Central Michigan Game Thread

[Chicagojayfan]

Hard to find much to complain about. Central MI was in for a long day pretty much no matter what, but offensively we really played sharp.

But a couple of downsides:

- I wasn't necessarily happy with the D in the first half. Both Butler and Pritchard had 16 in the first half alone, and as a team they scored more than 1 PPP, but second half was a lot better. 0.824 PPP in the second half

- I think we can struggle a bit to play the teams that can go with 4 quick guys. Not enough talent for them to take advantage, but it may be a concern as the year goes by. It looked like we did a better job of keeping people out of the paint in the second half - can't let guys have a clean lane to the basket and hope Kalkbrenner always picks them up - Second half was played much better, though

- Ashworth didn't shoot his usual tonight, but I thought Ashworth took good shots and moved the ball well and didn't force things when the shots weren't falling

Mostly good stuff though:

- Definition of unselfish: 28 assists, Two highest scorers on the team end up with 9 and 8 assists, Bello gets 5 off the bench even
- The 4 Position! Wow, insane day for Miller and Traudt -- they had 25 pts in the first half alone! When was the last time that happened, if ever? I have to think Doug did it once at least
- liked seeing us make a concerted effort to go to Kalkbrenner after the half.
- Even the bench did nice work with some extended minutes. King keeps improving and will be a load for the league next year. Bello's been great all year. Traudt is great (although he and Miller are co-starters, IMO), Loved seeing Dotzler, Green, and Lawson get some minutes also

[JacobPadilla]

Watched from home on Saturday, but circled back after volleyball to put together my takes on the game.

https://hurrdatsports.com/creighton-men ... -michigan/

[slaw]

IN.YOUR.FACE.CHRIS.KAMAN

[Outlaw_Wales]

People do remember that Kama actually wasn’t the problem in that NCAA game, right? Their guards are what torched us that time.

[skinzfan23]

Jays took care of business this week. Feel like the bench should have gone in a little sooner, but what a shooting performance from IT and Miller!

[Chicagojayfan]

Jays took care of business this week. Feel like the bench should have gone in a little sooner, but what a shooting performance from IT and Miller!

At least they got a full 10 minutes for Dotzler and Green and 7 for Lawson, and I was happy with how they played as well. Also liked that Miller got some time with the bench as an earlier scoring option at the end. I'm not sure that little pump fake, drive and floater he made near the end was something he would have tried earlier in the game

And I imagine having a game like this on film for Miller/Traudt will make for quite a few headaches for opposing coaches when trying to figure out how to defend us

[jays34]

Completely anecdotal here, but it feels to me that ever since the colorado state game, we've made a concerted effort to get into the lane. Our ball movement has been much better and as a result, we're getting cleaner looks. We still shoot a ton of 3s and will all year, but we're getting better looks than the isolation 3 pt bomb we sometimes fall in love with. Kalk throwing down some lobs in the 2nd half sure did make me feel better, hadn't seen a lot of that this year.

Trey scores 15 pts and was a handful of plays away from a triple double, and still doesn't feel like he "took over" the game as we've seen him do in the past. Guess that's a good problem to have, with so many capable scorers, he doesn't have to regularly drop 30. Kid has a ton of expectations on him and has done well, despite us fans (myself included) expecting him to dominate every single time out.

[gtmoBlue]

Hard to find much to complain about. Central MI was in for a long day pretty much no matter what, but offensively we really played sharp.

Mostly good stuff though:

- Definition of unselfish: 28 assists, Two highest scorers on the team end up with 9 and 8 assists, Bello gets 5 off the bench even
- The 4 Position! Wow, insane day for Miller and Traudt -- they had 25 pts in the first half alone! When was the last time that happened, if ever? I have to think Doug did it once at least
- liked seeing us make a concerted effort to go to Kalkbrenner after the half.
- Even the bench did nice work with some extended minutes. King keeps improving and will be a load for the league next year. Bello's been great all year. Traudt is great (although he and Miller are co-starters, IMO), Loved seeing Dotzler, Green, and Lawson get some minutes also

Yep probably Doug.

I was thinkin' my boy Dane Watts, in checking: he only had 1 game in the high 20s (Dec 9th 2007-CHICO vs St Joes). 8 of his 29 pts. came in the OT period, so not even close to saturday's totals.

https://www.espn.com/mens-college-baske ... =273430156
https://www.espn.com/mens-college-baske ... /273430156
https://gocreighton.com/sports/mens-bas ... watts/2865
https://whiteandbluereview.com/number-50-dane-watts/

Helluva player...always underrated, as he played with some of the CU Greats Motz, Funk, AT, Dotzler, McKinney, Bookwood, Porter, Miliner, also Jeff Day, Dusty, Johnny Mathies, Justin Carter, Bahe, Steve Smith, Hibma, Gakou, Ningsu,and later Kenny Lawson, P'Allen. Some heady days/seasons during that period (2004-2007)

[TrueBlueJay]

Yep probably Doug.

I was thinkin' my boy Dane Watts, in checking: he only had 1 game in the high 20s (Dec 9th 2007-CHICO vs St Joes). 8 of his 29 pts. came in the OT period, so not even close to saturday's totals.

https://www.espn.com/mens-college-baske ... =273430156
https://www.espn.com/mens-college-baske ... /273430156
https://gocreighton.com/sports/mens-bas ... watts/2865
https://whiteandbluereview.com/number-50-dane-watts/

Helluva player...always underrated, as he played with some of the CU Greats Motz, Funk, AT, Dotzler, McKinney, Bookwood, Porter, Miliner, also Jeff Day, Dusty, Johnny Mathies, Justin Carter, Bahe, Steve Smith, Hibma, Gakou, Ningsu,and later Kenny Lawson, P'Allen. Some heady days/seasons during that period (2004-2007)

Who is Bookwood? Haha!

Last edited by TrueBlueJay on Sun Dec 10, 2023 6:25 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[Gmorrowfan]

Watched from home on Saturday, but circled back after volleyball to put together my takes on the game.

https://hurrdatsports.com/creighton-men ... -michigan/

Great write-up as usual, but no sense in making demons stronger by exercising them; much better to exorcise them.