Toke 69,
Well a 6th place team in football got a playoff bid over a 5th place team, right?

down to the wire between fullerton and hawaii. Terrible stream.

And on to OT

And Fullerton advances to play Irvine

Fullerton 62, Hawai`i 60. Tough loss, as all OT losses are. Large Hawai`i crowd, as usual for a Big West tournament. If we get [ast UCR, we'll be playing the Fullerton game that got cancelled.

Btw when the stream gets static. Exit out of the app and restart. Fixed it for me at least!

It seems like ESPN fixed the technical problems that they were having. The OT was problem free but the final 3 minutes of regulation was unwatchable.

Everyone was having problems. I checked the Big West Boards Forum and everyone over there was experiencing the problems and some of the members were texting the Big West and ESPN. Maybe they got someone at ESPN to actually look at the feed and see what was happening.

We're watching the Poly and Santa Barbara game and the tech problems are back again. ESPN is dropping the ball!

I think the big sky did their tournament right by starting early. Semi and final on ESPN2. The plus hasn’t been a real plus.

I always restart the app and clear the data prior to the game. Not sure it ever helps

The bad transmission out of Henderson continues during the Cal Poly game. It's 32-26 POLY at the half. ESPN+ has stinky streaming.

I've watched ESPN+ on my AppleTV streaming over Comcast as well as on my iPhone over 5G. The breakups happen at the same point in the game regardless. It's definitely a screwup on the part of ESPN+ and whatever production crew they hired to do the tournament. Or whoever is their internet service provider - possibly ACME who helps out the coyote from time to time.

#2 Santa Barbara 64 #9 Cal Poly 54

And the abysmal tech problems continue on the ESPN feed. I imagine it will continue to be terrible for the Aggie game as well.

I've cancelled my ESPN+ subscription until fall and football. If I watch any more of the tournament, it will only be the finals on ESPN2. Then, of course, March Madness during which I will be rooting for the Big West team whoever it is.

With fox fired at Cal I wonder if Pesternick and Turner are on their short list

Two names consistently linked in recent weeks to the Cal opening are UC Santa Barbara's Joe Pasternack and San Jose State's Tim Miles, sources told ESPN.

https://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/35822282/cal-fires-men-basketball-coach-mark-fox-four-seasons

Miles has done a remarkable job at San Jose. I hope they can keep him. Be nice for them to have success and stability in basketball and football

The Fullerton v UC Irvine game is fabulous. It'll be replayed on ESPN-U tonight at 10 or so. The ESPN+ feed is good - much less image compression - probably better cameras - no breakup of the video.

Irvine and Fullerton are tied at 39 at the half. Both teams are playing at a very high level...the best half of basketball that I've seen in the Big West this year.

Fullerton 83 Irvine 80 in a great basketball game. I don't think I've ever seen such even stats.

Both teams shot 52% and both teams had 29 rebounds.
Fullerton was 10-17 from 3 and Irvine was 9-19.
Fullerton was 19-26 from the line and Irvine was 19-28.
Both teams had 13 assists, both had 24 points in the paint and both had 14 TO's.

Riverside 42 Santa Barbara 39 at the half in another really good basketball game.

I'm really surprised that UCI lost. I didn't see it, but from the boxscore it's clear that the two teams were evenly matched and it came down to Fullerton making 5/6 free throws in the last minute. If Riverside beats Santa Barbara, then both top seeds are out, to state the obvious.

Santa Barbara 92 Riverside 87

Fullerton and Santa Barbara play for the title at 6:30 pm tomorrow on ESPN2

I wouldn't be surprised if Fullerton won, given how late the game was today. Maybe a difference of 2 hours rest is not that big a deal, but the Gauchos have depth issues and Fullerton is well rested given that two of their last three regular season games were cancelled. Plus the Titans beat UCSB 74-60 at Santa Barbara only a few weeks ago. Even so, I would prefer that UCSB represent the Big West in the NCAAs because they have more talent.

Hi- don't post here often, but I am a long, long time fan of Jim Les & now UC-Davis.
Have had season tix for Bradley games since the 70's & help run the fan board for Bradley basketball for 20 yrs.
I watch as many Aggie games as I can and just wanted to say to your fan base, that your team
is one of the most enjoyable and entertaining teams to watch. I share in your disappointment this season - so many close losses (7 by 5 pts or less, 6 by just one single possession).

Coach Les has a knack for recruiting kids that play like he did - talented over-achievers who shoot well and compete hard - guys like Corey Hawkins, Tyler Les, Bronton Lemar, Siler Schneider, Chima, Manjon, TJ Shorts, Joe Mooney, TY Johnson, Eli Pepper.. etc. They are fun to watch. I know how hard it is for midmajors to land quality big men, yet still your guys hold their own. Good luck to the Aggies in the future, I will continue to follow. And if Coach Les or Kyle Vogt ever read your board - Doc says Hi...it was great to see you and have you back at Bradley for the Hall of Fame ceremony back in November.
https://www.gannett-cdn.com/presto/2022/11/20/NJOS/c2bc7972-6baf-42a8-9243-7d9391a79a34-thumbnail_IMG_5672.jpg?width=660&height=495&fit=crop&format=pjpg&auto=webp

Thanks for your post, user1. I couldn't agree with you more. We're lucky to have Les here.

We don't often get the most highly touted players coming out of high school or the transfer portal that some of the top teams in the Big West often get but Les does bring in kids with great potential and a hard work ethic. They're also high character kids who do well in the classroom and are highly coachable. The players you named in your post are great examples of this.

You should drop Les and Vogt an email. I'm sure they would love to hear from you. Here are their email addresses:

Jim Les: aggiebasketballatucdavisdotedu
Kyle Vogt: kvogtatucdavisdotedu

It would be great if we could schedule a home and home with Bradley in the near future too.

95% of Bradley fans would love that, but it prob won't happen. The admin that fired Les in 2011
was so hostile (and simultaneously so stupid and negligent) that they may well have burned any bridges for any future games. The only reason he came back for the ceremony this past November was because the players (his players from 2006) deserved it.
BTW- all the hires that the BU admin back then made after Les' (and other Athl. Dept) firings were so miserably horrible that they sunk Bradley almost back to the DIII level, 2/3 of the fanbase disappeared, more than 1/2 the season ticket base left- and we sukked at every sport -- until the angry fans finally pulled their donations and woke up a few Board members - and got the University President, the AD and the entire basketball coaching staff all FIRED simultaneously - something truly unprecedented in all of collegiate sports. It took several years to rebuild but Bradley's back - won the Tourney & the auto bid 2 of the last 4 years & won the league title this year.
But the events surrounding his firing caused a near-decade of futility for the sports fans.

btw- our current coach tried recruiting Elijah Pepper - he knew the kid's talent, but Pepper wasn't that interested in coming to the midwest.
https://www.bradleyfans.com/forum/sports-forums/basketball-fan-talk/28005-2019-beyond-recruiting-targets?p=465003#post465003

https://www.bradleyfans.com/forum/sports-forums/basketball-fan-talk/28005-2019-beyond-recruiting-targets?p=464525#post464525

https://www.bradleyfans.com/forum/sports-forums/basketball-fan-talk/28005-2019-beyond-recruiting-targets?p=465215#post465215

Coach Les had a conference record of 74–88 (.457) at Bradley. Conference standing typically 5th in league, once 6th and 8th, and last year 9th place.

His Big West record is 96–90 (.516).

believe what you want but the first couple years Les was at Bradley - he had a near-total rebuild,
and all the former players left. Plus he was not allowed to choose his own staff - admin chose one assistant for him. But he was still only a couple games under .500.
Then starting in his 4th season he had a run of four straight years with 21 or 22 wins each year.

..then starting in 2008, the hostile University President fired the highly successful AD (Ken Kavanagh, who then went to FGCU and won the National AD of the Year TWICE!)
..then she went after Les' staff and began firing his assistants one by one. It was a nightmare situation. Then she ran off a couple of his best recruits including Tyler Les who came to UC-Davis (remember, Tyler came to UC-Davis and played one year for Stewart even before Jim was here- then led the nation in 3-pt shooting) - so the last couple years at BU, Jim's poor record was kind of a result of upper level meddling - caused intentionally by the ogre in order to force Jim out and gain enough leverage to convince the Board to fire him, making it impossible for Les to win.
Jim' overall record at Bradley in seasons where he was able to choose his own staff was 86-56 and 40-32 in conference, with a Sweet Sixteen run, four years of post-season tournament bids and three of his players played in the NBA.

and you know how hard it is to recruit good players at UC-Davis - Jim does as well as anyone can. He had Kihei Clark signed but then Clark blew up the summer after he signed and went to Virginia instead-
All Clark's done since is win a National Championship at UVa and is right now playing vs. Duke in the ACC Championship game.

Santa Barbara 72 Fullerton 62.

The Gauchos pulled away in the final 5 minutes. Ajay Mitchell, who was the BW Player of the Year, is a sensational player and he's only a sophomore. The Gauchos are going to the Big Dance for the second time in 3 years.