***OFFICIAL MINNESOTA V TEXAS TECH, PITINO V TUBBY IN-GAME THREAD!!!***

tinyarch

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Texas Tech vs the Gophers

What a wonderful opportunity to see Tubby's squad take on our boys in Maroon. Tubby's teams generally play their best ball in November so it wouldn't surprise me to see Tech win on Sunday. However, I'm interesting in watching the contrast in offensive and defensive styles take place. I sort of hope the game comes down to the last second and Tubby's team has the ball. I'm interested in watching his boys stand around until there's no time left and then heave up a desperation shot at the buzzer.

What would be icing on the cake would be if somehow these two teams got to meet in a post season tournament. I'd love to see the difference in the two teams come March.

Until then, I'm looking forward to Sunday. I liked Tubby as a human being. I just found his style of basketball less than inspiring. I wish him well in Texas, just not on Sunday against our Gophers! Ski-U-Mah!
 



I hope we light them up pretty good. I think we can if we don't shoot ourselves in the foot.
 

Pitino has got to be feeling a lot of pressure going in to this game. Fair or not, losing to Texas Tech and Tubby in is 3rd year would lead to a lot of ridicule. If the Vikings were not also playing Green Bay on Sunday, I could see a hypothetical loss to Texas Tech being the "A" topic in the Twin Cities sports media on Monday.
 


Pitino has got to be feeling a lot of pressure going in to this game. Fair or not, losing to Texas Tech and Tubby in is 3rd year would lead to a lot of ridicule. If the Vikings were not also playing Green Bay on Sunday, I could see a hypothetical loss to Texas Tech being the "A" topic in the Twin Cities sports media on Monday.

And if the Vikes and Gophs both lose...keep the sharp objects locked up.
 

Pitino has got to be feeling a lot of pressure going in to this game. Fair or not, losing to Texas Tech and Tubby in is 3rd year would lead to a lot of ridicule. If the Vikings were not also playing Green Bay on Sunday, I could see a hypothetical loss to Texas Tech being the "A" topic in the Twin Cities sports media on Monday.

And rightly so. Whatever happens is fair and square and serves as a pretty good barometer of where these two men have their programs sitting at the moment. With few exceptions, all these players were recruited by them. Both took over their teams in a year when their personnel had cycled down. Tubby arguably had it worse right off due to losing Petteway. Both teams this year are young and trying to put a lot of new pieces together. In fact, it's almost eerie how similarly the two programs are sitting right now.

I know college hoops are unwatchable ;) , but I'm looking forward to watching this game.
 

Tubby's got them playing, they've got some size inside with decent skills, this is going to be a tough game for the Gophers.
 

And rightly so. Whatever happens is fair and square and serves as a pretty good barometer of where these two men have their programs sitting at the moment. With few exceptions, all these players were recruited by them. Both took over their teams in a year when their personnel had cycled down. Tubby arguably had it worse right off due to losing Petteway. Both teams this year are young and trying to put a lot of new pieces together. In fact, it's almost eerie how similarly the two programs are sitting right now.

I know college hoops are unwatchable ;) , but I'm looking forward to watching this game.

The future is still important. You have to compare the class year of players and look at recruiting. If they win but are a team with few promising players the next few years and not a lot of talent coming in, does the outcome of this game matter all that much? I have no idea what TT is like right now.
 



The future is still important. You have to compare the class year of players and look at recruiting. If they win but are a team with few promising players the next few years and not a lot of talent coming in, does the outcome of this game matter all that much? I have no idea what TT is like right now.

Gophers will probably be favored, it's on a neutral court, TT is nothing special. A win is a win. So, to me I guess it matters. Half the teams in the BIG are going through youth issues. Nothing unique to the Gophers.
 

The future is still important. You have to compare the class year of players and look at recruiting. If they win but are a team with few promising players the next few years and not a lot of talent coming in, does the outcome of this game matter all that much? I have no idea what TT is like right now.

The outcome of the game is the most important thing.
 

Let's rationalize

Some folks already rationalizing and making excuses if by chance the Gophers lose? Confidence, people. Like it or not, win or lose (my money is on a Gopher win), this game will tell us something about where both programs are in Year 3. It might even be possible both are headed in the right direction?
 

And rightly so. Whatever happens is fair and square and serves as a pretty good barometer of where these two men have their programs sitting at the moment. With few exceptions, all these players were recruited by them. Both took over their teams in a year when their personnel had cycled down. Tubby arguably had it worse right off due to losing Petteway. Both teams this year are young and trying to put a lot of new pieces together. In fact, it's almost eerie how similarly the two programs are sitting right now.

I know college hoops are unwatchable ;) , but I'm looking forward to watching this game.

Both teams are young but Tubby's team is more seasoned. His sophs played a lot of minutes as freshmen and I don't think he has any freshmen playing significant minutes. They look considerably brawnier throughout their lineup to me. Zach Smith looks every bit as athletic as Buggs and he looks more willing to mix it up inside than Buggs. Bakary will need to be able to play bigger minutes. He's probably a little better than Odiase but Odiase is strong, wide load and is more experienced. They don't seem to have anyone in their lineup who can shoot like Joey and our team appears to be a better perimeter shooting team. We also appear to have the edge in free throw shooting so hopefully we get a lot of foul calls like we got against Temple.
 



The outcome of the game is the most important thing.

Indeed it is important. With Clemson, OK St., and two tough mid majors (SDSU and Milwaukee) on the non-conference horizon, I'd much rather win than lose this game. If this team has any realistic chance of at least an NIT appearance, they can't finish any worse than 9-3 in non-conference.
 

Gophers will try to play fast while Tubby will play muscle. It seems a foreshadow of the B1G season. I actually think this can be an informative game about the state of our youth.
 

Some folks already rationalizing and making excuses if by chance the Gophers lose? Confidence, people. Like it or not, win or lose (my money is on a Gopher win), this game will tell us something about where both programs are in Year 3. It might even be possible both are headed in the right direction?
Both teams heading in the right direction? Is this possible?
Um, yes, it is.
 

It's been 2+ years since we've seen Tubby roam the sidelines during a Gopher game. Always classy Tubby will probably downplay the matchup but no doubt he and especially Esposito will want this bad. Gotta get more bench production and keep Konate out of foul trouble.

GET 'ER DONE PITINO!!!!!!!!!
 

I'm expecting a loss and I definitely wouldn't trade Pitino for Tubby.
 


What's Esposito's axe to grind? Something specific?
 

Some folks already rationalizing and making excuses if by chance the Gophers lose? Confidence, people. Like it or not, win or lose (my money is on a Gopher win), this game will tell us something about where both programs are in Year 3. It might even be possible both are headed in the right direction?

You're totally missing the point. Obviously it would be disappointing to lose. The point is that many people think this game is a great gauge for where the program is at simply because we're playing our former coach. We know the team is going to suck this year! Whether we win or lose, does that somehow change? Win or lose, does that somehow affect what we think this team will be next year when we have 5 new players playing for us, 4 of whom I think we all agree will be major contributors right away? This is along with several young players with talent who will have gained valuable experience and gotten better.

So, win or lose, what exactly does this game tell us that we don't already know about the team this year?
 


We're playing a Big 12 school our former coach now coaches. Nothing more, nothing less. Similar to the Temple team we played...definitely beatable. The Tubby factor? Background noise.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk
 

What's Esposito's axe to grind? Something specific?

I don't know, but there's always been speculation he kept an account on this site to defend Tubby. I also remember somebody (Marcus maybe?) retweeting an Esposito tweet on one of his first days at TT, where he said something like "Lubbock, Texas - the most beautiful city in America!" hahaha

Vince Taylor also is a TT assistant, and I just noticed that Saul Smith is the Video Director. LOL, I don't know whether to laugh at that last one or cry (remembering the fact that he actually was an assistant coach here, smh).
 

I'm hoping we can develop a good high/low inside game to compliment the outside shooting. TT is pretty good from the foul line (do free throws really count?) not bad from 3 pt. with Keenan Evans shooting at .600 2 others are around .300. followed by Gotcher at .144. Joey is at .577 Morris .417 Buggs .375 Mason .350 Have to find a way to shut down Williams and Gotcher averaging 18 and 10ppg and keep out of foul trouble while turning TT over.
 

We know the team is going to suck this year! Whether we win or lose, does that somehow change? Win or lose, does that somehow affect what we think this team will be next year when we have 5 new players playing for us, 4 of whom I think we all agree will be major contributors right away?

So, win or lose, what exactly does this game tell us that we don't already know about the team this year?

I don't ever, ever, ever "look to next year" until the season is over. Whatever improvements next year's newcomers bring (and I expect significant improvements) do nothing for me until next year. I want to win this game because I'm not willing to forfeit any hope for some postseason participation until that becomes very unlikely. I don't expect this team to be very good but I'm not certain yet that they are going "to suck this year."

We have a fairly tough nonconference schedule and I don't want 2 losses with Clemson, OK State, SDSU, and Milwaukee still on the horizon. The good news is that we have a comparatively easy conference schedule with only 7 games against the top six in the conference according to the current Sagarin ratings. Still, to have any hope for a postseason, we likely need to go no worse than 9-3 in nonconference.
 

What a wonderful opportunity to see Tubby's squad take on our boys in Maroon. Tubby's teams generally play their best ball in November so it wouldn't surprise me to see Tech win on Sunday. However, I'm interesting in watching the contrast in offensive and defensive styles take place. I sort of hope the game comes down to the last second and Tubby's team has the ball. I'm interested in watching his boys stand around until there's no time left and then heave up a desperation shot at the buzzer.

What would be icing on the cake would be if somehow these two teams got to meet in a post season tournament. I'd love to see the difference in the two teams come March.

Until then, I'm looking forward to Sunday. I liked Tubby as a human being. I just found his style of basketball less than inspiring. I wish him well in Texas, just not on Sunday against our Gophers! Ski-U-Mah!

What a wonderful opportunity? Are you insane!?

I'm really nervous.

Happy Thanksgiving though Arch!
 

If there isn't a Tubby line change during this game I'll be immensely upset.
 

What's Esposito's axe to grind? Something specific?

If I remember correctly, he just felt that Tubby was undeservedly fired. I think there were a couple tweets about their accomplishments and a maybe a shot or two at the Gophers program.
 

Tv coverage for this one?


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