Sorry that there can’t be a liveblog tonight. Be interesting to see what the ratings and attendance will be for the game. What with the Steelers on Monday Night Football as well. I expect a good crowd. Ratings will be decent since the Steelers aren’t on until 8:30 and Pitt starts at 7.
I’m really looking forward to getting home from work, and watching the game. Even on DVR delay. Excited to see how the players look this year and just start the season.
Really liked what I saw from Zanna. Brad was fantastic. Gibbs made big shots down the stretch. The beauty of the depth of this team is that on any given day, just 3 or 4 out of the 9 or so guys who will see significant minutes having really good days can equal a bunch of wins.
My one nitpicking complaint: Lamar Patterson, your range is inside of 20 feet. Remember that.
I would really like to see more minutes from Taylor (and think we will). Its a great substitution: for Gary/Nas to rough up teams on D/hustly for a while as our guards provide offense, then to allow us to spread the offense down low, use Zanna/Taylor both of whom have way better hands for catching passes and tipping in rebounds and both of whom can run the floor on fast breaks.
And watching us break the press, when we were effetive it was a lot of fun to watch. Looking forward to us running the floor more since we have the players to do it, more so dare i say than we did in 2008.
Granted, our front court didn’t seem all that effective, but besides loosing a few too many rebounds, on defense, URI didn’t do much damage inside the 3pt line. If all a team is going to do is shoot NBA-3s all game, so be it – that’s not winning you games against a team like Pitt.
I think we can expect to see a steady improvement from Taylor and Zanna if they continue to get minutes. They should and if they do, man, look out.
Given our deep rotation, even distribution of the ball/pts, we’re such a versatile team with pretty much zero weak spots. We’ve got the scorers in the back court, if Zanna or Taylor emerge as scorers/rebounders down low, we should be a legit (as opposed to ‘pre-season’) contender for the nat’l title.
Overall, a good win in the first game. Yes, there is a lot to work on, but they did a lot right and have a base upon which to build. I also thought Patterson showed flashes of potential, both offensively and defensively. Brown is still inconsistent (I don’t think that will change), but he looks stronger to me, and if he commits to it, he could be a really good defender.