Baru Does Everything But Score, CofC Escapes WCU

Final Score: College of Charleston 62, Western Carolina 58

Top Performers: Adjehi Baru 9 points, 17 rebounds (8 offensive)

                              Nori Johnson 17 points, 5 rebounds, 2 assists

With no Willis Hall, no Trent Wiedeman and no Matt Sundberg for the second half, the Cougars were left painfully thin up front. Fortunately, Adjehi Baru stepped up big time and CofC got some decent spot minutes from James Carlton to pull away from a very pesky Catamounts squad. Looking like a grown man amongst boys, Baru did everything right against Western Carolina except get the ball through the hoop. He was active on help defense, altered/blocked a couple shots and grabbed rebounds at a Dwight Howard-like rate. The young freshman had some good post moves and continually got hacked on his way to the rim but couldn't get a shot up. He made up for it a little bit at the line, going 7-15.

The Cougars also got a good contribution from Nori Johnson, who posted another career high with 17 points. It wasn't the most efficient 17 points, but he is becoming more and more reliable from the 3-point arc. It took quite a while for the Cougars to get going (see the points below) but WCU's timely turnovers and an insane 23 offensive rebounds by CofC kept them in this one. We held a comfortable lead going into the final minutes before Trey Sumler and company made 2-3 contested heaves to stay within shooting distance. Lawrence and Baru iced it from the line. 

More notes from this game:

• Didn't take long for the Cougars to break some glass on the night. And by that I don't mean the fluorescent bulbs under the scorers table that Lawrence careened into. I mean the glass ankles that our bigs apparently have. Sundberg came down from a rebound and immediately grabbed his ankle and joined Wiedeman and the recently recovered Baru on the bench.
• The first six minutes of the game went as follows for the Cougars: 3 points scored, 5 fouls, 5 turnovers, 0-5 from three and one James Carlton punched in the face
• Cougars need to trail Wiggins better when he slashes to the basket. He ain't passing when he gets to the rim and if he misses (which he did quite a bit tonight) there are four opposing players there for the easy rebound
• When he was inserted into the game, James Carlton did mostly James Carlton things. He made fantastic plays on defense with his athleticism, but he also had an offensive interference call and dribbled the ball off his foot for a turnover. I'll give him this though, he makes a pretty good pairing on defense with Baru on the floor. That's a very intimidating combination.
• Baru's offense started clicking when the Cougars finally started hitting from outside. Many teams earlier in the year fell for the Adjehi Baru "decoy" and doubled him, giving so many looks to the shooters. Tonight it worked the other way; Nori and Sundberg made some shots and suddenly Baru had some space to operate.
• To fix the above problem, WCU switched to a zone in the second. It gave Baru a wide open jumper from 6 feet out that he was able to hit consistently earlier this year. Don't know why he didn't take it tonight.
• In a one-point game, Antwaine Wiggins shooting from the foul line is not the shot you want
• There's so much open space inside the three point line when Baru and Wiedeman are off the floor. It's times like that when the Cougars need a really good screen setter like Willis to give them a path to drive to the basket

Cougars Return Home to Face WCU

College of Charleston (14-10, 6-7)

Western Carolina (10-15, 4-8)

TD Arena

Tipoff at 8pm on ESPN3

The CofC fan base has missed out on the opportunity to watch the Cougars play in person for nearly two weeks due to the latest 3 game road trip. Before the Cougars head into a much anticipated match-up against Davidson, they must take on Harouna Mutombo and the Western Carolina Catamounts tomorrow night. Thursday games have not been good to the Cougars this year (half of our losses this year came on a Thursday) so maybe this game against WCU will be a good opportunity to get the monkey off our back.

The Catamounts are another team that is floating around somewhere in the middling quagmire of the Socon North. They're not an awful team, conference-wise, but they have few victories to really hang their hats on. Western is a very balanced team scoring wise, with four players averaging right around 11 points per game. However, they're another very small team. So small in fact that their leading rebounder is senior guard Mutombo with 6 a game. The only real post presence in the starting lineup for the Catamounts is 6-7 Tawaski King who is averaging 7 points and 5 rebounds. 

Normally I would expect an Elon-at-TD-Arena type of performance by Trent and Adjehi, but both are still hampered by ankle injuries. Baru is back in the starting lineup which is a good sign, but Trent has been limited in practice and has been in a walking boot while on campus. Luckily for the Cougs, Andrew Lawrence is coming out of his midseason slump and we are again getting contributions from Nori Johnson. Mark Byington will be looking for his first win at home and he's got a shot at it against this reeling Western team. If the Cougars look good tomorrow night we'll really have some momentum going into Saturday. Just hope the guys are focused on the task at hand first. Go Cougars! 

John Kresse and "Coach-Speak"

If you got a chance to watch Bobby Cremins' press conference yesterday, you may have noticed that Coach seemed to be in good spirits but didn't really share anything we didn't already know. That's a common technique I've noticed with many in the sports world. With near-constant interviews and press conferences, sometimes even the intelligent and well-spoken resort to this strange verbiage of saying words without saying anything at all. "Coach-speak" as I like to call it, is the theory behind such great postgame one-liners as "we played as a team" or "we failed to execute". 

Being inspired by Cremins' announcements I'd like to take this opportunity to translate the many sayings of another great coach who is fluent Coach-Speak, Mr. John Kresse. The namesake of this blog is now a regular on the Cougar TV Network and his euphemisms are some of my favorites in the broadcasting world. 

Below are a few of Coach Kresse's game time quotes, followed by their translations to everyday vernacular (this exercise works even better when you read the quotes in Kresse's trademark New York accent).

• "Not a very high percentage shot" - Jordan, what are you thinking?
• "He runs the floor very well and is a great hustle player" -  kid can't shoot
• "He's a real rugged player, likes to roll up his sleeves" - this kid is going to get in early foul trouble
• "This is a very deep conference" - this conference sucks
• "Much more of a finesse player" - This young man lacks toughness, and is likely to cry
• "Gonna be a real up-and-down game Nate!"- neither of these teams can run a half-court offense
• "Fortunately, a number of players are getting big-time minutes" - we got too many injuries
• "Andrew Lawrence has a shot at playing in the London Olympics" - I've run out of talking points

Lawrence, Cougars Blow Past App State

Oh Captain, My Captain

Final Score: College of Charleston 74, Appalachian State 62
Top Performers: Andrew Lawrence 24 points, 7 assists, 3 steals
                              Trent Wiedeman 14 points, 5 rebounds, 3 blocks

Maybe the Cougars are turning a corner. 48 hours after losing to Elon in double-overtime, Coach Byington's group of young men got a substantial victory on the road against App State. Despite being out-rebounded 46-32 and a combined 3-point shooting of 9% by Matt Sundberg and Antwaine Wiggins, the Cougars still left Boone with a 12-point victory.

The team was lead by two solid performances by the aforementioned "Top Performers". Andrew Lawrence made up for the poor shooting wings by going lights out from deep in the first half. He made five straight 3's in the first half and finished the game with a very efficient stat line. Wiedeman didn't have an Elon type performance going against I-Like-Isaac-Butts-And-I-Cannot-Lie but he came out hot as well and scored the first 6 CofC points. He got beat on the glass a couple times but App State's big men are one of the more formidable groups in the conference.

Rounding out the score sheet were some nice chip-in performances by Adjehi Baru and Nori Johnson. Baru led the Cougs with 9 rebounds despite some foul trouble and Nori was able to get back to double-digit scoring with an 11 point game on 4-6 shooting. Neither of them had a turnover either.

The problems we've been talking about are still there. We're still getting beat on the glass too much (especially giving up offensive possessions) and only time will tell if we can show any consistency in effort and focus. On the bright side, the Cougars are learning to at least negate some of these shortcomings by hustling on defense and moving the ball more regularly on offense. Lawrence had a nice quote about how Byington is trying to instill an offensive scheme that matches the players we have right now. For better or worse our situation has dictated this 7 man unit. Early on we folded trying to fit square pegs into round holes but maybe the guys are starting to figure out their roles a little better. Now we just need to figure out how to win on Thursdays.

Final Leg of Road Trip: At App State

Sims already graduated?! But he was only 28 years old!

Appalachian State (9-12, 5-6)
College of Charleston (13-10, 5-7)
Holmes Convocation Center
Tipoff at 2pm on ESPN 910
Live stream through App State for $10 (sorry Appy, not in this lifetime)

The body punches just keep coming for the Cougars, who take on the Mountaineers in a couple hours in Boone. If we can build off the effort we put forth against Elon in the second half we should be good. One of the problems with the Cougars as of late has been lethargic starts. Hopefully something clicked on Thursday when they erased that near 20-point deficit within a half. If they come out of the gates with intensity and focus, it doesn't matter whether or not the shots are falling. There's still a good chance of staying in the game if you're crashing the boards and moving the ball on offense.

App State is pretty athletic and will be a matchup nightmare for Andrew Lawrence and our bigs after playing a 2OT contest just the other night. Hopefully the athletic training staff dished out some good massages and lots of fluids. App State is one of those teams in the clusterf*ck that is the Socon North division. They'll be looking for a marquee win as much as the Cougars will be looking for a win of any type. Play smart and play with effort, CofC. Go Cougars!

Elon Does Best to Throw Game Away, Cougars Miss Opportunity

Final Score: Elon 99, College of Charleston 98
Top Performers: Andrew Lawrence 32 points, 8 assists, 2 steals, 2 blocks
                              Trent Wiedeman 17 points, 17 rebounds

What began as a blowout turned into one of the most exciting Socon games of the season as the Cougars erased a 51-34 halftime deficit and fought through 50 minutes of action before falling by 1 on a missed Andrew Lawrence floater.

The first half was one of the worst performances to date by the Cougars. I'm not even exaggerating that to make the comeback more emotionally appealing. It was bad. The Phoenix opened on a 6-0 run and made six straight three pointers before finally missing with less than five to play in the period. Lucas Troutman was absolutely abusing Trent down low. It was probably retribution for Trent's dominance a few weeks ago. Troutman routinely took Wiedeman to the hole and scored over him at will. But more than Lucas alone, the Cougars dug themselves a hole on their own. Elon did as they pleased for 20 straight minutes; getting wide open looks, rebounds and every 50/50 ball. The Cougars had a lot of dumb fouls in their frustration and never got it going on offense. Elon was in a strict man-to-man which bothered the Cougars significantly. It wasn't until they inadvertently switched to zone that CofC could get something going.

The Cougars couldn't buy a basket in the first half. We could barely get the ball inbounds. Nori, TD and Sundberg kept getting blown by on D, which opened up Baru and Wiedeman to hack away at whoever came down the lane at them. That early foul trouble resulted in our bigs being even less aggressive and Elon continued to take advantage. But the WORST part of all of this was that the team had SEEN all these plays in the film session the morning of the game. That fact alone had Jeff and Everett in cardiac arrest at the scorers table. It was all ugly and I strongly considered turning the game off at that point.

But unfortunately for me I have a blog to write and was forced to watch what was sure to be a dreadful overall performance. But alas! The Cougars started to make things interesting upon the realization that they are also a Division 1 basketball team. My heart urges me to imagine Mark Byington giving a raucous, "Any Given Sunday" type of halftime speech to spark his team. More than likely, the closing run the Cougars went on was due in part to three things. Elon's shooting came down from Samford vs Davidson type numbers. The Cougars played adequate, still-not-great-but-adequate, defense. And the Cougars were finally hitting their own shots. That last was is probably a sort of Self Fulfilling Prophecy. The Cougars were making shots, which forced Elon to stop doubling Baru and Wiggins, which then freed up the latter to make plays.

The Cougars used this enlightenment to slowly chip away at what I thought was an insurmountable advantage for Elon. Andrew Lawrence stepped up big time (he played all 50 minutes) and Trent was demanding enough attention down low that the perimeter was open for Sundberg. CofC managed to tie the game for the first time with 22 seconds to go. The Cougars managed to do this despite poor shot selection at times and to-be-expected poor free throw shooting. The final shot of regulation was a well run play that got Nori open on the sideline but he missed a floater at the buzzer ( Johnson finished the game shooting 3-13, woof).

The overtimes were a back and forth affair much like the UTC game earlier this season. A 2-3 point run for the Phoenix here, careless turnover, 3-4 point run for the Cougars there etc. Both teams had ample opportunities to put the other away. Elon went through a funk where they couldn't get the ball to stay inbounds. The Cougars could have made it a multiple possession game if they could hit from the charity stripe.

After Trent Wiedeman, Matt Sundberg and Lucas Troutman all fouled out, Elon went on one last run to push the lead to six. Even then the Cougars showed one last burst of life to get a three from both Lawrence and Wiggins. One made free throw and one miss later and the Cougs had a shot to win at the buzzer. Lawrence kept the ball until there were less than 10 seconds to go, took a look at the defense, drove right down the middle of the lane and missed a floater as time expired.

It was a real tough loss for the Cougars but credit is due for the effort they put forth for the last 30 minutes. Whether that negates the lethargic manner in which they played the first 20 is up for debate.

In a season that has gone downhill so quickly, I'll take the positives where I can get them. This game looked like an annihilation in the making. The Cougars showed real determination in not letting that happen and had a chance to pull off a sweet victory. Things didn't go our way in the end but the fact that we had the opportunity is worthy of applause. For one night.

Cougars Look to Build on Victory, Travel to Elon

"One-man-team!"- Elon haters gonna hate

Elon University (10-10, 5-4)

College of Charleston (13-9, 5-6)

Alumni Gym

Tipoff at 7 on ESPN 910 or via free live stream here:

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/elon-phoenix-athletics

The Cougars get their second shot at the Elon Phoenix tonight at Alumni Gym. Coach Byington and the guys will be looking to build off their road victory over Samford and attempt to sweep the Phoenix. Coincidentally, Elon was actually the last game the Cougars had one prior to that Monday night game against the Bulldogs. That was a game that was thoroughly dominated by Adjehi Baru and Trent Wiedeman at TD Arena more than two weeks ago.

Who wouldn't want to see another performance from our Twin Towers akin to that one? Sundberg is still listed as the starter for this one, but unless Baru's injury was re-aggravated, we could see Adjehi play 20 minutes or more. In their previous meeting, the Cougars held Elon's Lucas Troutman in check with just 9 points and 5 rebounds. They also limited the Phoenix to just 44 points on a God-awful 24% shooting clip. I doubt we see a performance that dreadful from Elon at home but maybe we have this team's number.

I really loved the hustle and intensity that the Cougars played with in the second half against Wofford and most of the game against Samford. They have little time to practice in the midst of this three game road trip so they will most likely have to again rely on grit and effort to gain a second straight victory. Elon is reeling a bit (not as much as us) and this could be a good confidence booster for the Cougars if we pull one out. I'll be looking for another good game by the bigs and I also want to see if Lawrence and Sundberg have finally rediscovered their outside stroke. Go Cougars!