re: Auburn vs South Carolina

Crazy just 5 attempts after his performance on us. I guess UT scouted to shut him down and let their NBA freshman go off.

Exactly

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It’s all about matchups. Can’t do the this team lost by this much so we should win by this much or even down to the player level.

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Yeah, playing the transitive property game with basketball is useless.

So I need someone to sugarcoat or put a positive spin on today’s game: we just played probably the worst or one of the worst teams in the league, on top of they were playing without two of their starters, and we still almost lost. I’ve been criticized for being too negative about this team for their decline in performance the past 3 weeks, so I’m honestly asking, now that Broome is out for a few weeks, what’s everyone’s opinion of this team? Again, putting into perspective of this game, they were without two of their best guys and still almost won. I don’t know how that’s not an indictment of our decline in play since conference play has started.

I hope you’re right about Broome. I’ve personally dealt with ankle sprains in my past and it usually took about a month to fully recover. I think Broome will be back when we play our first home game in February against Oklahoma.

As for the road woes, yea, I will give a pass to playing Texas on the road. But I just can’t buy that excuse today. I’m positive that we had more fans than South Carolina. Again, they were without two of their starters, and they were beating us WITH Broome in the game. There’s something going on with this team that I’m trying to figure out. One thing I think is that teams are understanding how to attack us on defense, by making Broome guard quicker and more athletic forwards, causing a mismatch for him. I also think teams are taking Broome out of our offense and making others beat them, and it’s starting to work. Again, Pearl will have to adjust his strategy now and start over.

Well, if I was Pearl, now that Broome will be out for a few weeks, I would play Villanova ball on offense: 4 guards/wings and one big man. We can’t run our offense thru Cardwell or Chaney so we need our best shooters on the floor at the same time, which would be Pettiford, Denver, CBM and Kelly. I would run iso or drive and kick out to an open guy on the perimeter. That looks like the only strategy that could work because of our lack of interior presence and depth as well. On defense, we have to play zone, which we saw some of it today, especially towards the end of the game. We can’t match up man to man anymore, we don’t have the size nor depth as well as Chaney and Cardwell being foul machines, so we have to hope our guys can play like they did in the second half on defense.

We would get killed on the boards in that 4 out lineup.

But you have been right about that we have been in a funk even before Broome got injured.

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I just don’t know how we beat any of the teams ahead on our schedule in the next 3 weeks sans LSWho unless one of our guys gets hot during that time, without Broome on the floor.

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This is where I side with Corch. Yeah another team might look better on paper but sometimes our team finds the other team stilldoesn't stress them out as much. The year we lost Mclemore and only had 7 scholarship players left I didnt think we could hold onto the SEC, but we did.

3 - 0 in conference with 2 road wins is as good as we could possibly be at this point in the season. Just because it has not been pretty is no reason to panic. AU is going to lose games and there is no reason to act like the world is coming to an end when they do. I had us going at best 13-5 and most likely 12 - 6 in conference this year with Broome healthy. We will likely lose at UGA next Saturday with or without Broome as have two other ranked SEC teams. Every road game will be tough and having #1 beside your name makes it even more difficult. Unfortunately we lose a day of preparation with the next game being Tuesday so there is not a lot of practice time for Bruce to implement whatever he has planned to compensate for Broome being out. If AU somehow wins or is very competitive Tuesday against a very good MSU team, it's a good sign that we will be in good shape by tournament time. Try relaxing a little and enjoying the ride.

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Please someone explain to me how that doesn’t concern you for the near future?

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What the hell is being concerned about it going to do? You keep making these woe is us posts, what are you expecting exactly? All your complaints and worries about things aren't going to change things. You must be miserable to be around if you can only focus on the negative in a season like this.

I'm going to watch and enjoy this season for what it is, and enjoy all the wins we get. I'm not going to sit around being concerned about what might happen.

Broome being out an extended time would change our trajectory a good bit, but I think it might be the type of wakeup call our team needs too.

For what it's worth, I think you are right that a small ball lineup would be our best bet while he is out.