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If you told me at the beginning of the season that BYU would have a share of the MWC championship, I would have been very happy. Well, I actually am happy for BYU, but it seems to be a kind of empty happiness.

This is one of the oddest seasons I’ve experienced. Usually BYU has one killer marquee win that makes you feel like the team has potential to be really great. Of course, that major marquee win (or two) is almost always paired with some loss which should have never happened.

A quick look at the losses and you see that BYU Basketball basically won the games they should have won and lost the games they should have lost. The only exception was the loss to UNLV at home. However, I don’t think anyone is really all that surprised that UNLV could beat us at home. UNLV always seems to find something extra special when playing BYU and so the loss wasn’t a huge surprise. Disappointing, but not surprising.

I think the hollow feeling I have is related to two losses to UNLV (which makes me really sick since I work at UNLV) and a loss to the Yewts (this is never good). Add in the near marquee win becoming a 1 point loss to Arizona St on a change of call alongside a competitive game against Wake Forest until the last 5-10 minutes and I sit here wondering if this team is for real or not.

The question remains of whether this team can finally do the deed and win the Las Vegas Invitational and then a win in the NCAA tournament. They haven’t given me a reason not to believe, but they haven’t given me a reason to believe either.

My greatest hope lies in Jimmer. We’ve dreamed about having a player at BYU who can take it to the hoop. We finally have him and I believe he’ll be the difference in March.

Please forgive my lack of posting at this critical time of the basketball season. I would tell you why the site has been down, but my brother handles that. I’m just happy to be writing again. It helps me to deal with the long distance between me and most BYU sporting events. Though I am stoked for the game to be played in Dallas this fall against one Oklahoma. It should be fun.

On to the story at hand. I realize it is only a share of the conference title, but it is nothing to be ashamed of. It says a lot about the program that Dave Rose has established to be so consistently good. Its not like we are Memphis playing in Conference USA and we just tip toe through the conference tulips every year. The conference as a whole has gotten progressively better, and BYU has stepped up to the plate.

There were a couple of missed opportunities, namely against Wake Forest and Arizona St, but they put up a good fight and gained some respect despite the losses. Now the focus turns to the conference tournament and the Big Dance. I never know what to expect when it comes to this time of year, and I hate to get my hopes up, but I feel that this is the best team we have had in recent years.

In a lot of ways I think we were better off without Plaisted. In the past teams were able to focus on him, or one other single player and that pretty much shut us down. Now there are so many more options, and this is much more of a team. It will be far more difficult to shut the whole team down. Between Jimmer, JT, Lee, Jackson, and Miles it will be nearly impossible to keep them all down.

I am really looking forward to the next couple of weeks. On a side note congrats to BYU for cracking into the AP poll for the first time this season. It is well deserved, and hopefully one more step in the right direction.

I couldn’t be more excited about tonights BYU game against #6 Wake Forest. I’m so glad that Wake Forest was willing to travel to the Marriott Center to face BYU.

As I’ve read through some articles on Wake Forest on stat stood out above the others. The Deacons lead the nation with 43.9 rebounds a game. They also lead the ACC (and rank fifth nationally) with a rebounding margin of plus 10.4.

Wake Forest’s rebounding margin is just scary when I think back to BYU’s previous games. The Utah State game in particular I remember BYU just getting worked over on the boards. BYU will have to find a way to manage the rebounding margin and work in the intangibles of playing at home to win the game.

I hope the Marriott Center isn’t like past BYU basketball games that have occurred over the break. The #6 team in the nation should be enough reason to pack the Marriott Center. Pack it in their like we’re playing the yewts.

It was truly a sad afternoon. BYU controlled most of this game, and then simply let it slip away in the end. Tavernari should have taken that one more second he had to attack the basket, and maybe draw a foul rather than just throwing up a crap shot, but there is no way he could have known he still had that much time. He did the best he could given the circumstances.

What most people will probably focus on was the final tip and whether it was a basket or not. It really could have gone either way. I don’t think the refs could have made a bad call because it was truly that close.

The fact that it was that close meant BYU would lose though as the refs were definitely favoring Arizona St. in small degrees. I don’t think for a second that the refs singlehandedly cost BYU the game, because BYU still maintained control right up until the last couple of minutes, and then simply gave it away.

The biggest positive that I saw in this game was the great defense that they played. The aforementioned poor officiating cost BYU a couple of fouls, but the defensive effort was definitely there in this game. Miles put up a huge defensive effort this afternoon. I can’t remember the last time I saw a big man so consistently move his feet, keep his hands straight up, and put himself in good defensive position. There were numerous occassions he left his man with no other option but to kick it back out.

While they absolutely could have, and should have, won this game, Arizona St. was the toughest test so far this year, and in all reality it was a home game for them. BYU played a good game, but simply did not have enough in the end. There are lessons to be learned and hopefully they will be the better for it in the long run.

BYU put on a shooting clinic tonight and boy was it fun to watch.

The first half of this game was what most people probably expected with it being a close game. Everytime BYU pulled away a little bit, Boise came back to within a few. It was exciting all the way until the second half started, and then the fun began.

BYU just started shooting lights out. Had Boise St. been able to keep a handle on the ball and not turn it over so much, it may have been a slightly different story. But obviously that didn’t happen. BYU came down the court and almost everytime that ball hit the bottom of the net. It was a shooter’s dream to watch.

Their passes were crisp, they were giving up good shots for better shots, and everyone had a hot hand. At one point they were shooting near 80% in the second half, and a lot of those were threes. It was nice to see everyone getting in on the fun too.

The defense is what has impressed me in previous games, but tonight the offense took center stage. It is so much fun to watch this team because they are just that, a team. They are all out to win, and not for personal accolades.

They also have very sure hands. Any number of players can bring the ball up the court with confidence. This allows for all kinds of fast breaks and open shots, because the other team is not able to set up and get ready, and that leads to open shots and layups which BYU had plenty of tonight.

The more I watch this team the more excited I get about their success because it is coming from both sides of the ball, and from all the players on any given night. A player or two going cold will not kill us like in the past. The Mountain West better watch out, because BYU is rockin this year.

USU dominated the Cougars on the boards with 39 rebounds to BYU’s 29. Add in the 14-7 advantage in offensive rebounds and it makes you wonder what BYU’s big men were doing. I didn’t need to look at those numbers to know we’d been dominated. Just watching the game we all knew that USU was killing us on the boards, but those numbers sure drive the point home.

I’d be completely upset with our big men, but I think it’s probably more accurate to say that USU has some talented boys in the paint. USU is going to win a lot of games on the backs of Wilkinson and Wesley.

Despite USU’s talent, I thought BYU double teamed very well. In the past BYU has been regularly hurt by passes out of the double team that lead to open shots. This wasn’t the case against USU and it was fun to see BYU executed the double team so well.

Of course, my favorite stat of the night was BYU’s 12 steals. It sure is nice to have Jackson Emery back from his mission.

While it was not necessarily the same game as the last few in terms of individual results, the team result was the same and ultimately that is what really matters.

Utah State figured to be the biggest test of the year to this point, and they did not disappoint. BYU had every opportunity to run away with this one, but Utah State refused to go away. They kept fighting and took it to the wire.

Luckily for BYU they are a team and not a one man show, because the one man show known as Lee Cummard was not very good tonight. He would be the first to tell you that it is the team that matters, but it is stupid to think he wouldn’t be bothered by such a poor outing.

The major upside of Lee is that even if he isn’t contributing with stats, he is still the leader of the team and will get them all going. In past years if the team leader sturggled the whole team struggled. It seems to me that this year they are much better at stepping up and making something happen when one guy is off.

It helps that this team has a lot more weapons than they did in the past. On any given night almost any of the top 6 could go out and drop 20 points. That is a huge advantage to have. Much the same way that the football team had many options and was difficult to shut down, this team can go in a lot of different directions and be successful.

It is this blanace, and team effort that give me confidence that this year can be different and they can actually win a game or two in March. We should know a lot better about how likely that is after Jan 3 when Wake Forest comes to Provo. I will even be in town, unfortunately I have a prior family engagement, what can you do?

In the midst of my moping while at work about BYU’s terrible loss this evening, i noticed that the men’s basketball team was playing. Hoping that they could bring some happiness to my otherwise sullen day I decided to turn it on (thank you work for having DirecTV with all the channels).

It was an enjoyable game to watch, if not an exciting one. I needed a game where the outcome was not really in doubt for most of the second half. I will admit my outlook was very unsure coming into this year with the loss of some key players last year, namely Trent Plaisted. I was very impressed with the way they played though.

What a game Chris Miles had. He had some great moves to the basket, and continued to go for it, even when he missed a few. JT had a rough game, but every shooter goes through slumps, and he will work out of it. Cummard had another great game, and deserves all of the attention he is bound to get this year. When you are as good as he is, you find a way to score. It will be fun to see how teams try and stop him.

Perhaps the brightest spot I saw tonight was how well the cougars were with help defense. There were numerous drives where the defender got beat, but another cougar stepped in and filled the lane forcing the other team to kick it back out. I don’t think enough can be said about the importance of defense if BYU is to be successful this year especially once they start to play better teams with quicker players. We can’t expect them to go undefeated, but 5-0 is a great start. It should be another great year.

I’m too surprised and upset to write about tonight’s football game. My silence should say a lot.

In other amazing news, today the report came out that Chris Collinsworth had been jumped with his companion while on a mission in Australia. I’d always heard that Australia was a pretty rough mission for Americans that went there. However, I still can’t imagine what would bring someone to want to jump 2 missionaries. Maybe I’m wrong, but I can’t imagine Chris Collinsworth doing anything to provoke someone to do something like this. On my mission in Italy a few missionaries got into a tussle with some drunk locals. It’s sad when things like this happen.

I send out my best wishes to Elder Collinsworth, Elder Ferguson and their families.

Here’s an excerpt from the story that describes the incident:

Elder Collinsworth and his companion (an Elder Ferguson from Montana) were jumped from behind by three men, believed to be in their 20s, about 8:30 p.m. as they were walking back to their apartment. When the first attacker jumped on Elder Collinsworth’s back, he flipped the assailant over his shoulder and onto the pavement.

As Elder Collinsworth was busy fighting off the first attacker, a second man then began assaulting him. When Elder Ferguson tried to pull the second attacker away, the third man stabbed and slashed both of the missionaries with a small knife. During the tussle, the attackers managed to pull Elder Collinsworth’s shirt up over his face and tackle him to the ground. While on the ground, and with his shirt over his face, Elder Collinsworth was kicked and slugged repeatedly.
“They beat him up pretty good,” said Jeff Collinsworth, father of Elder Collinsworth.

Fortunately, a man passing by in a car saw the scuffle, pulled his car up and shined his headlights toward the attack — which scared the assailants away.

“That man probably saved their lives,” Jeff Collinsworth said. “At the very least, Chris probably would have lost his teeth.”

Elder Collinsworth spent Tuesday night in a Sydney hospital with a substantial stab wound to his back, but was released to the mission home Wednesday morning.

“He said he’s ready to get back to work,” Jeff Collinsworth said.

Elder Ferguson sustained substantial cuts to his legs, arms and hands and underwent surgery on Tuesday and remained hospitalized Wednesday.

I think every cougar fan is ready for BYU to finally win a tournament game. We could all certainly complain about the #8 seed, but that’s really no excuse for BYU to lose. Sure, a 5, 6 or 7 seed would probably be a little easier game. However, getting a #8 seed isn’t nearly as bad as when we should have gotten a #10 seed and got a #12 seed. At least we’re playing someone who is ranked below us. Now it’s time to show everyone that we should have been ranked higher. UNLV did a good job today representing the MWC. BYU needs to do the same.

It’s pretty easy to say that the second half is going to be important for BYU. We’ve been normally playing quite well in the first half and then just fall apart in the second half. I hope Lee gets a bunch of early second half touches. I think he’s going to be a hard match up for the Aggies.