Home Basketball Basketball: Howard @ Oregon State

Basketball: Howard @ Oregon State

95

JackBeav

I’m on the road, so I don’t have the time to do a comprehensive write-up for Howard. The key points for them are that they are young, fairly active on defense, and they have about 20% focus in any given game… meaning they will find about seven or eight minutes where they will click and make a run.

Fortunately for the Beavs this run will not mitigate the other 80% of the game. Howard will miss a lot of shots, and they will lose the handle a lot. It may not be pretty.

The long and the short of it? The Beavs should win pretty handily.

Beavs 86 – Bison 64

Angry

There was a time not long ago when fans fretted Howard. Now we're licking our chops. Can the Beavs put up 100? Will they win by 40? These are the questions, rather than "Will they win?" It's refreshing. Hopefully the team isn't overlooking these guys like I am.

I'm with JackBeav: 80 something to 60 something.

No TV for tonight's game, but I believe it's available via the official site's stream.

95 COMMENTS

    • On the coast with family right now… having fun playing in the weather and on the beach.

      I need a storm! The house I’min would be awesome for whale watching, but it would be better if a storm rolled in.

  1. Tonight I would love to see more Moreland, less Brandt. Also would love to see more 3 guard lineups and letting Roberto handle the rock and be a playmaker. He seems to be playing with more confidence and the ankle appears to be fine. If he can be a consistent three point shooter for the Beavers they will win a lot of games.

    Tonight Howard will undoubtedly throw zone at the Beavers. It will be interesting to see how they handle it. Craig has really been working these hard on attacking the zone properly. I think tonight we will see that pay off.

    I got the Beavers winning 89-60. I think Roberto leads the team in scoring with 20 points and dishes 7 assists.

    Although some may disagree, when Roberto is healthy and playing with confidence, I think he’s the best player on the team. Nobody else can penetrate and make passes like Nelson. Burton is a good passer but in a different way. Roberto also has the ability to get to the foul line and has the pull up jumper out of the halfcourt set that is deadly. Once he makes the triples he opens up the whole offense. Teams will try to run him off the three point line and he can pump fake and step in and make a jumper, go to the rim for a lay-in, or he can set up teammates for open shots. Cunningham benefits from this. Roberto is what makes this team go. I expect him to have a tremendous season in conference play. Hopefully Craig continues to get the ball in his hands and play him more and more.

    • Nelson is his own worst enemy. It’s all about confidence and making early shots for him. Though, now that he’s establishing himself, I expect him to be able to miss early and still take shots late. I think a lot of his issues were due to how highly recruited he was…probably felt he had to live up to expectations, so when he missed shots it compounded. Now that he’s proven himself he’ll put less pressure on himself. This guy was billed as the program’s savior, so it was a lot to live up to.

      • I agree. Roberto has always tried to do too much. He wants to be perfect out there and not just play ball. He so often is afraid to make mistakes. He’s a nice guy and defers to others. These are good qualities but can be an issue on the hardwood. He’ll pass up open shots to give a shot to his teammate. I’ve always felt he didn’t wanna come off as a selfish player. I think he shouldn’t worry about that. I know Craig has told him not to. Once he decides to just play and not worry about little things he plays great. A lot of his turnovers happen because he’s being too unselfish. Berto is the type of guy who can be incredibly unselfish and still drop 25 points. Cannot say that about many guys. I saw a little of that last game. I think he will get better and better. By March I think Berto will be “The Guy” with JC helping make up a great 1-2 punch.

        • I’d rather see JC be “the guy”…he enjoys it. Nelson seems to prefer riding in the sidecar. Both excel in their current roles. So why change it and make guys what they’re not?

          • They won’t change anything. Cunningham will be the team’s top scorer, when I say “The Guy” I don’t mean the guy who will lead the team in scoring. I mean, Nelson will be the guy that gets a lot of players good shots and creates his own. As we’ve seen of late Jared is better when he doesn’t have to create everything on his own. Nelson can do that. Nelson is starting to realize how good he can be. Just needs to be confident. Cunningham will excel playing off the ball from Nelson who can get him easy shots. Cunningham will lead the team in scoring while Nelson will be the team’s best playmaker on offense. That’s what I mean by “The Guy”.

    • I want to see Brandt shoot more. That is his best skill IMO and he really has the ability to spread the floor and open the lanes. I also would like to see more Moreland too though. I agree on Nelson… I think he is our best offensive player.

      • Angus is a great shooter. He has great range and has a different array of shots, but for some reason he plays so hesitantly. He can shoot the three well but so often passes it up and doesn’t look to score. Sometimes he looks like he wants to do everything perfectly sound and is overthinking out there. I just wanna see a game for once out of him where he just plays and doesn’t look like he’s trying to be flawless. Would love to see him block some shots here and there as well.

        • Sometimes when a guy gets tentative you can run a few plays for them to get them going then they are more likely to get theirs in the flow of the offense. I would like to see a few plays run to get Brandt some open looks and get him some confidence headed into conference play.

  2. I would like to see less early fouls on Cunningam. The agressive D is nice, but when it leads to 2 early fouls, that won’t cut it in league play because he’ll be forced to sit. He’s too valuable not to be on the court.

  3. I see the game vs. Howard pretty close to what appears to be the consensus. What I want to see is Roberto Nelson getting comfortable in his role of adding close to 15 points a game and Eric Moreland played for over 15 minutes. The guy was a beast defensively last game and he provides way more potential on both ends of the floor then does McShane. He is a guy who needs his development accelerated so he can be a big contributor this year. He definitely is capable of it. Hopefully Collier is good inside and Cunningham keeps attacking.

    OSU 84, Howard 63

    Howard @ Oregon St. Preview w/ Power Rankings:
    http://beaverbyte.com

    • It gets his game out of rhythm when he is too unselfish.. He needs to be a scorer. Who knows when and if Cunningham is ever going to be a reliable three point shooter.

      • I’m not sure about that. In the last few minutes, for the most part, they were back to their old selves, everybody outside the key and passing the ball around with someone finally casting off a 3 which usually didn’t go in. Part of the reason I said struggling is Parker said Howard was a young team.

        • If they’re having that much trouble scoring against a zone D which is manned by “young” players what’s it going to be like when they play a seasoned Pac-12 team playing zone?

          • They weren’t really having a tough time. They have been having open looks, early on shots just weren’t falling. They’ve looked much better against the zone tonight. They’ll be fine in Pac-12 play.

          • Open looks for 3’s but not open looks for non 3’s. This team is not a great shooting team w.r.t. 3’s so, imo, they can’t rely on the 3’s. CR has to come up with a scheme where by they can score against a zone without having to depend on 3’s.

  4. Tonight shows everyone that when Angus just shoots the ball and doesn’t worry about everything else he looks good. He is a pure shooter. It always looks good coming out of his hand.

  5. When Beaver players don’t hesitate on offense the team looks so good. This team has so much talent. Love what I’m seeing offensively tonight.

        • Subs were clueless which is kind of surprising, aren’t they competing against the starters in practice? I was pro-Murphy for awhile, but now I’m starting to see why CR has been prudent with giving him minutes. He may not make the rotation in league play.

          • I am still intrigued by Murphy as we could use a 3 point specialist but he isn’t going to play much if he shoots 0-3 from downtown. I wonder what is up with Chris Brown… maybe Rob is hoping he transfers.

          • It’s interesting you bring Brown up. Wasn’t he the guy that came in a couple of times last year and really had high energy? What’s going on that he can’t even see action with the walk-ons. Isn’t he on scholarship?

            Murphy looks a little slow on defense to me tonight. He looked smooth on his threes against that West Alabama, but tonight he was just jacking them up outside of the flow of the offense. He’s just getting started in his career, hopefully he has a lot of upside.

          • Well the word on the street is that Chris Brown is 1. A terrible basketball player, and 2. He doesn’t care too much about playing at all. So that is why we will never see Brown get any playing time this year…

        • They are walk-ons, I expected that. I wish they would have played a little better and not made the score looked a lot closer than it was. Nice win though.

        • Not surprising we have been bad the past few years, players like this were getting substantial minutes in every game and not just in garbage time.

  6. Very good sign that our two best players so far this season had an off night (Cunningham and Collier, 5-15, 19 pts) and Howard went on a 18-3 run to close the game and we still win by 21. I was hoping for back to back 40 point wins but this will do. Can’t wait for Pac-12 play to start.

    • I’m excited for Pac-12 play. Beavers got a chance in the conference opener to send a message. I think they’re better than the Huskies and got a good chance to prove it. Would be awesome to head north and pick up two big nonconference wins.

  7. It’s just nice we can even talk about how the end of the bench guys are giving up mini runs at the end of games where the Beavers had nearly a 40 point lead. Feels good.

  8. Nice to see the beavs run some stuff early for Brandt and get him involved. Loved seeing Starks hit 3’s… if him and Berto can lock in from downtown the Beavs could have a ton of success. Nelson struggled a bit but stuck with it and that was good to see… now if he would stop it with the stupid jump passes.

    What an exciting team. The crazy pass from Starks to Cunningham to Collier to flush it home and the behind the back alley oop by Cunningham from Burton were top 10 play worthy. Great stuff.

  9. Yeah, it’s nice to see a Beaver basketball team look so good and have so much upside still. About my only concern is that Jared has to find a semi-consistent three point shot. He had a couple of really nice looks tonight and still couldn’t hit. On the flip side, he was really looking to get others involved and had a lot of assists. Man, I am really looking forward to the UW game, talk about a test out of the gate.

  10. Does anyone know anything about next years recruits for B-ball? Success this year could open doors for more talented players. Are we full, or are we still actively recruiting?

    Go Beavs!

    • We are past full… No 4 star guys but I like the looks of them all. Jack probably knows more. Westbrook in 2013 might be rated higher when all is said and done.

  11. Are we worried about Portland State on Sunday? They’re my second favorite school and was thrilled to see them go to the big dance a couple years ago, I just don’t want them getting any big ideas this weekend against the Beavs.

    • I follow Portland State basketball and the short answer is “no”

      They can hang with teams if their shooting is on, but they just don’t have the ahteletes to keep up with Oregon State. The key will be our defensive pressure because Portland State doesn’t have great ball handlers. There should be plenty of steals and fast break opportunities in this game. They were able to “hang” with Oregon last week, but Oregon is garbage. Oregon got a ton of home cookin from the refs and were able to survive despite their horrible shooting and sloppy play. This is not a PSU tournament team. They had some studs on that team a few years ago but this years stars are not quite the same caliber.

      • Oregon is not garbage. They got a ton of hard working kids and a coach with a solid system. They don’t have the horses we do but they could beat us if our shots aren’t falling when we play them.

        • The Beavers can beat the Ducks even if they suck from the perimeter. The Beavers are quicker, stronger, more athletic and just better. The Beavers defense at times will suffocate Oregon and will force turnovers and get out in the open court. Oregon is going to try and ugly up the game. They wanna play it in a slow downed game against the Beavers. If they try to play fast with the Beavers they’ll get run out of the gym.

          • I wouldn’t say that about any team. OSU should be able to force some turnovers against UO… but that is not always a given and we do give up a high percentage from behind the arc. I know you are “frustrated” but that is no reason not to be honest and realistic.

          • How am I not being realistic? The Beavers are just better than Oregon. Turnovers being forced are not always a given, if the talent is equal. The talent is not equal on both sides. The Beavers are more talented. The Beavers give up 37% shooting behind the arc. That really isn’t that bad, considering they’ve faced some good shooters and in reality have played better D than that. Teams have shot 40% or better from three three times. Howard did it a lot late in the second half where there were walk-ons in and the defensive intensity is down. One was done by Hofstra but it was on just 10 attempts. Third one was against Idaho, where the Beavers really didn’t want to play. They’ve defended the three point line a lot better than you think.

          • yeah I am not saying those points are unreasonable I am saying that the talent gap is not so huge that a UO win is not out of the question. They are not Howard or UIC.

        • I see your point that they are hard working, which has resulted in some hustle victories against lower tier competition, but lets be realistic, they won’t be competitive against Pac-12 competition.

          Who have they beaten? Utep? Fresno St? Eastern Washington? Nebraska? Those were all close games, mostly on the home court, and they should have been blowouts considering the level of competition. Oregon is playing good enough ball to compete in the Big Sky conference this year, but in the Pac 12 they will have trouble.

          • They wont be great but they could steal a few wins with the shooting of Singler and Simm. I could see them getting the 5th or 6th spot in the Pac-12 knocking off a few teams above them and a NIT bid. I could also see them finishing 10th.

  12. Hey, that WAS a 40 pt win, and only garbage time made the score closer than the game was. The regulars were pulling away and the coach got merciful.

    If they continue to play the tough D, all game long, we are going to survive the shooting lapses. We should be very competitive in conference play.

    As to going after stars now, I would be careful what you wish for. This team seems to have real chemistry and togetherness, and though Cunningham is a “star”, he is still clearly part of the team family. If some big name is sought, we should be careful he is a team player.

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