The Bobcat Nation

Just a reminder that the Bobcat's men's will be home tonight to plat Cal State Fullerton. CSF comes to town with 4-5 record including a 1 point loss at Portland State. We will have to travel to CSF to return the favor latter this month. Bynum and Navarre have been picking up their play as of late to go along with Mbunga who has been solid all season. Bobby Howard, has had to very poor games after starting out the season on fire, and Rush has relegated himself to a role player. These two guy's are going to need to put it together, before conference get back underway, if we hope to make a run at a top spot in the conference. If they do not, look for Pieploli and Johnson push them for their starting spots.

We need Howard and/or Johnson to make a significant contribution. When they both disappear as they did against EWU we're doomed. Navarre needs to pass-pass-and pass somemore. He should only shoot if it's a point blank layup. Rush just needs to slow down.

BelgradeBobcat wrote:We need Howard and/or Johnson to make a significant contribution. When they both disappear as they did against EWU we're doomed. Navarre needs to pass-pass-and pass somemore. He should only shoot if it's a point blank layup. Rush just needs to slow down.

I am told before the first regular game of this season the coaches asked Navarre to start looking for his shot more. Navarre was considered a scorer, coming into Bozeman, but really tooled his game this summer and fall, to being this team's point guard. The coaches, though, felt that he was sacrificing too, much of his offence, and wanted him to look to score more. They want him to be treat from the point to keep players/teams from doubling the shooting guard, and small forward. I tend to agree with you Belgrade, but that is what I am hearing the coaches are telling Navarre.

Navarre has the shooting part down...it's just the making part that is lacking. I hope his shot comes around-if it ever does he will be a very effective player for us.

Watch the Fullerton guard last name of A--------- or something like that. He is a former Washington State transfer. Fullerton is athletic on the front line. MSU needs to move the ball and less dribbling from the guards. Howard, Rush and Danny P need to step up. This season will be either positive or negative depending on their play.

MSU tonight by 5 if they take care of the ball and shoot 70%+ on the FT line.

DawsonPirate wrote:Watch the Fullerton guard last name of A--------- or something like that. He is a former Washington State transfer. Fullerton is athletic on the front line. MSU needs to move the ball and less dribbling from the guards. Howard, Rush and Danny P need to step up. This season will be either positive or negative depending on their play.

MSU tonight by 5 if they take care of the ball and shoot 70%+ on the FT line.

Akognon (or Aknognen, I've seen it both ways)- averages 24.6 pt. per game.

BTW, there was no article in todays Chronicle about tonights game, the only mention at all was the game time in the What and Where box in the corner.

Yea that little guard from CSF can really play. I believe he is jersey #1 on their team. He does avg. just under 25 ppg. Let's hope the Cats D can stop him and control this game and come out with a win. See y'all at the game!

Fullerton 40
MSU 29
2:15 to go in half

Great game. Cats win 74-60 with great D in the second half. Awesome second half to watch.

I felt lucky to be down by nine at the end of the first half. We were totally outclassed physically in that half. Fullerton has a bunch of jumping jacks that can shoot.

But oh what a second half. Howard started off with a three and then just kept going. After a 15-2 run Huse does a hockey line change and Peopoli hits a three. Then miracle of miracle-Navarre hits a three to give us the lead-a lead we would never relinguish. Fullerton on the other hand was ice cold. Their stud guard who had 14 or 15 at the half ended with 18 points (he averages about 25). It looked like when they got just a little bit tired they completely collapsed.

Will Bynum only had three points, but he was charged with guarding their star player most of the night. He got his ankles broke a couple of times, but in the second half he was getting his hands on some passes and got nice steal at half court.

Huse is subbing Anderson for MBunga early in both halves. It seems to be working. MBunga looked fresher at the end of the game and he wasn't in foul trouble. Anderson held his own with four point and some solid defense and rebounding.

If we would have played half his well on Saturday we would have beaten EWU by 20. It's just so frustrating. Oh well, these non-conference wins will help the league's RPI a little bit.

Great win!! Fantastic 2nd half effort. Every Cat that played tonight scored.

MSU out rebounded CSF 43-25 Wow! Now if Howard could hit free throws (40%) at the same rate he hit 3 pointers (50%)

mslacat wrote:MSU out rebounded CSF 43-25 Wow! Now if Howard could hit free throws (40%) at the same rate he hit 3 pointers (50%)

He needs to lock himself in a gym and shoot about 1000 free throws. There's no reason for him to be so terrible at the line-he has good form and a soft touch. But whole team is suspect at the line-even tonight we weren't very good-although Mbunga made all of his-which was nice.

What a game for the CATS!
A pretty good defensive effort.(luckily CSF wasn't hitting their bombs)
Great rebounding
VERY patient offense.

Howard looked good
Rush looked much better.

alasax wrote:What a game for the CATS!
Understatement of the season thus far.
A pretty good defensive effort.(luckily CSF wasn't hitting their bombs)
Better than good, it was great, especially in the second half. A lot of those bombs weren't even close, and it was because we broke their confidence with that 15-2 run to start the second half. They never recovered.
Great rebounding
Agreed - they did what they were supposed to do against a smaller team - dominate the boards.
VERY patient offense.
Not so much in the first half, but definately so in the second half. We made them play defense for 25-35 seconds on most possessions in the second half, which is the best way to slow down their uptempo offense and wear them out.

Howard looked good
Agreed, aside from the freethrows, but that is all mental at this point.
Rush looked much better.
But still not good enough. He rushed his shot multiple times again tonight which resulted in a few turnovers

This team has really stepped up it's effort on defense in the past few games, holding both opponents under 40% for the game. I was also very impressed with the officiating crew that did this game. They missed a few calls (from my untrained eye ), but they were fair and consistent, and no one official dominated the game, as some tend to do. I would have said this even if score were reversed. It's nice when you don't really notice the officiating crew.

BelgradeBobcat wrote:I felt lucky to be down by nine at the end of the first half. We were totally outclassed physically in that half. Fullerton has a bunch of jumping jacks that can shoot.

But oh what a second half. Howard started off with a three and then just kept going. After a 15-2 run Huse does a hockey line change and Peopoli hits a three. Then miracle of miracle-Navarre hits a three to give us the lead-a lead we would never relinguish. Fullerton on the other hand was ice cold. Their stud guard who had 14 or 15 at the half ended with 18 points (he averages about 25). It looked like when they got just a little bit tired they completely collapsed.

Will Bynum only had three points, but he was charged with guarding their star player most of the night. He got his ankles broke a couple of times, but in the second half he was getting his hands on some passes and got nice steal at half court.

Huse is subbing Anderson for MBunga early in both halves. It seems to be working. MBunga looked fresher at the end of the game and he wasn't in foul trouble. Anderson held his own with four point and some solid defense and rebounding.

If we would have played half his well on Saturday we would have beaten EWU by 20. It's just so frustrating. Oh well, these non-conference wins will help the league's RPI a little bit.

I think that this will be the theme all year - we'll play really quite good at home, and struggle a bunch on the road. That's pretty typical for college basketball, unless you are clearly the elite of a given conference; which we are not, at this time anyway.

The kids should be really proud of their effort last night.

Great 2nd half and a great win by the Cats last night. They have a few tough raod games coming up so hopefully they can take this win and build off of it. CSF mostly played zone the entire 2nd half last night and the Cats were able to hit some clutch three's and really controlled the glass. I look forward to playing Wazzu and see how we do against their defense. Great win Cats!