solid performance from Quincy Diggs who played a significant role in sparking the first half run that gave the Zips the lead for good. He had a pretty quiet second half, but you can see him starting to turn the corner and figure out how he can contribute to this Zips squad. I look for more playing time from him as the season goes on. McClanahan had a pretty good night, leading the team in scoring and playing a key role in the big first half run. When he is knocking down his shots this team is tough to beat. Relatively pedestrian night for Nikola, at least by his recent standards. We really didn't need him to be THE guy tonight though. He still tallied an official 8 points, 5 boards and 3 assists for the night which is a very respectable line. I'm sure we will need more from him in the next two days, but it was nice to see the Zips take a comfortable win without needing a huge performance from Nik for once. In what is becoming an all to regular occurrence, I have to once again request that anyone who has seen Steve McNees please direct him to report back to the team. I'm not sure who that guy wearing #4 for us is right now, but it sure isn't the Steve McNees I know. Brett McKnight played a mostly invisible 8 minutes, scoring only 2 points on 1 of 3 from the floor. I think at this point we can safely say that KD isn't going to just hand him anything. Brett is going to have to earn his minutes back. Nice to see the Zips not really let up against the Trojans. They had their foot on UALR's neck at halftime and they never really let them get back into it. UALR closed it to 12 once or twice, but every time the Zips answered right back. Bring on the Stetson Hatters!

Josh Egner picks up a cheap foul while the game is already decided then makes it worse by picking up a tech. Thats a great way to earn some playing time Josh.

A lot of good performances tonight lead by the big fella and Daryl. Abreu, Cvetinovic and McClanahan have also had nice games and Diggs has been pretty solid as well.

Zeke is having as good a game on the boards as I can ever remember him having.

God I love having a PG who can drive to the hoop, draw the defense to him and kick it out for an open 3.

http://www.sidearmstats.com/stours/lasvegd...game3/index.htm The stats are so wrong it's ridiculous. Been keeping track myself McNees has 4 turnovers now, they have him with only two. And have him at 1-3 from the field, not even close either. According to French they are having problem with the stats at the arena as well. Not sure what the issue is. Hopefully they get it fixed for tomorow. Anyone pay for the video feed? Any insight as to the quality of the feed?