Game 35: #16 Northern Kentucky vs #1 Houston - NCAA Tournament - March 16th, 2023 - 8:20 pm CST - TNT (W 63-52)

@MRCoog when did I say that?

Mark, best shooter?

Yall remember my takes from early in the season. Things do change.

Mark hasn’t shot great in a while…

I was in the arena so I may have missed where his defense lapsed in this game…

Definitely, when he goes out of the game, our defense takes a big hit.

I wouldn’t say it “lapsed,” but he definitely didn’t have the lateral quickness he normally does. I thought he was just trying to be careful with it more than it actually hampering his movement.

Defensively, the whole team looked a little off to me for much of the game, so I’m not pointing the finger at Sasser.

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Marcus is saying 2 different things.
But I wouldn’t call a 7 out of 10 pain level a mere “funny feeling”.
He sounds like he needs an extra long time, but I hope :crossed_fingers: he can heal faster than the average Joe like he did with the partial shoulder separation.

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i just listened to sasser post fame comments, he usef the words reaggravated but noted that he thinks he will play on saturday…

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Tough gritty win. Watching the highlights again.

Team could’ve folded with Sasser and Shead banged up. But guys stepped up

Saw this clip, i believe its Jwan on a hot mic. Jwan battled. Need our wings Arceneaux & Mark to help hit the glass Saturday

Also this fade away by Shead was a thing of beauty

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I didn’t want to be the one to say it. But yeah once we missed on Lofton we decided to just go with Franics instead of a vet transfer. In hindsight it hasn’t worked out well this year. He hasn’t even got much PT to prepare him for next year.

It’s definitely not safe to assume Francis will be starting next year.

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I agree. Also, I think having another backup PG that can play the position at a good enough level makes a lot of sense to me.

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That helped, thanks

Maybe Mylik Wilson next year

Also Ramon not taking a step forward and not available leaves the team with 2 freshman coming off the bench.

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Looks like that was directed at Jarace, who was standing flat-footed watching NKU crash the boards for the putback.

I love Jarace and his potential. But as coach says, freshmen do freshmen things. Really wish we got more than one year too see him really put it all together.

I thought it was directed at Arceneaux.

I can see that, he was getting pushed around.

Which is why we decided to redshirt Mylik.

Just terrible timing for Sasser to go down.

I don’t really care about the Francis thing. Because if we had our All-American, we would be fine.

We don’t, however. So, yes. Our rotation just got shorter. And it is not great that we can’t go to Francis for any minutes.

It is what it is.

Will be interesting to see what we do in the portal.

I just feel really bad for Marcus.

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It does suck for Marcus considering he missed the tournament last year and in 2020 because of covid.

Hopefully the team plays a smarter game Sat and makes it to the 2nd weekend.

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For Saturday, I consider Marcus being “in glass, only break in case of emergency” type of player. That would be last ten minutes of the game and we are losing.

If we get past Auburn, we have six days off before the regional semi-finals Friday in Kansas City. Ideally, he doesn’t play and gets to rest. I don’t know if it will be 100% before the end of the tournament. Somebody posted a Willis Reed gif in a thread somewhere. Could be accurate with Marcus.

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When I recognize a ref, it is never a good sign.

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Im not in despair. Our inside game looked really good. Walker can score more inside.

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Spot on. I’m actually not concerned with scoring as much as our lack on perimeter defense. Shead and Sasser are lock down defenders when healthy. Without Sasser and Shead playing 100%, we have a hard time staying in front of guards, which means they can shoot better, draw fouls, and drive and dish.

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