Look, guys, let's not go over the unpleas- *whistled for offensive foul.* Hmm. That's annoying. Anyways, there's no need t- *whistled for second offensive foul.*
I'm not going to let this bother me. I'm not g- *whistled for third offensive foul* THATS CRAP HIS FEET WERE CLEARLY IN THE RESTRICTED CIR- *flag thrown, fifteen yards* ARE YOU GUYS EVEN REAL REFER- *writer ejected from intro section*
(suffice it to say that we at GBH are still a little annoyed by last Wednesday's events)
(let's break it down)
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Apply the transitive property at your peril
Sure, Iowa State lost to Baylor and Texas early in January... but that seems like a lifetime ago. The Cyclones have run off four straight since then, including home victories against the teams ranked #1 and #2 in the nation as recently as three weeks ago (Oklahoma and Kansas).
This team has hit their stride, and they have done so against a consistently higher level of competition. And it's not the just the top end in the Big XII... it's the depth. The grind. Something we're all too familiar with at Kyle Field.
Basically, Big XII Basketball laughs at SEC Basketball the way we laugh at, well, Big XII football.
The secondary options need to kick in
Against Arkansas, the "secondary options" (who I define as Collins + bench) did not have it. Collins especially, who hasn't looked like himself in over a week.
Here's the full group from Wednesday night:
- Anthony Collins (32 minutes; 2 points; 1-4 shooting; 1 assist/3 TO's)
- Tonny Trocha Morelos (15 minutes; 1 point; 2 rebounds)
- Tavario Miller (9 minutes; 4 points; 5 rebounds)
- DJ Hogg (13 minutes; 3 points; 2 rebounds)
- Admon Gilder (24 minutes; 3 points; 5 rebounds; 1 assist/3 TO's)
- Grand Totals - 93 minutes; 13 points; 4-13 shooting; 2 assists/6 TO's
We usually don't need this group to play great, but we do need someone to step up and kick in an above average effort. That's going to be especially true against an Iowa State squad that might honestly be more talented than we are.
Y'all, the team wearing not-A&M jerseys might be the team on the floor with more talent. That's new. This group isn't used to that.
The Aggies win with depth. The Cyclones do not.
Iowa State has six players averaging more than 30 minutes per game, with two additional players splitting the "7th" role.
No one else sees significant action... and it works. The talent at the top is just that good.
Georges Niang (19.3 PPG) and Jameel McKay (12.9 PPG; 9.1 RPG) will give Jalen Jones and Tyler Davis absolutely everything they can handle down low, and Monte Morris (15.5 PPG; 7.0 APG) runs the show as good or better than anyone we've seen this year. Fill in the gaps with athletic swingmen (Nader, Mitrou-Long) and long range bombers (Thomas, Burton) and you have an offense capable of scoring against anyone in the country.
They're just behind (or barely ahead of) Oklahoma in most categories, and Oklahoma has the most brutally efficient / enjoyable college offense I've seen in years.
Iowa State is really, really good. If we don't improve from Wednesday night, we'll lose by double digits.
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Let's re-iterate that final sentence: Wednesday night's effort will not be good enough. We are capable of winning this game, but it's going to take an effort like we saw at Georgia or home against LSU.
Tune in to ESPN at 1pm, Ags. This should be a good one.