This team reminds me of the 96 squad

[makiavelli]

This team reminds me of the squad that Nolan brought in after the runner up year. Very athletic at every spot, good shooters, and has the potential to blow any team out on any night. I still say that 96 team could have been our best team ever but watching the game last night I got flashes of that squad.

[FineAsSwine]

C'mon man. They were hot and Samford was cold. Don't read too much into it. It was just one game.

[rwspear]

C'mon man. They were hot and Samford was cold. Don't read too much into it. It was just one game.

is that the only thing you took away from the game?

[tusksincolorado]

C’mon man. They were hot and Samford was cold. Don’t read too much into it. It was just one game.

Don't you dare get your hopes up and excited about this season....

[bigred223]

C'mon man. They were hot and Samford was cold. Don't read too much into it. It was just one game.

However, we made it very difficult for them. Our defense deserves credit.

[makiavelli]

The athleticism at every spot is what reminds of the 96 squad. Didnt say we were as good as them, but that jumped out at me. We were flying all over the place. We haven't had that for a while I don't think.

[hawgball40]

C'mon man. They were hot and Samford was cold. Don't read too much into it. It was just one game.

if by cold you mean bothered by our defensive length and missing shots, turning the ball over, and suffering shot clock violations, then yes, they were cold. real story is we chased them off the 3 point line and funneled them to the middle for gafford to bully all who entered. and it worked great. now in the second half we saw some breakdowns allowing them to get some contested 3's off that went, and really all you can say there is that they made big shots, despite our defense. very rarely did they have an open look from 3. maybe 4 or 5 all night.

[FineAsSwine]

if by cold you mean bothered by our defensive length and missing shots, turning the ball over, and suffering shot clock violations, then yes, they were cold. real story is we chased them off the 3 point line and funneled them to the middle for gafford to bully all who entered. and it worked great. now in the second half we saw some breakdowns allowing them to get some contested 3's off that went, and really all you can say there is that they made big shots, despite our defense. very rarely did they have an open look from 3. maybe 4 or 5 all night.

We did play some solid defense and I really liked our rotations and effort in the half court. Seeing them do the same against Bucknell will be really encouraging in terms of showing that we may be able to bring that type of consistency every game so that, when our shots aren't falling, we can fall back on our defense and still win some games when our offense might not be clicking.

[HogFoo]

I kind of agree with you.  jesse pate was a scoring machine.  we had Bradley, reeves, hood, saxon,  and quite a few even those the top guys from that class which at the time was supposed to be 'the greatest class in basketball' at the time didn't make it to campus.  heck, what did we have 10 players ?  it was a ton!  then later we lose Adebayo and pate, and ya know, we didn't even unleash 40mins of hell that year until we got to the tourney.  And then we get to the sweet 16.   saxon left after that season and went to Memphis I believe.  which later Adebayo  ends up there as well.    but yeah that team had a lot of talent. 

I like this years team.  they have some very very good guards.  we have a big shot blocker inside who is going to erase a lot of shots this year with gafford.  we'll be even better with Hall developing and again, hopefully garland can get cleared.  itd be nice to have 2 guys 6'6-6'7    It'd be really nice once we get Cook and dustin back to give us some depth so that we can try to put more pressure on.  right now, we don't have the depth, but when our shots are falling, look out!  hopefully they'll continue to fall the rest of the season.  because there will be nights when shots don't fall and our defense will need to be on point.    tomorrow will be a good test though.  I think we'll win.  probably not as easy as Friday, but I think we'll win by at least 15pts. 

this is a good team.  like one of the other threads a guy was imploring fans to show up to the games.  I too am like that poster, not in real good physical condition, still recovering from back surgery, but I am going to try to go to all the games I can as well.