Win No. 301 for Scott
Sutton certainly wasn't the most enjoyable victory of his career. Sure, his ORU
club beat Western Illinois 77-67 inside the Mabee Center on Thursday night, but
Sutton wasn't handing out back slaps, handshakes, rainbows and sunshine following
the contest.
All you have to do is
listen to his opening remarks once he began his eight-minute postgame speech
with the media.
"Well, that wasn't
a whole lot of fun for me," he said. "Disappointed in our guys. I
didn't think we played with the type of energy or intelligence that you have to
play with."
Ouch.
With that we'll dive
deeper into the game...
The good: Per usual, Obi
Emegano and Korey Billbury did their thing offensively. Billbury had a
game-high 20 points on 8-of-15 shooting, and Emegano had 19 points while making
eight of his 13 field goal attempts. Both also grabbed seven rebounds apiece.
Those are the typical
outputs that ORU needs from those two to be consistently successful.
The two, however,
combined for only 58 minutes. Emegano (28 minutes) was limited after being
checked out ORU trainer John Joslin midway through the second half, and
Billbury was saddled with foul trouble much of the second half.
There was good news
about Emegano after the game, per Sutton. Apparently Emegano fell victim
to a lack of hydration after halftime.
"Just had
cramps," Sutton said. "He was dehydrated. Once you start getting
cramps, they keep coming back."
**Denell Henderson
continued his recent run of solid showings. He scored 14 points and hauled in
eight rebounds for the Golden Eagles. That's now five straight games — and
six of his last seven — where Henderson has scored in double figures. The
eight rebounds were the most he's had since nabbing 11 rebounds against IUPUI
on Jan. 7.
The big man also made a
3-pointer, his third of the season on 10 tries.
**Aaron Young may have
found his niche while on the floor with Billbury and Emegano. He realized on
Thursday that there's plenty of distribution to be had with those two on the
floor.
He turned that into a
career-high eight assists, to go along with nine points and four rebounds. And
most importantly: zero turnovers.
"I thought he made
easy plays and didn't try and force it," Sutton said. "...Zero
turnovers, and again, he shouldn't have any against (Western Illinois). The way
they play, I'm not taking anything away from them, but the way they play it's
ridiculous that we have 14 turnovers."
**The Golden Eagles'
45.9 percent shooting from the floor was far from great, but it was good
enough. The down side was 51.6 percent (16 of 31) turned into 40 percent (12 of
30) in the second half.
**Points off
turnovers — turning 21 Western Illinois turnovers into 21 points —
and scoring 12 points off 12 offensive rebounds was a good sign for ORU. Again,
there's a but: it'd be nice to score more points when the other team turns the
ball over 20-plus times, and the same goes for second-chance points.
**ORU reaped the
benefits of a full-court press during a 2-1 road trip through South Dakota,
IUPUI and IPFW. So it didn't take long for Sutton to deploy his team into a
94-foot pressure scheme on Thursday.
From the outset, ORU
spread defenders the length of the court and caused several miscues for Western
Illinois early on. It eventually led to a 10-0 lead for the Golden Eagles.
"Sometimes when we
press, it gives us a little bit of energy," Sutton said. "We came out
in the start of the game and played well."
The Leathernecks looks
mystified by ORU's propensity to pressure early. It clearly left Western
Illinois out of sorts early on.
"We've been running
that the last couple of games, and we've had some success with it,"
Billbury said. "We started off in it, but (Western Illinois) started
getting comfortable and breaking it easier so we backed out of it."
The bad: Normally, this
category isn't nearly as full as "good" after a win. That's not the
case for ORU after round two against Western Illinois.
**Once again, free-throw
shooting became an issue for the Golden Eagles. ORU made 18 of 29 foul shots,
making it the fourth time in the last seven games that the Golden Eagles have
shot 63 percent or below at the charity stripe. That's alarming for a team that
prides itself as a dominant free-throw shooting establishment.
"It's
amazing," Sutton said (and not in a good way). "You look at just our
percentages throughout the year, and we shoot the ball pretty well. We've
struggled, at times, late in games."
It was no different late
against Western Illinois. Starting with Jabbar Singleton's back-to-back misses
at the line with 1:19 left, the Golden Eagles made 7 of 12 in the final 79
seconds.
It nearly cost ORU, too,
but Western Illinois' Garret Covington missed a 3-pointer that rimmed out that
would have gotten the Leathernecks with three points with 54 seconds left.
At that point, Western
Illinois doesn't have to foul, and it would have been up to ORU to score a
basket without any help from Billbury or Emegano.
**It was pretty clear
that Sutton delivered a message about closing games out in the postgame locker
room. Without being provoked, Billbury started addressing issues about how the
Golden Eagles need to learn how to finish games off when they have teams on the
ropes.
"Late-game
situations keep coming back to get us," he said. "Hopefully we can
get these kinks out in the last five games."
What should maybe be the
bigger issue is that ORU shouldn't even be having to deal with clinging to
leads late in games. The Golden Eagles enjoyed double-digit leads at every
turn, but they never succeeded in putting Western Illinois away.
ORU even led by 16 with
eight-plus minutes left in the second half, but the Leathernecks came storming
back again.
At some point, ORU needs
to put its foot down and make it to where the other team just throws its
collective hands up and surrenders.
**Billbury fouled out
with 1:18 left to play in the game, and it was silly fouls early on that put
Billbury in a situation to be disqualified from the contest.
For instance, when
Billbury missed a wide-open layup with 11:26 left in the second half, Western
Illinois' Jabari Sandifer grabbed the rebound. In pure frustration, Billbury
slapped at Sandifer while going for a steal, and instead Billbury was whistled
for his fourth foul.
"Instead of missing
it and saying, 'hey, I've got to get back,' he goes to get the ball back and he
fouls. You can't do that," Sutton said of Billbury. "I told him
before the game, you can't be trying to steal the ball. He gets so many fouls
when he reaches in to steal the ball. There's very few guys that can do that.
It's hard to do that, and more bad things are going to come of that."
You can never question
Billbury's intensity level, but he does need to reign in his thought process
when he's attempt to go for steals that likely have a 7 percent success rate.
He's a good enough to
defender to stay in front of a guy and force an errant shot, rather than slap
at the ball and pick up a costly foul.
**The second half, in
general, was largely forgettable for ORU against Western Illinois. It wasn't
the worst half of basketball the Golden Eagles have played all year, but it was
far from the best.
(Few halves of
basketball can compare with the awfulness that ORU spewed out at Oregon State
in the first half or at Missouri State in the second half.)
The Golden Eagles
managed to balloon their lead to 16 points over Western Illinois, but then they
quickly zapped that momentum by letting the Leathernecks right back into the
game.
In fairness to ORU, it's
going to be difficult to play a superb 20 minutes when Billbury is in foul
trouble and Emegano is behind the bench being examined by Joslin.
**It's a message that
Sutton has reiterated all season long.
“This team – I’ve told
you guys and I’ve told them all year – ‘we’re not a very good basketball team
if we don’t play with tremendous effort and energy,’” Sutton said. “We’re
pretty good when we do. I think we can compete, and I think we’re one of the
best teams in this league if we play that way. Without it, you saw it tonight;
we weren’t very good.”
By the time you reach
mid February, you have to wonder if the message will ever sink in.
**The ball is in the
hands of Henderson, Emegano and Billbury a lot, so some turnovers are going to
happen. But against Western Illinois, the trio had 10 of ORU's 14 turnovers.
Sutton said he won't
stand for it.
"This is a team
that doesn't force — I think their opponents in conference were averaging
less than 10 turnovers a game — so...," Sutton said, emphasizing his
team's lackadaisical ball handling against the Leathernecks.
Since giving the ball
away six times at South Dakota, here's how ORU's turnover numbers have looked:
at IUPUI (16), at IPFW (13), vs. Western Illinois (14).
Have to clean that
up — and quickly.
The reality: Brett Olson
tried to do ORU a solid. After all, he did knock down a halfcourt shot at the
end of regulation to send his Denver club to overtime against North Dakota
State. Problem was that Denver opted not to show up in overtime, giving North
Dakota State a Mile High victory, the same kind of win ORU should have had in
Denver if not for a disastrous final seven minutes.
It was a great chance to
bring North Dakota State back to the pack, but instead the Bison are still in
first place in the Summit League at 10-2. ORU is 2 1/2 games behind NDSU with
five to play; that's a tough hill to climb during the home stretch of the
regular season.
With everyone in the
Summit League off today, things will ramp back up on Saturday. Here's a look at
Saturday's slate:
- Western Illinois at
Omaha, 1 p.m.
- North Dakota State at
South Dakota State, 4 p.m.
- IUPUI at Denver, 5
p.m.
- South Dakota at Oral
Roberts, 7 p.m.
Ideal scenario for ORU
on Saturday would be to win, obviously. Then having SDSU beat North Dakota
State would be preferable, mainly because it moves the Golden Eagles only one
game behind SDSU and NDSU both in the loss column.
Just to finish it off,
here's what the top five teams in the league have left the rest of the way
until the scene shifts to Sioux Falls:
North Dakota State
(18-7, 10-2 Summit) - 4 games left (at South Dakota State; vs. IUPUI; vs. IPFW;
at Oral Roberts).
South Dakota State
(18-8, 9-3) - 4 games left (vs. North Dakota State; at Western Illinois; vs.
Oral Roberts; at South Dakota).
ORU (14-11, 7-4) - 5
games left (vs. South Dakota; at Omaha; at South Dakota State; vs. North Dakota
State; vs. Denver).
IPFW (14-11, 7-5) - 4
games left (at Denver; at North Dakota State; vs. Omaha; vs. Western Illinois).
South Dakota (12-14,
6-6) - 4 conference games left (at ORU; vs. IUPUI; vs. Denver; vs. South Dakota
State).
Denver (10-14, 4-7)
IUPUI (8-17, 4-7)
Western Illinois (8-14,
3-8)
Omaha (8-16, 2-10)
Three weeks from
Saturday night, the Summit League tournament will commence. Let the madness
begin.
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