by: Griffin Bennett
Paul Connors - AP
More of the same. While any road win is a good win for the Huskies this year, the Dawgs scored a season low 22 points in the first half and continued to struggle to find any kind of offensive rhythm against a poor and short-handed Sun Devil team.
Tony Wroten put the team on his back and provided much needed energy and scoring that kept the Huskies from losing another road game. He got into the paint and finished at the rim including a MONSTER DUNKFACE on ASU’s Jonathan Gilling that will be replayed many times over. I hope the Wroten-makes-this-team-worse people will now go away.
It was great, and surprising, to see C.J. Wilcox back on the floor tonight. He looked a little slow and uncomfortable out there. Let’s hope that it’s only rust and not due to any pain or lingering injury-related cause.
For the second game in a row, Austin Seferian-Jenkins was a beast on defense and on the boards. He’s just a physical player that brings a new facet to this team. He had a few freshman errors and struggled at scoring but you have to expect that. Anything he brings to this team is just a bonus.
The Sun Devils are not a good team and the Huskies played down to their level. The Dawgs struggled shooting the ball all night and couldn’t buy a bucket from anything outside of the paint. Ross didn’t have a breakout second half like he has in the past which was disappointing.
Like I said, a win is a win, beggars can’t be choosers, and other idioms of that sort.
Positives:
- Tony Wroten – Easily the MVP tonight. He brought the heat all game, on both ends, and stuffed the stat sheet. He finished with 22 points, 6 rebounds, 3 assists, 2 steals, 1 block, and only 2 turnovers. As soon as I get a link to a video of the dunk, I will pass it along.
- ASJ – His real impact doesn’t show up in the box score but everyone who watches the games knows that he is a true positive out there. He finished with 4 points (his first as a Dawg), 5 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 block, and another 5 fouls.
- Defense – Given, it was a bad ASU team, but the Huskies were swarming around the ball tonight. There were a couple more poor rotations but overall, it was a good night. They recorded 7 steals, 5 blocks, and forced 15 turnovers.
- Points in the Paint – The Huskies did their work down low with 34 points in the paint, with most of them coming from Mr. Wroten. Even with a couple of 7 footers roaming around, the Huskies made their presence known.
Negatives:
- Offensive Rhythm – It’s just not there on the road. Everything just looks disjointed and chaotic. Just when you seems some good movement off of the ball, the handler gets congested and puts up a poor shot. Wroten’s ability to create his own shot was a huge help. The first half, especially, was ugly.
- Pace – The Huskies only had 2 fast break points. Gaddy doesn’t seem to want to press the issue when he has numbers on the break and it’s infuriating. It played right into the hands of ASU who falls back into their zone and force UW to shoot jumpers. Even if it’s a sloppy break, you’d like to see the Dawgs speed things up.
- Leadership – I just didn’t see it out there. None of the captains seem to get the team together and on track. Usually a leader would have appeared by now but it doesn’t seem like anyone wants it.
- Assists – Only 11 in the game. People try to create their own shots and getting a nice pass seems like a rarity. You’d wish Gaddy would step it up in this department.
Overall:
It wasn’t pretty but the Huskies grabbed a share of the Pac-12 Conference lead with the win. You would have liked to see UW finally put together a dominant road win against an inferior team but it seems like that won’t happen this season.
I keep waiting for Terrence Ross to put together a solid 40 minutes but he can’t quite figure it out. He’s a hard worker and puts in the effort but his on court leadership and killer instinct have yet to develop.
This all sets up a big time game in Tucson against the Wildcats which will feel like a rivalry game. It will be hosted by ESPN’s College Gameday which brings back memories of last season’s “white out” game at Arizona where the officials botched Derrick Williams’ block of Gant’s shot for the win. And yes, I’m still bitter.
Can’t wait for Saturday’s match up. Bow Down.
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Gaddy played every second of the game and it looks to me like he’s getting worn down without CJ. CJ doesn’t sub for him, of course, but when he is healthy Wroten would run the offense with CJ and Ross while Gaddy got some rest, that hasn’t been an option and I don’t think it’s a coincidence Gaddy has had 9 TOs in the last two games. That’s also why he doesn’t want to push the ball as much, he’s just plain tired. But I though he moved the ball well, he did get 5 assists and you have to remember he’d have had more if we weren’t shooting below 40% the first half.
Wroten has played much smarter and really cut down on the stupid TOs. I think Romar should let him run the offense to rest Gaddy at least for a couple minutes. Getting even a couple minutes rest makes a huge difference. Remember IT’s collapse after the tourney when he had to play non-stop? And not everybody has IT’s seemingly boundless energy. Gaddy also played solid defense all game long.
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It was a ho hum effort. In the pac12, on the road these are the wins you need to grind out. Sat’s game should have much more flow to it.
I think the keys sat are a healthy CJ and the bench getting into the scoring mix. We are going to have to score 85pts to win… 20 needs to come from the bench.
ASJ is a beast – these big guys cannot move him an inch in the paint – Chol will not be able to walk anywhere when he bumps into the 260lb football player.
I sort of feel good about this Arizona game… don’t know why. On the national stage we have looked pretty good thus far – hopefully the boys will be modivated like when they came out against Marquette. TW was built for this stage – LOE baby.
Bow Down
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Miller’s Wildcat squad abso-LUTE-ly won’t allow ” more flow, ” in Washington’s halfcourt offense come Saturday evening in McKale.
In other words, Arizona’s TEAM defense is relatively stronger than Colorado’s. Eh.
And didn’t this Ralphie squad BYTCHE SLAP Romer’s team back to murky, fuzzy, nihilistic Seattle. I though so!
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LOL!
He does make this team worse.
Why don’t you get this? Don’t watch the ball when he has it, watch everyone else. All they do is stand around because they know they will never get the ball back.
I love the kid cause he’s local and decided to stay here…but he really needs to learn how to play team ball. Please lead the team in assists for once…and not in FGA…smh…
Nice poster tonight tho..
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Mac. I beg of you. Bring something of substance to these comments or I’m going to block you. I’m getting tired of this schtick. I can tell that there’s an intelligent person behind your inane ramblings. Bring some real opinions and analysis and you’ll be more than welcome here.
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In the pregame article you said you’d never heard of Gillig, yet in this recap you gave the defense a good grade. UW’s defense made Gillig look like the best player on their team.
I feel pretty good about the UA game. UW tends to play to the level of their opponent. UA is more of a run & gun team like UW, which should help UW play better. They’ve never looked too good against ASU because they slow it down so much.
I wouldn’t worry too much about macjones either. He’ll probably be gone after the UA game – cats fan. I just skip over his posts because they don’t actually say anything anyhow.
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I absoLUTEly (gotta respect Lute) like macjones posts. I think they are funny. He speaks in a crazy, foreign, funny way that makes me laugh…it’s not like he is saying anything that isn’t true, we just don’t like it, eh…anyway…a win is a win. Keep em coming Dawgs. I still hold out hope we make the NCAA’s, even if this is the MOST frustrating Husky team I have ever witnessed.
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I’ll be gone only because ” Themod ” and Huskie fandom can’t handle the absolute TRUTH. That’s all.
For instance, he says ” substance ” and what not.
Yet, I guess it’s not substance enough for y’all Romer apologists, to know Washington was MOLESTED by a Colorado squad and the Wildcats narrowly lost by one point, to the same Golden Buffalo squad.
Matter of fact, in WEAK PAC-12 action, Washington’s two losses were against squads with strong overall TEAM defenses, in the name of Cal and Colorado. Of course, PAC-12 fanhood knows that.
And believe it or not, the Arizona Wildcat’s have the TEAM defense akin to both the Bears and Buffalo’s.
So, up tempo or halfcourt. It won’t matter to Miller’s squad. Because their TEAM defense will be the Red and Blue TRUMP card on Saturday evening.
By the way, here’s your substance. For what it’s worth. A couple of ESPN major college hoops pundits opined, that in Saturday’s game, which I’m bloviating about, defense will be the absolute main line factor.
Finally, I’d be concerned about all those minutes, Washington player will be playing. If you know what I mean.
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“Washington was MOLESTED by a Colorado squad and the Wildcats narrowly lost by one point, to the same Golden Buffalo squad.”
And Arizona lost to oregon, who UW beat soundly. Maybe they just shouldn’t play and call it a tie based on all that.
I’m not sure about calling Gaddy out for not having enough assists. He did have almost half of the team’s assists in the game, and made some good passes where guy’s missed decent shots.
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” And Arizona lost to oregon, who UW beat soundly. Maybe they just shouldn’t play and call it a tie based on all that. ”
Yes it’s true Romer’s team soundly defeated the Ducks in Seattle.
However, my contentious point is both Arizona and the Huskies have the conference ROAD game in Boulder as a comparison and this gives the fandom of both schools a focal point, to guess about the upcoming game. That’s all.
Because if Washington is this WEAK PAC-12 juggernaut Huskie minion loves to think about. Then why did Romer’s talent-laden team get MAN HANLDED by the Ralphie Stomp. Eh.
And believe it or not, I know WHY Romer’s team came away with the loss in Boulder. Too bad Washinton fanhood doesn’t have the eyes to see the plain simple evidence. Eh.
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I’m glad the Huskies won — they needed this one. This is the type of game a good team wins. It wasn’t pretty, but the defense was good. Not great, but very good. The offense was terrible, but they won anyway. That is what good teams do. As I see it, this team is basically treading water until CJ gets back and is really CJ. In other words, when he is healthy and unafraid. When he attacks the rack, and hits jumpers with ease. We started to see this in Wilcox, then the injury hit. Now we have a team that must pace itself. Our guards can’t go all out, or fatigue will set in, and they will make too many mistakes. Once Wilcox gets back to playing 30 minutes (and maybe we rotate Stewart in for another ten, just to give other guys more time to rest) we will get back to playing real Husky basketball. I mean, all out defensive pressure like there is no tomorrow. As it is, we see that it spurts, like the beginning of the second half. We got the job done, and if not for some really, really bad calls (my God, where do they get these refs?) and some bad free throw shooting (nice job by Gant to make all three, by the way) we would have blown them out.
So, for now, we should be happy with wins like this. I would love to beat Arizona, but lets face it, the Dawgs aren’t hitting on all cylinders yet. If things go well, and everyone hits their jump shot, then yes, we can beat the ‘Cats. It is also possible that Aziz will find his shooting touch again (why has he suddenly been unable to hit a free throw?). But until then, I’ll be happy with the split.
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