Toke, there’s a typo in the header on our opponent.

Copying my post from BW Stretch topic to here now that I see that there was a mistake made in the header of the redundant Bake thread:

You guys are correct, tonight's game is the biggest one of the conference season for both teams with the loser forced to play the extra game.

As for the outcome, with Davis being the most schizophrenic team in the conference, impossible to make a prediction with confidence.

UCSB has been trending in a positive direction, largely due to freshman pg Ajay Mitchell growing into a star player. The improvement has happened despite losing starting SG Ajare Sanni to an ankle injury; the reigning BW 6th Man award winner hasn't played since the end of January. Amadou Sow, with the exception of a 4 game slump early in the conference season, has been very reliable and will likely be All BW 1st team again and the other two back court players; Calvin Wishart and Josh Pierre Louis have stepped up of late too.

In all but one BWC game, UCSB has held a double digit lead in the first half yet they are only 4-5 in conference (5-6 counting games vs. UCSD). The one exception was a one point loss to UCI. It looked like that pattern was going to repeat vs LB as they went down in the 2nd half after leading the entire game, but they were able to quickly get the lead back and win by 13 over the 1st place Sharks (or whatever they're calling themselves now).
Point being, UCSB may very well jump out to a big lead but they suck at holding them so won't mean a Gaucho win.

It will likely come down to whether or not UCSB guards can stop Manjon, Fuller and Pepper from penetrating. If they can keep them out of the paint effectively, the Gauchos probably win.

Question, is BJ Shaw injured? I see he played just two games and not since December

Fuller and DeDruhl are in street cloths. That makes us thin especially the loss of Fuller.

I think I said it last year: Sow and Norris could have a shot at the NBA.

21-17 us at the 4 mark. Not sure we can count on them shooting this poorly the whole game

Pepper starting to get his groove going. Go Ags

31-25 at the half. Getting killed in the offensive glass. Borra has given us some good minutes on D

31-25 Ags at the half. Lets not lose this one on missed FTs

Great defense by the Ags. Held SB to 31%. Tough matchups for us with their size though.

Cold start; down 36-32 16 to go. No FG for us, they are taking it to the hole. Sow is getting away with slit under the basket to get space on the offensive boards

Can’t create any offense; fortunately only down 37-36 11:35 to go

Pepper can’t hit. down 5 3:30 to go

And my video feed dies

A really sad loss. It seems like the Aggies really hurt themselves at the foul line. The Gauchos got 15 more shots from there but what really hurts is that UCD cold have won in regulation if they had made just one more free throw. Still, one play does not make a game and the Ags could not stop the freshman Mitchell who scored 31, plus the rebound differential was huge: 46-32. UCSB was notably dominant on the offensive glass.

The Ags battled short handed with Fuller and Debrhul out and, as always, the Ags played very hard. Pepper had 21 and Manjon had 19 but neither shot the ball very well overall. They were a combined 16 of 40 and Pepper was only 4-13 from 3 and he usually hits those at a higher percentage.

Anigwe just can't seem to stay out of early foul trouble. I thought Murphy did a nice job of filling in for Anigwe particularly. We just don't have the interior size to match up well with the Gauchos.

A couple of huge plays hurt the Ags in overtime. The no call on the charge that Pepper took when he went flying to the floor and then Mitchell hit a 3. Also, poor Ade missed a wide open bunny right at the rim. Those hurt.

Mitchell was lights out scoring 27 of his 31 points in the second half. We simply couldn't stop him.

Mitchell was a beast. I was worried about our FTs early on. That might have been the dagger.

I thought no call on Pepper was big for two reasons. First, it would have been a turnover instead of points for them. Secondly, it took Pepper’s mind out of the game for the next couple possession (he was still pleading his case when they were shooting FTs the next time down the court).

Mitchell and size killed us. Anigwe had 2 straight possessions with the ball low and position, but hesitated and pump faked until Sow was in a spot to block it. Missing Fuller hurt here. He’s a good interior defender, especially off the game, and can post up. Sow had 4 fouls WITHOUT an interior presence; maybe Caleb helps to get another. Hope he can play Saturday, but seems unlikely

SB has big men who very athletic as well as having size and that's always going to be a tough matchup for us inside. They killed us on the offensive boards. With their kind of size and athleticism, they were able to go over the top of our bigs on several occasions for a tip in or another offensive board even when we were in good position for the rebound.

Pure specualtion on my part but I wonder if Caleb has some loose teeth from that hit to the mouth that he took in the Bake game? That's a slow healing process if that's the case. Do they even make a full face guard that would help protect his mouth?

The SB head coach and one of his assistants have very fiery tempers. They both exploded quite a few times and were real close to getting technicals. On the other hand, Les is still intense but his sideline behavior has really mellowed over the years.

From the Enterprise:

“I really appreciated our fight,” Les said. “We came out flat to start the second half and had every reason to just lie down and give in, but that’s when we really started to fight and it gave us a chance to win. Santa Barbara made some tough shots and we had some good looks that didn’t fall, but I really liked our intensity in the second half.”

The Aggies were without the services of Caleb Fuller, who was injured in last Saturday’s win over Cal State Bakersfield, but will presumably be back before the end of the season.

“We had to make adjustments,” Les added, “but our bench gave us some great minutes.”

https://www.davisenterprise.com/sports/basketball-uc-davis-men-fall-in-overtime/

Here are some shots from the game:

UC Santa Barbara vs UC Davis at Hamilton Court

I watched the replay of the CSUB game and it looked like he might have got knocked out by the blow. Announcers thought so also. Just speculation but the trainer was helping him to the locker room after guiding him by the arm.

Les got pretty fired up a couple times last night. On a play they called a foul on Murphy ( arm hit their guy in the face), officials huddled before reviewing - he was chasing after them throughout to a point I thought a T was coming. He’s mellowed greatly - his son more than makes up for it!

This was a terrific game to watch. My wife came away feeling that the "big calls" (or lack of them) went strongly against the Ags. I know for certain there was a no-call on Pepper toward the end of the game that was so utterly blatant...well, does not good to argue over calls.

We are over-matched consistently in the lane. Learning not to foul where there's no more to be done is a lesson the Ags haven't learned very well this season.

I'm concerned with Fuller's loss and hope he might return next week? I thought he was out during the shoot-around before the game but then he wasn't dressed.

Need to shoot free throws better - that's for sure!

Crowd seemed a bit sluggish until the end. Darius does a great job of trying to pump it up, but there seemed to be a flatness in the building. I liked the introduction with the lights down and two spotlights. Band is always a welcome sign although they even seemed a little less enthusiastic than normal.

Whole day up there seemed sluggish. Got up there at 4:30 and downtown seemed really deserted. Did try Raising Cane’s - solid. Need to get Bob Dunning to lead an effort to steam clean downtown. Looking a little worn

Fuller was out during the warming up before the game but then came out in street clothes at the start of the game. Makes me think he's good to do things that have no risk of contact.

Agree...it was a good sized crowd but it was flat in the building until the end. Always nice to have a few members of the band there.

My son was at the Chinese New Year Celebration last week in SF and he sent us a video of the Aggie Band marching in the parade and they were impressive. The crowd loved them too.

Administration is going to come after you, BGA. :rage: The "Aggie Band" doesn't exist any more.

:rofl: They'll always be the Band-uh to me!

People I know who are in it still informally call it the Aggie Band. I don't think that ever really changed once we were the "new" band.

:up: