Macalester 1/21/12

Yesterday afternoon we took on the Mackies aka the Scots from Macalester. Though, their record doesn't indicate it, they are a scary team. They one of the best, if not the best overall player in conference in Pierce Peters as well as a couple of guys that haven't put up the numbers they did last season. So, you never know what you will get. They beat a full strength Carleton team and were up 31-12 to Gustavus earlier last week. Their coach, Tim Whittle does a great job with their kids. They guys play hard and they execute their stuff making any game with them a dangerous one.

The game started off back and forth as both teams were locked together at 17. The pace was very fast and they were getting some easy shots. I wasn't exactly happy with our effort but I hoping we would be able to wear them down a little over the course of the game. We were getting really good looks, as in layups, and just not finishing them. In different situations, those type of misses are the difference in the game. We can't just expect to walk all over teams. Concentrate on the easy ones. We gradually pulled away in the first as the halftime score was 40-27. 21 of those 40 points were off turnovers. That's a great stat for us.

The second half started as the first half ended. We really stepped on the throttle and got them out of their rhythm. We extended the lead to as many as 39 points in the second half. We emtpied the bench and got a lot of guys minutes, which is always important, especially with two huge games on Monday and Wednesday. Final score, 91-56 in favor of the Pipeshow.

The guys really got out in transition and did some good things defensively. We still have to do a better job rebounding the ball. Not so much of getting to the ball, but get a body on guys (which we did a little) but getting guys out of the paint. We are giving up position too easily. We were outrebounded again, this time by seven. One most days, that isn't good enough but we forced them into 27 turnovers, which is right where we want to be. We will have to do a better job on the boards against Augsburg and St. Thomas.