Next Up: BYU

Thursday, with an 8:00 PM start.  Broadcast is on ESPNU, I am guessing using the BYUtv broadcast crew.  Looks like it will be replayed on BYUtv later that night.

BYU is 10-6 in conference, and 4-4 in their last eight games, including losses @LMU and @USD, and OT wins vs USF and @PU. So they have not been playing great recently.  USF should of beat them in Provo, up 7 with a minute to play. Bryant and big man Childs are their two main guys, each averaging 17+ ppg.  Bryant takes 53.6% of his **** from 3P. He's also the 2nd leading rebounder. Haws averages 12 ppg.

Against USD, they were 3-22 from 3P range, and committed 25 PFs to give USD 32 FT attempts.  USD's Pinero put up 20, and three other guys were in double figures.  USD shot 50% and outrebounded them 37 to 24.

So, keep Childs under control, force them to shoot threes, hope they can't hit, make your own shots, and the Pilots got a chance.

From our prior game with them, as I recall, Childs was dunking all night long as Phil left him to pursue whichever guard was driving, whether that guard was covered or not. If Childs gets as many dunks Thursday, the possibility of an upset is remote.

Pilots need to have stronger interior defense than they did last time to win this game.

ESPN wrote:Yoeli Childs scored a career-high 26 points and grabbed 13 rebounds, Elijah Bryant added 22 points with a career-high 15 boards

From a story on the first game.

Childs shot 9 of 15, a little above his season average of 7 of 13. He topped 26 points with 29 against SMC their next game. Bryant has had several high scoring games, but he not gotten that many rebounds again.

More importantly, in the first game the Pilots shot 29%, 26% from 3P. Marcus was 1 of 10, D'Marques was 1 of 6, Franklin was 4 of 14. Phil had no field goal attempts in 30 minutes, D had 3 attempts, 1 make, in 10 minutes. So no inside game, and couldn't hit an outside shot. Oh yeah, 31% on FTs (4 of 13). What an all around disaster.

I don't think the Pilots will play that bad again, and a little better defense on BYU's big two will make for a much more competitive game.

Go Pilots!

As with SMC last week, the Cougars are VULNERABLE right now. They come into this game playing relatively poorly (by their standards). Their last three games were OT wins over USF and Pepperdine and a 13-point loss at USD.
This is (yet) an(other) opportunity for the Pilots to show that they have improved over the course of this year -- not only in terms of moral victories or being competitive, but with an actual win over a higher-ranked team.

As Herb Brooks said (or, at least, as Kurt Russel said):

Remember these guys?  

This video was first posted the same day UP beat BYU, 114-110 in 3-OT, in 2014.

Korey, KB, Bryce, and Alec all fouled-out.
Haws set a Chiles Center record by scoring 48 points.
BYU lead by 8 in the 2nd OT.
Thomas had 27 points and 18 rebounds.
Bobby Sharp was the hero, hitting 8 clutch 3-pointers to keep UP in the game while scoring 27 points.  
The students rushed the court after that game and hoisted Bobby on their shoulders...

Still baffling to me that that 2014 team went 7-11 in the WCC.

NoPoNeighbor wrote:Still baffling to me that that 2014 team went 7-11 in the WCC.

I'd like to replay that season with a healthy Wintering at the end. He was hurt in Game 1 of the five-game losing streak the Pilots finished the season with and never came back. David Carr was an okay backup to have giving you a few minutes off the bench, but probably not the guy you want starting at PG.

Seems like it is a delicate balance. You want lots of capable guys on the team. But they can't all play. And guys don't want to be back-ups. Hard to keep everyone happy. Probably a topic for an offseason thread.

NoPoNeighbor wrote:Still baffling to me that that 2014 team went 7-11 in the WCC.

Remember that in addition to losing Alec for the last five games of the season, Kevin Bailey didn't play the last seven games....both with similar knee injuries, as I recall.

Even without those two All-WCC players, the guys hung tough the rest of the year, but couldn't win.

Funny now seeing "large Rev"...it was the summer of '14 when he was losing so much weight people were asking about his health. He still looks good, and thin, on the Georgia Tech sideline.

up7587 wrote:Seems like it is a delicate balance.  You want lots of capable guys on the team.  But they can't all play.  And guys don't want to be back-ups.  Hard to keep everyone happy.  Probably a topic for an offseason thread.

I see where you are going with that. Difficult to guess who might transfer during the offseason, but you now have to expect at least one or two a year....maybe more depending on the size of the roster, the distribution of playing time, and how happy a kid is at UP or any other school.

It's just the nature of the college game these days....

I'm calling it folks. Pilots pull one of the biggest upsets of the season, beating BYU by 5.

bobtcat2 wrote:I'm calling it folks.  Pilots pull one of the biggest upsets of the season, beating BYU by 5.

Sorry, someone already beat you to it...although he wasn't very forceful in his prediction.     On February 10th...

SouthCarolinaPilot wrote:I’m starting to get the feeling that we might upset the Cougar faithful in Chiles later this season.

The Las Vegas line is BYU by 10.5/138.5.

DoubleDipper wrote:

bobtcat2 wrote:I'm calling it folks.  Pilots pull one of the biggest upsets of the season, beating BYU by 5.

Sorry, someone already beat you to it...although he wasn't very forceful in his prediction.     On February 10th...

SouthCarolinaPilot wrote:I’m starting to get the feeling that we might upset the Cougar faithful in Chiles later this season.

The Las Vegas line is BYU by 10.5/138.5.

Dang, late to the party.  The line is down to 10.5, bodes well for tonight.  I would bet the house on the Pilots at +10.5 if I had a house.

- Tyson with the frustrating struggles tonight. Seemed like the plan was to get him hot early but didn't work out and it really showed with the technical and bad turnovers.
- Shaver for WCC Freshman of the Year. Don't leave us bby pls.
- Lol'd at TJ Haws "SHUT THE EFF UP" and the students booing him every time he had the ball.
- Felt like BYU outplayed us overall. Even the players who weren't good 3FG shooters still shot good 3FGs (the crucial ones at least).

Nobody stopped by for post game radio.

I was disgusted through much of the game, but I"m feeling more magnanimous now:
- I'm sure there was a game plan.  They did their best to implement it even though that bowl of Lucky Charms had spilled.
- It was really clever to stick with the same plan in the second half, even though it didn't work during the first 20.  Surely BYU would expect a change.
- No sense putting Rashad in because who needs an energy injection when you're chugging along nicely at half speed.
- If Joseph can't put up some numbers in two minutes, he deserves to be back on the bench.
-  I'm sure Franklin and DeMarques were great - just need to check the game stats.  

But let's face it, the play of the game, what made the whole evening worthwhile, was Phillip hitting those two free throws - and not just hitting them.  Did you see the second free throw?  SWISH!

It was just a BLAH sort of game the whole way. Nothing much to cheer about, and not much effort by the Pilots. Too bad on senior night.

Thought the Pilots showed great effort on the defensive side--hard for me to understand the criticism that effort was lacking. Pilots definitely struggled on offense.

Yoelie Childs is an impressive player. Bryant too.

Jojo has taken to casting up threes though he is mostly well off the mark. Found it interesting that Smart was running the offense when Jojo was in; Jojo appears to be playing off/shooting guard/wing, though there are other candidates.

We struggled all night from behind the arc. We likely would have made this a decently close game if we were hitting threes. Our shooting woes are perhaps the key to our loss---credit BYU's defense, which stifled our offense.

Phil Hartwich's play was impressive last night--he did a far better job on Childs and on the interior defense than in the first game with BYU. And those two free throws were a nice moment.

Marcus Smart was the Pilots best player last night.

Agree that it would not hurt to give Rashad a little run.

Let's hope Pilots end on a positive note. Predicting victories for this squad in this league in any game perhaps is a little much.

I am hopeful that next year the Pilots are more competitive . . .if the key players return . . .

One more thing: don't start games at 8 . . .particularly on a week night.