Good draw for the Bears. Hopefully the players see this as a great opportunity to get tournament experience. Don’t understand why teams like Virginia Tech outright rejected the NIT. Even if you have some players injured, let your Freshman / Sophomores or bench players get some experience. They can use that as an audition for next year on your team or tape to transfer out. Seems too whiny to say, “It’s NCAA or bust for us”.
Exactly. There will be times during the game the starters will need rest and your backup
players will maintain the game strategy and assist on the defensive / offensive end of the court. Who knows, there may be a player who's ready to step up to contribute full time.
How’d SMU get into the Big Dance? We beat them H-to-H and they finished with a losing conference record. They had a handful of quality wins, so did Cal. ‘Furd also finished ahead of the ‘Stangs in conference. I don’t think the selection committee would ever have a Cal or ‘Furd squad with a losing conference record in the tournament. Just my 2 cents.
When the season started, I thought that maybe we can be a 20 win bubble team once we started winning. And indeed, we were. The last two weeks were brutal in so many ways but that’s now behind us. There will be time for self reflection and introspection when the season has truly come to an end.
We were 2 wins away, IMO….beat Pitt on Senior Day to eliminate the awful loss, and honestly any of the W’s we couldn’t finish on the road in the ACC (@ Va Tech, @ FSU, @ Syracuse, @ Wake) would have gotten us in the play-in game after SMU’s slide late. That factors in the L in ACCT to FSU, who beats most teams THAT night with the hot shooting.
Sigh. So close, with a severely limited roster in this NIL era.
While disappointed in the ending results, this was such a fantastic season nonetheless. Postseason basketball was the goal. If we could’ve avoided either the Rytis or Dort injuries, we’re frigging dancing…just an amazing job by the coaching staff and players, despite the many massive limitations throughout the program.
A great building block - let’s capitalize and continue the trajectory. I’m scraping together all I can for the Cal MBB NIL fund and am gonna buy a full-season ticket plan. LFG.
also curious what Ruff could've done. Having no dribble penetration threats outside of our starting backcourt is tough. Those TT, Campbell backcourts were brutal offensively.
Sad we fell a little short of the Big Dances. But both teams had good seasons and deserve these high tournament seeds. Go Bears!
Good draw for the Bears. Hopefully the players see this as a great opportunity to get tournament experience. Don’t understand why teams like Virginia Tech outright rejected the NIT. Even if you have some players injured, let your Freshman / Sophomores or bench players get some experience. They can use that as an audition for next year on your team or tape to transfer out. Seems too whiny to say, “It’s NCAA or bust for us”.
Exactly. There will be times during the game the starters will need rest and your backup
players will maintain the game strategy and assist on the defensive / offensive end of the court. Who knows, there may be a player who's ready to step up to contribute full time.
How’d SMU get into the Big Dance? We beat them H-to-H and they finished with a losing conference record. They had a handful of quality wins, so did Cal. ‘Furd also finished ahead of the ‘Stangs in conference. I don’t think the selection committee would ever have a Cal or ‘Furd squad with a losing conference record in the tournament. Just my 2 cents.
It was the Pittsburgh loss that killed us.
No Q3 losses and more Q2 wins.
When the season started, I thought that maybe we can be a 20 win bubble team once we started winning. And indeed, we were. The last two weeks were brutal in so many ways but that’s now behind us. There will be time for self reflection and introspection when the season has truly come to an end.
We were 2 wins away, IMO….beat Pitt on Senior Day to eliminate the awful loss, and honestly any of the W’s we couldn’t finish on the road in the ACC (@ Va Tech, @ FSU, @ Syracuse, @ Wake) would have gotten us in the play-in game after SMU’s slide late. That factors in the L in ACCT to FSU, who beats most teams THAT night with the hot shooting.
Sigh. So close, with a severely limited roster in this NIL era.
Hey at least your call on where the season was going to go was right on the money
While disappointed in the ending results, this was such a fantastic season nonetheless. Postseason basketball was the goal. If we could’ve avoided either the Rytis or Dort injuries, we’re frigging dancing…just an amazing job by the coaching staff and players, despite the many massive limitations throughout the program.
A great building block - let’s capitalize and continue the trajectory. I’m scraping together all I can for the Cal MBB NIL fund and am gonna buy a full-season ticket plan. LFG.
also curious what Ruff could've done. Having no dribble penetration threats outside of our starting backcourt is tough. Those TT, Campbell backcourts were brutal offensively.
I'll be accused of being typically too optimistic only to be severely disappointed, but I like the draw and feel like we have a real shot.
The late-ish start time for the Wednesday NIT game made it possible for me to go to the game after work. Probably going to go. Anyone else going?