nova game impressions

[fadada1]

went to the game up here in philly, here are some of my impressions of everything:

1 - that good catholic upbringing sure didn't teach their students any manners. i've been to a bunch of away games for football, and have never (except texas, and that's expected) heard some of the things that were said to us (took my girlfriend). mind you, i've said some of these things, but again, with texas and okie state, you're obligated. bunch of rich, snobby, spoiled little children. on a positive note, the rest of the fans were very warm and friendly.

2 - the "pavillion": what a piece of **** this place is. while warm and cozy (and hot as hell inside), it's a dump. we had seats from an alumni on about the 40 yard line. the OU section was somewhere up in the rafters - seriously. we had great seats, and could barely see the OU crowd. strange configuration. student section was wild - but i've been to MUCH louder games in LNC.

3 - game: i'm having trouble figuring out why our guards can make crisp passes when trying to break the press. very poor, un-sampson like play. on several occasions, we never ran a set play. very disappointed in the guard play. their #2 scored at will on our guards. clearly we need some help with one-on-one guarding. forward play was solid. we should have bullied these guys out of the stadium.

4 - i've NEVER seen bigger home cooking by the refs. the only explaination: villanova saw the tech football game, called the big 12 office, got the same refs... the rest is history. i saw 2 or 3 legitimate fouls by us in the second half. the rest... i bumped their players more from the stands. while there were poor calls both ways, the majority went against OU. now i know where that $45K/year tuition money goes.

overall, very disappointed with the play. not the usual sampson-like intensity. i think we make a big statement this year (and this would've helped), but we need to find some fire.

[crawfish]

Dude, 10 points is usually what home court is worth. Without that, the game is dead even.

I see it as their guards lived up to hype, our big men lived up to hype, and homecourt was the deciding factor.

[OKC-SLC]

we played well enough to win, but they just played better. being at home helped.

this was the second road game for several of these kids, and Nova isn't Tulsa.

[GottaHavePride]

Anyone else notice that Curtis Shaw was the ref?

I heard them announce that and couldn't stop myself from shouting "CUUUUUURTIS SHAAAAAAAAAAW!"

[OklahomaTrombone]

heh...me too...

[NormanPride]

I was frustrated with Taj's inability to make a layup for about 70% of the game. It wasn't until the end where both he and Everett woke up and started making plays.

That being said, Nova's guards are crazy. I saw some NBA type plays out there, and I feel good that we played pretty evenly with them. I think we're both teams that could go deep in the tourney.