Thursday, November 22, 2007

Beasley/Mayo

- Kansas State is incredibly athletic, all the way around, except for the white kid from Minnesota. It's funny that Bob Huggins helped put this team together, because it reminds me alot of some of his Cincinnati teams: really athletic, but no all that disciplined and kind of all over the place, both on offense and defense.

- Beasley is getting all the press, and rightfully so, but his fellow freshman point guard Jacob Pullen is really impressing me so far. He can score going to the rim or outside, he's playing some great pressure defense against the George Mason guards, and the offense seems to just run more smoothly when he's in there.

- These announcers are killing me. They brought up before the game how K-State is so young and Mason has all the experience. Now they are using that as the storyline no matter what. Example: K-State up 18-13, Mason hits a three and the quote is, "You see how George Mason's experience led to them not panicking down five?" And there were 10 minutes left in the first half.

- Geez, K-State is basically a street ball team. I wish I would have known that before I wagered on them. They look like idiots. Probably why they're losing 39-30 to Mason at half.

- I think I severely underrated George Mason. They look really good.

- You've probably heard rumors, but I'm going to go ahead and confirm that Michael Beasley is ridiculous. He was in a bit of foul trouble in the first half, but with 10 minutes left he has 24 points on 10-13 shooting. And he's doing it inside, outside, with the dribble, mid-range. Wow. Just wow.

- K State might be able to come back, except that every time they start to make a run they get stupid. Forcing shots, dumb passes, or just leaving Mason's guys open on defense. They're just completely out of control.

- K-State goes down 87-77. Geez what a waste of talent. I hope those guys can figure out a way to pull it together.

- We're four minutes into the USC/San Diego game and OJ Mayo hasn't attempted a shot yet. I'm so confused.

- This is NOT the same OJ Mayo I saw in the McDonald's game. He's totally in the flow of the offense, has given it up to get teammates easier shots when he easily could have fired it up, and is busting his ass on defense (he's a terrible off-the-ball defender, but not for lack of effort.) With him playing like this, plus Gibson and Hackett, they might end up being pretty good.

- Ok, I'm all for balance and everything, but it's halftime and Mayo has taken three shots, all three outside jumpers. He's involved and all, but not looking for his shot. He tried to drive once and got called for the charge. It's almost like the time Kobe Bryant got all pissy about people saying he shot too much, and took something like seven shots in the game. OJ needs to look to score more than this. It's no surprise they are up only 27-24 at half. Meanwhile over on ESPNU, Gonzaga reminds me why I used to have a "never bet on Gonzaga" rule. Should probably go back to that.

- 3 second half possessions, three shots by Mayo, lead up to 9 already. Much better.

- Mayo is not only a bad off the ball defender, but it appears he's subpar at guarding the guy with the ball as well. This is an interesting development.

- Gonzaga wins, but doesn't cover due to their complete and total inability to handle the press with 22 seconds left. It's also very weird to watch them without Raivio. I think he was on the Wade Lookingbill eight year plan.

- I'm really confused by Mayo. He looks like a slightly above average college freshman. And he just lost his man again who hit a wide open three. I wonder if he got into the weed or something. Completely and totally unimpressive.

- Maybe it's that he's just kind of disinterested half the time out there. He just had a span where he hit a nice jumper, then picked the ball from the point guard trying to bring it up and dunked. Totally electric, the opposite of what I'd seen so far. Anyway, USC wins 60-50, and should have won by 30. Jerks.

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