LAST WEEK
MEN
Thursday, January 5th, 2012
Saturday, January 7th, 2012
WOMEN
Thursday, January 5th, 2012
Saturday, January 7th, 2012
All year, I've been railing on the seniors on the mens team for not stepping up and emploring the freshmen to take over the leadership to save the season.
It's at this point that I need to apologize.
The effort that our seniors gave against Washington State was HUGE. It appeared that the two day quick turnaround between the Washington game and the Wazzu game caught the younger players off guard as we saw below par games from The Mayor, Ski and Dre. So what happened? Carlon Brown plays easily his best game of his CU career, Austin Dufault killed the Cougars down low and we had Good Nate show up and lead the team all game. If those three can keep this up, this team suddenly becomes a lot scarier than everyone thinks.
As for the Washington game, that was unreal. When Washington came out inspired and CU came out flat, I had a horrible feeling that it was going to be a terrible day for the Buffs. But the team kicked it in to overdrive when Chen & Adams subbed in to the game and just didn't look back. The best part was that when they got up on the Dawgs, they put their foot on the throat and refused to let them up again. That's a team with 3 future NBA players that we took behind the woodshed.
The women got the 1-1 split that most of us were hoping for, but not in the manner we expected. They dropped their first game to Washington before rebounding and beating a superior Washington State team (going off of RPI rankings).
THIS WEEK
This is not going to be an easy week for either team. This week tells us if we're looking at NCAA (women) and NIT (men) bids or if we're going to have to lower our sights a bit. The men have to go on the road for the first time in PAC-12 play -- and the first time out of the state of Colorado since Puerto Rico. And they don't get to dip their toes in the water either as Thursday night they play the team that a lot of people think will win the PAC-12 in Cal. They just wore Oregon down last night, and honestly I'm not sure if they have any real weaknesses. If you look at their numbers, they're 21st in offensive efficiency and 24th in defensive efficiency. They don't really haev any weaknesses. They're 19th in the KenPom rankings and the teams they've lost to are ranked 9th (Mizzou), 17th (UNLV), 51st (SDSU) and 65th (Oregon State). All are on the road, so really you can't argue that there are any HORRIBLE losses. One thing I'm interested to watch is if CU can get to the line. They're 6th in the nation at defensive FTA/FGA whereas we're 10th in the nation at offensive FTA/FGA. That may decide this game.
Anyone who watched the Stanford-OSU 4OT marathon can tell you that Stanford doesn't give up. I missed the first half of the game, but loved watching Stanford come back from 10+ down in the second half to tie the game. The team follows it's coach in that it just doesn't seem to give up and keeps plugging away. The Buffs have had a tendency to let teams back in to the game when it should be over, so hopefully being on the road will help keep the petal to the floor if they're able to get an early lead. Stanford is yet another great defensive team (19th in the nation in efficiency), so it'll be interesting to see if we can get our offense going this week.
As for the women's team, this is huge. Cal is 49th in RPI and Stanford is 4th. 'Nik has said repeatedly that we need to make Stanford our red letter game and target them. This is our chance this weekend. If the Buffs can somehow pull off the upset, you would have to think that they could finally get ranked. I'm going to try to make the Stanford game to cheer our women on, but for those of you who can't make it to the Keg, the game will be broadcast on Root Sports.
Also, the women's team finally has a presence on twitter. If it's anything like our men's team's feed, it's worth your time to follow them. Make sure you check them out at @CUBuffsWBB.
SEASON NUMBERS TO FOLLOW
RPI Rankings
MEN
Thursday, January 5th, 2012
| 87 | 
| 69 |
Saturday, January 7th, 2012
|
| 71 | 
| 60 |
WOMEN
Thursday, January 5th, 2012
|
| 75 |
| 67 |
Saturday, January 7th, 2012
|
| 57 |
| 56 |
All year, I've been railing on the seniors on the mens team for not stepping up and emploring the freshmen to take over the leadership to save the season.
It's at this point that I need to apologize.
The effort that our seniors gave against Washington State was HUGE. It appeared that the two day quick turnaround between the Washington game and the Wazzu game caught the younger players off guard as we saw below par games from The Mayor, Ski and Dre. So what happened? Carlon Brown plays easily his best game of his CU career, Austin Dufault killed the Cougars down low and we had Good Nate show up and lead the team all game. If those three can keep this up, this team suddenly becomes a lot scarier than everyone thinks.
As for the Washington game, that was unreal. When Washington came out inspired and CU came out flat, I had a horrible feeling that it was going to be a terrible day for the Buffs. But the team kicked it in to overdrive when Chen & Adams subbed in to the game and just didn't look back. The best part was that when they got up on the Dawgs, they put their foot on the throat and refused to let them up again. That's a team with 3 future NBA players that we took behind the woodshed.
The women got the 1-1 split that most of us were hoping for, but not in the manner we expected. They dropped their first game to Washington before rebounding and beating a superior Washington State team (going off of RPI rankings).
THIS WEEK
|
| Men: Thursday, January 12th 9:00 PM No TV Haas Pavilion Berkley, CA | Women: Thursday, January 12th 7:00 PM BuffsTV Coors Event Center Boulder, CO |
|
| Men: Saturday, January 14th 2:00 PM Fox Sports Net Maples Pavilion Palo Alto, CA | Women: Saturday, January 14th 4:00 PM ROOT Sports Rocky Mt Coors Event Center Boulder, CO |
This is not going to be an easy week for either team. This week tells us if we're looking at NCAA (women) and NIT (men) bids or if we're going to have to lower our sights a bit. The men have to go on the road for the first time in PAC-12 play -- and the first time out of the state of Colorado since Puerto Rico. And they don't get to dip their toes in the water either as Thursday night they play the team that a lot of people think will win the PAC-12 in Cal. They just wore Oregon down last night, and honestly I'm not sure if they have any real weaknesses. If you look at their numbers, they're 21st in offensive efficiency and 24th in defensive efficiency. They don't really haev any weaknesses. They're 19th in the KenPom rankings and the teams they've lost to are ranked 9th (Mizzou), 17th (UNLV), 51st (SDSU) and 65th (Oregon State). All are on the road, so really you can't argue that there are any HORRIBLE losses. One thing I'm interested to watch is if CU can get to the line. They're 6th in the nation at defensive FTA/FGA whereas we're 10th in the nation at offensive FTA/FGA. That may decide this game.
Anyone who watched the Stanford-OSU 4OT marathon can tell you that Stanford doesn't give up. I missed the first half of the game, but loved watching Stanford come back from 10+ down in the second half to tie the game. The team follows it's coach in that it just doesn't seem to give up and keeps plugging away. The Buffs have had a tendency to let teams back in to the game when it should be over, so hopefully being on the road will help keep the petal to the floor if they're able to get an early lead. Stanford is yet another great defensive team (19th in the nation in efficiency), so it'll be interesting to see if we can get our offense going this week.
As for the women's team, this is huge. Cal is 49th in RPI and Stanford is 4th. 'Nik has said repeatedly that we need to make Stanford our red letter game and target them. This is our chance this weekend. If the Buffs can somehow pull off the upset, you would have to think that they could finally get ranked. I'm going to try to make the Stanford game to cheer our women on, but for those of you who can't make it to the Keg, the game will be broadcast on Root Sports.
Also, the women's team finally has a presence on twitter. If it's anything like our men's team's feed, it's worth your time to follow them. Make sure you check them out at @CUBuffsWBB.
| Colorado Offense | Colorado Defense | Cal Offense | Cal Defense | D1 Average | |
| eFG% | 52.2% | 46.3% | 54.0% | 45.8% | 48.8% |
| Turnover % | 21.2% | 18.7% | 18.5% | 20.2% | 20.9% |
| Off. Reb % | 33.8% | 30.8% | 34.2% | 37.4% | 32.6% |
| FTA/FGA | 47.7 | 30.4 | 33.8 | 23.1 | 36.6 |
| Colorado Offense | Colorado Defense | Stanford Offense | Stanford Defense | D1 Average | |
| eFG% | 52.2% | 46.3% | 51.3% | 45.5% | 48.8% |
| Turnover % | 21.2% | 18.7% | 21.6% | 23.7% | 20.9% |
| Off. Reb % | 33.8% | 30.8% | 38.2% | 28.6% | 32.6% |
| FTA/FGA | 47.7 | 30.4 | 39.0 | 33.3 | 36.6 |
SEASON NUMBERS TO FOLLOW
| Offensive Efficiency | Defensive Efficiency | Pace | |
| Colorado | 105.0 | 96.8 | 66.3 |
| D1 Average | 100.2 | 100.2 | 67.1 |
RPI Rankings
| RPI | SOS | |
| Men | 65 | 52 |
| Women | 90 | 324 |
