The Bulgarian Brothers – A College Hoops 2K8 & NBA 2K20 Dynasty

[studbucket]

Quote: Originally Posted by Careless Whisper

Good things happening for both brothers despite the injuries! Dinko's signing of Willingham is huge, he should immediately be a star in the NEC. And how about Oggy getting a good win against his former school - what an unbelievable performance by Evertsen!

Yeah, I think things are going to trend positively for both brothers in conference play, but it's still early. Evertsen is going to be huge for the next 4 years for Oggy, and hopefully he can be paired with some incoming talent over the next two seasons.

I will be interested to see what it's like to play with Willingham. I hope he's a talent outside shooter, but if not, he'll still be an asset due to his size. Vern Quick is a 6'8" SG, so Willingham (6'6") will be an awesome person to pair with Quick.

[studbucket]

The Red Flash are sitting at 3-6 after a 76-70 win over Maine. It’s not good, but it’s an improvement over where they were and they’re 2-0 in the conference. While losing non-conference games isn’t fun, Dinko would trade those for conference wins every day of the week.

This week they travel to Dinko’s alma mater, where he always receives a warm welcome. The Red Flash managed to defeat the Dukes in their matchup last year, which was the first victory for Oggy over his alma mater. The Dukes are struggling this year at 1-7 and haven’t made the NCAA tournament since 1977. Many Dukes fans have seen what Dinko has done in Loretto and are clamoring for him to come to Pittsburgh and bring his alma mater to glory, as it seems like Keith Dambrot may be on his last legs as coach.

Duquesne won their first game of the season over “Fake Francis” (St. Francis NY) and have lost 7 straight games including a few losses by 42 and 66 points against Seton Hall and Purdue. Given how miserable they’ve been this year, some have wondered if there will be more people cheering for Dinko and St. Francis in the A.J. Palumbo Center than are cheering for the home team. The Dukes are led by junior SG Majak McGrath (71 ovr) - who has the absolute best name – and senior SF Patrick Owensworth (70 ovr). Owensworth is a good shooter and is Dinko’s biggest concern.

Given all this, as frustrating has the season has been for Dinko, the Red Flash should be considered favorites in this matchup as they are objectively better in every aspect of the game than Duquesne.

NOTE: My game froze shortly after I finished this game, and I didn’t save immediately after. I will be simming until I get a win, then will move on.

It was a hot start for both teams as they worked the ball into the paint and were getting buckets. SFU grabbed an early lead 11-10, but they had already been whistled for 3 fouls to Duquesne’s zero. Things stayed close to the midway point as St. Francis kept the 1 point lead, 17-16. Duquesne had grabbed three offensive boards to this point, which was the key to them staying in this game. The difference makers for the Red Flash had been Stephane Diakite and Vern Quick who were using their size advantage to score on the interior.

Duquesne called a timeout and immediately came out and scored 5 straight, forcing Dinko to call time to regroup his players. He decided to go with an unorthodox lineup, putting in 1 guard (Tanoris Houston) and 4 bigs (Diakite, Holman, Hailey, and Akindele). Dinko was hoping the huge size advantage could throw off the Dukes. The approach was somewhat successful and St. Francis managed to dig out of their hole and take a 3 point lead into halftime: 37-34.

Duquesne is hitting their three pointers, which is keeping them close. St. Francis is answering by shooting 66% from the field themselves. Vern Quick has 13 points and Patrick Owensworth has 10 as both sharpshooters are leading their teams.

In the second half, the Red Flash clamp down on Owensworth, but that opens up scoring for others and St. Francis struggles to score early on. Duquesne takes a 42-41 lead after another Toussaint basket, forcing Dinko to call a timeout. Out of the timeout, Gerardo Bethel nailed two three pointers to put St. Francis up by 5. There was a big smile on his face as you could see him relieved to finally hit some deep shots, as he was 0-4 on the game so far and struggling from outside this season.

In the middle of the second half, the teams’ benches were squaring off and the quality of St. Francis’ backups shone through as they took a 55-47 lead with 4:40 left. Just over a minute later, it had all turned around as the Dukes tied it up 56-56. Duquesne had gotten hot and the Red Flash were missing all their shots.

However, Duquesne rotated back into their 2-3 zone and Vern Quick hit a clutch three to quiet the crazy crowd. St. Francis didn’t look back and won the game 68-60, giving Dinko his second straight victory over his alma mater.

St. Francis held Patrick Owensworth to only 6 second half points and he shot just 4-13 on the game. Vern Quick led all scorers with 22 points and the rest of the scoring was spread out. Special kudos to Tanoris Houston with 7 assists off the bench.

Around the NCAA

• The injury bug keeps biting the Hatters. In a 73-58 win over alma mater Robert Morris, Neil Mobley strained his lower back and will be out for 3 weeks. Oggy’s team is now down to a skeleton crew, with 3 of his 8-man rotation out.
• It was a showdown of the top two teams in the country, but it wasn’t even close. Florida dominated Maryland 101-73 behind Jave Ibikunle’s (PF, 82 ovr) 27 points.
• Oklahoma’s big man Sherman Turner is leading the nation in scoring with 29.8 point per game. Just behind him is Miami’s Trevor Barrett (PG, 27.3 ppg), Minnesota’s Tyler Dudley (SG, 26.9 ppg), and MSU’s C.W. Wente (PG, 26.6 ppg).

Around NBA

• No Giannis, no problem for the Bucks as 3^rd year PG Matt Forney (79 ovr) led the Bucks with 27 points as they beat the Wizards. Forney is emerging as a serious scoring threat off the bench for the Bucks as he’s scoring 21 ppg this season.
• Devin Booker (92 ovr) dropped 56 points as the Suns dominated the Hornets.
• The Bucks are 20-3 and winners of 12 straight, easily having the best record in the league. They won their most recent game on the back of Giannis Antetokounmpo’s (PF, 99 ovr) 44 points, 17 rebounds, 7 assists, and 5 blocks.
• The Brooklyn Nets are 8-15 and are tied for the second worst record in the Eastern Conference. Even though Kyrie is hurt, they should be much better than this, but the reigning champs have lost 4 straight and 7 of their last 10.
• The Trail Blazers are just starting to get healthy (both Brogdon and Jaylen Brown are back) but they sit at 5-19 with the worst record in the NBA.
• The Clippers are 8-14 and there are rumblings that the locker room is very unhappy and Kawhi didn’t sign up to play for a loser the rest of his career.

I try to play parts of games periodically, just to keep up with the league. I usually lose, but I managed to destroy the Clippers with the Thunder recently (111-77 final). OKC is a lot of fun, and has a slew of talented young players: Shea Gilgeous-Alexander (age 24, SG, 87 ovr), Jarrett Allen (age 24, C, 85 ovr), Dana Bright (age 26, PF, 80 ovr), Vytas Kowalczuk (age 24, SG, 80 ovr), Seth Valsin (age 21, PG/SF, 80 ovr), Milos Jeffers (age 23, SG, 79 ovr), and Dan Vignale (age 23, PG, 79 ovr).

Here are two fun highlights from that game:

Seth Valsin throws down the reverse alley-oop from SGA.

Dan Vignale posterizes two Clippers

[marshdaddy]

Despite the win, can’t imagine an eight-point win over a bad team is going to instill a ton of confidence in his group.

Tough injuries to the Hatters. How many guys are now getting playing time? It’s not a five-man rotation is it?

Was that second poster on Kawhi??

[studbucket]

Quote: Originally Posted by marshdaddy

Despite the win, can’t imagine an eight-point win over a bad team is going to instill a ton of confidence in his group.

Agreed. This team is missing the skills and leadership of last year's captain Muhamed Payne and is suffering a bit because of all the young players in the rotation. Though they are 2-0 in the NEC, which is a good start. We'll see if they can jel over the course of the season.

Quote: Originally Posted by marshdaddy

Tough injuries to the Hatters. How many guys are now getting playing time? It’s not a five-man rotation is it?

Haha, no. But it's not good. It's an 8-man rotation, but Evertsen and Scott are playing 37-39 minutes a game. The players off the bench are somewhere between "10th man" and "shouldn't be on a court". Luckily Deron Wagner just got healthy (the day after the SFU-Duquesne game), so that helps a bit. But we're still 2 weeks out from the other two getting back.

Quote: Originally Posted by marshdaddy

Was that second poster on Kawhi??

It absolutely was. I didn't know Vignale had those hops, but now I want to use him more. He's like a poor man's Ja Morant. The Clippers couldn't do a thing this entire game, which was shocking to me.

[Careless Whisper]

Dying at Fake Francis! Tough set of injuries for the Hatters, hopefully Evertsen can continue to play elite basketball and keep the team afloat. As for SFU, not super promising that they could only manage an eight-point win over Duquesne, but I still think they'll put together a solid conference campaign and set themselves up well for a chance at the dance.

[studbucket]

Quote: Originally Posted by Careless Whisper

Dying at Fake Francis! Tough set of injuries for the Hatters, hopefully Evertsen can continue to play elite basketball and keep the team afloat. As for SFU, not super promising that they could only manage an eight-point win over Duquesne, but I still think they'll put together a solid conference campaign and set themselves up well for a chance at the dance.

I'll have the conference previews out in one of my next few posts, and I'm starting to take a look at how the teams are doing. None of the NEC teams seem to be having a great non-conf schedule, so maybe SFU is in better shape than it seems, but signs aren't great so far - though there's no reason to panic.

I think the biggest need will be getting a frontcourt player to step up as a consistent scorer.

Also, I don't add a ton of flavor to my writing or dynasty, but Fake Francis is definitely my favorite as well

[georgiafan]

Glad to see you back with a update

[studbucket]

Quote: Originally Posted by georgiafan

Glad to see you back with a update

Thanks! Definitely been around, but I have been playing far fewer video games because of all the basketball coaching I was doing, plus work being a bit busier.