No, and I didn’t say Cincy “wouldn’t be motivated.” If you believe our guys really won’t be as motivated as the opponent, then you really haven’t paid attention to them this year. And we haven’t clinched any title - you should ask LJ if a tie is good enough.
You’re making claims that you can’t prove and can’t be measured, which is very convenient. And you’re also kind of dissing our guys by making them out to be too immature to handle getting ready for their next game.
There are basketball reasons why they could win. This is not one of them.
We’re gonna get their best shot and they’re gonna try to make the game ugly for us. This won’t be the first time or last time that will happen this year. Our guys will do anything in their power to avoid having to deal with the repercussions of a loss.
This isnt the only game we will have to kill the tie
And you’ve mixed motivated with quality of team
A&M was drastically more motivated to win the preseason scrimmage… all becuase we won, doesn’t mean they weren’t more motivated …
Samspon said it was meaningless scrimmage… buzz Williams said they were out to make up for ending their season… us winning didn’t mean we were more motivated… it meant we were a better team
I actually think we will focus on pushing as much growth as we can from sharp and TA…and wouldn’t be that obsessed with making sure we had to win that day … I’m sure we expect to win, but I don’t think we are losing sleep over Cincy
Desperate could be good or bad… extra effort where you don’t normally give, or could mean doing too much …from an oppenpent standpoint desperate teams are more unpredictable and hard to break and throw the white flag… but that’s what makes it fun
And I haven’t “mixed motivated with the quality of the team.” I take issue with your de facto proclamation that the visiting team will 100% be more motivated to win than the home team.
Playing desperate also isn’t necessarily the same as being motivated, and it definitely isn’t necessarily a benefit. The way they have played is the way they’ve practiced, and that’s the way they are.
Even if they’ve been saving up all of their extra motivation for Saturday, you won’t convince me that guys like J’Wan and Sharp are gonna roll into one of the last home games of the season like it’s an exhibition. J’Wan in particular is chasing a big rebounding milestone, and he wants it.
Again, I expect to get their best effort, and they can definitely stay with us and make it a game. I just don’t think it will be because our guys aren’t motivated enough to play to win.
I know you’re not asking me, but I will chime in with my responses:
When I played, once the clock started, I played every possesion as hard as I could with absolutely ZERO thought about what was at stake in the standings outside the game. I literally would not even think about standings the entire game. Maybe if the outcome became “decided” say with 56 seconds left on the clock, it might THEN enter my thoughts. But no, i wouldnt make any distinction during the game for “standing desperation” that would magically cause me to try any harder than my already maximized effort. I know not everybody is wired the same, but FOR ME, there was absolutely no bandwidth for a bigger picture when my focus was way better spent on my assigment/role in the moment. To me, such a distraction is a detriment in a cerebral game.
There very well may be a motivation (or desperation) discrepancy for each team going into any given game. But unless it’s a Hollywood script - and as you’ve alluded to - a moderately motivated great team can STILL often defeat a highly motivated/desperate team. (ie a lacking team’s desire alone is often not enough to overcome all other disadvantages).
Having said all that, to be clear, I don’t disagree that it’s a trap game. I just think that being a trap game isnt as big of a concern here as it can be for other teams with a non-Sampson style mentality …not quite as focused as ours.
We could still lose the game, but Cincy’s “motivation” is not somehow scary enough (to me) to elevate them to victory more so than them having an uncharacteristic great shooting night or such.
Actually 2-6 on the road in conference play. 2-1 out of conference with wins at Georgia Tech and Northern Kentucky, a loss at Villanova. But your point still stands, they are not good on the road, their most impressive win is at UCF which says a lot
Great stuff. I agree it all comes down to the individual. I do believe there is some extra motivation to take down the king when you get to mid-late February. We’re everyone’s Super Bowl and have been for a month.
I just don’t think our team is built to let the margins move enough to lose when intangibles and motivation are part of the equation.
There is a formula for beating us. Players who distribute the ball really well out of our monster trap, good 3-point shooting, drawing fouls, and keeping us off the glass . You usually need 3 out of those 4 to beat us. The Uber talented teams can get away with 2.5.
Tech shot 40% from 3, drew 24 fouls, and Williams and Yalaho had some really good assists out of our traps in the Feb 1 matchup.
Cincy is a good passing team and one of the best in asst/to ratio (37th), but they don’t shoot the 3 ball well (222nd), they don’t rebound well (191st), and they don’t draw fouls (333rd). If a weakness plays into one of our strengths, we win.
I can see us not covering and Cincy making it interesting in the second half, but the metrics don’t lie this late in the season.
Plus looks like these comments were made before Georgia did us a huge favor by beating Florida last night. That has to take the Gators out of the 1-seee conversation at least for the time being.
