Christmas Wish Lists

With another six days until Christmas I thought I would beat the crowd and get out my list of what I would give to a few teams in the Horizon League. No re-gifting allowed.

Youngstown State: A "W" over a Division I or II team.

It's been a tough year so far for the Penguins but there is one Bright spot. Sorry, I couldn't resist. Kelvin Bright has shown that when he gets hot he is a force to be reckoned with. His per game averages do mask a pretty pedestrian 40% field goal percentage.

Wright State: A do over.

Remember when you were a kid and nothing seems to go right at the beginning of a game? You call for a do over, right? Coach Brownell needs to petition the NCAA for a do over after the Raiders 0-6 start. Can someone please tell me what has happened to Todd Brown? PLEASE?!?

Milwaukee: A victory over a team with a winning record.

The Panthers are 5-5.

Record of teams the Panthers beat: 10-39

That's bad. Like really bad. Did I mention one of those victories was against DIII Upper Iowa University? I really like the depth of this team and they are 2-0 in league play. But show up for a game against a team you shouldn't destroy.

Green Bay: Some rebounding.

Green Bay can shoot. Evans. Tillema. Cotton. They are a GREAT free throw shooting team. But they rebound by committee, and they don't do it particularly well. Their aggregate rebound margin for the season is -40, and -30 in the team's four losses. Losing 6-6 Chop Tang won't help.

UIC: ...

If you're like me you have a friend or family member that is really hard to shop for. That would be UIC this season. They have the leading scorer in the Horizon League, Josh Mayo. The Flames have the leading rebounder in the Horizon League in big man Scott VanderMeer. And they have the second best assist man in the HL, Spencer Stewart. Even the team defense has been impressive as the Flames have only allowed one team to score over 70 points against them this season, 77 in a victory against Northern Iowa. Consistency remains the only obstacle for UIC this season.

Love it.

By now you've probably seen this...but I can't watch it enough.

Nice work, Vikings.

The Day After...

If you're anything at all like me, then you've had mornings where you've woken up and said to yourself, "I wish I'd done that differently." Well, I had one of those this morning...but thankfully it wasn't due to a poor decision made within the previous 24-hours. Instead, it was due to what appears to be a good decision...one that can be expanded on to make this "video blogging" concept more enjoyable for everyone once league play begins in January.

Adam and I ran into some of the expected hurdles, like spotty wireless internet signals. This was a fear of ours out on the road (it worked out better than we expected), but not within the arena. At first we suspected it was because I was running a Mac computer...but we found out later (from Bradley's SID) that Carver Arena's wireless system has its issues. Luckily we found away around the problem, and we don't expect to run into that issue again, as all Horizon League arenas have great Internet systems because of what's required to webcast games on HLN.

Aside from technical problems, last night's dress rehearsal gave Adam and I an idea of what we "should" and "shouldn't" do during these video updates on location. We now know that it will be a priority for us to arrive at our selected arenas several hours before tip-off, in order to get you ready for whatever game is on tap. After that, we can begin finding students/fans that enter the arena as soon as the gates open to give you an idea of the atmosphere. While the game is going on, Adam and I will likely be relegated to providing text updates to the blog with thoughts and insights. Even though we can essentially turn around our video updates in a matter of 5 minutes...5 minutes in a basketball game is an eternity, and anything we say would likely be outdated by the time it makes it up to this blog. Besides, once we start traveling to league games, you'll already be watching whatever contest we're at on HLN, right? This way, we can point out a few things from our perspective, without distracting you while you're watching the game action on HLN. Perhaps we'll provide one video update at halftime...and we'll certainly continue to provide post-game soundbytes from players and coaches. We'll also have a day in between our scheduled Thursday/Saturday trips...so we'll have to figure out what to bring to the blog on those days.

We certainly appreciate the comments posted here last night...and there were other places where we noticed some "discussion" on what we were doing. All in all, we'd like to hear more from you to know if you like our plan, or if we're completely missing something with this idea. Let us know, and we'll do what we can. Once we start this back up again in January, it's sure to be much smoother and easier to follow. We'll keep things relegated to one "entry" for each game, and only update that entry throughout the game (placing the newest updates at the TOP...not the bottom).

Now, I swear we'll get back to basketball-related discussion next time I write. There's already one comment we received last night that I was planning to address anyway. I guess great minds think alike.


-DL

Post Game Goodies

Brad Stevens

On tonight's win over Bradley...

On Avery Jukes' performance tonight...

On the growth of the freshmen starters...

That's it for tonight, look for more of this from the blog once league play starts. But better. 

More From Peoria...

Under 4:00 Timeout

Butler up 15 at 36-21. Bradley cut the lead to ten at 31-21 and a quick basket by Avery Jukes and another three pointer by Gordon Hayward got it back up to 15. Jukes looks strong with the basketball and has two easy buckets off of screen and rolls.
Coach Stevens was VERY animated about a possible missed defensive assignment by Butler freshman Garrett Butcher. I can't remember him ever being that animated. Bradley guard Sam Maniscalco keeping the Braves in it with his outside shooting.

Hey guys, we found a Butler fan here in Peoria! 

Someone asked about the size of the crowd. You ask and you shall receive...

Update: Butler now only up 5 w/8:00 to go, good run by Bradley. And Damon's computer hates him. 

6:37 mark 2nd Half

Shout out to the Valpo women's basketball team who defeated #23 Purdue tonight 71-60.

On The Road

We're on our way! In an effort to give YOU the fans a more full Horizon League experience we're on the road and video blogging along the way. Here's a quick look at the beginning of our trip:




6:55pm: We've arrived...but we're having a few technical issues at our destination. Stick with us...

7:03pm: OK...now for the reveal...


7:10pm: "Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain." Or...in this case...pay little attention to the time frame in the video. Read the timestamp I'm including in these posts.

8:35pm: Alright...this is why we do "test runs" with this sort of thing. Having some issues with the wireless connection in the arena. We're not giving up, but unfortunately, it'd be a little pointless to show you our "Pre-game Interview" with Butler Radio Analyst, Nick Gardner. Sorry Nick.

Anyway...Butler leading 31-17 with 6:30 to play. Bradley went to a zone defensively for a few possessions, but Gordon Hayward shot 'em out of it pretty quick. He's having a solid 1st half with multiple 3-point field goals. Defensively, Butler has held their own against a pair of trees in the post.

A Road Test...For Us!

If you've been following along here on the HLN Blog, you may remember a couple weeks ago when we mentioned that this season we'd be trying something new with a gameday "video blog" of sorts. We're still in the planning stage, as far as figuring out which league games we'll be hitting once the calendar flips from 2008 to 2009...but there has been some progress to report.

The progress, essentially, is that our video camera arrived! It's about the size of an iPhone and fits in the palm of your hand. What makes it so useful for us, is the built-in USB Port...which will allow us to shoot a couple minutes of video, plug it into our computer(s), edit if necessary, compress the file for use on this blog (or HLN, or the HLN Facebook page, etc), and post it for you to see. I know, it sounds complicated...but the whole process when I tested it out today, took about 2-4 minutes. And the video is incredibly sharp for the camera's size...identical to what you see content-wise on HLN.

So, with that in mind...we're going for a test drive tomorrow (Wednesday) night. There are a few games on the Horizon League schedule (men's and women's)...and we'll wait to tell you which game we're planning to report from. We want you to check it out, and tell us what you think. All content tomorrow night will be posted right here, on the HLN Blog.

Two things will make this fun for everyone. 1) Your participation. 2) Strong wireless internet signals. Inside an arena, this shouldn't be an issue...but the whole point of this idea for gameday video blogs, is to be able to bring you thoughts/opinions/strange happenings...while we're on the road. In turn, we'll respond to your comments/thoughts/questions along the way. We'll be using a wireless internet card while we're traveling from site to site...so hopefully Bill Kurtis isn't a liar.

See you tomorrow!