Buffs enter stretch run

[Buffnik]

@ UCLA
@ USC
vs ASU
vs UA
@ Utah
@ Furd
@ Cal

Buffs currently 18-6, 7-4 in the Pac-12. There are 6 teams, including CU, with 4 or fewer losses in conference play. We play all of the other 5 during this stretch.

So 5/7 on the road and 5/7 against the best of the Pac-12.

Top 4 in the conference get a bye in the Pac-12 tourney.

Do the Buffs earn that bye?

 

[CVilleBuff]

No. We can get to 10 wins, but get ****ed on a tiebreaker. Need 11 to get top 4 and that may be a bridge too far, imo.

 

[Scotch]

No. We can get to 10 wins, but get ****ed on a tiebreaker. Need 11 to get top 4 and that may be a bridge too far, imo.

Agree on 10. Hopefully they can figure it out on the road and get to 11 wins.

 

[cubuffs85]

Heart tells me 5, head tells me 4

 

[rolandftw]

I'd be happy with 3 wins. Road games are tough to win in college basketball. 10 wins and the team is in great shape for the tournament. Which would be a great feather in the team's cap, considering the amount adversity the team would have faced to get in. If they beat UCLA thursday night, I'll raise my expectations though.

Getting Fletcher back within the next couple weeks would help for the stretch run.

I don't think they have much of a chance of a bye. Might need 12 wins to pull that off. It'd be nice to get a Bye, but really not something I'm overly concerned about. If the team keeps playing good defense, they will have a chance in every game the rest of the way.

 

[Quattro]

Tad ball will be in full effect and we scrape out 4 wins


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[cnbuff410]

I think 3 wins is a realistic expectation but I am hoping for 4

 

[cubuffs85]

I'd be happy with 3 wins. Road games are tough to win in college basketball. 10 wins and the team is in great shape for the tournament. Which would be a great feather in the team's cap, considering the amount adversity the team would have faced to get in. If they beat UCLA thursday night, I'll raise my expectations though.

Getting Fletcher back within the next couple weeks would help for the stretch run.

I don't think they have much of a chance of a bye. Might need 12 wins to pull that off. It'd be nice to get a Bye, but really not something I'm overly concerned about. If the team keeps playing good defense, they will have a chance in every game the rest of the way.

And if they lose I'll lower mine. Well not exactly, depending on the result

There's no "automatic wins" left. I think we'll beat ASU at home, USC on the road, Stanford or Cal, and I like the UofA game with GameDay there. That fifth win in there: Utah.

I'm just not sure how much the committee is going to discount our pre-Spencer play.

No I doubt I'll be happy with only three wins. Four wins would be OK. I'll be happy with five. Call me crazy for shooting for the stars.

 

[rolandftw]

And if they lose I'll lower mine. Well not exactly, depending on the result

There's no "automatic wins" left. I think we'll beat ASU at home, USC on the road, Stanford or Cal, and I like the UofA game with GameDay there. That fifth win in there: Utah.

I'm just not sure how much the committee is going to discount our pre-Spencer play.

No I doubt I'll be happy with only three wins. Four wins would be OK. I'll be happy with five. Call me crazy for shooting for the stars.

If they win the 5 you mention, they won't have to worry about the committee discounting pre-Spencer play. A 12-6 Conference record with wins over Arizona, ASU, Stanford or Cal would get the 3rd highest seeding in this conference. Maybe 2nd. If anything, the committee would likely dismiss CU's early losses to Arizona, Arizona State, UCLA as at least partially related to CU adjusting to play without Dinwiddie and Fletcher.

Like you said no automatic wins, although a loss to USC would be very bad for CU. Want to avoid a bad loss while getting a couple wins against Tourney caliber teams. Anything beyond that, is gravy imo

 

[cubuffs85]

If they win the 5 you mention, they won't have to worry about the committee discounting pre-Spencer play. A 12-6 Conference record with wins over Arizona, ASU, Stanford or Cal would get the 3rd highest seeding in this conference. Maybe 2nd. If anything, the committee would likely dismiss CU's early losses to Arizona, Arizona State, UCLA as at least partially related to CU adjusting to play without Dinwiddie and Fletcher.

Like you said no automatic wins, although a loss to USC would be very bad for CU. Want to avoid a bad loss while getting a couple wins against Tourney caliber teams. Anything beyond that, is gravy imo

Agreed with winning 5 games in terms of just making the Tourney, at that point we'll still where were seeded (but more importantly who we play). I don't think they are going to think we needed an "adjustment" period even if that's the case. What I think they'll see is improvement however. A bit of semantics, but they aren't as CU focused as we are.

I see ASU/@USC to be two expected wins. I fully expect to be able to get atleast another win in there with UofA, Utah, and one of the Bay Area games as most likely. I think we can get another win there as well. I don't see us beating UCLA or both Bay Area teams on the same roadstand.

 

[tante]

And if they lose I'll lower mine. Well not exactly, depending on the result

There's no "automatic wins" left. I think we'll beat ASU at home, USC on the road, Stanford or Cal, and I like the UofA game with GameDay there. That fifth win in there: Utah.

I'm just not sure how much the committee is going to discount our pre-Spencer play.

No I doubt I'll be happy with only three wins. Four wins would be OK. I'll be happy with five. Call me crazy for shooting for the stars.

Utah is very tough at home, it would be very tough to beat them there. Cal just knocked off zona at home. Not sure either of those two are beatable on the road.

Also don't freak out if we lose to UCLA. We do not match up well with them. If we lose to ASU at home I'm gonna cry.

 

[cubuffs85]

Utah is very tough at home, it would be very tough to beat them there. Cal just knocked off zona at home. Not sure either of those two are beatable on the road.

Also don't freak out if we lose to UCLA. We do not match up well with them. If we lose to ASU at home I'm gonna cry.

Why would I freak out if we lost to UCLA, I said I didn't see us beating them. I know Cal beat UofA at home, they also lost ASU -- the transitive property argument isn't a good one. Teams are always going to get more up for the #1 team in the nation coming to town than some run of the mill team. I just think we can take 1-3 of the "tough games," games we aren't supposed to win. Frankly, if we don't take a few of them we'll have a hard time making the Tourney, minus a deep P12 Tourney run.

 

[tante]

Why would I freak out if we lost to UCLA, I said I didn't see us beating them. I know Cal beat UofA at home, they also lost ASU -- the transitive property argument isn't a good one. Teams are always going to get more up for the #1 team in the nation coming to town than some run of the mill team. I just think we can take 1-3 of the "tough games," games we aren't supposed to win. Frankly, if we don't take a few of them we'll have a hard time making the Tourney, minus a deep P12 Tourney run.

That was more for everyone than you specifically. People on the board tend to overreact to a loss.

If we beat USC, ASU and UA. Our RPI will be around 30 before the pac12 tourney. We are on the right side of the bubble. Just gotta steal one on the road and finish strong at home.

 

[rolandftw]

I see ASU/@USC to be two expected wins. I fully expect to be able to get atleast another win in there with UofA, Utah, and one of the Bay Area games as most likely. I think we can get another win there as well. I don't see us beating UCLA or both Bay Area teams on the same roadstand.

I hope you're right. I expect them to win and lose a game that I wasn't expecting. Really hope they can take it to the Arizona schools, but it won't be easy.

 

[CVilleBuff]

I'll consider ourselves fortunate to win 2 of the remaining road games. 3 would be road play that frankly we've yet to see, Dinwiddie or not. We've yet to show the poise to go in and take care of bad and middling teams on the road. If that suddenly changes here, great. I'm encouraged by tonight's performance but it would hardly be the first time we came off a strong home performance and went on the road and took a couple lifeless losses. USC should be a win, but they beat Cal and scared the living **** out of Stanford and Oregon State (lost both in overtime). Also beat a Dance team in Xavier. USC is more than capable of beating us. Both Stanford and Cal are beatable, Stanford more so because of Dawkins. I just don't hold extreme confidence that we win either one. And you had better believe Utah will be waiting for us. Let's not kid ourselves, if that last Utah game was in SLC they blow it open in the second half and we don't recover and win. It will take a far better effort. Oh, and ASU is becoming a borderline psychological issue at this point after getting straight bullied 3 times in a row by them. It's up to this team whether they've had enough of these ASU ****heads and punch them in the mouth for a change. I'm not trying to sound the panic alarm by any means, but it's easy to see how this stretch could turn to **** when our only home games in 7 are Zona and an ASU squad that gives us problems. We're going to learn an awful lot about this team. I'm sure as hell glad we had these last 3 games to get wins and build confidence, but the practice test is officially over. Please Buffs, bring us road wins.

 

[DBT]

Awesome! 5 of next 6 on ESPN.

 

[Scotch]

Things like limiting turnovers, defending the perimeter, and making free throws will be that much more important during this last month. Especially on the road. Youth isn't an excuse anymore.

Really need to see some fight in these guys @UCLA.

 

[BuffG]

I'll consider ourselves fortunate to win 2 of the remaining road games. 3 would be road play that frankly we've yet to see, Dinwiddie or not. We've yet to show the poise to go in and take care of bad and middling teams on the road. If that suddenly changes here, great. I'm encouraged by tonight's performance but it would hardly be the first time we came off a strong home performance and went on the road and took a couple lifeless losses. USC should be a win, but they beat Cal and scared the living **** out of Stanford and Oregon State (lost both in overtime). Also beat a Dance team in Xavier. USC is more than capable of beating us. Both Stanford and Cal are beatable, Stanford more so because of Dawkins. I just don't hold extreme confidence that we win either one. And you had better believe Utah will be waiting for us. Let's not kid ourselves, if that last Utah game was in SLC they blow it open in the second half and we don't recover and win. It will take a far better effort. Oh, and ASU is becoming a borderline psychological issue at this point after getting straight bullied 3 times in a row by them. It's up to this team whether they've had enough of these ASU ****heads and punch them in the mouth for a change. I'm not trying to sound the panic alarm by any means, but it's easy to see how this stretch could turn to **** when our only home games in 7 are Zona and an ASU squad that gives us problems. We're going to learn an awful lot about this team. I'm sure as hell glad we had these last 3 games to get wins and build confidence, but the practice test is officially over. Please Buffs, bring us road wins.

Amen, brutha. CVille on point as usual

 

[SECOBuffsFan]

USC, Stanford on road.....Arizona State at home

Would not suprise me if we beat Arizona also....national spotlight

 

[CarolinaBuff]

Should be able to beat USC and ASU, then maybe Arizona and/or 1 of the last 3 on the road. 4-3 would be great but realistically I'm expecting 3-4.

 

[Goose]

Brad, Teets, Rugged & I briefly talked about this before the game - do we WANT that buy? I mean, that'd be nice and everything, but I'd rather have the 5/12 matchup game and get the easy win over USC if at all possible (because, let's face it, if we can't beat USC we don't deserve to dance anyway).

 

[tante]

Brad, Teets, Rugged & I briefly talked about this before the game - do we WANT that buy? I mean, that'd be nice and everything, but I'd rather have the 5/12 matchup game and get the easy win over USC if at all possible (because, let's face it, if we can't beat USC we don't deserve to dance anyway).

I was thinking about this yesterday and I'm not confident enough in this team to beat any other team in the tournament. Maybe if we blow out USC on the road I might feel better. What happens if we fall to 6 and have to play Washington State? They probably feel pretty confident they can beat us after our two close wins.

 

[Shldr2Shldr]

I think we punch UCLA in the mouth in a grind out kind of win this week (we should have beaten them here), and throttle USC this weekend. Get some payback over ASU and lose a close one to U of A. Beat Utah, then lose the next two as we head into the tournament.

 

[buffaholic]

The UW win was a beat down of epic proportions, but I'm not sure that we've turned the corner or if UW just didn't show up. I suspect the former. Still difficult to see more than 2-3 wins left with so much on the road and the problems we have with ASU and 'Zona. If we play inspired like last night, we win 5 or so.

 

[Shldr2Shldr]

The UW win was a beat down of epic proportions, but I'm not sure that we've turned the corner or if UW just didn't show up. I suspect the former. Still difficult to see more than 2-3 wins left with so much on the road and the problems we have with ASU and 'Zona. If we play inspired like last night, we win 5 or so.

If they play like they did last night we win 7-7. There are not very many teams that are going to beat you when you hold them to 32% from the floo and out rebound by 12.

 

[cubuffs85]

That was more for everyone than you specifically. People on the board tend to overreact to a loss.

If we beat USC, ASU and UA. Our RPI will be around 30 before the pac12 tourney. We are on the right side of the bubble. Just gotta steal one on the road and finish strong at home.

Ok gotcha, I'm probably one of the more rational people on here. If anything I undervalue single game results, not overvalue them.

The bubble is an evolving thing, that's one of the reasons I'm shooting high with five wins (keeping the status quo with the good wins/bad losses balancing out).

Hard to believe there's only TWO home games left. I always say this but boy does the college basketball season fly fast.

 

[cubuffs85]

I hope you're right. I expect them to win and lose a game that I wasn't expecting. Really hope they can take it to the Arizona schools, but it won't be easy.

Yeah that wouldn't surprise me normally speaking, but there's only two games, where I think they are expected to win. The reason I like UofA game however is because of the GameDay factor. The typical home game I'm not sure I'd like them, and sure it helps they'll be minus Ashley but they still should be expected to win on the road I'd think.

Yesterday's game definitely raised the bar for me. I was expecting them to win but not so much dominate even if UW looked terrible.

 

[cubuffs85]

Awesome! 5 of next 6 on ESPN.

Yeah I noticed that when I looked at the schedule a few weeks ago since I have to go elsewhere to watch the P12 Network games. (I try to avoid illegal websites as much as possible not for moral reasons but because I don't want to run the risk of getting a computer virus).

 

[wyobuff]

This is a tough one for me to call. I'm hoping to split with the LA teams and the bay area teams, (Probaby USC and CAL, but who knows). While it may not mean much, both XJ and SKI hate CAL and both (I think) of the LA teams for not recruiting them as hard as they thought they should be recruited. They both tend to get hyped up for those and play pretty well (though XJ last night and his seemingly newfound consistency is something to be smiling about).
At this point, i'd agree with whoever said that the ASU thing was becoming a mental issue - it absolutely has. I think we've got a better chance beating zona (though not by much) because of the big stage and bright lights on that game.
So, we go 3-3 with the bay area, LA and zona schools, that leaves UTAH.

They are going to be ready for us make no ****ing mistake about that. They thought they should have had us here, so you know they'll want this buffalo hide on the wall of the huntsman center. To me, that UTAH game is going to be key.

Right now, if things break our way we can get as high as a 2 seed in the conf tourney (I dont think anyone can catch zona), or fall somewhere to the middle of the pac.

Time for a pair check guys.

 

[cubuffs85]

USC, Stanford on road.....Arizona State at home

Would not suprise me if we beat Arizona also....national spotlight

Pretty much what I'm thinking but I could see it being Cal instead of Stanford.