WVU/Pitt, Illinois/Indiana
1. All credit to Ronald Ramon for drilling the triple at the buzzer that gave Pittsburgh a 55-54 win over West Virginia Thursday night, but don't overlook Keith Benjamin, who provided the assist on the play. Panthers coach Jamie Dixon had called timeout to set up a final play, but by the time Benjamin received the ball -- with three seconds left, at the top of the key -- the play had broken and Pittsburgh was in scramble mode. Rather than panicking, Benjamin drove left as the clock wound down. The defense converged on him as the clock wound down, but again, he didn't lose his poise. Feeling Ramon's defender slough off, he flicked a pass to the wing, giving Ramon just enough time to catch and fire the game-winner.
In professional basketball, you rarely see players rush in the waning seconds, but college is a different story. I was even a little surprised that Benjamin didn't panic and loft an almost impossible three-pointer when he first received the ball, and even more shocked that he didn't toss up a runner when given the first sliver of daylight on his drive. But his patience, as much as Ramon's shot, won the game for his team.
(Also, if WVU wants to complain about Pittsburgh's bucket that pulled them within one, I'll listen. The Panthers were inbounding the ball under their own bucket down 53-50, and Benjamin threw a pass up high to DeJuan Blair in the post. Blair went up high with one hand and deftly tapped the ball back to Benjamin before coming down with it. It appeared to me, however, that Benjamin only got one foot down before catching the ball, which means he should've been ruled out of bounds. How ESPN announcers Dave Pasch and Len Elmore -- who impressively noted that the play was made possible by the WVU defender leaving Benjamin to double Blair as the pass went up -- missed this is beyond me, given how many times they showed the replay).
2. The millionth example of a coach overthinking something: Indiana and Illinois tied at 69 with two seconds left in overtime Thursday night. On the line is Shaun Pruitt, a 55% free-throw shooter who missed a pair of foul shots at the end of regulation that might have won the Illini the game. His first attempt is woefully short, a line drive that richocheted hard off the front rim. He turns away from the basket, talking to himself in frustration. Teammates Demetri McCamey and Jeffrey, son of Michael walk to the line to give him some words of encouragement, while ESPN color analyst Jay Bilas commends them for trying to pick up a teammate. Still, Pruitt looks like he's a serious underdog to make the second.
Indiana coach Kelvin Sampson calls timeout, trying to ice a shooter who simply cannot be iced any further.
The whole point of calling a timeout and making a kid think about it to get in his head, to get him out of his rhythm. Pruitt was already in his own head, and the only rhythm he was feeling was the sound of his repeated bricks from the stripe echoing in his head.
Yeah, I know, Pruitt missed anyway -- long this time -- and Indiana went on to win in double overtime. But the point remains that nothing that could have happened during that timeout would have made Pruitt any less likely to make that shot. Instead, he gave the young man the opportunity to re-compose himself, and gave the Illinois coaches the chance to calm him down.
It was also Indiana's final timeout, which meant that once Pruitt did miss, the Hoosiers couldn't stop the clock and set up a play for a long inbounds pass and a shot.
3. Really impressed with Indiana winning in that environment, full of venom recognizing Hoosier star freshman Eric Gordon's first visit to Champaign. (I don't have the space to get into why Illini fans hate Gordon, but briefly, Gordon had apparently committed to Illinois before enrolling at Indiana, and the guys in orange aren't sure that Sampson's recruitment of Gordon was on the up and up. For more details, try Google).
To be honest, I expected a strong effort at the outset from an Illinois team that has this year shown plenty of pluck but little ability to score. So I wasn't surprised, not a bit, when they came out defending well, and my eyebrows raised only a bit when they hit three-pointers on four consecutive possessions during one stretch in the early-going. If Indiana could weather the early storm and not let the crowd -- booing on every Gordon touch -- get to them, eventually their superior talent would be enough for them to win comfortably.
The Hoosiers were up to the task despite a rough first half for Gordon. At the break, Illinois held a four-point lead, but I really felt like there was no way a team that has been as anemic offensively as they have could score enough to beat a good team like the Hoosiers.
But then, the second half started, and McCamey was still hitting threes and the lead stretched to double digits. At that point, with one of the toughest crowds in the country booing and yelling who-knows-what at their team's 18-year-old best player, it would have been hard to blame Indiana for packing it in. Instead, the Hoosiers hung in there, even as Gordon continued to struggle.
But they hung in there, getting a basket here and there, a stop when they needed one, and eventually Illinois' shots -- particularly from the free throw line -- stopped going in. Credit the Hoosiers for still being in the game when they did.
In professional basketball, you rarely see players rush in the waning seconds, but college is a different story. I was even a little surprised that Benjamin didn't panic and loft an almost impossible three-pointer when he first received the ball, and even more shocked that he didn't toss up a runner when given the first sliver of daylight on his drive. But his patience, as much as Ramon's shot, won the game for his team.
(Also, if WVU wants to complain about Pittsburgh's bucket that pulled them within one, I'll listen. The Panthers were inbounding the ball under their own bucket down 53-50, and Benjamin threw a pass up high to DeJuan Blair in the post. Blair went up high with one hand and deftly tapped the ball back to Benjamin before coming down with it. It appeared to me, however, that Benjamin only got one foot down before catching the ball, which means he should've been ruled out of bounds. How ESPN announcers Dave Pasch and Len Elmore -- who impressively noted that the play was made possible by the WVU defender leaving Benjamin to double Blair as the pass went up -- missed this is beyond me, given how many times they showed the replay).
2. The millionth example of a coach overthinking something: Indiana and Illinois tied at 69 with two seconds left in overtime Thursday night. On the line is Shaun Pruitt, a 55% free-throw shooter who missed a pair of foul shots at the end of regulation that might have won the Illini the game. His first attempt is woefully short, a line drive that richocheted hard off the front rim. He turns away from the basket, talking to himself in frustration. Teammates Demetri McCamey and Jeffrey, son of Michael walk to the line to give him some words of encouragement, while ESPN color analyst Jay Bilas commends them for trying to pick up a teammate. Still, Pruitt looks like he's a serious underdog to make the second.
Indiana coach Kelvin Sampson calls timeout, trying to ice a shooter who simply cannot be iced any further.
The whole point of calling a timeout and making a kid think about it to get in his head, to get him out of his rhythm. Pruitt was already in his own head, and the only rhythm he was feeling was the sound of his repeated bricks from the stripe echoing in his head.
Yeah, I know, Pruitt missed anyway -- long this time -- and Indiana went on to win in double overtime. But the point remains that nothing that could have happened during that timeout would have made Pruitt any less likely to make that shot. Instead, he gave the young man the opportunity to re-compose himself, and gave the Illinois coaches the chance to calm him down.
It was also Indiana's final timeout, which meant that once Pruitt did miss, the Hoosiers couldn't stop the clock and set up a play for a long inbounds pass and a shot.
3. Really impressed with Indiana winning in that environment, full of venom recognizing Hoosier star freshman Eric Gordon's first visit to Champaign. (I don't have the space to get into why Illini fans hate Gordon, but briefly, Gordon had apparently committed to Illinois before enrolling at Indiana, and the guys in orange aren't sure that Sampson's recruitment of Gordon was on the up and up. For more details, try Google).
To be honest, I expected a strong effort at the outset from an Illinois team that has this year shown plenty of pluck but little ability to score. So I wasn't surprised, not a bit, when they came out defending well, and my eyebrows raised only a bit when they hit three-pointers on four consecutive possessions during one stretch in the early-going. If Indiana could weather the early storm and not let the crowd -- booing on every Gordon touch -- get to them, eventually their superior talent would be enough for them to win comfortably.
The Hoosiers were up to the task despite a rough first half for Gordon. At the break, Illinois held a four-point lead, but I really felt like there was no way a team that has been as anemic offensively as they have could score enough to beat a good team like the Hoosiers.
But then, the second half started, and McCamey was still hitting threes and the lead stretched to double digits. At that point, with one of the toughest crowds in the country booing and yelling who-knows-what at their team's 18-year-old best player, it would have been hard to blame Indiana for packing it in. Instead, the Hoosiers hung in there, even as Gordon continued to struggle.
But they hung in there, getting a basket here and there, a stop when they needed one, and eventually Illinois' shots -- particularly from the free throw line -- stopped going in. Credit the Hoosiers for still being in the game when they did.
posted by H.S. Slam, Ph.D at 12:56 AM
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