How You Start Isn't Always How You Finish

Final Score: CofC 64, Davidson 75

Top Performers: Nik Cochran 21 pts, 7 rebs, 4 assts

                              Jeremy Simmons 11 pts (5-7 FG), 5 rebs, 4 blks

With their second straight poor performance, the Cougars were unable to readjust their game plan enough to defeat a struggling Davidson team. It was another case of CofC playing to the level of the competition. Except this time there was no covering up the mental mistakes that could have cost us a victory at Georgia Southern.

The first half began predictably enough. Davidson came out running a slooooow, borderline lethargic offensive pace. Each play they set was well rehearsed and precise. The Cougars responded accordingly, playing solid man on man defense and boxing out the Wildcats after a shot. On the offensive end the Cougars remained calm, mimicking the Davidson style of play, running the shot clock down until they found an open shot. If something wasn't open on the perimeter, Donovan or Drew got the ball to Simmons. Jeremy was able to get good looks with some aggressive isolation moves under the basket. Things were going well and the Cougars maintained a comfortable double digit cushion. 

The second half was a whole different story. Davidson knew they had to change their style of play to have a shot at defeating Cremins' team. 

I've watched enough sports in my day to know the perfect recipe for a team to give up a lead and get "home cooked". The recipe is simple: get too comfortable with the way you're playing, allow the opponent to get some highlight worthy plays (think steals and fast break dunks), and the crowd will be inspired enough to make the game 5x more difficult to play in. This is exactly what happened on Saturday afternoon.

For whatever reason the Cougars stopped playing inside-out basketball with Jeremy. They instead went back to depending on long balls or contested jumpers. We also continued to turn the ball over at an alarmingly high rate. Again, continuing the sloppy trend that started in Statesboro. 

Because 4 CofC players were hovering around the perimeter and Donovan and Drew were handing them the ball, Davidson got what seemed like twice as many possessions as they had in the first half. Couple that with the crowd getting back into it and you see where this is going. After shooting 0-10 from 3 in the first half, the Wildcats shot with confidence in the 2nd and connected on 9 of 14. They gradually crawled back from an 11 point deficit and stuck it to the Cougars for our second conference loss of the season.

The cushion over Wofford, Chattanooga and Furman is gone. The NIT bid and tourney bye is going to be tougher to claim than we thought they would be a week ago.

But the sky is not falling. 

This week may not be a make or break kind of stretch, but seeing how the Cougars respond will tell us if this is a different team from those of the past two years. Wofford and Furman will both be coming to the Carolina First Arena to try and steal conference supremacy from the Cougars. There is still a big X on our backs and both teams are more than capable of beating us. But both teams fell to Charleston when we made our mini road trip through the upstate.

I have not lost confidence in this particular team. The seniors understand the importance of the week ahead and it's significance in the scope of things. If this squad is who I think they are, they will play with a sense of urgency that we haven't seen yet and put away both the Paladins and Terriers in convincing fashion.