Tuesday, April 04, 2006

Hoop and the Harm


I suppose I should write about last night's basketball game. It will probably be therapeutic, albeit likely incoherent as I'm still in a state of shock. I'm shocked at how impressively the Bruins were outplayed. I'm shocked out how the Bruins were outcoached. The only thing Bruins' fans can take pride in is that they weren't outclassed. While Florida was dunking and dancing all over the court, UCLA at least showed some dignity and kept playing hard without resorting to any frustration fouls or dirty tactics. And yeah, I know that I'm grasping for a silver lining. Other thoughts on the game:

I'm not sure how Florida was only credited with only 73 points as I seem to remember them dunking 347 times during the game.

By the early 2nd half, the UCLA tournament games went from "Save until I delete" status on my Tivo to "oops, I seem to have thrown my tv out the f*cking window."

Billy Donovan set the US speed record for cliches in a one minute span in his "live for the moment" pregame speech to his Gators.

The worst part of the experience by far was the camera shot of Rick Pitino in the stands, hands folded in a smug Dr. Evil pose as he watched the Gators cruise to victory.

Another disappointing side note to the game: I was really hoping that Larry Brown would hold the honor of being the only UCLA head coach to lose in the championship game.

UCLA had been advancing throughout the tournament by imposing their will on other teams. It was readily apparent by the first timeout of the game that the Bruins strategy of double-teaming in the post wasn't going to work. Unfortunately, Ben Howland was too stubborn to revise his strategy. Not that it would have mattered too much last night. Florida was playing a perfect game and was in the zone. There was no stopping them.

Clark Kellogg in the pregame described Corey Brewer as being as versatile as a potato. I think that pretty much summed up the mismatch for the game. Billy Donovan had just too many potatoes for the Bruins to handle. Just too many potatoes.

1 Comments:

At Tue Apr 04, 07:26:00 PM PDT , Anonymous Anonymous said...

sorry about the bruins man...but two things:

1. at least it wasn't a heart-breaking loss
2. they had a great year and should be even better next year.

a lot to look forward to in westwood.

 

Post a Comment

Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]

<< Home