2022-23 Season

[byufan4ever]

BYU lost at home to #9 (15-3) Gonzaga (Q1). Last year we got blown away at home so losing by just 1 is an improvement. But to be up 10 in the second half and then let it slip away hurts. Jaxson Robinson is supposed to be a good defender, but two of Gonzaga's late 3s were his fault. On one occasion he came to provide help defense, but someone else had also come with help defense so the ball handler was triple teamed and Robinson way over committed and his man hit a corner 3. Then, he didn't step in front of a screen to allow Gonzaga to hit the go ahead 3. Maybe I'm being too nitpicky, but I did notice he was at fault for both of those. Robinson did have a fine game overall though. Also, that last play, that can't be how the coach drew it up...either no one was getting open for a pass or Spencer Johnson horribly mismanaged that.

Still, Johnson gets the Best Performer award scoring 18 points on 7/11 shooting including 3/4 3s, 6 rebounds, and 5 steals! But we only went 5/10 at the FT line as a team. That has got to improve. Traore really should start taking our technical FTs as he's really the only good one on the team. Dallin Hall gets the Struggled award having the lowest PER for a player with at least 15 minutes, but with a rating above 10 he really didn't play that bad. Waterman only played 12 minutes, but they were a really bad 12 minutes missing both shots and turning the ball over 3 times. He has really gone downhill after having a few good games earlier in the season.

BYU won at home to #161 (5-12) Pepperdine (Q4). BYU started off strong and had a 13 point lead at HT, but where this felt like a game that we could have won by 20+ most of the second half was very close until the final couple of minutes where BYU made a push to get the lead back to 10. BYU had 14 more FTAs then Pepperdine and actually made 78%. If I had a nickel for every failed cross-court pass...Sometimes the pass was right to a defender and sometimes it was into the stands. Please don't try to play up tempo for the rest of the season, we just can't do it. Traore was a beast scoring 19 points on 8/12 FGs and 3/4 FTs and grabbing 9 rebounds and 3 blocks. I was just thinking to myself before this game that Rudi Williams should get more minutes and come off the bench earlier and then he lays an egg. 2 points and 4 TOs, ouch.

Next week's games are against #79 (14-5) Santa Clara and #130 San Franscisco (11-9). BYU is #91 (12-7).

[byufan4ever]

On Thursday BYU lost to 15-6 (4-3) #79 Santa Clara (Q2). SC had a clear strategy to not let Traore get the ball as they were doubling him on entry passes. And it worked as he only had 3 FGA and 2 FTA although he still managed to have an impressive PER. For a while BYU stayed with them by hitting threes, but after that dried up it was a done deal. I'm actually surprised that the game was as close as it was. Williams had BYU's best game scoring 24 points off the bench and having more assists (4) than TOs (2)! Atiki struggled getting 7 boards, but no points and 3 TOs. This team and TOs...sigh...

On Saturday BYU lost to 13-9 (3-5) #112 San Francisco (Q2). BYU actually had more FGs than SF (28-23) but SF had more 3FGs (12-5) and FTs (24-13). After TOs BYU is also showing a horrible ability to defend the 3. Rudi had a terrific game scoring 28 points on 10/13 shooting and just one TO. While it's great to have a spark off the bench I think it's time to start him again. Hall played less than 15 minutes so I spared him my Struggled to Perform award, but he had 5 very bad TOs. He wasn't even pressured. I don't think any of them were steals. He just threw each of them away to nobody. He visibly looked frustrated on the bench and he really needs to take a step back and make some adjustments. Waterman gets the red mark scoring just 1 point in 24 minutes. Why was he playing C for the last 8 minutes or so instead of Traore? This isn't the first time Traore has spent long periods on the bench despite not being in foul trouble. Anybody have any word on this?

BYU has just one game next week, against 17-4 (7-0) #6 Saint Mary's. BYU is 12-9 (4-4) #98.

[Gunk]

Been a while since we’ve had a season this bad.

Losing to SC and SF. Eeeshh. At this rate we will be lucky to make it to the NIT.

[byufan4ever]

BYU lost by 1 to 19-4 (8-0) #6 SMC at home (Q1). Robinson, Waterman, and Atiki were all suspended for violating a team rule. I was most worried about not having Atiki as BYU is already so low on tall/big players. Walk-on Tredyn Christensen filled in for 7 minutes and scored his first basket of the season. I thought that maybe we were going to see Braeden Moore, but if he's not going to make an appearance when we're this short-handed I guess he's just not going to play this season.

Give Pope credit for putting fight into this team as they didn't fold when they went down early in the game. The pick and roll strategy worked pretty well against SMC's freshman guard. Hall scored a career high 23 points and gets the best performer award, but he has got to practice his FTs this off-season. He can nail a clutch 3, but cannot hit 2 consecutive FTs. Trey Steward mostly played good defense, but that foul on a 3 point shot near the end of the first half really hurt especially as we lost by 1 point. It was a real soft touch after the shot. I saw this mentioned elsewhere, but it would be nice to see a rule change in cases where the foul clearly didn't affect the shot like this so that the team gets the ball back, but no FTs. It should be treated as a non-shooting foul. For the most part this was an extremely well officiated game. They let them play and bump and only a total of 24 fouls were called. I enjoyed that part of the game. Saunders got the start, but did not perform well at all scoring zero points and grabbing just 1 rebound in 28 minutes. I like his energy, but he's gotta show more for it.

Coming up next week BYU has 16-7 (6-3) #84 LMU at home (Q3) and 11-12 (4-4) #210 Pacific at home (Q4). BYU is 14-10 (4-5) #94.

[BoiseBYU]

People aren’t going to like looking for moral victories, but we are two points from having beaten both SM and The Zags and in both of those games it took clutch shots of the opposing team to win it and at least with regards to the SM game to play as they did without our two largest players…..well hats off to the effort and coaching. Heartbreaking losses, and being so close doesn’t help much if at all, but man this team is close….

[scott715]

It shows that they can compete. You never know what will happen in the conference tournament.

[byufan4ever]

On Thursday BYU beat 16-9 (6-5) #99 LMU at home (Q3). This was BYU's first win this season where it just felt like they dominated from start to finish. Robinson was dropped from a starting role for the first time this season with Waterman taking his place. It's hard to question that lineup change with the results of this game and the next one. However, Waterman still had the lowest PER of any player with at least 15 minutes. He is struggling mightily offensively. He did get 1 block and 2 steals so I guess you just gotta trust the coach on this. Williams continues to come off the bench and he had the highest PER scoring efficiently and getting 4 assists and 1 steal to ZERO turnovers! BYU only had 7 team TOs! Wow, look at what happens when TOs are kept to under 10!

On Saturday BYU beat 12-13 (5-5) #203 Pacific at home (Q4). BYU didn't quite dominate from the opening tip like they did against LMU, but their lead never dipped below 10 in the second half. Waterman started again, but got into quick foul trouble and none of his shots were even close to going in. He got 8 minutes which is probably about what he deserved. Traore only had 2 points in the first half, but finished with 19 to go along with 12 boards and the highest PER. Robinson had the lowest PER for 15+ minutes shooting just 4/11 and 1/6 from 3. Again, BYU kept their TOs to under 10 and this time they forced 18. If BYU is going to even have a sniff at winning away at Gonzaga and SMC they will need to continue this trend.

Next week BYU plays 8-17 (1-10) #211 Pepperdine away (Q3) and 19-5 (8-2) #11 Gonzaga away (Q1). BYU is 16-10 (5-5) #85.

[byufan4ever]

I forgot to add that BYU's screens and pick and roll has suddenly gotten better the past three games. I've complained since the Dave Rosa era that we set some of the softest screens, but kudos to making an improvement in that area!

[scott715]

Gonzaga lost another game? Was it St Mary's?

[byufan4ever]

Gonzaga lost another game? Was it St Mary's?

Yep, they lost 78-70 in OT at SMC.