Geez, only one starter over 6'5". Reminds me of the teams I used to watch when I was there back in the 60s and early 70s.:grin:

ESPN gives the Aggies only a 44.3% chance to win.

Thanks DrMike, the ESPN site I saw made it look like a home game for the Aggies, but it's pretty clear now that it's a tournament including UC Davis, Nicholls State, Santa Clara and Idaho State.

I did not mean to minimize the impact of this pandemic on all of us. It is more that too many decision makers are simply closing things down as a spurious "preventative" measure thinking neither of alternative means nor unintended consequences. I certainly do not want to politicize this post from which I have gleaned a great wealth of camaraderie, advice, tips and insights into Aggie sports. This will be my last post to signal a form of grieving over the actual consequences to hundreds of dedicated athletes who now will never have a chance to compete in the sports for which they have so much passion.

If this country had its act together, we would have mobile testing as they do in South Korea and perhaps even testing to get into events so that we would be able to retain some sense of normalcy. My grave concern is that the mass cancellation of all things we like to do will give people more reason to panic and more time to dwell on it. Not just talking about sporting events, but arts performances, concerts, movies, church services, not to mention schools.

As bad as I feel for any fans who spent a lot of money to get to Anaheim, I feel worse for the Hawaii fans and band whose expenses were a lot more. The band consists of students who had to pay their own way to get there. On the other hand, it does take away the slight advantage that Hawaii has against the Ags. What most people do not understand is that the Hawaii sports teams are the "major league" team for the entire state of Hawaii, since there are no pro teams out here, which is why they will go all the way to the mainland to root for the Rainbow Warriors.

No Aggies on the Big West All Conference Team, but Ezra Manjon was named Freshman of the Year:
https://bigwest.org/news/2020/3/9/big-west-reveals-2019-20-mens-basketball-all-conference-team.aspx

"They" say that it's hard to beat the same team 3 times in a season as Hawaii would have to do to beat the Ags on Thursday, Try telling that to Vanderbilt when they lose to Kentucky 3 times (no data, but I imagine it has happened more than once). Ditto for Wake Forest and Duke (yes, I know that the Demon Deacons upset Duke this year, but still...). My protestations notwithstanding, I think that "they" are right when it comes to teams who are evenly matched as UCD and Hawaii are. Last time I looked, their net rankings were right next to each other (215 and 216), so WE SHOULD WIN THIS TIME.

Thanks for the correction. I get all askew with basketball seasons since they overlap two years. I wasn't at Davis when Carlson won, but I know he had two great forwards in Al Budde and John Frost, who were no doubt instrumental in getting the Ags their first playoff berth. They were both seniors in Ham's first season. Frost had as sweet a jump shot as anyone I ever saw and Budde was a monster on the boards. I took a basketball Phys Ed class from "Smoky Joe" Carlson who simply told us on the first day, just go out and play, no teaching. I did ask him about my free throw shot and he told me that my form was fine as it was.

Hmmm. Mooney got hot. 57 seconds left and Ags still have a chance. One possession game. Turnabout is fair play.

No way is UCR this much better than the Aggies. I hope UC Davis regains their mojo in the tournament next week because they'll likely play Hawaii in the first round and Irvine if they get by the Warriors.

In his first three years, UC Davis won the at least a share of the Far Western Conference title for three years in a row. Each yer they lost in the first round to UNLV which was also a division 2 team in those days. We were still excited though because the Ags had never been to the post-season before then.

Far Western Conference in those days was:

UC Davis
Sacramento State
Nevada
Sonoma State
Chico State
Cal State Hayward
San Francisco State
Humboldt State

Fuller is keeping the Ags in the game. I don't know what's worse, the Aggie defense or the camerawork. I suspect the Aggie's morale is a bit down, which might explain the offense. No excuse for the poor defense.

So we can still finish 9-7 and get a three-way tie for third place if CSUN beats Hawaii and Cal Poly beats UCSB. We're 1-3 vs those two. We lose the tie-beaker with Hawaii who split with the Gauchos. I guess that would put us in fifth place, while a loss would certainly give us fifth place. If Hawaii beats CSUN we fall into the same tie, but the way I figure it, we finish fourth since we swept the Mats. Can anyone confirm my reasoning here? If so, we need to root for Hawaii, but really, for seeding purposes it does not matter since 4 plays 5. It becomes a matter of pride, I guess, and being the "home" team in the first round. Let's look at the bright side. Most forecasters had UC Davis finishing eighth this season.
(Speaking of overcoming low expectations, does anyone know why the 49ers mascot, Sourdough Sam, was at the game on Thursday along with others?)

movielover, I can't recall Ham ever yelling at a ref. He'd yell at his players or become demonstrative with his towel over a bad call, throwing it into the bleachers, but I don't think he ever disputed a bad call/

Ezra Manjon was the only player who really played well against Hawaii. I jinxed Stefan Gonzalez who practically kept UC Davis in the game in Hawaii but only hit 1 of 5 tonight. He hits even one more and the Ags win. Plus no one else stepped up to help Manjon, notably Joe Mooney who scored only 3 points. Hawaii had no business winning. Glad I'm retired so I don't have to hear it from my colleagues (I used to work at the University of Hawaii).

Eerily disappointing for me, having suffered through the loss here in Honolulu in a similar fashion. Ags seemed to lose their cool on offense at the 3 minute mark, which has become a very bad habit of theirs. I'm not sure if it's a lack of floor leadership. I was not impressed that they were able to break the press because Hawaii is not a good pressing team. Ags also let down on defense. Avea is the lone Hawaii born player and not known for his three-point shooting. He was one of the players who missed the game in Hawaii. Nonetheless, once he hit a couple, they should have been on him like white on chalk.

Aggies missing a lot of inside shots while giving up too many to Hawaii, but amazing 3 by Ezra!

Hawaii usually does not do well on the road and they are 2-4 in Big West road games this season. Their current coach, Eran Ganot, seemed to have them doing better in away games in past seasons, but not this year and a local sports writer suggests it is in the players' heads this year that they can't win on the road. I doubt that that's the case, but it's true that they got swept by Cal Poly and Long Beach not long ago and the Aggies are much bette than those two.

The betting line has UC Davis as a 2.5 point favorite and ESPN gives the Aggies a 65.6% chance of winning, down from 70% earlier in the week (don't know why). In their last loss, Hawaii scored the fewest points in a game since 1998. Their offense seems to have disappeared. They know they will face a tough game tonight. Interesting that Curry gets back to the Golden State Warriors, but the Aggies have their own Stef who lights it up just like the NBA Steph. Gonzalez' 49.1& from 3 is still the best in the nation by a good 1.7% points. Remember that it was he and Ezra who kept us in the game against Hawaii in Honolulu, as the rest of the team played poorly, yet it was 1 point game. Hawaii will be at full strength tonight (they were missing two key players when they played UCD before), but if Mooney plus anyone else plays as they are capable of playing, I think the Ags will win.