skip-zip

This is what I was thinking. If Cowlumbus State had a football game on that night, I doubt this would have happened. I've had to beg to get "our local D-1A college" games turned on in this place before, and now this? But since most of the OSWho fans are bandwagoners, they'll be showing up for this soccer game and saying that they've been Zips fans their whole lives.

My problem with any of these places is that it will be Friday night at 11pm. Won't they have either DJs or Live Music?

Dysfunctional is a good description. It's confusing and flat-out just doesn't make sense how we could have, no... SHOULD have beaten the MAC champs?! We're probably the worst team in all of D-1A football, get absolutely rolled by NIU, yet... whatever, it does no good to try and understand it. Again, the MAC is so pathetic it's just begging for a mediocre school to dominate the conference and garner illegitimate Top 25 rankings. Come on, iCoach! Make us that illegitimate Top 25 team! Like Marshall did? Yes, it does seem like it's not that difficult of a task. I've never liked the "Miami beat NIU, and we almost beat Miami, so maybe we could compete with NIU now" logic. It's one game, and it's a major upset. But I do feel as if we were playing better at the end of the season, despite the fact that it was also the easiest part of the schedule. The problem is, most of the guys that made things happen this year are graduating. If we had shown some improvement at the end of the year, and could attribute it to the growth of young players who might get even better in the future, I might be more inclined to buy into that thought. What really sickens me is that Miami did this with their backup QB. Wasn't this something like his 4th game? And he throws for 333 yards against NIU? So much for the "we need to give guys time to develop" argument. If someone is a good player, they will start to produce when given the opportunity. We need to be able to RECRUIT more of that level of player. Wagner certainly never had to wear the "just give him some time" label for very long. I'm tired of waiting for guys to develop and grow. Coaches can only do so much with guys who struggle to produce.

I loved it. I only wish we did the same.

I see this possibly happening too. Who would be the third team? Hopefully they don't think it's the team we played last night. From everything you hear around the Horizon Detroit is supposed to be the third best team. If that is the case the only way the Horizon gets 3 bids is if CSU stays hot for most of the season but somehow lands Butler in the tournament semi-finals and loses. Then Butler goes on to lose in the finals to Detroit. In that case I could see Butler and MAYBE CSU getting at-large consideration. Otherwise, forget about it. Detroit is nowhere close to being an at-large team. I think it's still remote to think they'd take 3 teams from that league, even if Detroit wins the Horizon tournament. If that happened, I'm afraid CSU or Butler would have to get sent home. As far as Detroit as an at-large, I looked at their schedule/results. They already have 4 losses, from what I can see. And I'd like to see them try to get the tournament committee to forget about a spanking at home to a MAC team who is not at-large material themselves right now.

I see this possibly happening too. Who would be the third team? Hopefully they don't think it's the team we played last night.

My thoughts... 1) If Detroit is a possible contender for the Horizon title, I didn't see it. They looked silly at home against an Akron team that is still trying to find itself. 2) A good effort to guard some people totally threw this Detroit team out of sync offensively. That's an incredible amount of turnovers. Do Horizon League teams play poor defense if they think this Detroit team is so good? 3) As Quickzip said, we switched Abreu and Roberts to get the newcomers mixed in a little more with the experienced guys. I think it took a little pressure off of him. He may end up being the best dribble-drive option we have, which could open up more scoring opportunities. But I want to see him start to make a lot better decisions when it comes to deciding to shoot. 4) I'd like to see Egner and Diggs mixed in with the starters a little more too. I think these two guys have the potential to be the biggest contributors this year among the reserves. 5) Darryl definitely adds strength to the bench. I just hope this move doesn't decrease his minutes, because I think we still need him out there to give us the best chances to have a great season. 6) McClanahan is exceeding my expectations right now. But I still see a lot of that same guy who looks panicked, and rushes shots. And I've never liked his potential for consistency from long range with that long (and often unbalanced) shooting motion he has either. I said at the beginning of the season that if we started getting more out of him than 10 min. per game as fill-in player that I'd be happy, and he's certainly doing that. 7) Euton as a suitable replacement for McKnight? Please. If that ever materializes, it's a long way off.

The absence of Wagner is unbelievable.

Sadly, a couple of things that we could call our strengths this year, such as our Sr. experience at RB and WR, might be added to our list of weaknesses come next year. But hopefully, we'll find out that those positions really weren't that strong to begin with.

I wish I could convince myself of the same thing. It might take away some of the sting of not looking so hot early on. But, we have 2 Seniors and 2 Juniors in the starting lineup, along with a Soph. who got significant Freshman-year experience. And a Sr. in Bardo as one of the early guys off the bench. Can we really call ourselves "young"? I don't know. And how does that experience level stack up against our competition, especially in conference play?

Exactly. I'm just pointing out to those who might not know that they certainly don't live in a warm, sunny beach climate. In fact, their summer weather is actually far cooler than ours.

FYI - Northern California is not San Diego.

Well said, especially on the points I highlighted. You saved me from a lot of typing

My immediate thought upon hearing that was "The feeling's mutual". +1

This is pretty consistent with my thoughts. Unfortunately, this was a year where we could have won, and next year was going to be the "down" year, as far as personnel is concerned. Do we then consider that we're making progress if we win 2 games or more? I don't know. Consider that LO only won 8 games in his first 3 years combined, and he ended up staying here for several more seasons. I certainly don't want a repeat of that. If we recognize that this guy does not have what it takes to be successful, then I'd like to see him gone sooner rather than later. And I can't be impressed with what I've seen so far, on a number of different levels.

Who are these people that are buying out both sides of the lower level reserved? There is never anyone in their seats, i find it hard to believe that the entire bottom area is sold out. Create two sections for students behind the visitor bench, leave the rest and everybody wins. Zachthezip hit the nail on the head with the reasons why the behind the basket seats are terrible as well. I'm just being realistic and giving you what the AD's perspective would probably be. When you have trouble filling in a smaller section of student seats, you generally aren't thinking about increasing the number of student seats you have to fill. This is part of what I think about when I contemplate this issue too. I'd love to see the students occupying a couple of sections behind the opponents bench, but when I see so many empty seats behind the baskets on a daily basis, what indication does anyone have that many of those seats would not sit empty for most games?

This is funny. I was talking to some Cowlumbus State fans over the holiday, and they are totally defending this guy's comments. Told me I am "concentrating on every little word he said" and "not understanding that he really meant", instead of understanding that at least "most" of their games are against competitive teams. Hilarious...but expected.

If by chance you're referring me, you're misrepresenting me. I've consistently said that losing Brett would hurt in the short run. In fact, I don't recall anyone saying that things would be better in the short run without Brett. But maybe you can cite something specifically that I'm not recalling. It's all over the "suspension" thread. I don't recall who all said these things, and wasn't calling anyone out.

What? Do you honestly think it's ok to lose games as long as you got some young guys some extra playing time? I don't know any coach who would buy into that idea. If our coach determines that playing our starters 30+ minutes a game gives us the best chance to win, then expect to see our starters continue to play those kind of minutes in these kinds of games. Many teams have to go this route in order to win games. With our lack of experience on the bench this year, maybe we're going to have to do that to win games too. The young guys will never be able to contribute if they aren't given adequate experience. Which would you rather have, an extra win or two early in the season when the wins don't count so much by playing the veterans long minutes, or a stronger, more experienced bench at the end of the season when postseason play is on the line by giving decent PT to the younger players early in the season? Take your pick, because you can't have it both ways. Dave, I know where you're going with this line of thinking. But you don't sacrifice victories to give other guys more experience. Save those situations for the ends of big wins, big losses, and horrible seasons. If your best chance of winning is to play your starters for 40 min., you play your starters for 40 min. Should someone have told that coach down there in Cowlumbus that he should not have played his starters 35+ minutes last year because he needed to think more about the future? He was simply doing what he thought was best to win each game. I don't know coaches who'd think otherwise. I'd like to see a postgame press conference where someone tries to sell people on the idea that "sure, we could have won this game with our starters playing more, but we decided it might be more important to give some other guys some experience for later in the season".

We don't need Brett. We have Dakotah. We'll be just fine. He has more "up side" than Brett. (I can't believe I was reading some of this in another thread). Of course we miss a senior, who was a point scorer, and has been a go-to guy in many "we need a basket" situations over the last few years. Were a few people on here just in denial? Steve's lack of shot attempts is a mystery to me. It certainly appears to me that he's more focused on quarterbacking the offense than scoring points this year, but I don't know why either.

What? Do you honestly think it's ok to lose games as long as you got some young guys some extra playing time? I don't know any coach who would buy into that idea. If our coach determines that playing our starters 30+ minutes a game gives us the best chance to win, then expect to see our starters continue to play those kind of minutes in these kinds of games. Many teams have to go this route in order to win games. With our lack of experience on the bench this year, maybe we're going to have to do that to win games too.

Excuse me? We give up 64 points to a team averaging in the mid 70s in points and you think the problem is defense? We scored 51 freaking points and turned it over countless times. No one could create their own shot. Our offense was terrible tonight and we still had a chance to win. I disagree, the D was not the problem. Right on the money. Not that our defense didn't have breakdowns tonight, but our overall defense, and our ability to keep the score down, is the only think that kept us IN this game.

His comments are beyond laughable. How do you even react to something so utterly hypocritical? Someone needs to get this guy a mirror, and possibly a new set of glasses.

I predict 4,200 combined attendance. I say 3,400 (paid) with at least 200 no-shows in lower reserved because some of the really old people will stay home to start preparing for out-of-town visitors. I really hope a decent amount of students stick around for this one.