First off I watched this entire game, while riding my bike and by the end the excitement of the game and the two hours of riding got a little sweat on my notes.  I’m a gamer and I can still make them out.  My first impressions of both teams where that the Gophers have way more talent and are much more athletic.  Northwestern seems to have better basketball sense/savvy.  At times I wonder what Tubby is doing presently in games some of his substitutions seem to be counter productive and I’m not always sure I understand the offense he has the team running.  Now that I’ve let the game sink in for almost an entire day I realize that right now in the present isn’t as important for this team and this program as the future.  I’ve got a few thoughts that I’ll add to the end of this on the program in general but here is my take on last nights game.

1. Northwestern starting off the night taking a lot of outside shots and a lot of threes.  The first third of the game they were hitting.  The second third of the game they went cold.  The final third of the game they started to heat back up, but it was too little too late.
2. Westbrook started on freaking fire.  His 7 quick points kept the Gophers in the game early.
3. Colton Iverson came up with possession of the ball off of a steal/turnover early in the game.  Iverson drove down the length of the court with his right hand and was completely lost as to what to do once he got to the basket.  If Paul Carter hadn’t been trailing the play Iverson assuredly would have turned the ball over.  Iverson can do some things like play defense and rebound but his offensive game is horrible.
4. Iverson played a great anchor in the Gophers full-court press.  He was never out of position at the back-end and made several plays on help defense.  In the first half alone he had three blocks and he forced multiple Northwestern players to rotate the ball out of the paint and to pass-up on drive opportunities.
5. Iverson easily  made the pass of the night to Rodney Williams for an alleyoop dunk.  (I feel the need to say that it was a dunk because both teams ran alleyoop lay-up plays later in the game.  Very odd to watch a guy sky for a pass and then softly lay it in.  In my eyes if you are going up there above the trees you might as well let everyone know what you are capable of doing.)  I can’t find the dunk from last night but I’ll throw some Rodney Williams highlights on at the end.  This guy could/should be amazing.
6. At the 12 minute mark when the Gophers send in their second unit and Northwestern countered with theirs the Gophers started to take back the game.  It didn’t help Northwestern that from the 12 minute mark to the 8 minute mark they picked up a number of quick fouls.
7. The Gophers second unit has no real scoring threat.  Devron Bostick did hit a huge three to at the 7:16 mark left in the first half to close the gap.  What we lack in scoring from the second unit we make up with full-court hussle.  This is when we started our tenacious full court press that really started to wear down Northwestern.
8. The second unit really struggled with floor spacing on the fast break.
9. Colton Iverson is a big guy, he doesn’t have a ton of meat on the bones but he’s big nonetheless.  For as big of a guy as he is he shies away from contact way too much.  Iverson, and Sampson, needs to be a force inside.  Far too often he was looking for fouls and not standing strong on defense.  That’s not to say he wasn’t in correct position on pretty much every play.  I just would like to see a little bit more of a mean streak in him.  Especially when you consider how much the announcers kept referring to him as a beast.
10. There was a great sequence with about four minutes left in the first half where Westbrook makes a steal, passes it ahead to Hoffarber who drives the lane and kicks it back out to Westerbrook for an open three.  The Gophers set-up their full-court press and this was the only time that Northwestern totally broke the press and found a man for a wide open two-fisted thunderous dunk.  Only for the Gophers to sprint back up the court with Joseph finding Hoffarber on the right wing.  Hoffarber drove the lane for an old fashioned three point play.
11. The Gophers where losing 19-21 but they turned it around to 27-23 from the 12 minute mark to the tail end of the Hoffarber and one
12. Revsine kept saying that Northwestern was breaking the press.  To me breaking the press means you quickly find a basket off the in-bound.  Northwestern was able to get across half-court but they weren’t finding the open man for easy buckets, except for that one time.  The Gophers where keeping the Northwestern players in front of them and forcing Northwestern to run their half-court sets.  Breaking the press seemed a little much.
13. Devoe Joseph is really long, his arms are crazy long.
14. Paul Carter was a huge part of the Gophers come-back in the first half.
15. At the half the Gophers had an eight point lead but they looked really uninspired.
16. The game had a really slow pace but the Gophers played Northwestern the entire length of the court and were forcing Northwestern to use their bench, which is much weaker then the Gophers.
17. Rodney Williams has a ton of talent, he doesn’t seem to know how to fully utilize it yet but the Gophers need to find ways to get him more involved.
18. At the half the Gophers led Northwestern in block 6-2.
19. Offensivly both teams struggled from inside.  The Gophers have such great interior defenders and such poor interior offense that I chalk this up to us along.  At least if we are going to have to be a perimeter team we were able to make them one too.
20. The start the 2nd half the Gophers kept up their full court press.  Within a few minutes you could already see it taking a toll on Northwesters team.  Northwestern started allowing more penetration.  Which is when they switched to the 1-3-1 zone.
21. Just before Northwestern started the 1-3-1 they had moved to a spot up, pick and pop type of offense.  Which was leading to a lot of long rebounds and really opened up the Gophers fast-break.
22. As soon as the 1-3-1 was established the Gophers went cold.  Once they started missing outside shots Northwestern started to sag on the Gophers outside shooters and move the pressure up on the ball.  Devoe Joseph seemed lost.  Joseph gave up his dribble way to much and didn’t attack the zone.  Instead he telegraphed his passes out of the zone trap and that led to 3 easy lay-ups for Jeremy Nash.  Jeremy Nash needs to learn how to dunk.
23. Tubby put Cobbs in but not to spell Joseph instead he took him aside and must have been digraming how to beat the 1-3-1.  As soon as Joseph went back into the game he started to attack the zone a little more and started making the cross court passes that tire out a 1-3-1 zone.
24. Overall the Gophers needed to push the tempo a lot more then they were.
25. Due to the Gophers inability to deal with the 1-3-1 Northwestern went on a 10-0 run.
26. Sampson the III has a horrible stroke from the free throw line, but so do most of the Gophers.
27. Paul Carter had a horrible lay-in attempt that at the time would have tied the game up.  Carter needed to finish that one strong.  It wouldn’t have been show-boating it just would have been scoring.  Instead he looked like a fool dropping the ball next to the rim.  Get two hands on that one and throw it threw the hoop.
28. Hoffarber hits a 3 from the corner with 7:13 left in the game putting the Gophers up 48-43.  The last seven minutes were completely back and forth.
29. With a just a few minutesleft in the game out of a time-out the Gophers isolate Cobbs and he drives it to the hoop and had no chance because the play was totally telegraphed.  Northwestern easily defended the play.  On Northwestern’s ensuing possession Michael Thompson drained a 3 to tie the game.
30. On the Gopher’s following possesion Westbrook makes a bad pass that Shurna steals and pushes ahead.  Joseph was back on defense but instead of getting a charge is called for a block.  I know that I was able to watch the replay like five times but it was a charge all the way.  The Gophers youth hurt them on that call.  Shurna hit one to put Northwestern up by one.
31. Then it became the Blake Hoffarber show.  With 4:43 left Hoffarber hit a three 51-49.  Then after a Gopher stop with 4:17 left he hit another 54-49.  Then Damian Johnson picked up a pass threw it ahead to Hoffarber who was sprinting down the court with Westbrook with no Northwestern players in site.  Hoffarber layed it off to Westbrook for the easy lay-in, it was a very selfless act Hoffarber could have easily had the lay-in to pad his own stats.
32. The 1-3-1 struck again at the 3 minute mark and again Nash just layed it in.
33. To follow that up on the Gophers next possession Devoe launched up an ugly three due to pressure from the 1-3-1
34. With 2:31 left in the game and the Gophers up by 56-54 Westbrook gets the ball with six on the shot clock.  Instead of taking the shot he passes it to Hoffarber who catches it as the shot clock hit 2 and instantly fires up a perfect contested three 59-54 and the game was over for the most part.
35. Devoe missed another 3 to make it interesting but Northwestern wasn’t able to do anything with it.
36. With 10.6 left on the clock in a 3 point game Joseph at the line for a one and one.  He missed the front end but Hoffarber snagged the rebound and Northwestern had to foul.  Hoffarber hit two free throws to make it a five point game.
37. Michael Thompson drained a three from the base of the M in the Minnesota logo to make it 63-61 Gophers
38. Westbrook got the inbound and drilled both shots to completely ice the game 65-61!

Both teams are fast and get up and down very quickly.  The Gophers can out jump Northwestern at pretty much every position.  The Gophers don’t always seem to know what to do with their ability.  Northwestern is a little more veteran team and they seemed to have a better sense of how to play the game.  Tubby teaches a lot during games.  Mistakes that happened early were almost always corrected.  Outside of not being able to handle the 1-3-1.  Which is probably due to Joseph and Cobbs having to work on their offensive sets more this past week due to Nolen’s suspension.  This team is building for the future and trying to put itself in position to make the NCAA tournament this season.  They talent that Tubby has recruited should really start to blossom next season.  Especially if they are able to land Corey Joseph along with Devoe.  Think of this line-up White-Sampson-Hoffarber-Joseph-Joseph.  Sure you wouldn’t be that athletic or big at the 3 but you’d have one hell of a perimeter.

Tags: Blake Hoffarber, Colton Iverson, Devoe Joseph, Laurence Westbrook, Ralph Sampson III, Royce White, Tubby Smith

This entry was posted on 01/27/2010 at 6:51 pm and is filed under College Sports, Gophers Basketball, Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.