Is that game REALLY at midnight???

That ESPN casting call was supposedly a private email sent to a casting call network. Somebody leaked it from there. It was never really official. It was funny, in the sense you saw somebody commit career suicide over half-terrible stereotypes.

When Boyle knocked Singler to the floor last night in the SIU/Duke game, and the intentional foul was called, Shulman brought up the “similar situation” at UNC, when Harris committed a “hard foul” against Zeller. What I noticed that was interesting, was the the offical under the basket made no call at all. It was only after a conference with the official at half court, who happened to be in earshot of K, was anything called. (In fairness, the replay showed Boyle’s arm in Singler’s back, and was probably the correct call). Very much “unlike” the situation at UNC.

Yes, the North Carolina schools do look a little too perfect.

I first read about that in a fanshot on this site a few weeks back. It certainly is embarassing.

Michigan beat UCLA 55-52… BenHowlandBall is without a doubt effective (as 3 straight final fours will attest to) but man oh man… they really do try to put you to sleep.

…what is there really to be gained with starting Liggins so early in the season? He can get playing time and learning time later on in the games. If Billy likes, he can even get more playing time than Porter coming off the bench. The ‘risk’ does not justify the reward. If you start him now and he fails, you have a huge issue…there is no one else to turn. Besides, think of the kick to the stomach to Porter. This move this early runs the risk of hurting the confidence of both…

I went with “No. He’s not ready” but I think I would have been more appropriately classified as “No. Gillispie is too stubborn.”

should NOT start – plain and simple.

I’d like to see Liggins start. I think he brings a lot of good things to the table, and he is surely our LG of the future. Plus, that could get Porter back to SG off the bench a little, which might be a better situation for him. However, this analysis is coming from a guy who last played organized basketball in the 6th grade, and over a three year junior pro career, averaged 10 points per season. So take that for what it’s worth.

I think there’s a legitimate argument for sticking with Porter if he’s really playing better in practice. We all know Gillispie’s mantra is “whoever earns it in practice plays.” We basically assume that’s why we haven’t seen Kevin Galloway lately; he doesn’t practice well, whatever that means to Coach.

Now, pretend you are Kevin Galloway. You’d love to see the floor right now, but Coach says your practice isn’t up to snuff. Liggins makes no discernible improvement in his practice habits, yet he all of a sudden goes from the bench to starting. Coach just undermined his argument with you, and you are now (perhaps) less motivated to work hard. Coach will make an exception if things get bad enough. Perhaps you become a problem in the locker room because of this double standard.

Now I don’t know Galloway. He may be way above that kind of stuff. He may work his butt off every second of every practice regardless. And, of course, you could plug in a lot of other names for “Galloway” in the above scenario. The bottom line is, this coach thinks good practice is what produces good games. He reinforces this by assigning PT based on practice. If that’s going to be your philosophy, you have to stick to it, or you’re going to lose the confidence of your players, and it’s going to get really ugly when that happens. You can argue about whether it’s the right philosophy, but UK is betting a lot of money on the idea that it is.

I really don’t care if they start Galloway, Liggins, or Williams at point guard but they need to get someone who can do the job with minimal turnovers. Many others on the team are just as guilty as the point guard, but since the point guard initiates the offense then it is even more important that he not turn the ball over.

Without question, Liggins has more talent than Porter, but has Liggins mastered the offensive or defensive scheme of Gillispie? Ultimately, Liggins will be the LG for this team. Perhaps Gillispie recognized that on the road at the #1 team in the country can be a tough place to cut your teeth for a freshman point guard. Perhaps Gillispie thought Porter, while not making spectacular plays, would be durable enough, to at least not cost the team the UNC game the way an inexperienced LG could?

Because us fans aren’t privy to practice and must base all our decisions on game play, coaches have a reliable—albeit extremely maddening—reason to excuse a player’s poor game performance as inconsistent with their practice performance.

Rich Brooks does this all the time with Lones Sebier. While Sebier’s in-game performance at kicking has been dubious at best, Brooks often dismisses this saying he makes his FG in practice.

Bottom line, most of us are basing these decisions on two regular seasons games this year and the potential/hype of Liggins. Viewed through that limited prism, however, I think starting Liggins would be a prudent choice.

First, I was hoping the poll would read “Should” rather than “Will.” I voted Yes, because he should, and Liggins is ready enough considering the situation. I don’t think Billy will start him yet.

Liggins does make mistakes, and tries to be flashy, but it seemed to me that our only signs of life during the UNC game came with Liggins running the point. The offense completely stagnated when Porter was there.

I agree with the opinion that Porter should come off the bench as a SG, and should never play the LG/PG spot. He wasn’t recruited as such, and he will not ever be good there. I think he could actually be an effective shooter as a backup SG, and put in 2-4 3’s per game. When Jasper came back last year, and Porter spent some time at backup SG, he started scoring more. Put him in at backup SG, give him 8-12 minutes/game, and I think results could be surprising.

..more then 24 secs…! I would at least like to see him in action when UK’s is being pressed…
Until then, I’ve seen plenty of Porter to know that the kid is just not good enough.. Not saying Porter is not good, just not good enough for a typical UK point guard..
Liggins should start at this point…

hey, after watching the 1st 2 games, in all honestly, Meeks has been the most consistent at playing the point…

During the Vandy/Illinois game last night the NCAA stat leaders were scrolled along the top, and Meeks is currently the #1 scorer in all of college basketball at 29.0 ppg. After his 39 against VMI, if he can get 20+/game he might be able to hold that title for at least a few more weeks.

Too bad we’re sitting at 0-2.

What will we do without Tru to provide the live threads for our Vegas tournament games??

I posted that link to the Awful Announcing article as a fan post on the 13th.

Glad to see no one cares what I say!

kidding….

The article said that Indiana and Kentucky’s “descriptions” were the most insulting of all. Anyone know what they were?