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Sunday, December 03, 2006
(Updated with new links at 8:17 a.m.)
Looking for five plays that were the keys to Northern Iowa's 57-48 win over Bucknell Saturday? Then look no further than the five three-pointers hit by the visiting Panthers.
Write the story of any one of the five. Highlight it. Ctrl-C. Ctrl-V. Repeat three more times. That's your ballgame in five paragraphs.
Sure, accuracy requires a little bit of tweaking here and there, but it would be a minor edit to what otherwise was a Groundhog Day afternoon for the Bison. Each three came on a Northern Iowa possession in which Bucknell played incredible defense. Each three came after UNI had all but run out of time on the 35-second shot clock. And each one came in key situations, each foiling any bucknell effort at a run or momentum swing.
There were other big plays. The four-points UNI got when Bucknell coach Pat Flannery got hit with a technical arguing Abe Badmus' third personal comes to mind as one. Coming with UNI holding a 45-42, and moments after a no-call when Badmus was knocked to the floor trying to finish inside against UNI's Eric Coleman, the four free throws -- two by Brooks McKowen on the T and two by Jared Josten on the Badmus foul -- turned a one-possession game into a three-possession affair.
It was not as big a swing, though, as. say the three McKowen hit two minutes later. That one came as the shot clock expired, just when it looked like Bucknell, which had clawed its way back to within three, might be about to get a huge defensive stop. Bucknell never again got within one possession.
It was one of three treys for McKowen, who scored 15 of his game-high 17 points in the second half. All McKowen's three-pointers came in the final eight minutes of the game, each at similar key moments, in similar shot clock situations.
The first, with Bucknell up by one (40-39), came after UNI got an offensive rebound when Grant Stout missed a three with one second on the shot clock. The second came with 5:31 to play, after Bucknell had managed to get even again with a Darren Mastropaolo layup. Again it came after a missed three-pointer with the shot clock about to buzz, and an offensive rebound. For good measure, this one McKowen drilled with 33 of the shot clock's 35 seconds already gone.
"It came down to possessions, They hit a couple big corner shots and got a couple big offensive rebounds . . . That really hurt us," Flannery said,
"Late in the shot clock . . . every time they made a run, one of our guys would make a shot," said UNI forward Eric Coleman, who scored 12 of his 14-points in the first half, when he went 6 for 7 from the floor. Coleman, by the way, also had 10 boards to complete a double-double.
McKowen was not the only three-pointer hero for the Panthers. Grant Stout, a 6-8 senior forward, also had a pair of treys. Naturally, each came after Bucknell had UNI on the shot clock ropes. Stout's first, with 2:19 to play in the first half, came just after Bucknell center Chris McNaughton left the floor with his third personal. With Darren Mastropaolo also in foul trouble (2 in the first half), Flannery chose to use sophomore 6-11 Josh Linthicum down the stretch. With the shot clock running down, Linthicum got lost inside on a switch as Stout popped out to the arc on the right side. McKowen found him there, Stout beat the buzzer and what had been a 1-point UNI lead was back to four.
Stout's second came early in the second half, after Bucknell had cut UNI's 28-24 halftime lead to 30-29. The ball went out of bounds off a Bison with two second to go on the shot clock. Turned out two seconds was precisely how long it took Stout to step out to the arc off a Coleman screen, catch a long skip pass and drain the trey.
"The easiest shots to shoot are late in the shot clock. You know you are going to shoot as soon as you get it," Stout said.
There were other factors. Bucknell again struggled to find a third option on offense. With McNaughton's minutes limited to 27 by his foul woes, that was an even bigger problem. The big German played some of his best ball of the season, scoring 10 points and grabbing 9 rebounds. But when he was off the floor, Bucknell had no inside threat. Mastropaolo, so assertive on offense early in the season, looked like a bobblehead doll, head faking and pump faking repeatedly each time he caught the ball down low, then kicking it out, for some reason hesitant to go to the rack against Stout, who guarded him much of the afternoon.
Badmus had 11 points on 5 for 12 shooting. He was 1 for 5 from the three-point arc, but at least was not passing up the open jumpers the way he has most of the season.
No other Bison made more than two shots. Donald Brown, who led the team in scoring in the wins over Yale and St. Francis, was on the panel of the milk carton opposite Mastropaolo. Jason Vegotsky, who only managed to get open for three shots (making one) is on the milk carton, too. Matter of fact, it is pretty crowded. John Griffin (6 points), who was 2 for 6 from the field and missed all three treys he took, was the only Bison other than McNaughton or Badmus with more than five points.
The way Stout and Coleman managed to light up anybody not named Mastropaolo or McNaughton was also a problem. Coleman had a monster first half, and is a heckuva ballplayer, undersized as a center at 6-6, but able to make up for it because he is strong as a plow horse, quick as a race horse and jumps like a show horse. Truth be told, his quiet second half was not so much because Bucknell made any defensive adjustments as it was because Mastropaolo or McNaughton was guarding him most of the time. Most of his points came against Linthicum, who Coleman treated like a 6-11 speedbump.
All those factors, though, the Bison might have been able to overcome. The big three-pointers, were too much.
"We were able to make a couple of shots in the second half as the shot clock ran down'"said UNI coach Ben Jacobson. "That was the difference,"
NOTES: The announced crowd was 4,011, the smallest crowd for a Saturday game in Sojka since the Cornell game Dec. 17 of last year. That game was with students on break . . . That figure is 11 over Sojka's official capacity, but the place was far from full. The student sections were only about half full and there were a number of no shows among the season ticket holders on each side . . . Bucknell now with two losses in Sojka for the first time since the 2003-2004 season when they went 10-2 there . . . Also on the Bison milk carton: brawny junior power forward Andrew Morrison, whose minutes have vanished since the Penn State game. Morrison, whose strength would seem to have made him a reasonable matchup on Coleman,did not get off the bench . . . Bucknell left Lewisburg a short time after the game, headed to D.C. for Sunday's meeting with George Mason . . . Northern Iowa's 54.2 percent first half marked the fifth half a Bison opponent has shot 50 percent of better from the field . . . Last season it happened in 10 halves the entire season, six outside of the two game mini-slide at Santa Clara and at Duke . . . Bucknell had a player foul out nine times all of last season. With Badmus and Mastropaolo each disqualified for the second time this season, the Bison have now tallied 8 foul outs already this season.
Postgame audio clips (Pat Flannery and John Griffin)
Gameblog
Looking for five plays that were the keys to Northern Iowa's 57-48 win over Bucknell Saturday? Then look no further than the five three-pointers hit by the visiting Panthers.
Write the story of any one of the five. Highlight it. Ctrl-C. Ctrl-V. Repeat three more times. That's your ballgame in five paragraphs.
Sure, accuracy requires a little bit of tweaking here and there, but it would be a minor edit to what otherwise was a Groundhog Day afternoon for the Bison. Each three came on a Northern Iowa possession in which Bucknell played incredible defense. Each three came after UNI had all but run out of time on the 35-second shot clock. And each one came in key situations, each foiling any bucknell effort at a run or momentum swing.
There were other big plays. The four-points UNI got when Bucknell coach Pat Flannery got hit with a technical arguing Abe Badmus' third personal comes to mind as one. Coming with UNI holding a 45-42, and moments after a no-call when Badmus was knocked to the floor trying to finish inside against UNI's Eric Coleman, the four free throws -- two by Brooks McKowen on the T and two by Jared Josten on the Badmus foul -- turned a one-possession game into a three-possession affair.
It was not as big a swing, though, as. say the three McKowen hit two minutes later. That one came as the shot clock expired, just when it looked like Bucknell, which had clawed its way back to within three, might be about to get a huge defensive stop. Bucknell never again got within one possession.
It was one of three treys for McKowen, who scored 15 of his game-high 17 points in the second half. All McKowen's three-pointers came in the final eight minutes of the game, each at similar key moments, in similar shot clock situations.
The first, with Bucknell up by one (40-39), came after UNI got an offensive rebound when Grant Stout missed a three with one second on the shot clock. The second came with 5:31 to play, after Bucknell had managed to get even again with a Darren Mastropaolo layup. Again it came after a missed three-pointer with the shot clock about to buzz, and an offensive rebound. For good measure, this one McKowen drilled with 33 of the shot clock's 35 seconds already gone.
"It came down to possessions, They hit a couple big corner shots and got a couple big offensive rebounds . . . That really hurt us," Flannery said,
"Late in the shot clock . . . every time they made a run, one of our guys would make a shot," said UNI forward Eric Coleman, who scored 12 of his 14-points in the first half, when he went 6 for 7 from the floor. Coleman, by the way, also had 10 boards to complete a double-double.
McKowen was not the only three-pointer hero for the Panthers. Grant Stout, a 6-8 senior forward, also had a pair of treys. Naturally, each came after Bucknell had UNI on the shot clock ropes. Stout's first, with 2:19 to play in the first half, came just after Bucknell center Chris McNaughton left the floor with his third personal. With Darren Mastropaolo also in foul trouble (2 in the first half), Flannery chose to use sophomore 6-11 Josh Linthicum down the stretch. With the shot clock running down, Linthicum got lost inside on a switch as Stout popped out to the arc on the right side. McKowen found him there, Stout beat the buzzer and what had been a 1-point UNI lead was back to four.
Stout's second came early in the second half, after Bucknell had cut UNI's 28-24 halftime lead to 30-29. The ball went out of bounds off a Bison with two second to go on the shot clock. Turned out two seconds was precisely how long it took Stout to step out to the arc off a Coleman screen, catch a long skip pass and drain the trey.
"The easiest shots to shoot are late in the shot clock. You know you are going to shoot as soon as you get it," Stout said.
There were other factors. Bucknell again struggled to find a third option on offense. With McNaughton's minutes limited to 27 by his foul woes, that was an even bigger problem. The big German played some of his best ball of the season, scoring 10 points and grabbing 9 rebounds. But when he was off the floor, Bucknell had no inside threat. Mastropaolo, so assertive on offense early in the season, looked like a bobblehead doll, head faking and pump faking repeatedly each time he caught the ball down low, then kicking it out, for some reason hesitant to go to the rack against Stout, who guarded him much of the afternoon.
Badmus had 11 points on 5 for 12 shooting. He was 1 for 5 from the three-point arc, but at least was not passing up the open jumpers the way he has most of the season.
No other Bison made more than two shots. Donald Brown, who led the team in scoring in the wins over Yale and St. Francis, was on the panel of the milk carton opposite Mastropaolo. Jason Vegotsky, who only managed to get open for three shots (making one) is on the milk carton, too. Matter of fact, it is pretty crowded. John Griffin (6 points), who was 2 for 6 from the field and missed all three treys he took, was the only Bison other than McNaughton or Badmus with more than five points.
The way Stout and Coleman managed to light up anybody not named Mastropaolo or McNaughton was also a problem. Coleman had a monster first half, and is a heckuva ballplayer, undersized as a center at 6-6, but able to make up for it because he is strong as a plow horse, quick as a race horse and jumps like a show horse. Truth be told, his quiet second half was not so much because Bucknell made any defensive adjustments as it was because Mastropaolo or McNaughton was guarding him most of the time. Most of his points came against Linthicum, who Coleman treated like a 6-11 speedbump.
All those factors, though, the Bison might have been able to overcome. The big three-pointers, were too much.
"We were able to make a couple of shots in the second half as the shot clock ran down'"said UNI coach Ben Jacobson. "That was the difference,"
NOTES: The announced crowd was 4,011, the smallest crowd for a Saturday game in Sojka since the Cornell game Dec. 17 of last year. That game was with students on break . . . That figure is 11 over Sojka's official capacity, but the place was far from full. The student sections were only about half full and there were a number of no shows among the season ticket holders on each side . . . Bucknell now with two losses in Sojka for the first time since the 2003-2004 season when they went 10-2 there . . . Also on the Bison milk carton: brawny junior power forward Andrew Morrison, whose minutes have vanished since the Penn State game. Morrison, whose strength would seem to have made him a reasonable matchup on Coleman,did not get off the bench . . . Bucknell left Lewisburg a short time after the game, headed to D.C. for Sunday's meeting with George Mason . . . Northern Iowa's 54.2 percent first half marked the fifth half a Bison opponent has shot 50 percent of better from the field . . . Last season it happened in 10 halves the entire season, six outside of the two game mini-slide at Santa Clara and at Duke . . . Bucknell had a player foul out nine times all of last season. With Badmus and Mastropaolo each disqualified for the second time this season, the Bison have now tallied 8 foul outs already this season.
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