Cincinnati puts up 93

[KansasCityCats]

Yes, Buffalo wasn't an embarrassing loss...but it was embarrassing the way we were blown out in the first round by a team that only defeated one decent opponent all season (at WVU).

Houston was deep in the tourney and has NBA caliber players.

I love Miller but Lloyd deserves more credit for his accomplishments last season.

[arxpert]

Houston had no real NBA caliber players in that game. Sasser wasn't even playing. It was just a reverse Buffalo and a good coaching job in a tough road environment when the team was having a terrible Dance before that game starting with the opening 2 games. A slow boring Houston team that beat a fast team that couldn't hit 3s and wasn't prepared to neutralize their defensive approach by having Koloko step out and stretch the floor. Tubelis was not allowed to stretch the floor either in Tommy's system. The same thing is happening this year, but so far Ramey and Kerr have hit enough 3s to scrape by even when losing most of the 2nd halfs of games. Keyword So Far. Time will tell if that catches up to us sooner than later vs a team that doesn't fold early. If Ramey continues his thought process he might shoot us out of a few games too. He shouldn't be this far relied on, but is because Pelle is wrongfully deployed.

Lloyd got his credit. I wrote the most appreciative and honest post about his success on the entire forum before March Madness began. I did that purposely knowing that he was likely going to fall short of the high expectations he had. I think this year he should be held to the standard of Conf Champions, Conf Tourney Champions, Elite 8 and if lucky maybe he can break through to what many here believe is the promise land "final 4", but is really just 1 more win than an elite 8.

Not expecting Elite 8 would be illogical for all the rigorous defense of the man's system because it's "fun to watch". The team is better, more well rounded, and has a lot more addition by subtraction that most think. More versatility, Only problem so far is Pelle's role.

[KansasCityCats]

Cincy put out some blueprints tonight that much better and more experienced teams are going to emulate and have more success with.

Cincy was defeated within the first 10 minutes of the game, but clearly this team is going to have trouble establishing their flow early in games. This only adds to my thesis until something changes.

One of the worst performances I've seen from Pelle. Tommy will eventually listen to me when we take a vicious loss. Pelle needs to be the 6th man and still get his 25 minutes. He's not built to be a starter in this system. Other players need early shots and Pelle needs to be reliable for perimeter defense on whoever is shooting hot for the opponent. Opponents are going to continue to exploit Pelle early and try to get him in foul trouble until Lloyd sees this trend and makes some changes.

Our whole bench was ineffective tonight as a result of Pelle getting 2 quick 1st half fouls and Tommy started scrambling rotations. We won because we were cherry picking all game and getting the easiest buckets imaginable while Cincy missed just enough shots to not score over 100 themselves.

Another instance of being run out of the gym in the 2nd half. Couldn't even cover the spread. Outscored 63-61 in the 2nd half. Tommy Lloyd doesn't seem to care if this team plays any defense at all on the perimeter. It's a shame.

We can play any style with any type of lineup, but it seems that Tommy is hellbent on making sure that Pelle is the least effective player on the court. He would be the guy that is supposed to play intense perimeter D, but he was taken out of the game early playing foolishly. A true 6 player team that plays 9 guys - If someone has a bad shooting night I am not certain that relying on dumping the ball inside is going to pull through. Especially with a piss poor Team FT%.

Xavier just gave up 46 points in one half to a Creighton team that we limited to 79 in the entire game. Was Sean Miller just "run out of the gym"?  According to the above post...yes.

[arxpert]

Cincy put out some blueprints tonight that much better and more experienced teams are going to emulate and have more success with.

Cincy was defeated within the first 10 minutes of the game, but clearly this team is going to have trouble establishing their flow early in games. This only adds to my thesis until something changes.

One of the worst performances I've seen from Pelle. Tommy will eventually listen to me when we take a vicious loss. Pelle needs to be the 6th man and still get his 25 minutes. He's not built to be a starter in this system. Other players need early shots and Pelle needs to be reliable for perimeter defense on whoever is shooting hot for the opponent. Opponents are going to continue to exploit Pelle early and try to get him in foul trouble until Lloyd sees this trend and makes some changes.

Our whole bench was ineffective tonight as a result of Pelle getting 2 quick 1st half fouls and Tommy started scrambling rotations. We won because we were cherry picking all game and getting the easiest buckets imaginable while Cincy missed just enough shots to not score over 100 themselves.

Another instance of being run out of the gym in the 2nd half. Couldn't even cover the spread. Outscored 63-61 in the 2nd half. Tommy Lloyd doesn't seem to care if this team plays any defense at all on the perimeter. It's a shame.

We can play any style with any type of lineup, but it seems that Tommy is hellbent on making sure that Pelle is the least effective player on the court. He would be the guy that is supposed to play intense perimeter D, but he was taken out of the game early playing foolishly. A true 6 player team that plays 9 guys - If someone has a bad shooting night I am not certain that relying on dumping the ball inside is going to pull through. Especially with a piss poor Team FT%.

Xavier just gave up 46 points in one half to a Creighton team that we limited to 79 in the entire game. Was Sean Miller just "run out of the gym"?  According to the above post...yes.

Being run out of the gym for Arizona has to do with being smoked in the 2nd half of games by teams who have no business keeping up at all with Arizona to the extent that we are lucky to win by virtue of playing slightly better early in games. Xavier tonight scored 45 in the first half and allowed 46 then dominated the 2nd half until a little petty scramble in the last 45 seconds of the game to fake-make it close. Xavier ran Creighton out of the gym in the 2nd half which is the far more important half to be strong in. Everyone who watches college basketball knows a team can go up 20-30 early and lose. It happened in the National Championship game last year. Enough's enough. We are not a 2nd half team. Time to get over it. Tommy is not that coach to get us to the last shot where as Miller was. If you don't like the results, that's on you, but I'd prefer to not be blown out in the Sweet 16 again as a 1 or 2 seed. Miller never was embarrassed in a 2nd weekend game in his tenure. Anyone can lose as a 4-6 seed. Those are 55-45% games. Don't over think it. They are the prime bracket busters for a reason.

You also owe a correction and apology as far as I'm concerned now - it is #12 Xavier (say it properly going forward or pay the price) and likely will be top 10 Xavier next polling. Without barely a respectable 4 star player to their name to boot. Miller has used X's and O's to dominate thus far. Dominant to the extent I am actually mad about it. Not jealous, but mad. He knows how to coach basketball. He doesn't stand around with lesser talent with his wholesome arms folded watching and rooting on random dumb 3pt shots. Yeah, you all would get mad in the past when someone would try it and get benched over it by Miller. Tommy doesn't have the balls to bench anyone because he doesn't have a bench developed. When he learns to develop a bench then he might grow a pair to sit someone down who steps out of line early.

If/when Xavier passes Arizona in the AP I will have to come back and watch how many haters are going to have to suck it up and look at themselves in the mirror as ugly liars to themselves that Miller is able to waltz in the door and take a team that had nothing going for it to where it's currently at in half of a season while Tommy is barely clinging onto what he has going still with some of Miller's players including 2 of our 3 best player still being Miller holdovers. Deal with it. Cope. The Sadist's known as the Committee would just love to place Zona, Gonzaga, and Xavier in the same bracket. If we keep trending how we are we will be lucky to be the 2 seed and maybe will have to go through Miller and Few. We will see.

[KansasCityCats]

5 point margin in a half is "running somebody out of the gym"?  I'll keep that in mind because there are plenty of games that involved similar Arizona wins against solid competition...and you still ripped their performances.

I hope Miller and Lloyd win but it's obvious that both will lose more conference games before the season is up.

You seem quite confident about Miller's offense. He's doing a great job thus far but this is the same coach that was bullied with simple zone defenses at Arizona because he couldn't attacked the basket (and the Cats settled for outside shots).

[arxpert]

5 point margin in a half is "running somebody out of the gym"?  I'll keep that in mind because there are plenty of games that involved similar Arizona wins against solid competition...and you still ripped their performances.

I hope Miller and Lloyd win but it's obvious that both will lose more conference games before the season is up.

You seem quite confident about Miller's offense. He's doing a great job thus far but this is the same coach that was bullied with simple zone defenses at Arizona because he couldn't attacked the basket (and the Cats settled for outside shots).

"Gonzaga, Arizona, and now Xavier are all top 10 offenses thriving while playing 2 "spacing eating bigs" together. It's a feature, not of a bug, of their schemes" -Jordan Sperber