Welcome to The Holy Land of Hoops

Game on at 10 EST again, this time ESPNU. I don't have that on my Sling, BUT, as of now it's showing up in my que for ESPN3... so it looks like it's available.

This is the writeup from CU website on the Venezuela game:
https://gocreighton.com/news/2019/8/2/m ... zuela.aspx

and VU Hoops SB Nation:
https://www.vuhoops.com/villanova-baske ... ie-samuels

Can't say enough about Powell, total stud and SHU is so lucky the idiots in the NBA didn't steal him away. LOVE THIS QUOTE:

Powell was proud of the team's accomplishments so far in the Games. "The BIG EAST is the best basketball conference in the country, but right now it's not really about the BIG EAST. It's about repping for your country."

Puerto Rico won by 3.
We led for entire game except maybe 30 seconds at the end.
Big East faces Argentina tomorrow.
We finished 2nd in our group (USA, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, US Virgin Islands), and advanced to knock-out stage.

We were up 16 in the 1st half and in control.
I turned away for a while (ESPN switched coverage to women's boxing), and when i came back much later it was BE up 77-70 in 4th.

Player on PR from Oregon State (Collier) bumped Powell into ref's back, and i think a double-foul was called, which fouled out Powell. Powell only had a couple of points for some reason.

Puerto Rico drilled a bunch of threes over the final 6 minutes, some tough shots.

I think Samuels gave us a 2 point lead on a nice layup with maybe 90 seconds. PR hit 2 free throws. Groselle hit one of 2 free throws with maybe 40 secs left. PR hit a corner 3 with 20 secs to go up 2. Diallo drove, ton of contact, no call. PR hit 1 free throw, missed but got board. Forgot exact final sequence, but BE missed potential tying 3 to end it.

Offense got stagnant late.

Good, entertaining game. Besides Collier, PR also had a former Manhattan star named Andujar, along with the son of former Padre catcher Benito Santiago.

We started out like a house afire from three. As soon as we cooled off Puerto Rico started chipping away. The offense is struggling a little bit.

Wish we were playing with a full deck

Had the whole family tuned in during the second half and it was a train wreck in almost every way. Couldn't make open shots, gave up offensive rebounds (including one at the end of the game on a missed FT in the middle of the lane which was inexpicable), and the refs were horrible.

What I don’t understand is apparently Cooley is responsible for the offense and Willard is responsible for the defense. That seems totally backwards