Portland vrs St. Mary's

I thought the men might make a game of it when they were only down 4 in the second half. It was nice to see them do better than the blow out at St. Mary's. I wish they would have gotten more shots off, because St Marys seemed to be missing their free throws more in second half. I believe they have some positive momentum going into the tourney. I look foward to being in San Diego and maybe they can win one there. Sorry I missed you in Portland Pilot Nut. Were bringing down about 8-10 people from Mesa so hopefully we can all sit together and with the player's parent make some noise with the small Portland contigent. There's a rumor that Kramer's older brother will be there painted Portland Colors so that ought to be interesting for you guys in Portland. I don't know if he will be as interesting as the Body Paint kid at Portland games but he's flying in from Iowa/Illinois so I am sure he will be "crazY" for Kramer and the Pilots.
I hope some of you guys can make it and we can pick up a win. I have enjoyed reading and Posting with you and I'll be back next year for the winning edition of Pilots BB.

See ya in San Diego,


Mesa Pilot1

agreed that we have some momentum heading into the tourney, and it looks like we will be playing Pepperdine in the first round... it will be nice to avenge the horrid collapse in Chiles.

I will be down in sunny San Diego... the really white guy from Oregon.

Great game. You guys should be very proud of yourselves the way you played SMC and GU this year.

Hello to Purple Pride! Sorry we did not make it to Chiles this year - had to save the $$ for the trip to the WCC tourney. You'll see us behind the Gael bench next year for sure!

The Pilots played OK last night... they definitely put up a fight and played hard, but we have a hard enough time scoring as it is, and when we're up against a really good defensive team like SMC, it was especially tough to get points. Still, they hung tough for a long time with a team that has been ranked almost all year. And they didn't show any quit at all, coming back from big deficits two times before finally letting it slip away at the end. Overall, I think they did about as well as could be expected against an NCAA tournament team like SMC.

And what can you say about Simpson... the guy is just a beast. Really smooth and extremely active on both ends.

One thing I will say, though... I wanted to STRANGLE Patty Mills. Yes, I realize that he was taking what the refs were giving him (if they aren't going to call it, why stop doing it?), but he was fouling Ito on literally every single possesion. Absolutely ridiculous. I just don't understand how a player can so blatantly break the rules every single time up the floor, and shame on the refs for not taking control of it early on. Once they let it slide for a while, there was no turning back. I actually noticed Randy Bennett pulling him aside for a one-on-one talk right after a timeout was called, and he seemed to be pretty animated in telling him to cut it out. And after that, Mills did stop fouling Ito as much as he was.

But again, you can't really blame the guy for doing it - the refs were allowing it.

Just like I've said the past few games, Kramer is really starting to look good. He's being more aggressive on offense and you can see that he is getting stronger. His post defense was really good again too... he is going to be a very solid player for us!!!

I felt bad for Stohl... he just couldn't get a shot off with Mills and Smith on him. SMC is so good at getting around screens and switching, Jared just never got any open looks.