Mississippi State fails to close on the road....again. Part II

Alright, time to take another look at this thing now that I've had a chance to take the emotion out of the equation. I watched the game again this morning and was hoping to take on a pretty ambitious project. The goal was to break down individual possessions and grade players based on a very simplistic +1/-1 system. Then add up the +/- and see what I got. In the end, offensive performance was emphasized far too much for my liking, so I had to scrap the results. If I can figure out how to tweak my system, I will start posting the breakdown for every game that I'm able. Don't count on it though, this method of grading works much better for football and quiet honestly I'm not sure how to get it to translate over to basketball. In any case, its time to move on.

In hindsight I may have been a little harsh on Jamont Gordon. He does play out of control at times, 5 turnovers in the first half as evidence. He does try to drive to the basket, only to end up surrounded by defenders too often. He also scores about half the time on those types of plays. Yes, I really hated the last play of the game. Everyone knew Gordon was going straight to the basket. I would much rather have gotten Stewart or Hansbrough a look. Sure, supposedly he was going to kick the ball out if anyone was open, but I don't believe that was ever going to happen. Even had all 4 of his teammates been wide open, he was going to keep it all the way . On the other hand, without him would Mississippi State have been in position to tie or take the lead on that final possession? Hard to say, but I would guess no. Those other 39 minutes have to count for something.

I am not going to back down from the comments I made about "moral victories" though. You know what I heard a Bulldog fan say today? "I'm proud of how hard this team played. How can you expect them to be winning games at teams like Tennessee and Kentucky?" and "How can you criticize this team. The game was at RUPP ARENA." Is this what it has come down to at Mississippi State? That is a loser mentality if I have ever seen one. So they should have just forfeit yesterday's game? Why exactly shouldn't they be winning games at Kentucky, at Tennessee, at LSU, etc.? I don't know about you but I want more than mediocrity out of this team. Are they playing hard? Absolutely, but they need to start winning these games.