I won't critique your analysis game by game, as I agreed with all but 4 of them, and for now I'll just give you the benefit of the doubt and accept the "one game one way or the other" and obviously would go the positive way with that, putting us at 9-5, with a FAR stronger SOS than Nebraska who we would be tied for 4th place with at 9-5. We'd be comfortably in, NU would be the bubble team. And we have 2 games remaining vs Iowa and Wisconsin. So we'd finish at worst 11-7, IF I concede we'd lose to MSU and Purdue since they are both ranked Top 4 and OH SO AWESOME, right???
Just in general, one thing you seemed not to factor in to your analysis is that added offense is not the only difference adding 2-3 players to a game brings.
For every additional basket the Gophers score because of having those 2 players available on offense, there is also the additional defense, scores by the other team are stopped that otherwise weren't because guys like Konate or a hobbled McBrayer were the defenders.
Also, adding say just 25 minutes for each player, combined is 50 minutes that Konate or a hobbled McBrayer or a not quite as good Hurt do not need to be out on the court. And would McBrayer's health have deteriorated the way it did if he didn't feel compelled to be playing? He could have been sat out of a few games and been allowed to heal up and the games he did play in he would have been more effective. Lynch and Coffey going out exasperated McBrayer's situation.
Individually, Coffey may have played vs OSU, but how effective was he? When he first got injured, it was announced that he would be out until Feb 2nd. His coming back to play the OSU game was his coming back WAY too early, the result being he aggravated the injury.
Had he simply been healthy that game, along with Lynch, I'd say that could have made an 18 pt difference. That was the 5th game they had played in the 5th different city over an 11 day period. No way fatigue wasn't a factor. Add another 50 minutes and every other player on that team has more energy in the 2nd half. And they were only down 7 pts at the half, WITHOUT Lynch and a healthy Coffey.
And the same could be applied to the Purdue game, even you said we played them pretty well in the 1st half. The game at Iowa was only a 4 pt game very late in the game. Adding Lynch and Coffey may have totally swung the momentum our way and also prevented the team from running out of gas at the very end.
So its not out of the realm of possibility that 9-5 is the best we could have possibly done.
And the Indiana game? Maybe going into that game sitting at 9-4 or 8-5 with a full lineup of players would have changed the whole vibe of the game from the opening tip off?
I have a friend with 4 kids that all were very successful in sports, and he was a huge Vikings fan, and he always said, "Winning begets winning and losing begets losing". Had we not had to deal with the loss of Lynch and Coffey and had won just the IU and Maryland games even, we'd have been in a great position to win 4 in a row going into the game in Assembly Hall and well, you say they put in a pathetic effort all around, that probably would not have been the case.
