The Key to this loss, and you could see it when it happened.

[phoenix]

We have a 5 point lead, we are playing a lineup of thomas, stockton, bradley, moss, in with I don't remember who.

The offense died, and one player made 3 straight bad plays which basically gave up the lead, and from that point on USC was good to go. I hated to see that group in there at one time. I think Moss finally got a basket, but this is basically a no offense, no defense group, and it really cost us. Overall SC outhustled us, but we were holding our own until this key interval where we lost our lead and lost the driver's seat.

[kubl]

if i remember right, it was stockton, moss, thomas, morris and bradley and they actually had us up 50 - 45. Tubby then put in our stand around starters who promptly got outscored 14 to 5 to make it 59-55 South Carolina. Game Over at that point.

Poor Thomas. he looks lost out there.

[Rockober]

UK quit taking it to the hole. When Rondo penetrated into the lane he made a few buckets and it also opened up things. I know they switched to the zone but he can still penetrate.

Yes, Thomas played bad. He has had some good games for UK-but he stunk it up today. I feel bad for the kid but this helped change the momentum. Kentucky never rebounded(pun) after that stretch.

South Carolina is whipped. They will lose by 20 tomorrow. They are just whipped.

[Swimmer4uk]

Rockober wrote: South Carolina is whipped. They will lose by 20 tomorrow. They are just whipped.

and if they aren't whipped....they're going to certainly get whipped. FL/LSU is going to come out running. And I hope they slaughter them by 50.

And Noah and Balkman get haircuts....

[Realist]

We had a 5 point lead when the starters came back in.

[Wildcat Larry]

Not completely true. Take a look at this game log. I bolded the substitutions and the scoring plays, the Balkman dunk came from leaving Thomas in his dust. That possession came after a Thomas foul, and the last three by USC came after a Thomas turnover. Morris was subbed out with UK up by three and didn't return until that game was tied. Thomas was in ther the whole way, the only sub that was in there the whole way.

************************************************** ******************

12:37 SUB IN : Stockton, Brandon
12:37 SUB IN : Bradley, Ramel
12:37 SUB IN : Thomas, Sheray
12:37 SUB OUT: Rondo, Rajon
12:37 SUB OUT: Sparks, Patrick
12:37 SUB OUT: Perry, Bobby
MISSED JUMPER by Moss, Ravi 12:35 BLOCK by Palacios, Keving
REBOUND (OFF) by (TEAM) 12:32
MISSED 3 PTR by Thomas, Sheray 12:08
REBOUND (OFF) by Bradley, Ramel 12:08
GOOD! TIP-IN by Bradley, Ramel [PNT] 12:04 47-45 H 2
REBOUND (DEF) by Moss, Ravi 11:38 MISSED 3 PTR by Kinsey, Tarence
11:31 FOUL by Palacios, Keving
TIMEOUT MEDIA 11:31
MISSED JUMPER by Morris, Randolph 11:14 REBOUND (DEF) by Balkman, Renaldo
REBOUND (DEF) by (TEAM) 10:53 MISSED JUMPER by Palacios, Keving
GOOD! 3 PTR by Moss, Ravi 10:22 50-45 H 5
ASSIST by Thomas, Sheray 10:22
REBOUND (DEF) by Morris, Randolph 09:54 MISSED 3 PTR by Kelley, Tre'
MISSED JUMPER by Moss, Ravi 09:28 REBOUND (DEF) by Sheldon, Bryce
FOUL by Thomas, Sheray 09:02
SUB IN : Wallace, Brandon 08:59 SUB IN : Perry, Bobby
SUB OUT: Palacios, Keving 08:59 SUB IN : Sparks, Patrick
08:59 SUB IN : Rondo, Rajon
08:59 SUB IN : Crawford, Joe
08:59 SUB OUT: Moss, Ravi
08:59 SUB OUT: Stockton, Brandon
08:59 SUB OUT: Morris, Randolph
08:59 SUB OUT: Bradley, Ramel
08:58 50-47 H 3 GOOD! DUNK by Balkman, Renaldo [PNT]
TURNOVR by Thomas, Sheray 08:20
08:05 50-50 T 8 GOOD! 3 PTR by Sheldon, Bryce
08:05 ASSIST by Wallace, Brandon
TURNOVR by Sparks, Patrick 07:29
07:29 TIMEOUT MEDIA
07:29 SUB IN : Moss, Ravi
07:29 SUB IN : Morris, Randolph
07:29 SUB OUT: Sparks, Patrick
07:29 SUB OUT: Thomas, Sheray

[Rockober]

And I woke up the whole neighborhood saying Bench him Tubby! Sit him down please.

I am now sitting at home on the bench. My wife put me in timeout. Well deserved. I should be benched.

[phoenix]

That's the period that I think put SC back in contention. We had them where we wanted them up until then. Oh well, if not this interval, we could have gone south during some other interval and still lost the game.

[Rockober]

The momentum simply changed at that point. USC was tired and these lapses gave them a second wind-and then the adreneline kicked in for South Carolina. The 4 spot has been our achilles heel all year and teams are foolish not to at least try to expose it, especially when you need a big basket.

UK also did not have an answer for Kinsey. He was excellent in every game against UK. I really thought Rondo cwould disrupt him more today. Kudos to Kinsey for hitting some big time shots.

[Aike]

At 50-45, Thomas went to sleep and let Balkman go baseline and dunk. Then, at the other end of the floor, Sheray caught the ball wide open on the block and walked. SC then hit three straight threes to go up 56-50.

[Realist]

I'm not sure why Tubby subs so many people at once. You get 3 or 4 guys coming in to the game who've been sitting on the bench. Especially in a game like today, SC was slowing things down, there shouldn't have been that much fatigue. I wondered when he pulled Perry at 12:37, it seemed like he had been playing well and didn't appear to be fatigued. It seems like that just about the time the team gets some rythm going Tubby subs 3 or 4 people.

I was sitting by a sportswriter for the Danville Advocate at a Centre game a few weeks ago. A player for the other team had hit 3 in a row and the coach pulled him. The sportswriter made the comment that it was a Tubby Smith move, the player gets hot and you pull him. A well conditioned college athlete ought to be able to play more than 25 minutes.

I've also noticed a difference between certain players in how they get subbed. Woo missed one pass and never got back in the game on Friday. Bradley missed 2 layups and it didn't seem to matter. Someone on this board made a comment earlier in the season that Tubby got so mad at Rondo that he benched Sparks. That seems to be his pattern, some guys get a lot of leeway and others get none.

[wildcatdon]

Excellent post phoenix..i told my kids the same thing that you just mentioned..it was a backbreaker..

[phoenix]

I thought the sub pattern was goodagainst bamaand wore them out, we kept everybody down in the 20's, but against SC our subs are less athletic and certain lineups are less athletic and it doesn't match up as well, in some substitution patterns. I thought we were pretty tired overall and it contributed to some of the goofy passes going around the court. But I really thought things were going fine until this segment of the game. Much less stressful and more relaxing playing with the lead than it is trying to catch back up. Morris really needed to be pulled and rested more than he was. He was doggin it. Woo could have gotten in there and given both teams a rest while they stood at the foul linea few times.

Realist wrote:
I'm not sure why Tubby subs so many people at once. You get 3 or 4 guys coming in to the game who've been sitting on the bench. Especially in a game like today, SC was slowing things down, there shouldn't have been that much fatigue. I wondered when he pulled Perry at 12:37, it seemed like he had been playing well and didn't appear to be fatigued. It seems like that just about the time the team gets some rythm going Tubby subs 3 or 4 people.

I was sitting by a sportswriter for the Danville Advocate at a Centre game a few weeks ago. A player for the other team had hit 3 in a row and the coach pulled him. The sportswriter made the comment that it was a Tubby Smith move, the player gets hot and you pull him. A well conditioned college athlete ought to be able to play more than 25 minutes.

I've also noticed a difference between certain players in how they get subbed. Woo missed one pass and never got back in the game on Friday. Bradley missed 2 layups and it didn't seem to matter. Someone on this board made a comment earlier in the season that Tubby got so mad at Rondo that he benched Sparks. That seems to be his pattern, some guys get a lot of leeway and others get none.

[catfanintn]

I boil this loss down purely to lack of hustle when compared to SC. Yes, Sharay played poorly and I was yelling at the screen as much as anyone to yank him. But how many times in the second half were we out hustled to the ball. How many times did Balkman himself out hustle us? Really don't think it was a matter of being tired, either. Most of the times I saw, we just looked to non-chalant. One guy thought the other guy was going to get the loose ball and a SC guy gets it instead.

They just seemed to want it more than us as has happened in many of this years games.

[BigCat33]

kubl wrote: if i remember right, it was stockton, moss, thomas, morris and bradley and they actually had us up 50 - 45. Tubby then put in our stand around starters who promptly got outscored 14 to 5 to make it 59-55 South Carolina. Game Over at that point.

Poor Thomas. he looks lost out there.
thats exactly what happened. i griped all day about that. they were passing the ball so well and then they brought in the big guns. lol! like ive said rondo cant run the offense for @#$%!

[poodoo]

like ive said rondo cant run the offense for @#$%! QUOTE

____________

? ?? FWIW, Rajon Rondo had eight assists to one turnover, a fantasticassist to turnover ratio.

We had a couple of key turnovers when we could have pulled out the lead. :(One player was not contributing in any way today, as far as I could tell, but that was somehow unnoticed by the coaching staff. :(

I agree that the lack of athleticism in some of our subssomewhathurt us yesterday, although the extensive substituting had been quite helpful in wearingdown Alabama. Regardless, what hurt the most was that South Carolina caught fire from the outside,drainingfour straight threes andfivein seven possessions,I believe, some of which were aggressively guarded.

[I. Melvin]

Why we consistently leave good shooters open for three to help on marginal inside players attempting a two is beyond me.

This is not 1954.

[bigbluelife]

My thoughts we lost it on the defensive end- when USC substitutes Shelton EVERYONE should know what he's there for- TO SHOOT- that's all he can do and what happense we leave him WIDE OPEN at least three times. Moss says we knew he could shoot- we just didn't get out on him quickly enough- if you knew he could shoot why leave him in the first place?

[poodoo]

bigbluelife wrote: My thoughts we lost it on the defensive end- when USC substitutes Shelton EVERYONE should know what he's there for- TO SHOOT- that's all he can do and what happense we leave him WIDE OPEN at least three times. Moss says we knew he could shoot- we just didn't get out on him quickly enough- if you knew he could shoot why leave him in the first place?


Shelton's threes killed us, for sure.

What hurts the most is that not hanging on to defeat South Carolina probably cost us a seventh seed, which I surely would love to have now, instead of a potential second round game against UCONN. Of course, on the other hand, I surely hope NOW that we get to face UCONN. :cool: