Saturday, Dec 28 - USF @ Pilots

San Francisco @ Portland
Saturday, Dec. 28 - 7:00
Chiles Center

Broadcasts
TV - Root Sports Northwest/Rocky Mountain (DirecTV 683/687, Dish Network 414/426/5414/5426)
TV - Time Warner Cable SportsNet (DirecTV 691)
TV - Comcast Sportsnet California (DirecTV 698, Dish Network 409)
Portland Radio - 910 AM
Internet - www.thew.tv

Projections
Pomeroy: #101 Portland 86-77 over #179 USF
RealTimeRPI: #133 Portland 87-72 over #234 USF

Portland (8-4) - Season Stats
Wins - UC Davis, Idaho, Columbia, San Jose State, Southern Utah, at Portland State, vs. Bradley, vs. Princeton
Losses - at Oregon State, at Michigan State, North Texas, Montana State

San Francisco (7-5) - Season Stats
Wins - Notre Dame de Namur, Cleveland State, at Montana, Sonoma State, Vermont, Nicholls State, American
Losses - Nevada, Idaho State, at Oregon, Illinois State, at St. John's

Portland Info
(coming soon)

San Francisco Info
(coming soon)

Here's a crappy scout of USF...the Dons generally run eight deep.

Starters - C Mark Tollefsen (6-9, 199); PF Cole Dickerson (6-7, 227); SF Matt Glover (6-5, 212); SG Tim Derksen (6-3, 202); PG Avry Holmes (6-2, 196).
Off the bench - SG Chris Adams (6-4, 194); PF Kruize Pinkins (6-7, 230); SF Gavin Hoffman (6-5, 204).

Tollefson is a skinny 6-9 but is hitting over 72% of his two-pointers and will step back to take a three about three times a game as well. Some touch on this big man.

Might be a lot of points scored this game - USF is ranked 57th in the country on offence but is way down the list (310th) in D.

Just like before the North Texas and Montana St. games, I don’t like the fact UP is favored….but there it is, the latest Las Vegas odds show UP by 9.5 points over USF.  

The Dons wrapped up their non-conference slate with a 77-69 victory over American last Sunday….continuing their string of alternating losses and wins over its last four games.  USF has not won consecutive contests since ending the month of November with back-to-back victories.

Cole Dickerson is the guy that scares me, and he leads the Dons in scoring and rebounding this season, averaging 14.4 points and 7.6 boards per contest.  JUCO transfer Kruize Pinkins (12.7) and my favorite USF player, Mark Tollefsen, (12.2) round out the double-figures scorers for San Francisco, which ranks third in the WCC with an 81.5 ppg average.
 
The Pilots are averaging 80.2 per game, so this could be a high scoring affair this evening.

San Francisco has dominated this series of late, taking 21 of the last 27 meetings.  Last year the Pilots lost at home to the Dons, 75-72, but returned the favor in The City, beating USF 78-76.

Winning is so, so important at home this year…..let’s hope the Pilots play as a TEAM as they have all year….and someone breaks out (like Bryce did in Las Vegas) to assure a positive start to WCC play.

UGH. Only WCC team to lose at home today.

Up 3 with 3.3 seconds to play. Sure can make a case to foul them immediately, before they have a chance to shoot.   

Up 3 with 3.3 seconds to play. Sure can make a case to foul them immediately, before they have a chance to shoot. wrote:

My thoughts exactly!  

I was also disappointed to see how unenthusiastic we came out to start the 2nd half.  No emotion, no fire, no energy... and the Pilots 8 point halftime lead just vanished before the players snapped out of it.  I just don't know, is that coaching or is that on the players for not understanding the need to play with intensity until the final buzzer?

I have to say, it's very hard to argue Charles Barkley's point - especially after this game and the Clippers' mistake on the Batum 3 Tuesday night. FOUL and put them on the line. The 3 point shot is just so commonplace now, I will take my chances putting somebody on the line, who has to hope they get an offensive rebound and score.

Terrible coaching desicions down the stretch. The guys deserve better. They played well (minus the rebounds).

With the half that Bailey had you have to assume the Dons are gonna make adjustments. Why not have some set plays to keep him hot in the second half? He's so effective getting to the rim but has to settle for jumpers because our bigs clog the lane.

The announcers kept pointing out the fact that our bigs don't box out, it's not something we've ever been good at. We have three 7 footers. We should never lose the rebound battle. We celebrate the fact that Ryan is our best rebounder. That's embarrassing. He shouldn't be out rebounding our bigs.

Glad to see Sharp back in form. Glad to see Alec play with such maturity so early in the season.

I still think we don't run enough plays for Bailey and Pressley. We rely so much on their ability to create their own shots that we don't have enough plays that create lanes and allow them easier baskets. We waste so much clock trying to get the ball inside that when our guards do get the ball it's a long jumper or something creative. That's not gonna work against Gonzaga. We have to run better options for our guards or our bigs need to learn to play against the double team real quick

Coach agrees with our opinion.

@CoachReveno wrote:Tough OT loss to open WCC. Should have fouled up 3 w/ 3.3 left in regulation. Couldn't get stops in 2nd half and USF rebounded 57% of misses.

So why didn't he if he agrees?

This loss stings. A lot. Missed free throws, mistakes (not fouling), allowing the Dons to shoot 60% thanks to way too many lay ins... Ouch.

Also, with the ridiculously unfair and unbalanced schedule the WCC handed the Pilots this year, it was/is imperative to win most of these early home games. The Dons and Pilots are pretty evenly matched, so losing this one is not a good thing. I'd say it was one of the must wins we had to have of these first five.

We are 0-4 in games decided by fewer than 14 points. 8-1 in games decided by 14 or more. Absolute inability to close out close games. Given how evenly matched the teams in this conference seem to be this year, that does not bode well at all. I expect a lot of close games, and we don't seem capable of winning those.

If anyone's interested in the read, I thought this essay here neatly describes the various options available to a team up by three in the closing seconds - http://www.depauw.edu/ath/mbasket/images/up3.pdf - you can argue with a few of his arbitrary numbers but the reasoning is still solid. (Recap of essay - foul!)

Can anyone recall another situation in recent years with the Pilots up three with under 10 seconds left and what they did in that situation?

And why on earth is tomorrow's game at 3 PM on a Monday afternoon? You guys having some sort of holiday down there? Columbus Day?

DeanMurdoch wrote:If anyone's interested in the read, I thought this essay here neatly describes the various options available to a team up by three in the closing seconds - http://www.depauw.edu/ath/mbasket/images/up3.pdf - you can argue with a few of his arbitrary numbers but the reasoning is still solid. (Recap of essay - foul!)

Can anyone recall another situation in recent years with the Pilots up three with under 10 seconds left and what they did in that situation?

And why on earth is tomorrow's game at 3 PM on a Monday afternoon? You guys having some sort of holiday down there? Columbus Day?

Thanks DeanMurdoch for this. Hard to argue with math. I've never understood the "don't foul" rationale. Up one with the ball seems like a fine predicament to be in at the end of a game.

Why are we showing USF highlights on the portlandpilots.com home page? We couldn't find enough UP highlights to make a video without having to relive the football pass and subsequent dunk that essentially sealed the game for USF?

Told the people next to me we should foul before the play ever happened. We didn't foul....and I looked like a genius. I'd trade looking like a genius for the W though.

If you check out Rev's Twitter timeline, that he implies that he had not considered the situation before with the team; I find that quite surprising... With as much "end of game scenario" practice as they must do (or maybe don't do??), it is interesting that this situation had not been discussed. It is also a frequent topic of discussion on just about every TV broadcast during a close game.