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Sometimes NFL execs like guys who can "play football". Jatavis clearly fits that category. I just wish he had both "linebacker size" and "can play football" next to his name. Is one going to be enough? Is his desire and instincts good enough to give him a chance, and to allow him to impress at the position where he stands out? And if not, will anyone make the investment in a position change with a late round or free agent MAC player?

After the last game, I was starting to think that Reggie really needs to shoot the ball more and more for us to be really successful this year. Then.....he goes cold and Jake and Josh go a combined 9 of 12 from 3-range tonight. I guess that's why I don't make a half-mil a year coaching basketball, like the guy on our bench. I'd like to say that we played great aggressive defense tonight. But lets face it, Miami has one guy who can score points. And physically, we were just far superior. I hope this means we can win in Oxford this year too. Stats of the Game: 1) 3-Point Shooting: Akron - 53% Miami - 10% 2) Akron shoots 100 PERCENT (9 of 9) from the FT line.

Amazing how the mention of the 2 losses to Miami reminds us of how we closed out the regular season last year. We lost 6 out of 7 games in that stretch to end the season, before the improbable 3-wins-in-4-days tournament run.

Funny. Shawn Roberts comes up twice within a 24 hr. period on this forum, nearly 30 years after he played.

Probably one out of every 20 Zips fans could have gotten Kenny Cullifer, I would guess. Shawn Roberts, and Eric McLaughlin are pictured as well. I MIGHT still have this poster somewhere. We used to have a lot of these kinds of promotional posters, like the "Smash Hits" poster showing football's defensive front all holding sledgehammers during the Faust era. I could go on and on. It brings back memories seeing that Classic game against #3 Pitt on the schedule, at the old Richfield Coliseum. What a night. Thanks for posting, Dr. Z. This kind of theme would work well today with the latest Star Wars craze. EDIT: I also had to check and see if that ASHLAND game was against Keith's Ashland team, but I can see he didn't start coaching there for about another year.

How about the call late in the game where EMU scored a basket, and they called a foul for a push away from the scorer that resulted in another 2 free throws? Bizarre. Gave them a 4 point trip at a very critical juncture in the game.

1981grad...lets just hope we don't have to hit HALF of our 3-point shots to pull out a win at home anymore this year.

Keith pointed out in the postgame that EMU is a poor 3-point shooting team, and that the shots were well contested. Sometimes that happens. That's basketball. You can do everything possible, and the balls still drop in the hoop far too often for the effort you make to stop them. EMU might never have a night like that again this season from the 3 line, and it just happened to be last night on our floor. I want to point something else out too.... The effort really was there last night to stay with the dribble drives. And we did get help from the big guys. Where we failed at times was cutting off the passes in the interior after steps #1 and #2 were sometimes executed successfully. It pained me to see some of those dunks that resulted.

At halftime, down 8, I couldn't help but to think about how close we were to a 3-game slide from which we may not recover. That's how dangerous negative momentum can be to a basketball team. We had tremendous effort in the first half, and still trailed by a decent margin. Luckily, effort eventually paid off, and we got the job done. I felt that we showed plenty of the "Old Akron" tonight, and really wanted to win. I'm still amazed at how much teams are scoring against us. Keith touched on the fact that teams are driving more because of the shorter shot clock this year, and that is exposing something defensively that's clearly not our strength. If that is truly what's impacting us, it's not going away unless the rules change again. So, we need to get the personnel in there that can help us adjust, because we are not equipped yet to win 80-90 point games.

Dr. Z....read back. Someone was calling Ken+ the MAC's "model program" for something they did 15 year ago. Yes, a few games. Elite 8 takes only 3 wins. Of course I wish that was us, but I think you missed what I was responding to.

UA Zipster........Ken+ is a model program, not Akron? Ken+ hasn't won a MAC title since 2008. And haven't been to the title game since 2011. And they lost that title game to Akron. And have gotten eliminated quite a few of those other years by....you guessed it....Akron. Ken+ is failing, time and time again, in the postseason. But, if you think Ken+ is the "model program" based on winning a few NCAA tournament games 15 years ago, have at it.

I'm scratching my head. Toledo missed 13 Free Throws in this game. They were 16 of 29. Does that tell us how bad this could have been? This team doesn't have a lot of fight in them. I don't know what it is. Toledo wanted to win this game, and they did. I think it's the very reason that we didn't put away some of those teams a few weeks ago. This didn't just start this week. Beating Buffalo might have been the worse thing that could have happened to this team. Keith has warned that he "might have to go back to the beginning" in the postgame. Maybe that's what it's going to take with this group.

Ace...the mind-blowing statistic for me was that Cooper ended up with ZERO field goals in that game. Switching on the ball screens only works if the big guy picking up the guard after the screen can contain him. I recall CMU taking some of our big men right to the hoop after some of those switches. So unfortunately, you still have to have the right personnel to make it work, or you just end up with some serious mismatches that will be exploited.

Wow. I'm surprised I don't remember this guy. And I can't find any information anywhere regarding his time as a Zip. Maybe someone can help us out.

wadszip, I think you make some good points except that you may be looking at the last game in particular (and maybe even Buffalo) as a situation where guys were standing out on the 3-line, and deciding whether to shoot or drive. But if you look back, a lot of the easy baskets were coming early in the possessions, where guys were simply driving to the basket (and may have been looking to create space to kick out for a 3 ball) and had simply beaten their man to the basket instead. And I agree with you, as I stated earlier, that maybe some of this will correct itself when Pat is able to play 30 min. per game again. Let me correct something on the 2013 games vs. Ohio: Harney was matched up more against Cooper in the championship game, especially when Carmelo was not on the floor (we were playing without Abreu, remember). But, the real strategy change that year was that we were switching more often on the ball screens out top, which was something we had not done a lot in previous games. It was a whole host of much bigger defenders that ended up wearing him down and making it difficult for him to shoot.

Hilarious. I love how people possess such lofty hopes for a 14 year old kid. I've seen way too many HS freshmen with potential who amount to very little, and plenty of late bloomers who come out of nowhere to stardom. It's impossible to know where this will go.

I want to comment on the "we've had this problem for years". Yes, we never HAD "athletic" guards for many of the KD years, who were quick enough to stay in front of guards driving to the basket. But on the surface, it looks like we have those types of players now, but it seems like the problem is worse than it's ever been. Guys with the quickness of an Ivey or a Jackson seem to be getting beaten to the basket more than Dru or Dials ever did. At least it seems that way. Maybe it's more effort than ability? Are we jumping out to take away the 3-ball too much and causing the problem? Are the MAC Guards better at creating their own offense than they were a few years ago? We'll see. Coaching a basketball team over a long period of time requires one to adjust their personnel/strategies as the competition changes.

I guess the real answer to how we match up against a team like CMU, and their style of play, will come in a month when we get another shot against them in the JAR. I heard a lot of "we need to get better" in the postgame last night, in reference to our deficiency in guarding people heading to the basket. It's not quite that easy. If you don't have guys with the physical ability to stay with those kinds of players, and you can't make up for the deficiency with a different way to defending them as a team, those teams are going to continue to attack you the same way, and will probably continue to be just as successful. I'll be very interested to see how the home game goes.

I'm still sticking with the goal. No more than 3 conference losses. Although, I thought we'd win this one. Still a few tough road games to get through this year. We'll have to steal an unexpected one to keep the goal.

I hope we learned something tonight. What more can you say? We need to find an answer to guards driving to the basket for easy buckets. Maybe when Pat gets full-time minutes we'll be able to protect the rim a little better.

Amazing. We've earned that 3-point shooting percentage defense number over 15 games, and someone wants to validate it by the results of ONE game? Check it again 5-10 games from now, and let me know.

Sportsjunkie...you just about hit it perfectly. Sports fans, in general, want to watch games that matter. MAC games don't matter. Most years, we're playing for a bottom seed, and a chance to be a nearly forgotten entity in a tournament that we have an insurmountable chance of winning. We have little chance of changing that dramatically right now. Long winning streaks help, something close to a 30 win season would help, and an occasional appearance in the AP poll helps. But until we show shades of accomplishing the kinds of things that Butler, Wichita State, etc., have accomplished, it's easy for people to brush off what Akron does as being insignificant.

Balsy, I am even more removed than you. I haven't been in school there in nearly 30 years. But trust me, alums are pissed. They may not seem passionate about Athletics at Akron, but they do feel strongly about the degrees they received, and how they will be perceived as the University changes. And they've stopped donating money, which is probably the biggest voice we have.

1981 Grad. I'd love to see those Bandwagon "I'd rather watch the Suckeyes on TV" guys treat Akron the same way. We're ranked higher than them right now, and probably will be for the remainder of the season. If they are true Bandwagoners who gravitate to the team that's the best, and they live in within short driving distance of the JAR, they have no excuse anymore.

Let me try to address a few things: 1) This isn't the first season that they have tried to "save" many seating combinations for the purpose of multi-game packages. I think it's a bad idea. 2) In past seasons, we've often been told that the lower bowl is "sold out" to season ticket holders. I think the only exception is the section where the visiting guests sit. Maybe someone has a current update on that. 3) I'm not going through another season listening to complaints about the JAR as a reason why fans aren't coming. 4) The 2,600 for a conference opener, with a long winning streak and a huge road win a few days earlier, is pathetic.