Tournament Review: O'Reilly CBE Classic

Six hundred miles, fifteen hours of driving, ten hours of total sleep, lots of new friends, three trips to Bagel & Deli, three inappropriate signs, two losses, one win. What a weekend. The tournament was something else, so why don't we go over what we've learned about our team.


Top Performer: Alex Young
Alex averaged 17.7 and 6.3 over the weekend, living up to his billing as IUPUI's go-to-guy.

Biggest Surprise: Mitch Patton
Mitch played out of his mind in all three games, and despite seeing a little foul trouble and not insanely good numbers (7.3, 2.3), his impact outside of the stat columns was obvious. He was constantly tipping balls out to the guards, taking fouls (somewhere in the neighborhood of 7-8), and learning with every minute.

Biggest Disappointment: 1-2
IUPUI took the lead into all three games, but was only able to come out with one victory. While no one is claiming the Jaguars were going to get an at large bid to the Tournament, it still would have been a great morale boost to win at least one other game.

Best Moment: Defending Fletcher.
Rahmon Fletcher was the key to Green Bay's success. By all accounts, shutting him down was the best way to stop the Phoenix. So what does Stephen do? Shadows him around the court, effectively making Coach's defense a 2-2 Zone with one man-to-man part. Stephen picked up two quick fouls in this effort, so Greg Rice went in, and this is where it got good. Greg played such tight defense, Fletcher literally took a play off and stood in a corner. Greg got within an inch (literally) and turned the game into 4-on-4 for a play. Absolutely hilarious.

Worst Moment: 15-0
We were right with San Diego State until they went on a 15-0 run midway through the second half of our second game. It was painful to watch.

Best Shot: Mitchell Patton's Superhoops
I'm not sure if you've ever seen a kid 6-9 shoot a three pointer, but usually it is pretty terrible. But when Mitch took both of his shots against San Diego State, something incredible happened. It seemed he shot the ball  DOWN into the net, as opposed to at an arch. The young man is so tall and was so ridiculously unguarded he was able to throw the ball down like he was playing Bozo-Buckets.

Worst Shot: Alex Young's "Buzzer Beater"
To say the shot was his fault is entirely true but also entirely false. I'm shocked he got a shot away with 0.6 seconds left, and double shocked it was on target. What was bad about it had to be the distance. The ball was about 12 feet short on a 25 foot shot. Again, circumstances dictated an extremely quick release, but you've gotta put the ball in an area it can get in. The women's superhoop line is not that place.

Best Learning Moment: Game 1 & 2
Let's face it, not every game is winnable...But all three of these games were. Coach has a lot of great "you should have" or "you've gotta" moments to take from the first two games that will absolutely help our boys as


----------


There is plenty more Student on Sports coming after a short Thanksgiving break! I hope everyone has a safe, fun holiday and I'll see you in St Louis!!!!