The Aggies continue their conference road trip to SoCal today at 4 pm when they take on Long Beach State in the Walter Pyramid. The Ags suffered a tough loss at Irvine in their conference opener 71-69 in OT last Thursday. This is the first conference game of the season for the 49ers.
The Beach has always been a tough match up for the Aggies and they lead the all time series 21-7. The Ags, however, have been playing well of late and, with only 4 wins to their credit this year, they will be extremely hungry to come home from this two game road trip with a split.
AJ John was back in the line up for the Aggies against Irvine but looked rusty after being out injured for so long. It will be a real bonus for the Ags once he begins to get back into good form. Stefan Gonzalez was dressed but did not play at Irvine which brings up the question of whether he is still ailing as well.
A win against The Beach would certainly make for a happy flight home.
Very impressive first half. Joe Mooney has really turned into a solid player. Very impressive growth from when I first saw him play. Lack of scoreboard on ESPN3 is annoying. Have to flip my phone so I can see the stats and see the current score. This would be a HUGE early season win
Dan Monson was head coach at Minnesota prior to coming to LBS in 2007, compiling a 116-108 record. He’s had a similar winning percentage with the 49ers: 190-186.
My God...the Ags come out in the second half and turn the ball over 4 straight times and LB scores 9 points off our TO's to take the lead...what an awful 2 minutes of basketball by the Ags!
Ags lose 82-77. The Ags lost this game in the first 2 minutes of the second half when they turned the ball over 4 straight times and LB scored 9 straight points to take the lead and never look back. The Beach scored 31 points off our TO's = ballgame....
The other big stat was that 4 Ags fouled out which led to LBSU scoring 32 of 42 from the line. Les needs to recruit for more length and athleticism so we can compete with athletic teams. Overall, we're too small and too slow against quick, athletic teams that have length.
Game ball goes to Joe Mooney who scored a career hight 29. Welcome back Joe we've missed ya!
I missed most of the second half but thought the officiating in the first half was VERY picky, both ways.
Mooney’s transformation from dear in the headlights early in his career to the player he is now, is incredible. I liked Fuller’s contributions in the first half. Silar still makes turnover that just make you shake your head. He shot well in the first half, how about the second.
Twice this season on early Saturday games I took my wife to dinner around halftime. Both times we went Mexican. First time was Arizona game, second time was last night. My apologies
So it was the "take the wife to a Mexican restaurant after halftime jinx" that did us in!
The refs were calling it very tight. I don't like it when the refs let players mug each other but lots of ticky tack touch fouls that do not create any disadvantage to the "offended" player is just as bad. The thing I really did not like about this crew was that they were calling fouls on players making incidental contact on husltle plays scrambling after 50-50 balls on the floor. That penalizes effort and it's unnecessary.
I like the fight we are getting from the team. We were in both of these road games right up to the final seconds against two very good teams. I also thought Jim Les did a great job of coaching throughout both games mixing up the defenses, subbing in and out for offense/defense and managing the clock. Unfortunately, the Ags have little to show for their efforts in the win column...we just might be the best 4-12 team in the nation...
Agree on the jinx and on les’ coaching. Sequence before the end of first half was great example. Beach calls timeout with 10 seconds left, we come out in a zone and get a turnover. Timeout with about 2 seconds left, set up the TJ special for a clean look (miss). That would have been a big swing.
Montezuma’s taco revenge? No worries about that next Saturday, since we’ll be at the game
The decisions by Les that you noted were masterful coaching. He's a great strategist of the game and has the experience to be able to make those great decisions in the heat of the moment.
So a couple of thoughts after a day of decompressing
Do we see Mooney in the starting lineup instead of Squire? We started slowly in both halves of the beach game, and with the way Joe is playing right now, not just his long range shooting but also his drives to the basket, maybe he has earned the start.
I know there is no such thing as a "must win" game in January, but it sure would be nice it the Ags defend home court on Thursday against UCSB. It's a brutal schedule to start conference play, but we need to start winning some of these close games (UA, IU, Beach, UCI). UCSB would be a good confidence building win.
I don't know how this happened (hard work, obviously), but Garrison Goode has gone form a completely awful FT shooter, to pretty good. It was so hard for him after his freshman year, that he actually started shooting FTs left handed. Now, he's shooting at 71%, better than Mooney and Shorts.
Mooney and Shorts need to make more FTs!!!
I may have missed it, but anyone know why Gonzalez was out for all of UCI and most of the Beach game, but then played the final minute or so? I'm guessing he's hurt but they brought him in to just foul down the stretch, but wasn't sure. Boy, one more good shooter might be the thing that really tips the season in a positive way.
Looking forward to four home aggie basketball games in the span of three days (DH on Thursday and Saturday).
Generally, I do not like the way that the regular season is only of value for seeding in the tournament. For this season, though, Jim Les might want to make use of that fact. This season it does not seem to be as critical to finish first in the regular season as to work the team so that they peak at tournament time. Just last year, CSU Fullerton finished fourth and won the tournament. The question is whether the Ags have the talent to do something similar. They certainly have the experience.