So we go to a 4 Pace, 7 Motion setup, which is unlike anything we've had before.
The Butterfly Man steps in as the starting SF. We also have
Joseph Velarde,
Raphael Taylor, and the Butterfly as our three new focal points on offense for the next month+. I have no idea how this is going to play out.
Code:
2019 Big West Conference Standings
TEAM CW CL Pct W L Pct RPI Prestige
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cal State Northridge Matadors 0 0 .000 7 4 .636 76 23
UC Riverside Highlanders 0 0 .000 6 6 .500 7 49
UC Santa Barbara Gauchos 0 0 .000 6 4 .600 124 47
Cal State Fullerton Titans 0 0 .000 4 7 .364 246 32
UC Davis Aggies 0 0 .000 3 8 .273 68 49
Long Beach State 49ers 0 0 .000 3 7 .300 213 24
Pacific Tigers 0 0 .000 3 8 .273 285 19
Hawaii Rainbow Warriors 0 0 .000 2 9 .182 296 23
Cal Poly Mustangs 0 0 .000 2 8 .200 341 40
UC Irvine Anteaters 0 0 .000 0 10 .000 240 25
Enjoy seeing that because it won't last.
UC-Riverside is looking like the best team this year, followed by
UC-Santa Barbara. Our injuries will prevent us from challenging for the title, but hopefully we can squeeze out a .500 record in conference play.
@ Pacific (3-8)
Really talented center in
Armando Sherlock, but the backcourt is two freshmen, neither of whom look that great at this stage in their careers. Time to see what we're made of.
We're getting slightly outshot, but the
Butterfly Man's 13 first-half points carry us to a 36-30 edge. I'm not going to hope for anything really while we're so decimated, but it's nice to see us showing we can compete against a team that clearly has the best player on the court.
50 seconds left. They hit a 3 pointer. We lose 60-62. Fuck all of this.
So
2 point loss to Pacific
4 point loss to Fullerton
2 point loss to Cal Poly (blowing a 13 point lead)
1 point loss to UC-Davis (on a 3 point buzzer beater)
Finally a 5 point victory over UC-Irvine on
Raphael Taylor's 18 points, 13 rebounds, 2 blocks and
Joseph Velarde's 15 points and 2 steals, but we sure tried hard to lose that one, too.
16 points and 3 steals by
Raphael Taylor, though
Joseph Velarde's 17 points is PotG in a flattering 10 point win over Long Beach State. 12 boards, 2 blocks for
Thomas Hadden as we score a flurry of points late to steal the game we were losing.
20 points, 7 assists, and a steal for
Joseph Velarde in a one point win over UC-Riverside that sees them nail a 3 point buzzer beater. It's our first nail-biting victory of the Big West season. No PotG for any of our guys here, though
Papilion Faulvarque scores 13 with 2 steals and
Thomas Hadden pulls in 16 boards with 2 blocks and 2 steals.
Winston Reyes is playable at 93% against UC-Santa Barbara, so he goes back in the lineup and takes the third scorer slot from
Raphael Taylor with a chance for us to somehow end up at .500 to end the month.
We get our asses handed to us and
Geoffrey Blodgett is questionable for our next game. You can't make this up.
We finally get our first big man recruit.
Code:
#2 C Tony Salazar
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Height: 6-9
Weight: 253
High School: Parma High School
Hometown: Parma, ID
GPA: 2.69
Test Score: 1020
Rating: *
Attributes:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Type INS JPS FTS 3PS HND PAS ORB DRB PSD PRD STL BLK QKN STR JMP STA
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Current: 22 23 49 14 17 3 28 15 42 27 7 49 6 64 43 30
Potential: C D C F D D C C B D F B
Season Stats:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PTS OREB REB AST TOS A/T STL BLK PFS
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
11.9 2.8 6.6 1.1 2.0 0.56 1.3 4.6 2.7
Shooting Averages:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FGM FGA FG% FTM FTA FT% 3PM 3PA 3P%
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
4.6 8.5 .541 2.7 3.4 .779 0.0 0.0 .000
Recruiting Notes:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Qualified: Yes
Committed to Cal State Northridge
Rankings: None
High School Awards: All-State
Top 5 Schools: *Cal State Northridge
Shotblocking specialist with some defensive potential. Meh. It's our usual garbage Mountain All-State 1* pickup when all our other options are exhausted. Red/Yellow. Screams
Truman Crain, and that's not a good thing.
UC-Riverside is indeed running away with the Big West title at 7-1,
their only loss to us.
Can you see why I'm so fucking frustrated? We've been snakebit six ways to Sunday with injuries and close losses the last two seasons. Without all those injuries, we're probably a title contender.
Not one of three 3-5 teams sitting second to last and ahead of only Long Beach State.