It's looking like a real dogfight at the top. If Hawai`i beats UCSB in Honolulu tonight and Fullerton holds serve at home against UCI, there will be four 2 loss teams. The Aggies would be only one game back with a win down in Barkersfield (Inside joke. I had a dormmate named Barker form there whom we called Baker from Barkersfield).

I like BlueGold's starting five, but I've seen all of them and I have to disqualify myself from anyone who played prior to 2012, when Hawai`i joined the league and I had a chance to watch even one UCD game, let alone the plethora I get to see now.

One big problem with a player who lets his emotions get to and control him, is that the other teams can use it to their advantage with trash talk to throw him off his game, but we digress...

Just looked it up. Yes, Gonzalez .477 3-point average led the nation ins the 2019-20 season.

Gotta put Elijah in there somewhere.

I did hear the alma mater. At least they still play that.

Question for those who are lucky enough to attend the home games: Does the band still play Ragtime Cowboy Joe and Hot Time in the Old Town?

What I can't figure out after seeing the game is why Cal Poly is 1-7 in conference play?

After leaving 12 points at the free throw line and having their best player hobbled, it was unbelievable that they could go on a 15-0 run at the end to pull it out. All credit to T Y Johnson, who provided the spark. Great clutch steals and drives to the hoop. The game winner came over a 7-1 center. A loss wold have been a disaster, so it was huge that they could pull it out. Nice crowd too, That might've helped.

You know we're in trouble when Adebayo is the leading scorer.

This is getting ugly. It looks like the Aggies are disheartened and came out flat and sloppy. They need some kind of spark, because Cal Poly is playing out of their minds so far at both ends of the court, leading 19-7 with 7:42 left in the first half.

This is from UCSD's website: "The Big West Board of Directors approved the submission of a waiver to the NCAA that, if approved, would allow UC San Diego to participate in NCAA Championships beginning this fall should the Tritons earn The Big West automatic bid in applicable sports. In addition, the conference approved UC San Diego to be included in the men's basketball standings beginning this season."

Williams frequently mentions the need for Ade to put the ball up more often because not ding so means that defenses sag off on his team-mates. I'm sure that Jim Les understands that and has probably pushed Ade to show more offense. Even trying a 3-point shot at the start of the game would help. And here I speculate: Maybe Les gave Ade that play BECAUSE the Highlanders would least expect him to be shooting at that point?

Hard to find anything "wrong" with the way the Aggies played. It was close the whole second half, back and forth and UCR happened to be ahead at the end. I note that neither Borra nor Mani got in the game to counter the Highlanders bigs, so Coach Les must have little faith in them. Ags got 34 rebounds, only 2 less than UCR.

I;ll have to watch it about an hour after it starts due to a scheduling conflict.

One big difference between the turnovers today and in previous games: Today, many of the turnovers were due to the two guards trying to force the ball inside. Previously, many of them were due to sloppy passing.

Whew! Am I glad their free throw shooting has improved.

Ags only have 1 TO in second half.

Ags coming back. Plus they're doing a great job of defending free throws. :smile: Tritons only 4/9.

The Triton offense is looking very good. I noticed a large number of their points came around the rim where they were beating the Aggie defender one-on-one with some pretty good moves. Meanwhile, TY needs to start playing under control. A too often ignored quality of a basketball game is simply hustle and the Ags are getting out-hustled.