Really, nothing about Nolen?

Donate To GopherHole
F

From the Barn

Active member
Joined
Nov 20, 2008
Messages
4,255
Reaction score
0
Points
36
He put this team on his back and had one of the best performances by a Gophers I've ever seen. He put this team on his back, and if you didn't notice how his hustle was contagious you weren't paying attention.

No, his stats weren't amazing, and never will be since he is relatively limited offensively. But under the circumstance with the departure of Joseph and Nolen clearly not all the way back from injury, all he does is get 14 pts, 6 rebounds, 4 assists and 4 steals.

We might not win many games the rest of the year by being better than anyone, but as long as guys like Nolen are on the court and the team plays with the effort we saw in the second half, I'll be cheering loudly and won't be giving up on the team as long as the team doesn't give up on themselves.
 


I'll give him this: He was horrible in the first half and turned it around about as dramatically as he could have in the second. Maybe the play of Williams is over shadowing Nolan's game?
 

From the Barn said:
He put this team on his back and had one of the best performances by a Gophers I've ever seen. He put this team on his back, and if you didn't notice how his hustle was contagious you weren't paying attention.

No, his stats weren't amazing, and never will be since he is relatively limited offensively. But under the circumstance with the departure of Joseph and Nolen clearly not all the way back from injury, all he does is get 14 pts, 6 rebounds, 4 assists and 4 steals.

We might not win many games the rest of the year by being better than anyone, but as long as guys like Nolen are on the court and the team plays with the effort we saw in the second half, I'll be cheering loudly and won't be giving up on the team as long as the team doesn't give up on themselves.
Click to expand...

That's exactly right FTB. Nolen willed this win. He played an incredible second half and owned every ball near him. If can get the rest of the team to follow that effort we will have something.
He deserves every bit of credit you gave him and more.
 

Al played great and IMO, he was the reason we won tonight. He had some big rebounds, penetrated very well in the second half and had some big buckets, including a much-needed 3 pointer.

Go Gophers!!
 


Al played great ball down the stretch. No question. What gets me is his play, and seemingly lack of effort, during the the first half particularly the opening minutes.

Compare that to the full game effort and lay-it-on-the-line type performence of Trevor. We need Nolen to step-up and play like a seasoned veteran and lead this team.
 

2nd Half was GREAT! If he can maintain that intensity we will be fine.
 

Hopefully Nolan continues to play his best ball without Devoe because he looked really good again today not taking alot of shots but taking good ones when he did. I liked what I saw forsure.
 

Bayfieldgopher said:
Al played great ball down the stretch. No question. What gets me is his play, and seemingly lack of effort, during the the first half particularly the opening minutes.

Compare that to the full game effort and lay-it-on-the-line type performence of Trevor. We need Nolen to step-up and play like a seasoned veteran and lead this team.
Click to expand...

I guess we were looking at two different games. Nolen barely played at all in the first half and in fact, when his unit was gaining a little momentum, Tubby decided it was a good time to yank him and put in the freshman. It's when Tubby decided to concede a little control to his PG (Nolen) that Nolen seemed to put the team on his back and lead them to victory.

Mbakwe, Williams, Hoffarber and Iverson all played good supporting roles, but Nolen was the difference maker in this game.

It was clear that this team had to shake off the events of the day to get focused on winning this game. I was very impressed with how well the entire group came together and pulled out a win. The Iowa/OSU game makes me excited about the possibilities of an upset at Columbus.
 



Seemed like Tubby was saving Nolen for the second half knowing we would need him.
 

Nolen was the game changer. I agree he put this team on his back when they needed him. Blake and Mbakwe had their usual strong games and Rodney had a very nice night.
 

From the Barn said:
Seemed like Tubby was saving Nolen for the second half knowing we would need him.
Click to expand...

Ahanmisi played 16 minutes, hit 2 nice 3-pt FG, and grabbed 3 rebounds. His play allowed Nolen some rest to have something left in the tank for 2nd half.
 

Nolen was very good in the 2nd half. I wouldn't say it's one of the best performances I've seen by a Gopher (Al himself was much better against UNC for example), but his defense and his penetration on offense were key aspects to avoiding an absolute disaster tonight.
 



I'm sure its hard to know what to say when lots of effort went into building a case for why we are better without Nolen!
I was especially impressed with a few of Nolen's rebounds.
 

Friend Of Tubby said:
Ahanmisi played 16 minutes, hit 2 nice 3-pt FG, and grabbed 3 rebounds. His play allowed Nolen some rest to have something left in the tank for 2nd half.
Click to expand...

You are right FOT, I forget to mention Ahanmisi. He had a really good stretch of minutes when he was in there.
 


Are you guys serious? Saving Nolen for the second half? Really? He hardly played in the first half because he was completely awful on both ends. He and Sampson sat early because of their putrid efforts.

While Sampson stayed that way the whole game, Nolen, to his credit, turned it around to play maybe the best half he has ever played. Good for him. We needed it. Now we need better efforts for the whole game from all the players.
 

WilliamsArenaGuy said:
Are you guys serious? Saving Nolen for the second half? Really? He hardly played in the first half because he was completely awful on both ends. He and Sampson sat early because of their putrid efforts.

While Sampson stayed that way the whole game, Nolen, to his credit, turned it around to play maybe the best half he has ever played. Good for him. We needed it. Now we need better efforts for the whole game from all the players.
Click to expand...

Exactly.
 

We're such a better team when Nolen is constantly in attack mode like that. When he pushes the tempo we're so much better. He really can basically drive by his guy whenever he wants. I remember a ton of times being frustrated that we'd give up an easy bucket and then Nolen would sprint down the floor, drive, get a layup, and then I'd relax. We're going to really miss him next year. Mav and Hollins are going to be forced to play way more minutes than they should really be playing at pg.
 

From the Barn said:
He put this team on his back and had one of the best performances by a Gophers I've ever seen. He put this team on his back, and if you didn't notice how his hustle was contagious you weren't paying attention.

No, his stats weren't amazing, and never will be since he is relatively limited offensively. But under the circumstance with the departure of Joseph and Nolen clearly not all the way back from injury, all he does is get 14 pts, 6 rebounds, 4 assists and 4 steals.

We might not win many games the rest of the year by being better than anyone, but as long as guys like Nolen are on the court and the team plays with the effort we saw in the second half, I'll be cheering loudly and won't be giving up on the team as long as the team doesn't give up on themselves.
Click to expand...

He played a good second half, at home, against a conference bottom feeder. His good second half helped make up for a putrid first half.

That's 'one of the best performances by a Gopher you've ever seen?'

New to the game?
 

We sat in view of the Gopher bench. Al was seriously sucking wind at times in the second half. Marcus said that Tubby said Al has trouble with asthma now and again. I didn't know that.

It was a pretty odd situation with Devoe suddenly be gone, if it wasn't highlighted by someone before, Tubby, at least to me, seemed to almost holding an audition for his vacated guard spot. Goes without saying right? There, obviously, was no back up plan to what happened with Devoe so it put last nights game almost into preseason mode. Seeing who would fit best and where which to me explained a lot of the disarray we saw last night. At least that's my take on things.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.



Top Bottom