With about 6 or 7 minutes remaining, Few pulled Timme, effectively saying the Zags remaining goal was to escape this hell-hole without any injuries other than to their pride.
I don't know if I'd say they're most talented. Think of T J Ford, Durant, Mo Bamba, some of Shaka's incredibly talented teams. But this team is VERY well coached on defense, and offense; incredibly well prepared defensively--the way they double teamed Timme when he stepped low into the paint was genius. This team was moving without the ball creating open shots, making the extra pass to get a better shot, etc. They played disciplined. I haven't seen a Texas team this well coached both on offense and defense ever. And that is not hyperbole.
I started to take exception to this statement, but the only team I might offer to counter your suggestion is TJs final four team. Barnes coached defense quite well, but I suspect TJ's native talent overcame some of Barnes' shortcomings as an offensive coach. So I ended up agreeing with you, but I'd still put a couple of Barnes' best teams up for consideration as "extremely well coached".
Zags may be a bit overrated this year, or they may just be starting slow and will be a lot better by March. There is always a process of improvement involved within each season.
This years Zags are basically the same squad minus Holmgren, who only made one basket on us last year. Timmay hung 37 on us last year - last night he scored 18. That's your difference I think. The way our guys teamed up on Timmay and shut him down was good damn execution of some good damn xo's.
We'll probably never have another TJ or Durant, but I think the scouts see guys like Mitchell and Morris as sure-fire 1st rounders. NBA talent is NBA talent. The things we've been missing since like 2008 are the glue guys. Cunningham showed spurts of that last season, but now? Disu can rebound, block, and shoot from further than 3 feet away Allen plays gritty (although he had a rough game yesterday) Rice has a chip on his shoulder and can do both offensive and defensive things well, like when his NMSU team got through a bunch of upset wins Hunter is as good as advertised and can distribute as well as shoot Carr is a leader Adding those freshman superstar pieces is going to make us a nightmare matchup for pretty much any team in the country not named Houston. The one thing we're lacking is a big who can body up with a bruiser, as we got exposed against Purdue. I still think that will hurt us come tournament time, but if I'm a HS big man right now, Texas would be at/near the top of my list. I'm thinking if this year's squad had last year's schedule, the improved talent and preparation with an extra year under Beard would give us at least +6 wins going into the NCAA tournament.
Gonzaga is probably no less than a two seed come March. It is early, but the box score indicates the game was not a fluke night. Fg and 3pt % was about even as were rebounds. The big difference was on turnovers and that was the Texas harassing defense. The defense last night reminded me of Tech’s defense when Beard took them to the championship game. They play defense like that consistently they will still be tough even on an off night from 3. They may still have some problems with teams that have bruising bigs but they have the guards to overcome that. I didn’t see them take many bad shots (at least after the game was joined) and if they continue to do that on offense they will be tough out. Conference play is going to be fun, especially now that we will have a real home-court advantage (not that little 12 officials won’t attempt to screw us anyway).
Losing so early may well help the Zags to be a better team. Texas beating a #2 ranked team Will help the Horns.
WHEEE! Maybe next week he will invite McKendree since they are the first seed in the NCAA Bowling Tournament PT Barnum has to be laughing his *** off. I really hope that Kansas, oSu, Tech, and TCU can find a real conference to join or create one.
The way the football team’s defense was swarming to the ball—playing tough and smart—maybe Beard was in Kansas on Saturday.
Wow. Must admit that the margin of victory surprises me. UK is no slouch. Zags are really good. Horns are in the process of making a statement. This year is really gonna be fun.
