Pilots @ Portland St. Vikings

In the ugliest final two minutes I've seen in a long time, the Vikings fouled every possession and managed to score 75 points. Fortunately, the Pilots had enough points to survive poor FT shooting and win by 7.

Nice. Go Pilots. Does not seem inappropriate to suggest the team is better than anticipated. Leykam may have been right to retain Porter and to suggest last year not all Potter's fault.

Dean Murdoch wrote:Can’t say I saw this Pilots team with a 4-1 but I am sure happy to be proved wrong!!

Hear, hear!

There certainly seems to be a much-improved vibe/chemistry around the team, which I think has helped. Of course we haven't faced a murderer's row in terms of strength of schedule, but at least we are beating teams that likely would have (and did, in some cases) beat us last year.

Conference play will be very tough. But at least there's a glimmer of progress happening right now.

Excellent win. Most impressive was overcoming a couple of stretches of self-induced damage in each half. That string of turnovers in the beginning of the second half was quite painful, but the Pilots' recovery and solid offense down the stretch was encouraging.

Tryon should give up on shooting threes and just try to get fouled. Like a reverse hack-a-Shaq strategy. He was unstoppable from the free throw line.

Nice to break that losing streak to PSU, and to get a second road win. Like Mr. Murdoch, I'm pleasantly surprised with the 3-1 start (I choose not to recognize the Willamette game).

The Pilots are now up to #226 in the KenPom rankings (anyone remember what we were ranked pre-season?). We've beat #323 (SJSU), #317 (Maine), and #278 (PSU). UC Davis on Saturday comes in at #309. Our only chance to beat someone ranked higher than us before the Hawai'i tournament is at Seattle U (currently #191).

Adams didn’t  score much, but 9 assists and 3 TO is pretty impressive. He was a big part of breaking the press.

Whites 8 assist with only a turnover is as impressive as his points, and I’m glad jojo woke up second half

Give props to Malcom for getting it done where others weren’t

And the bigs for the most part got better after sleepwalking though PSU’s 11 point run at the start. 2 PSU turned ankles helped.

Well, I had the Pilots by 7 part right but very hard to guess totals with all the fouling at the end of games. This team has been a lot of fun. White and Adams are fantastic additions. Happy to see Terry Porter having some better results, a great guy in anyone's book.

I just looked at the box score:
https://portlandpilots.com/boxscore.aspx?path=mbball&id=10359

When was the last time the Pilots had 25 fast break points?! That made a huge difference. And a big improvement over past seasons (spanning both the Reveno and Porter eras) is the very consistent finishing at the rim on the fast break so far this year. The Pilots' fast break offense really seems in control. Good, early passes and no missed layups. Impressive.

Yes, I agree, Terry Porter is a great guy, but one of the reasons the Pilots are doing better so far this season is because the offensive and defensive game plans/preparations and the majority of in-game decisions have been turned over to his assistants this year...likely directed by Scott Leykam, because not listening to his assistants was not working for TP.

Lots of contributors tonight, but the huge numbers that stand out is 21 assists on 28 made baskets (17 of those assists made by Chase and Isaiah and 4 by JoJo), and also the 25 fast-break points.

The helter-skelter/havoc style on both sides of the ball by PSU that DD said we'd see was certainly something the Pilots couldn't prepare for with their own scout team, but once they figured it out and settled down (with a lot of help from Malcolm), the game turned around in UP's favor.  

This team could still go 0-16 in WCC play, but they're a whole lot better than last year's team.

NoPoNeighbor wrote:The Pilots are now up to #226 in the KenPom rankings (anyone remember what we were ranked pre-season?). We've beat #323 (SJSU), #317 (Maine), and #278 (PSU). UC Davis on Saturday comes in at #309. Our only chance to beat someone ranked higher than us before the Hawai'i tournament is at Seattle U (currently #191).

Prior to Willamette - 259
Prior to USC - 260
Prior to SJSC - 256
Prior to Maine - 241
Prior to PSU - 241

Current WCC KenPom Rankings:

6. GU
35. SMC (beat Fresno St. in Sacramento tonight)
72. BYU (lost at BSU in OT tonight)
104. USF
109. PU (lead early before losing by 7 at USC on Tuesday)
128. SCU
171. USD (lost by 17 at home to SDSU tonight)
195. LMU
215. UOP
226. UP

The WCC is ranked the 8th out of 32 conferences by KenPom.

Geezaldinho wrote:Sounds like the praetorian guard took care of business elsewhere in the kingdom

Is that in reference to the volleyball coach's dismissal?

Guards in the kingdom? Spies? 

I guess I need to return and complete my degree to understand the relationship between the monarch and the dukes that DD wrote of and the praetorian guard.

Dean Murdoch wrote:Anyone know if Quincy Ferebee was hurt? Or just didn’t get in tonight?

He was on the bench and in uniform, but the staff was good at sticking with the guard lineup that was working.

Perhaps the staff felt the pace of play was a little quick for Quincy or just found no reason for substituting for a group that was figuring it out.

Lavar only got in the game for about 3 minutes in the first half in an attempt to slow things down a little, but he didn't return once the guards had sorted it out.

StudentPilot wrote:

I guess I need to return and complete my degree to understand the relationship between the monarch and the dukes that DD wrote of and the praetorian guard.

The cohorte Praetoriani we’re responsible for the installation and/or removal of emperors  Nero, Caligula,Claudius, Galba, Piso, Vespasian, Titus, Domitilan, Trajan, Caracalla, Comodus, Pertinax, Didius Julianas, Elagabalus, Severus Alexander, Philipus, and probably a few other emperors. I can only remember so many.
Tiberius was a hairs breath from getting sacked by Serjanus, the head of the guard.
Galba said He was used to  recruiting  soldiers, not buying  them, so they killed him.
Piso didn’t even get to the palace.
They were thick into the year of the four emperors, though I don’t think it actually took a whole year.

Nobody retired to a country villa after removal, if you get my drift. In one case they openly auctioned the position off and then Killed the buyer ( Didius Julianus, I think) three months later. The next auction didn’t go as well.

They were still mucking around in the Western Roman Empire when Constantine invaded Rome and Ravenna and dissolved them around 400 AD.

Many of the Western Kindoms grew out of that, including one  that wasn’t Holy, Roman, or really an Empire.

And the title Duke (Duc, Dux) is originally Roman. ( military commander with territorial responsibilities - sort of a division of labor)

Class dismissed

Glad to end the 3 game losing streak to the Vikings. Also broke their 9 game home court winning streak. I was worried the Pilots would be too amped up for the rivalry game. But after they stopped throwing it away almost every possession, they were pretty calm running the offense.

DoubleDipper wrote:Well, sort of.  Apparently the prime minister advised the monarch that his subjects were yelling, "off with his head," and that immediate changes must be made!

So the monarch followed the PM's "advice," and not only began listening to members of his royal court, but after exiling one of his dukes, put two of his remaining dukes in charge of running his kingdom...which made the remaining dukes and prime minister very happy.

After one of the crown princes, the heir to the throne, left the court the dukes happily began conducting the king's business on both sides of the king's court, and the other prince developed into a potential king...

Whether everyone will live happily ever after and the king will retain his head remains to be seen...

My vote for post of the year!

And the court jester's website was still up and counting the days...