Wednesday 12/3/08: EWU @ Portland

EWU returns to the Chiles Center on wednesday... hopefully we can maintain our perfect record at home and extend the win streak with a W against the Eagles.

EWU is 4-2 so far this season, with wins over UC Irvine (twice--huh?), Texas Arlington (who?) and our next opponent, Idaho. The 2 losses were both against good teams, @ Illinois and @ Minnesota. EWU was picked to finish 7th out of 9 in the Big Sky this year.

It looks like the Eagles' strength is their guard play, which will be a great opportunity for Campbell to respond on both ends of the court. Benny Valentine is a transfer SG from Texas Tech, and he just happened to score 29 points against Minnesota! EWU appears to be thin on the inside, so Kramer, Robin, Jasonn & Luke will need to have big games.

Game time is 7pm Wednesday... see you there!

GO PILOTS! CRUSH THE EAGLES!

A win would be huge. We started 4-1 in 2004-05 as well, but lost 66-63 to a mediocre Oregon State team in game six. If we can get over the hump in games like this, I'll be very excited about our prospects to compete in the top half of the WCC.

GO PILOTS!

EWU is another one of those teams that can be deceptively good some years. Rodney Stuckey was just a phenomenon for a school of that size...
I would expect a close game.

Niedermeyer is out for at least ten days, maybe two weeks. Hopefully that won't effect too much.

Dammit.

Look on the bright side. At least he is lost for non-conference, and it will give other players some extra PT, which will help for the conference games.

Hard to see a bright side. I thought he was most improved this year. And sitting two weeks will hurt his fitness for additional time. Jared will really need to step up and get open for his shot. And all will have to be more careful about fouls with a shorter bench.

Also, to quote the Schonz, "you've got to make your free throws."

"Nobody said it was going to be easy."

up7587 wrote:Also, to quote the Schonz, "you've got to make your free throws."

No kidding.

From the UP website and today's Oregonian:

Junior F Ethan Niedermeyer has started all five games for Portland, but is listed as doubtful for Wednesday after suffering a high ankle sprain against Nevada.

At least nothing was broken...

This is where that depth comes in handy

Wouldn't be surprised to see Nik play a lot of small forward while Ethan is out. Jared can step in and play some shooting guard, and I seem to remember Rev using Taishi and TJ on the floor at the same time together as well.

And maybe Porter can get some burn too... heck, even Mitrovic if we get out ahead of them.