Thursday, November 6, 2008

Exhibition #2

Disclaimer: There will be plenty of acronyms today so watch out.


Well, we've officially seen the boys in action once this year. An exhibition against Stevie Thompson's CSLA (Cal State Los Angeles) proved that Johnny is still Johnny, Devo and Andy can use their respective ACL's and AO is a monster. Hell, AO went 6-6 on Monday. Granted his largest competition was a few inches under him, and a hell of a lot lighter.

Basically what you can take from the first scrimmage is that this year our offense will work inside out. We need to establish Arinze on the inside and feed him. Once that is established, any of our shooters looked good, Devo looked to be fearless after his injury and Andy's shot looks as smooth as ever. Paul even was converting from deep, going 2-4.

On Sunday comes the IUP Crimson Hawks (Indiana University of Pennsylania, not to be confused with IUPUI - Indiana University, Purdue University of Indianapolis or the real Indiana University in Indiana). Again, this will be more of a game to get the guys legs under them, rather than a "real" evaluation.

On the blocks, the tallest, IUP has to offer is 6'8" 220lb. Senior Chris Seaborn who didn't see much action last year. Odds are at down two inches and 55lb. from Arinze, this should not be much of a matchup issue.

What to look for on Sunday is Devo and Andy playing their game. What I mean by this is Devo fearlessly slashing the hole and making things drop, which was an issue on Monday. Andy needs to be moving well without the ball and playing solid D. AO will dominate, Flynn will be faster and pass better than their team and Harris and KO will play thier game. Those aren't issues. Its a matter of the two returnees staying healthy and looking to Rick, Mookie, Sean and Kris to see signs of improvement.