Appalachian @ Georgia Southern - Game Thread

[T-Dog]

Neal is not improving this team.

Did you see this team in November/December? We're light years ahead of that team.

Burgess has improved a lot by necesity, but he's still not there yet. He could be the true PG we need as he has heart and can dribble around like nobody's business, but he's only a freshman. We need Neal at the point to have a shot at the bye and in Asheville. There's no other way around it.

[appgrouch]

Neal is not improving this team.

I'm afraid he is because he's all we got. He's careless with the ball and missed 4 straight at the line, but without him we lose by 15-20 tonight.

I look for Burgess to give him a run for starter next season.

[ASUMountaineer]

Who cares? This season is a wash. We are supposed to get excited cause this game will put us in 4th place?

No, you're supposed to get excited because it's App State and the season is not over. That's the thing about basketball, the regular season means next to nothing because, especially in our league, a team could get hot, win the conference tournament and make the big dance. It's not about winning the regular season it's about setting yourself up with as good a chance as possible to win the tournament.

We are not is a position to have such fair weather fans.

If Jerry Moore were coaching the basketball team, he would be the team's biggest cheerleader.

If you ask me, his attitude "who cares" is precisely the problem we have with basketball at ASU (I'm sorry, App State).

[Saint3333]

Other than DC I agree we have a chance to win the rest. The SoCon is as bad as it has ever been.

6-2 would be good enough to finish 4th and get a bye.

As bad as things are we control our destiny as we are 4th, 2nd in the North.

Beating UNCG, Samford, and UTC are must win games to keep the bye.

Remaining games, the schedule is favorable:

@ DC - L, class of the conference
Furman - W, the worst of the SoCon
@Elon - L, that cracker box gym has been bad for us
@ UNCG - W, they are almost as bad as Furman
Citadel - W, at home should win
Samford - W, must win for the bye
UTC - W, should have beaten them by 10 on the road but couldn't break the press

[asumike83]

I'll say it again. I give our bball team a smaller chance to beat DC than I did our football vs GSU this year.

As one of the few App fans who gave our football team a decent chance of beating GSU... I think we've got next to no shot on Saturday.

Pulling off a road win last night was very important for this team but if we play like that at Belk Arena on Saturday, we will lose by 20+. I'll be there to cheer the boys on but realistically, I'm just hoping for a performance that the team can take some positives from and not have their confidence shot.

[hapapp]

Neal is not improving this team.

I'm afraid he is because he's all we got. He's careless with the ball and missed 4 straight at the line, but without him we lose by 15-20 tonight.

I look for Burgess to give him a run for starter next season.

I'm hopeful one of our recruits will take over the starting role next year. This team is limited in how far it can go with Neal at the point. He brings a lot of hustle and energy and certainly has a place on this team. However, for the season he has a negative Assist to Turnover ration (44-52). You can't be successful with that kind of performance. He is a 75% FT shooter but he really fell short of that when it mattered last night. I won't disagree that we are a better team with him than without him but he has severe limitations at the PG position.

[SpeedkingATL]

This team has improved by leaps and bounds since the beginning of the season and if they can figure out how to break full court press and get in better physical condition they can make a run in the SoCon Tourney against a bunch of like/just okay teams. Healy is playing at the highest level physically possible and he needs a couple of other guys to step up to his level. Support this team guys, its the only one we have. It would be great but unexpected to see them beat the Catz in that crappy gym of theres, especially when Healy has a target painted on his back after the last game.

Go Apps!

Oh, and it's always nice to beat the Stink anytime/anywhere!

[appgrouch]

Neal is not improving this team.

I'm afraid he is because he's all we got. He's careless with the ball and missed 4 straight at the line, but without him we lose by 15-20 tonight.

I look for Burgess to give him a run for starter next season.

I'm hopeful one of our recruits will take over the starting role next year. This team is limited in how far it can go with Neal at the point. He brings a lot of hustle and energy and certainly has a place on this team. However, for the season he has a negative Assist to Turnover ration (44-52). You can't be successful with that kind of performance. He is a 75% FT shooter but he really fell short of that when it mattered last night. I won't disagree that we are a better team with him than without him but he has severe limitations at the PG position.

It is the same problem we have had since DJ graduated. Sims was a 2 guard playing the point. Neal is a 2 playing the point. Burgess is someone that can be a Tyson/DJ type point, he just needs a year to get into the system. The times that we have had Burgess in as point and Neal at the 2 we have looked good.

[asumike83]

Last night's game sure didn't do anything good for my blood pressure, that's for sure. So many good and bad things to take from it that I'm almost unsure how to feel, although coming away with the W is what is most important.

Mike Neal makes this team better than we were without him but I do think we need better play from the PG position to move from average to good. Neither him or Burgess could handle the GSU guards very well but the biggest difference is defensively, where Burgess got absolutely abused off the dribble.

On offense, Neal allows everyone to play their natural positions but unless he takes much better care of the ball, this team will remain inconsistent. I'm happy that we got the win but 2 assists, 8 turnovers and 4 consecutive missed free throws in crunch time will not get the job done against better teams. Mike clearly has talent but he presses at times and tries to do too much. Learning that the easy pass is better than the spectacular pass more times that not would go a long way.

Team defense tightened up in the second half but all the gambling we do at times is infuriating. We will play 20 seconds of solid defense, then overplay to try for a steal or double team on the perimeter and get burned for a wide open lay-up. I just want to run in the huddle and tell them to keep their hands up, stay in front of their man and box out. Forcing a missed shot is good, you don't need to go for a steal every possession.

In the end, they gutted it out on the road. The team showed some real fight and I was happy with that. Going into the game, I thought we needed to win at least 2 more road games to have a shot at a bye. We've already beaten Elon once and anything can happen but if I were to guess, I think we either go 4-3 or 5-2 down the stretch. I like our chances in all the remaining home games but UNCG is the only road game that I'd give us a healthy chance in.

[AppinVA]

It's a win on the road. As critical as I have been over the last few weeks, I applaud them for gutting it out. Yes, it was frustrating, but in some weird way, I'm glad we didn't make one more foul shot in regulation, which would've kept the game from going to OT. We were perfect from the line in that last stretch (maybe the entire OT period). I can only remember one turnover against the press in the OT. Go to Davidson playing with house money, see what happens, and get back to it next week.

[hapapp]

Neal is not improving this team.

I'm afraid he is because he's all we got. He's careless with the ball and missed 4 straight at the line, but without him we lose by 15-20 tonight.

I look for Burgess to give him a run for starter next season.

I'm hopeful one of our recruits will take over the starting role next year. This team is limited in how far it can go with Neal at the point. He brings a lot of hustle and energy and certainly has a place on this team. However, for the season he has a negative Assist to Turnover ration (44-52). You can't be successful with that kind of performance. He is a 75% FT shooter but he really fell short of that when it mattered last night. I won't disagree that we are a better team with him than without him but he has severe limitations at the PG position.

It is the same problem we have had since DJ graduated. Sims was a 2 guard playing the point. Neal is a 2 playing the point. Burgess is someone that can be a Tyson/DJ type point, he just needs a year to get into the system. The times that we have had Burgess in as point and Neal at the 2 we have looked good.

Didn't mean to sound down on Burgess. He is just a freshman and I do believe he has a future at PG but I'm still hopeful one of our highly touted recruits can take us beyond what we currently have.

[asumike83]

It's a win on the road. As critical as I have been over the last few weeks, I applaud them for gutting it out. Yes, it was frustrating, but in some weird way, I'm glad we didn't make one more foul shot in regulation, which would've kept the game from going to OT. We were perfect from the line in that last stretch (maybe the entire OT period). I can only remember one turnover against the press in the OT. Go to Davidson playing with house money, see what happens, and get back to it next week.

I do wish we'd held on in regulation but I was puzzled by this as well. It was like as soon as OT started, we somehow knew how to properly break a press and shoot free throws. Had we played the final 5:00 of regulation the way we played the OT, this thing would have been wrapped up.

Hopefully, we carry that over to Davidson because they will surely be pressing us. Like you said, we'll get a road split at worst and are playing with house money. Maybe they'll come out loose and shock the SoCon.

If they do, I'll be the guy at midcourt getting tackled by DC security after the horn sounds!

[proasu89]

Mike83,
If the security guards are as old as their fans then you won't get caught.

[YesAppCan]

I am happy for the win and not giving up by the players... I also thank the GSU guy for missing that last free throw.

[JCline0429]

Mike83,
If the security guards are as old as their fans then you won't get caught.

Some on this board like to poke fun at the older crowd at Davidson. I just wish we had as many of the rich old fogies as Davidson does; as we'd be sitting pretty in terms of being able to afford and keep higher profile coaches and buy out JC's contract if deemed necessary.

[proasu89]

Mike83,
If the security guards are as old as their fans then you won't get caught.

Some on this board like to poke fun at the older crowd at Davidson. I just wish we had as many of the rich old fogies as Davidson does; as we'd be sitting pretty in terms of being able to afford and keep higher profile coaches and buy out JC's contract if deemed necessary.

True, but don't underestimate the effect that non-scholly FB has on their funding for BB.

[JCline0429]

Mike83,
If the security guards are as old as their fans then you won't get caught.

Some on this board like to poke fun at the older crowd at Davidson. I just wish we had as many of the rich old fogies as Davidson does; as we'd be sitting pretty in terms of being able to afford and keep higher profile coaches and buy out JC's contract if deemed necessary.

True, but don't underestimate the effect that non-scholly FB has on their funding for BB.

I don't, but I feel exactly the same about UNC-G, CofC and anybody else who might drift into our conference who don't fund football on the I-AA level. The fact that Davidson doesn't fund Football on the scholarship level is misleading. They divert tons of dollars from academic funding to finance scholarships for those kids. I'm just glad we don't have to do that to much of an extent.

[asumike83]

True, but don't underestimate the effect that non-scholly FB has on their funding for BB.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't envious of Davidson's basketball program, that kind of consistency is impressive. However, I wouldn't want it at the expense of having an actual football program.