BG is on a 7 game losing streak, although they did beat us by 10 at BG earlier. They just loss a hard fought home game vs rival Toledo 91-86. I would think they are emotionally down after that tough loss and losing 7 in a row and dropping into 9th place. We can tie them with a win tomorrow. BG is 10-17 ( 4-10) while Miami is 9-18 ( 3-11) We are in a 3 way tie for 10th, 11th, and 12th. We do not play any of the top 4 teams the rest of the way so I think we have a reasonable chance at each of these last 4 games. We picked up some momentum with a 20 point comeback win at NIU Saturday.
BG is led in scoring by 3 guards ( Curtis comes off the bench). SR G Leon Ayers 17.4 ppg ( he lit us up last time), Sr G Samari Curtis 12.4ppg ( good driver and gets a lot of free throws), and Soph Kaden Metheny 11.2ppg ( almost all his points are outside shots, mostly 3’s).
Morgan Safford leads Miami in rebounding and is second in scoring at 15ppg. Andy Merambreau is second in rebounding and assists and 3rd in scoring. 5th year SR Mekhi Lairy has now set the all time Miami record for games played and is also first all time in ft% and is going to end up in the top 5 all time in both points and assists. As a team, we are 12th in the country in FT%. Miami is 51-18 all time at home vs BG.
MAC standings
Kent 12-2
Toledo 12-2 won 11 in a row
Akron 11-3
Ball State 10-4
Ohio 8-6 (won 5 in a row)
NIU 7-7
Buffalo 6-8
Central 5-9
BGSU 4-10 (lost 7 in a row)
Miami 3-11
Western 3-11
Eastern 3-11
Offense started late. I turned the game on when it was 5-0. Defense has looked good. Preventing drives and contesting shots. Offense was getting looks, but couldn’t hit. Mekhi stepped up.
Safford having a the roughest shooting night. You know it’s bad when your dunk comes back out. Love that the team had his back though. Laugh it off and move on.
Kamari got wind I was going to hire someone else to play the role of Kamari in “Glass Kamari” (my made-for-tv after school special about a rebounding protege who also happens to be a cyborg, but with a heart of gold who helps save the teen center) and has brought a special message to the casting director telling them to reconsider. This is the Kamari the fans want to see.
Ps, he’s my player of the game if we win. Anderson was great (as usual, sorry to the haters) but we don’t win this game if Kamari doesn’t pick up for Morgan (who is usually very dependable like Drakkar used to be for me on ladies night back in the day, so I’m cutting him slack.)
IMO, it’s been awhile since we got after it defensively, but I thought we did for the entire 1st half and most of the 2nd half. We were disruptive and that added up as the game went on, leading to our double digit lead. And we didn’t let our poor offensive start impact our defense, that was impressive. Our bigs played big and our perimeter players moved their feet and contested a lot of shots, the opposite of the 1st meeting.
Getting the ball inside more on the block in the 2nd half to Mirambeaux and Morris was a great adjustment as was playing Williams over Lewis tonight. Tatum’s minutes were valuable as well. The last 5 minutes were shaky. Lairy needs to go get the ball. When you’re the point guard, go get it. But that was a quality effort by everyone, coaches and players. Great job. Let’s get another one this weekend!
Life is so much easier when the bench is contributing even a little bit. Getting 23 pts (and 15 rebounds) tonight was the difference imo. Kudos to Kamari, Tatum and Morris and I hope they can keep it going.
While his defense continues to be suspect, one can’t deny Anderson’s offensive efficiency. On a night that Safford struggled to score, Anderson picked up the slack. As did Kamari and Morris, with decent minutes from Tatum as well. If Morris had made the putbacks he missed he would have easily been in double digits. Love his energy on the glass and defensively. Although if looks could kill, Morris would be in a pine box from the glare Steele gave him after the technical!
Kamari’s stat line, 9 points on 3/6 shooting, 6 rebounds, that is what we need from him every single game. He needs to be efficient offensively and he has to get rebounds. His defense still needs a lot of work but offensively, this is what we need from him.
Same with Morris, 8 points on 4/8 shooting, 6 boards, very active defensively (needs to cut down his fouls though), i 15 minutes of court time, helps us tremendously. As I mentioned above, had he not missed a couple of gimmees, he would have been in double figures. I thought he was tremendous.
