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Reg: 02-04-06
03-04-17 03:52 AM - Post#224643    
    In response to mmp629

The announcers were pretty bad about promoting the Duke-UNC game instead of covering what they were showing. And the fawning over Harvard, to the seeming exclusion of any backstory or discussion of Princeton, was annoying. I liked the Yale commentators better.

Early on, Princeton's double-teams were coming well after the ball had arrived to the post man, making it easy for him to get the ball out to the relay man for a perimeter pass to a wide-open shooter. Later, they went back to doubling during the flight of the ball, which made it a lot more effective, although Lewis (who played another terrific game against the Tigers) still managed some nice passes. Still, Princeton got their hands on a lot of passes and hurried the Harvard players into making some bad ones, leading to the big TO advantage for the game. Smart to blanket Chambers and make somebody else beat you. Unfortunately, the Crimson got a lot of good looks and knocked a ton of them down. Also it seemed to me that the level of physicality wasn't there for the Tigers, as they got beat to a lot of rebounds and loose balls, sometimes trying to bend over or reach while their opponents were diving for them. Luckily it didn't' come back to bite them.

Towns looked like the player I've feared he would be but wasn't in the previous games I watched. His shooting form is very smooth, and he even hit a couple of mid-range turnaround jumpers, I'm sure much to Mike James's chagrin. There's something almost stately about his game--even when he's moving quickly he doesn't look hurried. Aiken again looked like an overmatched, somewhat hotheaded freshman making dumb plays, and Harvard looked best when he was not handling the ball. The crowd's "airball" chant after he missed that early trey really seemed to bother him. I know his overall stats are great, but, wow, that long leash from Amaker is pretty long.

The ending play by Bell kind of seemed like a tiny bit of a reversal of the 2011 Brandon Knight-over-Kareem Maddox play in the NCAAs. Lewis played good defense there but Bell had better offense. Love his ability to drive.

Weisz made some amazing passes, including a bullet hook pass to Cannady that Devin inexplicably chose not to shoot off of. He had the right idea backing down the various Harvard runts who tried to guard him, but I think he only got one of his finishes to go down. Cannady looked like he was limping a bit after one play, but seemed to shake it off and at least managed to hit a couple of shots. Brennan played bigger minutes than usual and was pretty good though not shooting much, moving all over the court on defense and tipping some loose balls to advantage.

Cook was simply awesome. It was so much fun watching him put his whole repertoire on display--treys, backdoor cuts, drives for dunks, tip-in follows. And he played as well on D as anyone. Stephens had some tough luck with the officials and had some misses from in close but still made huge plays, scoring efficiently and ripping that key OR at the end to set up Bell's clincher.

You could tell that Princeton knew they were going to win. When Harvard came out in the second half and quickly erased their nine-point deficit, the body language of the Tigers and their play remained confident and poised. I think the winning streak and the experience of the key players has really cemented their sense of what they need to do and what they can do. That confidence may have led them to get outhustled at times tonight, but it served them well down the stretch.
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