About What You Expected: Louisville 96, Arkansas 66

by Stephen Expat on Nov 17, 2009 9:06 PM CST in Arkansas Razorback Basketball

No real surprises in St. Louis tonight, as Rick Pitino and Louisville cruised to an easy victory over the Razorbacks. Arkansas played very well for the first 10 minutes of the first half and the first five minutes of the second half, which the Hogs opened with an impressive 14-0 run. Unfortunately, there were 25 other minutes in the game and that was enough time for the Cardinals to fashion a 30-point margin of victory.

As the second half dragged on, I found myself begging for the game to end, but overall, it's hard to get too upset up about the outcome. The Hogs played hard, but they are severely short-handed right now, and Louisville is a Top 20 team. Anybody who didn't think the game had a strong likelihood of playing out this way is living with a healthy dose of denial.

It's early. Much basketball to be played. I'm not ready to give up on my dreams of an NIT bid just yet.

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Most disappointing thing...

All the missed free throws. It seems like everytime I looked up, they were clanging another one off the front of the rim. What’s the point of getting to the line if you don’t sink the freebies? I was impressed with the foul management, though. As long as we’re shorthanded, PFs are going to have a much larger effect than if we had a full roster. Kudos to Mike Washington for not having to miss significant portions of the game due to foul trouble.

by dxf04 on Nov 17, 2009 11:01 PM CST reply actions

15 minutes of Hell > 0 minutes of Hell

I hope I don’t have to listen to Bobby Knight every time the Hogs play this year.

by Hog Fan in Houston on Nov 18, 2009 8:15 AM CST reply actions

Knight

I usually hate listening to Knight, but he was spot-on with his analysis of what we were doing wrong. Our help-side defense was horrible. Our rotation on defense was very slow, allowing Louisville easy lanes to the basket or open three pointers. Also, Knight was right about running more screens for Rotnei. I don’t think he should be the focus of our offense, but with so few options right now, running more plays for Rotnei makes sense.
Very impressed with Powell and Nobles. Disappointed with Mike Washington – it looked like he was scared to take the ball to the basket against Louisville’s bigs.
Anyway, I’ll gladly take an overmatched group giving good effort than entitled troublemakers. I hope the guys on suspension feel horrible letting their teammates down.

by PossumJackson on Nov 18, 2009 9:48 AM CST up reply actions

Nobles

I agree with what MexiHog said in his FanPost: I like the way Nobles plays the point. Which is to say, I like the way the Hogs move the ball with him at the helm. With Fortson last year, there was lots of standing around as he dribbled all over the place.

I hope Fortson pulls his thing together and comes back soon, but if/when he does, I hope he plays more like a traditional point guard.

by Stephen Expat on Nov 18, 2009 9:08 AM CST reply actions

Knight

I too appreciated much of Knight’s commentary. As a neophyte to the strategy of the game that is informed only by games of half court in neighborhood driveways, I found his analysis to to refreshingly understated and insightful. He helped me understand the game and he didn’t annoy the crap out of me like most of the color analysts do. Not only were his observations about the lack of set-up for Rotnei informative, I also appreciated his counterpoint to Pelphrey’s ideas about discipline. Pleprhrey benches. Knight runs em. I agree more with the latter. Of course Knight forgot to mention that he then throws chairs at his players too!

by HogInAiken on Nov 18, 2009 10:14 AM CST reply actions