Reply To: Army – January 29, 2012

Forum Forum Lehigh Sports Lehigh Men’s Basketball Army – January 29, 2012 Reply To: Army – January 29, 2012

#4633

LU65
Participant

Some random thoughts and observations from Section 4/Row EE

You want to play up-tempo…..OK let’s go.
What a fun display of athleticism. Lehigh took it to the Black Knights and “ran” over them at their own game (see Ken Pomeroy stats below) forcing 16 TOs while recording 10 steals and 7 blocked shots. Half to 3/4 court length passes leading to easy baskets had the fans into the game early. Fast break-points (17 to 8 in LU’s favor) bear out the results.

Lehigh and Army lead the PL in Tempo (average # of possessions / game) but differ widely in Offensive Efficiency (# pts. per 100 possessions). You do the math, with Lehigh attempting 70 FGs to Army’s 59 (thanks to LU’s stingy defense forcing one shot-clock violation and numerous close calls), the results were predictable.

Tempo
LU 70.0 (41st in the nation)
Army 70.9 (25th in the nation)

Offensive Efficiency
LU 107.0 pts. (60th in the nation)
Army 92.2 pts. (288th in the nation)

Fan Support
OK, I know it’s not Sojka Pavilion-like numbers, but consider the following:
Yesterday’s attendance: 1768*
4 home PL games played to date: 5745 (1436 average)**

* And, that’s with an extremely poor student showing (I counted 18 cheerleaders, 12 pep-band members and < 60 in the end-arena seats) yesterday. A careful glance around the arena would support the 1768 number as I'd estimate that more than 1/4 of the 5600 seats were occupied.

** At this point last year (4 PL games), we averaged 843.

What do they say, "Win and they will come." Well maybe, just maybe, the Lehigh Valley is beginning to pay attention to a winning program (17 W's to date) and wants to see what all this CJ talk is about.

CJ
If Cav’s personnel were there to watch, they had to be impressed with the solid line that included 25 pts., 10 boards, 5 steals and 3 assists. That last number could have easily stood at 5 with two dishes that led to missed shots (easy ones at that!). Hope the selfish talk is put to rest.

Corey’s Start over Mackey
Think it’s just another “shot over the bow” warning to Mackey for what might be another violation of team rules. Doubt it’s anything more than that. Mackey did, however, get the majority of minutes at the point and had an all around outstanding game. While some may disagree, I believe Coach Reed does run a tight ship and has the attention of all his players.

Bench Coaching
It happens a lot but gets little air time. Coach Reed and his staff – particularly Wyche and Krueger – more often than not will huddle with players returning to the bench. They never seem to miss a teaching opportunity. No one is beyond the long reach of their arms as they wonder back to the bench that includes CJ. I like it.

John Adams
norcal, this one is for you and all the fans who like this guy (me included)
Another workmanlike performance from John with 5 pts and 5 boards in 12 minutes on flawless 2-2 shooting against Army. Seems like PL play suits him just fine and is deserving of the “first big off the bench” status.

Stat: PL Play / OOC Play
FGA: .615 / .385
PPG: 6.6 / 2.8
RPG: 2.6 / 3.3
MPG: 16.9 / 11.2