The defense did not get it done today.
- Thread starter FeralFelidae
- Start date
Probably something to do with being down three starters.
This is what Iowa does. It’s why they never make noise in the tourney. They play zero defense and that just doesn’t work in the tournament.
A healthy NU team wins this game. Very confident saying that. It is what it is. Iowa deserves the credit for hitting big shots and getting the win, but down three starters it’s actually amazing we kept it as close as we did.
If Langborg could have played ANY this game, this was the game to pull out the stops. Let him rest up on the road.
(If he could't, then it is what it is.)
This is our 2nd-worst loss of the season. It will hurt in many ways.
Score was disappointing, but you would have been proud if you watched. Down three starters, we had no business being in that game and we kept battling back.
Get healthy (worried about Nicholson) and we’ll be okay:
We played hard as hell. But the boneheaded lazy defense when we got it to 67-65 was absolutely brutal. Completely inexcusable. I don’t care if fatigue is in place (and it was). You have to get back. We need to learn from this.
I don’t want to be a downer here, but seeding is kind of irrelevant. Just get in the tournament and celebrate it. This team isn’t getting beyond the first weekend and they will be very lucky to hang in a first round game. That’s ok and, frankly, the tournament alone would be worth cerebrating. 16 months ago, nobody in their right mind thought NU would make one of the next two - let alone both - tournaments.
The way this season has played out is really unfortunate because NU could have gone toe to toe with anyone in the country in January. But, this team is now a fraction of what it was with the loss of Berry, what seems to be Nicholson now and a hobbled Langborg. They are a well coached, cohesive unit that still has Buie, so they have grinded out important wins. But those wins have come against VERY mediocre teams. Since Berry went down, they’ve played Penn State, Rutgers, Indiana, Michigan and Maryland before today’s game. Those are 5 of the 6 worst teams in the conference who had long since been eliminated from postseason play.
Let’s be real about what we are working with at this point. What’s left of this team isn’t about to beat a 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 seed. So I wouldn’t be worried about a seed.
If NU can find a way to make it in the tournament, it will be a minor miracle. Losing your second best player midway through and then losing your second best shooter for a key stretch at the end plus now possibly losing your 7 foot senior center….. and still getting in? At Northwestern?? It will be amazing.
Maybe.. it’s possible they don’t need to win again though. So the miracle would have already been performed.
What they have working against them now - and why I think they probably need the 12th win even to avoid a play-in - is a group of talking heads arguing that this is an entirely different team at this point than the one that built the majority of the resume. I don’t necessarily disagree with that, but it sure does suck.
They were missing their interior D when MN went down
The team battled like hell down 3 starters. Very few teams can survive that. Iowa should sacrifice a hog in a show of thanks to the gods for this one.
Both teams shot the lights out. NU hit 54% of their shots, Iowa 55%. Both were 10-20 from 3, which is outstanding. NU was 14-16 from the line, Iowa 11-13. It really came down to Iowa getting 8 more shots from the field, due to their advantage in rebounds and turnovers.
To be honest, at the game it didn't feel like NU was shooting as well as Iowa. Seemed like everything Iowa put up went in. I was surprised when I looked at the stats today.
To be honest, at the game it didn't feel like NU was shooting as well as Iowa. Seemed like everything Iowa put up went in. I was surprised when I looked at the stats today.
Thought Collins got outcoached by Fran. Yes we didn’t have enough ammunition to beat Iowa. But their ability to push pace on us time after time was the difference. Collins never adjusted fatigue or not. Need to win Wednesday. Borg will be back
Nonsense. How in the hell could Collins adjust without 3 starters? What do you thinks he should have done?
Meant for @Skunkpilot.
Do we have anyone like Dix on our team? He created most all of his own shots and made them! Sandfort is deadly. Even Krikke made shots that he created; we have no bigs like him. Boo (who was also deadly), Brooks and Mart (and a better game than expected from Smith) almost saved us, but we were beaten by better creators/shooters yesterday.
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Well, we have a couple of guys like Dix, and their names are Berry and Langborg. Unfortunately, both were out with injuries and didn't play. In my opinion, we would have won this game easily if we hadn't been down 3 starters in the second half, and probably would have won if MN hadn't been injured.
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