Speaker 1: This is I on the Ball with Steve Rivera on
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Speaker 2: On the Ball.
Speaker 3: Hey, welcome back to Eye the Ball here on Fox
Speaker 3: Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera. In today with me
Speaker 3: is Dave Silver. Now we have Kobe with breaking news.
Speaker 1: This is Eye on the Ball Breaking news on Fox
Speaker 1: Sports fourteen fifty.
Speaker 4: Arizona baseball ends opening weekend winless after lost of Louisville,
Speaker 4: but is currently beating New Mexico eight to nothing in
Speaker 4: the bottom of the seventh inning.
Speaker 3: Welcome to the competition that you can kill home games
Speaker 3: against New Mexico. Yes, yes, no, they those games in
Speaker 3: Arlington were not even close. I don't think. I don't
Speaker 3: know what the third game was. The first two was
Speaker 3: were not But here we are kind of recalibrating, right, Yeah, okay.
Speaker 4: Short handed Arizona women's baseball gives number ten ranked TCU
Speaker 4: a game you'd have a basketball, oh basketball, yes, yes, yes,
Speaker 4: but runs out. I guess losing my score of eighty
Speaker 4: five to seventy three.
Speaker 3: I guess they played. Yeah, she paid without two two
Speaker 3: players players. Every every game is like a different deal.
Speaker 3: It's kind of been difficult.
Speaker 5: I don't know what the deal is.
Speaker 6: Plus TCU has got what Maddy Connor who played in Arizona, Yeah,
Speaker 6: you scored like eighteen or.
Speaker 3: A lot of a lot of the girls or the
Speaker 3: women who left this place have done fantastically well a
Speaker 3: lot of other places. Although although I thought, I don't
Speaker 3: know if you did you pay attention to last year's
Speaker 3: season with it with the U.
Speaker 5: Bank, I mean's not that much.
Speaker 3: She did a fantastic job under the conditions because they
Speaker 3: were playing with six seven.
Speaker 6: Yeah, girl, that was like the highlight of the year
Speaker 6: was the fact that they didn't have enough.
Speaker 3: Players and they almost they took USC to the brink
Speaker 3: on one game. It was like, holy crap, how you
Speaker 3: doing this? Yeah, but you know, another year of she's hurt,
Speaker 3: she's not hurt, she's sick, blah blah blah. Well, there's
Speaker 3: got to be, you know, some reckoning. I would I
Speaker 3: would think, I don't know her contract. I think has
Speaker 3: been a story coming to you, so that could be
Speaker 3: something you know, again, in this the budget crisis of
Speaker 3: the U of A, who knows how that's gonna play out? Right,
Speaker 3: Certainly she's a legend. It's gonna be an issue. Yeah.
Speaker 4: Arizona Softball completes bear Down Fiesta sweep with win over
Speaker 4: cal State Fullerton.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And I think they have another tournament this weekend, right,
Speaker 3: the Hilli Brand Tournament. Yes, I believe so, with the
Speaker 3: Thursday fight Saturday or something like that. Yeah, yeah, okay,
Speaker 3: he's They usually stock up pretty well in the in
Speaker 3: these early season games. You know, get a chance to
Speaker 3: get some of these teams from the Midwest it can
Speaker 3: barely practice probably to come out to the Sunshine. I
Speaker 3: don't know about perspective, but but it looks like they
Speaker 3: have some people. I mean, they're not beating they're not
Speaker 3: just beating anybody. They're being a couple of people right Alabama,
Speaker 3: I think, and whatever. So maybe there's hope that they'll
Speaker 3: get back to the tournament. And that's that's the sad
Speaker 3: thing about this place, Dave giving you in here just
Speaker 3: a little longer than me, that you can go from
Speaker 3: November to let's say, mid May and have a pretty
Speaker 3: good year, and if you don't get to the tournament
Speaker 3: to the you know, your season is not really a
Speaker 3: good one. You're talking women's softbtball yeah, and we can
Speaker 3: talk about basketball. Yeah, basketball, you're judged by March.
Speaker 6: And it's going to be interesting too because they're again
Speaker 6: dipping into a new conference. Who are they going to
Speaker 6: be playing? Oklahoma State? It's always pretty good. I don't
Speaker 6: know if there's a lot of depth in women's softball,
Speaker 6: is there? Not nearly what they were facing in the pact.
Speaker 6: But well, the Texas.
Speaker 3: Tech girl who left Stanford for a million dollars, Oh, yeah,
Speaker 3: she's she's the picture there. So there's you know, they're
Speaker 3: sprinkled around some there.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's that's a sport that really has changed in
Speaker 6: the last decade with some of these programs coming into play,
Speaker 6: especially in the SEC. And I guess, you know, maybe
Speaker 6: we'll see this in the Big twelve.
Speaker 3: I don't know, I blame I blame Mike Candrea, the
Speaker 3: godfather of softball. Easter turned everybody else into a jugernaut. Yeah,
Speaker 3: because they had to catch up right, build stadiums and
Speaker 3: get the women to go there.
Speaker 6: And here they are giving all kinds of women opportunities
Speaker 6: to come to colleges around the country that you know,
Speaker 6: back in the day, it was like, oh, you know,
Speaker 6: if you're great, you're gonna go here, You're gonna go
Speaker 6: to UCLA, maybe Fresno State, whatever, but that was it.
Speaker 5: Do you remember softball specific the field they played on
Speaker 5: back and then I remember it, well, do you really?
Speaker 5: It was?
Speaker 3: Yeah, because I got here in eighty seven and and
Speaker 3: Teresa Cherry I think was a pouture and some of
Speaker 3: the it was just a backstop, a backstop, and there
Speaker 3: was facing west. Yeah, it was facing west and bleacher
Speaker 3: seats and it was like and now you look back,
Speaker 3: says Mike Kntrea is obviously the loud Olson of this
Speaker 3: because you know, he brought this thing into a And
Speaker 3: if there's a guy that should be deserving on the
Speaker 3: Mount Rushmore, oh for sure, it's it's Mike Kntrea.
Speaker 6: We in TV paid little attention in those years, and
Speaker 6: we just didn't. I mean, there was no no reason
Speaker 6: to go out there. There was no like, oh we're
Speaker 6: gonna go. I mean there had to be a reason
Speaker 6: to go. But when they broke through and won a
Speaker 6: national championship, all of a sudden, we all just like,
Speaker 6: WHOA what just happened? And then we all jumped on
Speaker 6: that bandwagon and we started going to Oklahoma every year
Speaker 6: and it was again, that was where some of the
Speaker 6: highlights of my time on TV was just going to
Speaker 6: those games. It was a blast, and the women were
Speaker 6: terrific to cover, and it all just was literally from scratch.
Speaker 6: There was you know, our friend Rocky Lorose was a player,
Speaker 6: you know, back she's like my age, so she was playing,
Speaker 6: you know, back in the late seventies, I think, and
Speaker 6: then whatever the league was, it wasn't even there was
Speaker 6: no NCAA women's softball in those years.
Speaker 5: It was a different league.
Speaker 6: It was all different you know, organization kind of running
Speaker 6: women's sports.
Speaker 3: I'm sure you dealt with Mary Roby at that time
Speaker 3: when she kind of the title nine started and all that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, So, I mean softball was was just a you know,
Speaker 6: like a club sport, I'm sure up until you know,
Speaker 6: Mike really built it up and it got it just
Speaker 6: changed nationally as well. I mean, we were going side
Speaker 6: by side with you CLA for so many years and
Speaker 6: that was basically it. And then next thing, you know,
Speaker 6: the SEC gets all this big football money. They start
Speaker 6: building these beautiful facilities down there in Florida and Alabama
Speaker 6: and Tennessee, and teams like that just started popping up.
Speaker 3: Yes, Texas was always good as well for softball. Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: yeah they yeah, yeah, lucky. I was lucky enough to
Speaker 3: go with USA Today to the Olympics in two thousand
Speaker 3: and two thousand and four. And yeah, Cat and the
Speaker 3: Mendoza and all these people were coached by coach by
Speaker 3: Mike and Tram. Yeah, so it was. It was a
Speaker 3: lot of fun. Those girls unbelievably good.
Speaker 4: Joe Buck to call Brewers Yankees, Brewers Yankees opening Day
Speaker 4: game on ESPN. Buck's last national broadcast was with Fox
Speaker 4: in twenty twenty one, when he covered his twenty fourth
Speaker 4: World Series for the network. He joined Chip Carry last
Speaker 4: year on the local broadcast of a Saint Louis Cardinals game.
Speaker 6: Yeah, that's good, good news. If you're a baseball fan,
Speaker 6: you want to hear his voice. He's one of the
Speaker 6: all time greats, him and his dad act. I was
Speaker 6: kind of surprised when he went to ESPN to begin
Speaker 6: with it. That didn't wasn't part of the deal that
Speaker 6: he'd get some baseball. But apparently he just didn't want
Speaker 6: to step on the toes of others who've been doing it.
Speaker 6: ESPN and baseball is another story that we'll have to
Speaker 6: watch here soon.
Speaker 5: There's some talk that they're going to be not doing Major.
Speaker 6: League Baseball play by play here, possibly in the next
Speaker 6: round of contracts.
Speaker 5: With with with that, so spending too much money in
Speaker 5: the NBA, And yeah, the NBA.
Speaker 6: Is a whole nother craziness with Amazon coming on board
Speaker 6: and NBC coming back, and you know, basketball is going
Speaker 6: to be a different watch in the.
Speaker 5: Next four years or so. Did you watch it?
Speaker 3: I'm trying to interrupt your breaking news, but did you
Speaker 3: watch a Law Star game?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 4: I watched it. It wasn't that great.
Speaker 5: I was going to say, why did you watch watch?
Speaker 5: I did not watch a single thing I did.
Speaker 6: I watched the So they played like these two semi finals.
Speaker 6: I watched the first one just to kind of see
Speaker 6: how they were playing, and it was just as bad
Speaker 6: as was played a regular game. I mean, they play
Speaker 6: to forty points. Yeah, and then you know, I don't
Speaker 6: know if you saw the comments from Draymond Green. He
Speaker 6: was doing, uh the stuff up with with with Charte, well,
Speaker 6: I guess with the other you know, analyst group outside
Speaker 6: the arena in San Francisco, and he just ripped it.
Speaker 5: He was saying, the players can't stand this. This is terrible.
Speaker 6: I'm I'm just thinking, you know, the NBA has got
Speaker 6: to be going what is he saying? But that's been
Speaker 6: the consensus I think from.
Speaker 3: The right, the whole, and the whole. You're just about
Speaker 3: basketball itself. You watch NBA games, Yeah, why because you're
Speaker 3: like the only one.
Speaker 4: Yeah, because I've always been a diehard Nick fan, So
Speaker 4: i watch all the Knicks games. And yeah, it's just
Speaker 4: something I've always been doing. But there's definitely a problem.
Speaker 4: What do you what do you think why there's no
Speaker 4: like culture, people the players like sit out a lot,
Speaker 4: and like you see the four Nations in hockey right now,
Speaker 4: like they're all playing, and.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the NBA just wouldn't do that. Well it's that
Speaker 3: little management. I'm getting paid. I don't need to do
Speaker 3: this exactly.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, there's no reason for them to play.
Speaker 5: It really isn't. And well even in the I'm talking
Speaker 5: about regular season. Yeah, just you know, I'm not feeling
Speaker 5: like it today. Yeah.
Speaker 3: And what about Phoenix, God, they're not they're out of
Speaker 3: the playoffs right now.
Speaker 4: Well, they sold their whole future eleven seed right now.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's crazy.
Speaker 6: Yeah, but they are gonna They're changing the name of
Speaker 6: their arena again for about the tenth TIMEO rerints going away.
Speaker 5: Oh really, now they're looking for a contracts over, I guess. Yeah, so,
Speaker 5: I don't know. It's always been.
Speaker 6: US Airways, not even around the north. Yeah, America West first. Yeah, Okay,
Speaker 6: those are the glory years.
Speaker 5: I remember those.
Speaker 4: Some great men's college basketball matchups. Today, Number five Houston
Speaker 4: travels to face the Arizona State.
Speaker 5: That's that's a great matchup.
Speaker 4: Yeah, great, there's some. There's some more. Number twenty one
Speaker 4: ranked Mississippi State will host number seven Texas A and
Speaker 4: M good one. Yeah, and number thirteen ranked Purdue will
Speaker 4: travel to face the number fourteen ranked Michigan State.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Big ten is pretty good too. SEC is obviously really
Speaker 3: really good. I know where I'm gonna go with the
Speaker 3: national championship team. Let's hear it, drummer, oll please no
Speaker 3: Lolorida Florida nine to one, nine to one. I think
Speaker 3: it's a good number. They've beaten the number one team
Speaker 3: in the country. Already. Give me an odds on Arizona.
Speaker 3: I'll tell you what it is, but I want you
Speaker 3: to guess. For the odds of Arizona winning the national title.
Speaker 4: I think I looked at the other nine thousand it no.
Speaker 5: Oh no, not that much.
Speaker 6: No, I'm going to say like twenty five to one,
Speaker 6: forty five, forty.
Speaker 5: Five, yeah, down from seventy. Yeah. So if you're saying
Speaker 5: you have a chance, you have a chance eight if.
Speaker 6: The eight man roster can do it, let's yeah, they
Speaker 6: hold up over six games.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, people don't talk about that often enough.
Speaker 3: And I say, you know, they're eighteen, nineteen, twenty years old,
Speaker 3: this is what they do. But after seeing them in
Speaker 3: this league getting crushed and just you know, thirty nine minutes, please,
Speaker 3: it's like a price. It's like the Hearns Hagler fight.
Speaker 3: Please let this round get finished with.
Speaker 5: Where's the bell? Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 3: It's yeah, you gotta you gotta get stamminy, you get lucky,
Speaker 3: and you gotta be good and get good matchups.
Speaker 5: I mean, there's so much that goes into that.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And I think that was one of the Tommy's things
Speaker 3: I asked him. I think he got a little little
Speaker 3: upset with My question, was you know Houston is notorious
Speaker 3: for running teams down. Did you feel like that? And
Speaker 3: he kind of answered the question then he kind of
Speaker 3: then he got kind of like his eyes lit up
Speaker 3: like that. Yeah, but you know, you know, well you
Speaker 3: look at.
Speaker 5: You like, well, you don't think we knew that was
Speaker 5: gonna happen.
Speaker 4: What do you mean? It's just a question.
Speaker 6: I'm a coach, I'm making all this money. I'm paid
Speaker 6: to know all that's gonna happen.
Speaker 5: To us, Right? Could you write this down?
Speaker 4: Hold On cam Mood states that he'll remember the teams
Speaker 4: that won't draft him. Ward hasn't decided if he will
Speaker 4: throw at the NFL combine next week.
Speaker 5: That's funny.
Speaker 3: I read that too over the weekend, and I'm thinking, Okay,
Speaker 3: so you don't get drafted, you gotta what are you
Speaker 3: gonna miss out on?
Speaker 5: He says, not the first guy.
Speaker 3: Pick, isn't he? It's not gonna be too many teams.
Speaker 3: He's gonna be upset with rich people getting upset.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I don't.
Speaker 3: Yeah, who's he gonna Who's I don't even know. I
Speaker 3: should know who's the number one? Who is the number one?
Speaker 3: Who's the Raiders?
Speaker 4: Titans have number one? Okay, then who's two?
Speaker 8: Two?
Speaker 4: Mm? I know Patriots are three?
Speaker 5: So there's quarterbacks should do?
Speaker 3: Or what and I will Hunter right, Hunters, the the
Speaker 3: guy t Mac in the top five.
Speaker 5: It's right, you can, you can.
Speaker 4: The Titans said they might not draft a quarterback.
Speaker 3: It's all smoke screen Tennessee, Cleveland, Oh Giants, Patriots, Giants,
Speaker 3: Giants quarterback Raiders are six Cleveland is a quarterback.
Speaker 5: The other dudes are talking about t Mac.
Speaker 6: At one point, I thought, it's whatever Tom Brady wants, right,
Speaker 6: tom Brady's.
Speaker 5: Running the show.
Speaker 4: Dallas, Maverick star Kiier Irving says he wants to play
Speaker 4: for Team Australia at the twenty twenty eight Olympics. Irving
Speaker 4: was who was born in Over in Australia, was asked
Speaker 4: during All Star Weekend whether you would consider making a
Speaker 4: switch from Team USA.
Speaker 6: Or he hasn't played on that team for a couple Olympics.
Speaker 6: I don't think, or.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it wasn't on this last team. See the world
Speaker 3: of spot guy. Who is he the guy that says
Speaker 3: the world is playing? Oh yes, yes, no, oh yeah,
Speaker 3: it's just not around. But we got a call.
Speaker 4: You gonna call.
Speaker 5: Let's take the straight line to Melbourne, take the bus.
Speaker 5: You're in the air. Night of the ball. Who's this? Hey?
Speaker 8: This is Rob.
Speaker 5: Rob. How are you doing? You sound like a first
Speaker 5: time caller.
Speaker 9: I am a first time college How are you doing?
Speaker 3: Thanks for calling in, Thanks for listening. What do you
Speaker 3: have to say to us? Hey?
Speaker 9: I was just curious. Uh, do you think that Lloyd's
Speaker 9: gonna do kind of the same thing with high school
Speaker 9: recruiting at Arizona, just like Patino's doing at Saint John's.
Speaker 3: Which would be what forget about it?
Speaker 9: Well, it looks like he's he's gonna focus on the
Speaker 9: transfer portal and not so much on high school with so.
Speaker 3: I was I was right. I think you go with
Speaker 3: what you can, and he's not. That'll have to happen
Speaker 3: after beyond this next year, because he's got some high
Speaker 3: school kids coming in. But yes, I think that's everybody's
Speaker 3: case where you have to go with that to fill
Speaker 3: the holes that are leaving. I think everybody's doing that.
Speaker 3: I think, don't you think, Yeah, that's the way it's
Speaker 3: been working, that you have no choice but to do
Speaker 3: it that way. I think though, the problem that's gonna
Speaker 3: be run a case against teams that are mediocre or
Speaker 3: less n I l that's gonna be a tough thing
Speaker 3: because we're they gonna come over the money.
Speaker 5: Hey, Rob, are you a U a grad? You follow
Speaker 5: them or whatever?
Speaker 9: I don't think you'll appreciate my Uh it's a different
Speaker 9: no no.
Speaker 8: No conference.
Speaker 9: But yeah I I follow Arizona basketball. Uh big Caleb
Speaker 9: love fan, which he came to Syracuse though. Uh, kind
Speaker 9: of a hint of my favorite college team.
Speaker 3: But yeah, but don't you think you I'm sure you
Speaker 3: called into asked our opinion, but you probably already knew
Speaker 3: the answer to your situation.
Speaker 9: It's gonna be I'm just I'm I'm concerned. It's gonna
Speaker 9: curtail development of new players, and it's just going to
Speaker 9: be a farming of the transfer portal.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no question, Rob. If you listen to us a lot,
Speaker 3: the JC people, they're going to be shut out. The
Speaker 3: high school people are going to be shut out because
Speaker 3: now it's just a kind of rent to rent a
Speaker 3: transfer pretty much.
Speaker 9: Yep, yep, exactly. Yeah, it would be interesting, should be interesting.
Speaker 5: It is it? Interesting is a good word? But is it?
Speaker 5: Is it? Okay with you? I mean, okay, that's the
Speaker 5: right word.
Speaker 9: I'll be honest with you. It's not I went to
Speaker 9: college in an era where kids were just getting scholarships
Speaker 9: to school and they you know, the playing field was
Speaker 9: more pure. You know, these kids were really fighting to
Speaker 9: get to the NBA. And I think now it's it's
Speaker 9: just a whole different atmosphere with you know, NIL and
Speaker 9: now revenue sharing and everything that college sports has turned into.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's gonna make a lot of panic to people
Speaker 3: here in the next few years.
Speaker 5: It's already has. You know, how are you gonna come
Speaker 5: up with all this money?
Speaker 6: Well, I mean, look at especially in college football, is
Speaker 6: incredible turnover.
Speaker 5: I mean even the U of A.
Speaker 6: And it's talking with like forty forty new players already
Speaker 6: have kind of signed up for next this next season.
Speaker 5: So I mean it's a turnover.
Speaker 6: And I mean Dion basically turned over the entire Colorado
Speaker 6: rosters first year.
Speaker 3: And then and then the second year and then they
Speaker 3: look at look at here locally, Brent had to do
Speaker 3: the same thing.
Speaker 6: That's what I'm saying that, you know, Arizona's just kind
Speaker 6: of just bringing in everybody.
Speaker 3: Rob, Rob, thanks for coming and bringing us down.
Speaker 4: You know, yeah, I worry about that.
Speaker 10: Guy.
Speaker 5: Hey keep calling. Thank you very much for the call.
Speaker 5: We got to go.
Speaker 4: Yeah, thank you time take guy.
Speaker 5: We got to go and take a break.
Speaker 3: Get ahold of Evan min cowill get some smart people
Speaker 3: on the show with not that Rob isn't I mean
Speaker 3: with us? Obviously He's gonna tell us a lot what's
Speaker 3: going on with this analytics to this point in the season.
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Speaker 1: Breaking down all the xs at ohs. This is I
Speaker 1: on the Ball with Steve Rivera on Box Sports fourteen fifty.
Speaker 3: Hey, welcome back to I on the Ball here on
Speaker 3: Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera and with me
Speaker 3: today is Dave Silver Now and I phonely have Evan
Speaker 3: Maya Kawa.
Speaker 5: Give us your website. Evan at that great website of yours.
Speaker 8: Yeah, so, Evan mia Kawa is one of the more
Speaker 8: popular or college basketball analytics websites that's used.
Speaker 16: By a lot of fans for analyzing the sport, but.
Speaker 8: It's really become popular with a lot of coaches. There's
Speaker 8: about one hundred different Division one teams, their coaches staffs
Speaker 8: have subscriptions on my website and it's used for a
Speaker 8: lot of things like lineup analysis and deciding player rotations,
Speaker 8: but also during the portal, especially in the off season,
Speaker 8: a lot of portal evaluation stuff. So there's a lot
Speaker 8: of stuff there really for anybody kind of no matter
Speaker 8: what level of fan or if you're all the way
Speaker 8: up at kind of the coach level in the sport.
Speaker 3: I would assume to me this would be and you
Speaker 3: can correct me if I'm wrong or just what I'm thinking.
Speaker 3: This is a cheat sheet when the NCAA tournament comes
Speaker 3: and you know you want to beat the secretary because
Speaker 3: the purple color is favorite, turn they win the title
Speaker 3: that they can kind of, Yeah, I evaluate teams this
Speaker 3: way and analytically.
Speaker 16: Yes, absolutely, I think.
Speaker 8: Really the key to building a good bracket is.
Speaker 16: Not just looking at what has a team done in their.
Speaker 8: Season so far, but it's actually using some of these
Speaker 8: advanced analytics to predict how good they're.
Speaker 16: Going to be going forward. And that's really where I
Speaker 16: find a lot of value in what I do on
Speaker 16: my website because it doesn't overreact to things that are
Speaker 16: kind of more of the commonly stated narratives kind of
Speaker 16: in the sport publicly. And the other thing that you'll
Speaker 16: find when we get closer to the tournament and then
Speaker 16: when the bracket comes out is I'll actually put up
Speaker 16: on my website an entire page of basically every single
Speaker 16: team's probability of making it to each round, so you
Speaker 16: can see the most likely teams to make the Sweet
Speaker 16: sixteen the Final four based on the.
Speaker 8: Draws that they have. You can even stimulate different bracket
Speaker 8: outcomes based on the realistic game probabilities of potential matchups
Speaker 8: that teams could find. So there's gonna be a treasure
Speaker 8: trove of things that you can use when it comes
Speaker 8: to filling out your bracket once we get that. On
Speaker 8: the election Sunday, I want.
Speaker 5: To We've had you had a number of times.
Speaker 3: You're one of my favorite guys to talk to because
Speaker 3: you're so good at this and it's intriguing. We'll talk
Speaker 3: at the back end of how in the hell you
Speaker 3: decided to do this because you were like a computer
Speaker 3: whiz somewhere in Texas and probably working for the FBI
Speaker 3: or something. Well, we'll get to that later. Go ahead
Speaker 3: day with any of questions, I was just.
Speaker 6: Going to say, So, you're you're watching a game saying
Speaker 6: in February, and you're you've been working with a team
Speaker 6: and you see them kind of using your formulas.
Speaker 5: Is that gratifying to you or does it happen all
Speaker 5: the time or how does that work for you?
Speaker 4: Yes, it really does.
Speaker 16: I see it all the time.
Speaker 8: I'm constantly communicating with different coaches. I mean, an example
Speaker 8: somewhat recently was I won't necessarily name the team, but
Speaker 8: there's a team, a high major team who's going to
Speaker 8: be in the tournament, who basically was kind of having
Speaker 8: a discussion with me throughout the season of identifying their
Speaker 8: best lineups.
Speaker 16: And basically they have a lineup that they was not
Speaker 16: their starting.
Speaker 8: Lineup, but with a lineup that had been very successful
Speaker 8: for them throughout the duration of the season. It's one
Speaker 8: of the best performing lineups in the country and sort
Speaker 8: of out of necessity. They were forced to use that
Speaker 8: lineup starting in a game recently. It was amazing and
Speaker 8: they won the game, and they've decided to stick with
Speaker 8: it and they've had incredible results since. And really a
Speaker 8: lot of that comes down to utilizing the analytics to
Speaker 8: figure out, you know, gaining you know, winning by those
Speaker 8: fine margins and finding ways to have an advantage over
Speaker 8: your opponents through that type of thing. So it's very
Speaker 8: gratifying to see. It's also being talked more and more
Speaker 8: on air, on you know, ESPN broadcasts and things like that,
Speaker 8: so it's it's been super cool. I'm just really, really
Speaker 8: honestly thankful to the Lord that for this opportunity, because
Speaker 8: you know, college basketball has been my whole life, my
Speaker 8: favorite sport, and to see my work having this kind
Speaker 8: of impact is really cool.
Speaker 5: Is that coach does his initials start with T and
Speaker 5: end with LL.
Speaker 16: I'm not going to say, I'm not going to say no.
Speaker 6: I mean, I'm looking at the Arizona page and you know,
Speaker 6: Steve he's got his five man lineup and his fore
Speaker 6: man lineup that you know includes Carter Bryant who never
Speaker 6: never starts, has he has he started maybe once.
Speaker 5: Or two's league twice.
Speaker 6: He's got Jayden, Bradley, Carter, Brian kJ who does the start,
Speaker 6: Caleb and Henry.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so you know, well, what do you think about Aris?
Speaker 3: What do you think about Arizona? Because here in town,
Speaker 3: the world was ending Saturday afternoon. They lose to Houston,
Speaker 3: But no, no shakes, because you know, Houston's a heck
Speaker 3: of a team. They just played really well in Arizona,
Speaker 3: adam on the brink and then they go back and back.
Speaker 16: I do not think, yeah, I do not think people
Speaker 16: realize have come.
Speaker 8: To grips with how good this Houston team is.
Speaker 16: And I think a lot of that was because they
Speaker 16: lost a bunch of really close.
Speaker 8: Games to good teams early in the season and so
Speaker 8: people kind of counted them out. But they are an
Speaker 8: absolute juggernaut. I have them ranked second in the country.
Speaker 16: Actually have them ranked just.
Speaker 8: A tad ahead of Auburn right now in terms of
Speaker 8: how well they're going to do going forward. Now, granted,
Speaker 8: do Houston and Auburn are way ahead of everyone else,
Speaker 8: but but basically Houston winning, you know, on the road
Speaker 8: against Arizona, that's that's not really that big of a deal.
Speaker 8: And for Arizona to follow that up with their win
Speaker 8: last night, you know, pretty comfortably handling Baylor down the
Speaker 8: street in Waco does speak to just the resilience of
Speaker 8: this team. I have Arizona right now tenth in the country,
Speaker 8: so when you look at all the teams in the country,
Speaker 8: I predict them to be in the top ten in
Speaker 8: terms of performance going forward. And I think the thing
Speaker 8: that really sticks out to me is, you know, maybe
Speaker 8: there was a time when this team, the Arizona team,
Speaker 8: relied on Caleb Love. Their identity was around him. But
Speaker 8: now you look at their roster and every single game
Speaker 8: you have someone else kind of being that guy. And
Speaker 8: last night was the case of that. You didn't have
Speaker 8: a single player on this team scoring over fifteen points,
Speaker 8: but you had four of your starters in double digits.
Speaker 8: And you're starting to.
Speaker 16: See, you know, players like Henry Vsar, who you know,
Speaker 16: was just kind of a bit player to.
Speaker 8: Start the year, but because of injuries and things like that,
Speaker 8: he has really blossom to be one of the most
Speaker 8: impactful big men in the country and certainly in the
Speaker 8: Big twelve. And when you can get meaningful minutes out
Speaker 8: of him and Toby lock on the court together. That
Speaker 8: really says something.
Speaker 16: So I love the depth of this team that.
Speaker 8: They don't need to rely on a Caleb Glove or
Speaker 8: a Jaden Bradley to kind of dig them out of
Speaker 8: a hole. And they they've experimented. Tommy Lloyd has had
Speaker 8: enough flexibility to experiment with that starting lineup and with rotations,
Speaker 8: and so I really like the tinkering that they've been doing.
Speaker 8: I think it's positive thing. And I've always been high
Speaker 8: on this team. I know that they had a rough
Speaker 8: start to the year, but my analytics, even at that
Speaker 8: point when they were down in December, still pointed to
Speaker 8: Arizona climbing back into this thing, and that's certainly what
Speaker 8: they've shown down the stretch in big club play.
Speaker 3: I was going to say, I saw you on I
Speaker 3: guess in the X and Twitter yesterday in the day
Speaker 3: before you were really talking about Gonzaga and UCLA, if
Speaker 3: I'm correct, Can you just your thoughts on them and
Speaker 3: Arizona because you talked about the Sweet sixteen that you
Speaker 3: wouldn't be surprised.
Speaker 8: Yeah, yeah, I was specifically highlighting Gunzaga in Kansas.
Speaker 16: Actually as two teams at two teams that basically.
Speaker 8: I'm buying low on compared to where public sentiment is
Speaker 8: on them. Godzag, I think is a little bit more
Speaker 8: straightforward Gonzag It's sort of similar to Houston kind of
Speaker 8: early in the season. They Gonzaga has a lot been
Speaker 8: like zero to seven in all close games against good teams.
Speaker 16: This year, and a lot of times that's not really
Speaker 16: a predictive.
Speaker 8: Stat that will carry forward.
Speaker 16: And in the past Mark Few has been.
Speaker 8: Really great in close games. So I'm not super worried
Speaker 8: about this Gonzaga team. They're blowing out a lot of teams,
Speaker 8: they have one of the best offenses in the country.
Speaker 8: They've made you know, nine consecutive Sweet sixteen, So I
Speaker 8: think when they get into the bracket they're going to
Speaker 8: be a much better team than what they're seed is
Speaker 8: going to indicate. And so I still have a lot
Speaker 8: of faith with them. Kansas, I think is a little
Speaker 8: bit more intriguing because if you survey this Kansas fan base,
Speaker 8: they are all for the most part, completely out on
Speaker 8: this team. They are super disappointed.
Speaker 16: They the transfers hasn't been great.
Speaker 8: Obviously this team.
Speaker 16: Kansas was the number one team.
Speaker 8: In the preseason according to the eight People they're certainly
Speaker 8: miles below that. So yeah, they're not necessarily a national
Speaker 8: title contender. But I still think my analytics have them
Speaker 8: as a top fifteen team in the country. That's still
Speaker 8: a team good enough to make a Sweet sixteen or further.
Speaker 8: And I really think if you sort of, you know,
Speaker 8: bigger scope on the season, I still think roster strength wise,
Speaker 8: the veteran leadership they have on this team, I still
Speaker 8: think they're going to be good. Bill self is still
Speaker 8: a very good coach.
Speaker 16: And so you know, if Kansas suddenly wins two or
Speaker 16: three games in a row, I won't be surprised. But
Speaker 16: if they do that all of a sudden, the public
Speaker 16: sentiment will be back on their side. And so I'm
Speaker 16: just trying to identify these trends a little bit earlier,
Speaker 16: you know, so that people aren't overreacting too much to
Speaker 16: you know, just one single game or two single games.
Speaker 6: You know, it's interesting too with a lot of these
Speaker 6: schools have shifted conferences and stuff like that, but it
Speaker 6: still sort of seems to remain the same. You still
Speaker 6: have an Arizona in the top ten, even go they're
Speaker 6: in a brand new conference. Have you noticed anything, you know,
Speaker 6: with these conference switches affecting college basketball in general.
Speaker 8: Yeah, that's a great point. I think a lot of
Speaker 8: people thought when you have your your Houston's and Arizonas
Speaker 8: and BYUS, especially the Houston BYU coming from we incur
Speaker 8: conferences in the American and the WCC to the Big twelve,
Speaker 8: sort of thinking, hey, like, these teams are really going
Speaker 8: to have a tough time transitioning. And the reality is
Speaker 8: that Houston has been the best team in the Big
Speaker 8: Twelve every single season they've been in the Big Twelve,
Speaker 8: and BYU is more than holding their own in the
Speaker 8: Big Twelve so far. You know, Arizona obviously first season
Speaker 8: of the Big Twelve, and they're clearly in that upper
Speaker 8: echelon top four or five teams in the conference. And
Speaker 8: so yeah, I largely think that the conference changes for
Speaker 8: the most part have not really been you know, affecting
Speaker 8: where the level that these programs are used to being
Speaker 8: for the most part. And you know, I do think
Speaker 8: maybe there are some exceptions. We still have to collect
Speaker 8: more data.
Speaker 16: On how some of these West Coast teams like.
Speaker 8: A UCLA and a USC are performing when they're all
Speaker 8: the way on in the West Coast and they're having
Speaker 8: to travel all the way to the East coast multiple
Speaker 8: times a year. I do think we have to work
Speaker 8: a little bit more to see how that plays out,
Speaker 8: because that travel is certainly a big factor that you know.
Speaker 8: I don't think Arizona has to do the same thing
Speaker 8: because of their you know, closer proximity relatively speaking to
Speaker 8: some other teams in their conference. But yeah, by and large,
Speaker 8: these teams that have been good in weaker conferences have
Speaker 8: still been about as good as they've been in previous years.
Speaker 8: When you look at, you know, the national landscape, and
Speaker 8: that's a good sign because you want these these programs
Speaker 8: to continue to do well.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you have no question.
Speaker 3: I was gonna ask you about the teams that that
Speaker 3: kind of fill off, I'll fill off North Carolina and Indiana.
Speaker 3: Indiana had the best money a team money can buy,
Speaker 3: and look what happened. Ballo was with them in North Carolina,
Speaker 3: which you know is North Carolina. What's up with that?
Speaker 8: Yeah? Man, Honestly, at what it really goes to show
Speaker 8: is that, you know, just having money and throwing it
Speaker 8: at players in the transfer portal does not mean that
Speaker 8: you're going to have a great team.
Speaker 16: It's all about identifying the right fit and not just
Speaker 16: going for the biggest names. You know, you could throw
Speaker 16: Kansas State.
Speaker 8: In here as well. Obviously they've been a bit better recently,
Speaker 8: but they've just lost two games in a row and
Speaker 8: that's kind of mostly crushed their chances of an at
Speaker 8: large bid. And from from what we know, Indiana and
Speaker 8: Kansas State where you know, to the two of the
Speaker 8: teams that.
Speaker 9: Had top five nil war.
Speaker 8: Chest naziason based on kind of publicly you know, publicly
Speaker 8: known numbers about what they were spending. And the reality
Speaker 8: is you can't just throw a bunch of guys you know,
Speaker 8: who are worth a lot in the name, image of
Speaker 8: licen of space on your roster and expected to gel.
Speaker 8: There's there's more that you have to do there, and
Speaker 8: so you know, you look at there's there are other
Speaker 8: teams who have done this much better and have spent
Speaker 8: a fraction of what these teams have spent. So, you know,
Speaker 8: a lot of it really comes back to do you
Speaker 8: have you know, are you a good coach who's able
Speaker 8: to develop the players that you're getting And Tommy Lloyd,
Speaker 8: if we're.
Speaker 16: Talking about coaches who have, you know, they they'll get
Speaker 16: good players.
Speaker 8: From the portal, from the high school ranks, but then
Speaker 8: the way that these guys develop and start to finish
Speaker 8: at a program. Tommy Lloyd at Arizona, you know, in
Speaker 8: his time there has been exceptional.
Speaker 16: In this regard where the guys that he's getting.
Speaker 8: I mean look at it like a you know, Jaden Bradley,
Speaker 8: he was a highly toadded player out of high school,
Speaker 8: did was used pretty sparingly at Alabama his freshman year,
Speaker 8: and then comes to Arizona and is content enough to
Speaker 8: you know, play behind Kylon Boswell, but has slowly been
Speaker 8: groomed into being one of the most consistent, reliable players
Speaker 8: on this team, and he's content to stay there. That
Speaker 8: speaks to the coaching staff number one, being able to
Speaker 8: develop guys you every year and to get them to
Speaker 8: buy in to what their long term future is, you know,
Speaker 8: at Arizona, And I think that's really impressive.
Speaker 3: Do you this might be a dumb question, but when
Speaker 3: you do your analytics and it's just some fantastic self
Speaker 3: because you have a lot of different categories, do coaching
Speaker 3: factor into that? Do you conclude all that with a
Speaker 3: good coach, bad coach, or mediocre coach?
Speaker 16: Yeah?
Speaker 8: I don't explicitly measure that, although I have been working
Speaker 8: behind the scenes on developed and kind of of a
Speaker 8: private coaching metric that could basically tell you how good
Speaker 8: as a coach at using extracting more out of their
Speaker 8: roster than than what's there. But generally speaking, there was
Speaker 8: kind of a hidden variable four teams. When I'm doing
Speaker 8: the preseason rankings of preseason projections.
Speaker 16: For teams that basically looks at essentially how good is
Speaker 16: your roster.
Speaker 8: And then how good has your coaching staff.
Speaker 16: Been at extracting value out of rosters.
Speaker 8: You've had in previous years, and so, you know, an
Speaker 8: example of that might be like in Indiana where I
Speaker 8: think they in the preseason, based on the talent that
Speaker 8: they had, they had a top ten roster in the sport,
Speaker 8: but their actual preseason projection was closer to twentieth.
Speaker 16: Because it was basically identifying that.
Speaker 8: Hey, in previous years, you know, Mike Woods and his
Speaker 8: staff have not done a great job of getting their
Speaker 8: teams to perform up to the level of the talent
Speaker 8: they have on their roster. And a flip, you know
Speaker 8: side of that would be a team like Yukon where
Speaker 8: everyone identified coming into the year, their team was going
Speaker 8: to be roster wise much worse than what they've out
Speaker 8: in previous years.
Speaker 16: But because of Dan Hurley and what his staff.
Speaker 8: Has done, their team gets a little bit more benefit
Speaker 8: of the doubt, and so I had them ranked more
Speaker 8: like in the top ten than if we've just been
Speaker 8: purely going off the roster talent would have been in
Speaker 8: more in the twenties there. So it definitely does take
Speaker 8: that into account.
Speaker 5: It's interesting too, you have coaches.
Speaker 6: Is there any evidence that coaches are looking at your
Speaker 6: ratings as they're making decisions on players they may go
Speaker 6: after in the transfer portal?
Speaker 16: You know, oh, absolutely, yeah, that's that's one of the
Speaker 16: most popular uses.
Speaker 8: For coaches, and really a lot of that has So
Speaker 8: I have a whole transfer portal set of tools where
Speaker 8: it ranks every transfer based on if this player goes
Speaker 8: to any school, what is his projected value next year
Speaker 8: to your team on offense and defense, And it looks at,
Speaker 8: you know, all of the saint information we have available.
Speaker 8: How efficient are you in terms of your stats? How
Speaker 8: is how are you impacting team performance? Adjusting for level competition,
Speaker 8: all that stuff, and it really has become essential for
Speaker 8: many coaches to reference what I'm doing, because, as you
Speaker 8: can understand, in this day and age, you have to
Speaker 8: make evaluations on transfer portal.
Speaker 16: Players very quickly, sometimes within.
Speaker 8: Two weeks or a week or even a couple of
Speaker 8: days to decide, Hey, this guy entered his name in
Speaker 8: the portal, is this someone that we want to pursue.
Speaker 8: And so being able to kind of even just filter
Speaker 8: your list down initially of saying does this guy meet
Speaker 8: the criteria of what we're looking for in terms of
Speaker 8: his skill set, in terms of his overall value, is
Speaker 8: really really beneficial. And so yeah, it's very very popular
Speaker 8: with coaches during during.
Speaker 16: The transfer portal cycle because it's essential to use kind
Speaker 16: of objective data driven tools like mind to kind of
Speaker 16: go along with your own individual scouts of those players
Speaker 16: when you're looking at video and.
Speaker 8: Things like that.
Speaker 5: I love that stuff. Just to me, it's just an
Speaker 5: intriguing thing. Real quick.
Speaker 3: We got about a minute, give me, give me how
Speaker 3: this all started, because I think you're in college getting
Speaker 3: your degree, your master's or something, and then you got
Speaker 3: a job and then this came about.
Speaker 8: Yeah, so I have my PhD in statistics from Baylor,
Speaker 8: and I think the first time I came on the
Speaker 8: show with you guys. Was still while I was in
Speaker 8: Texas and Waco finishing that degree. So I graduated with
Speaker 8: my PhD in twenty two and had already started this
Speaker 8: website kind of as a fun side project where you know,
Speaker 8: I was just working on player and team ratings and
Speaker 8: just because I love college basketball, and that was an
Speaker 8: easy application. But it's just organically grown over the last
Speaker 8: several years and well, you know, as we mentioned, is
Speaker 8: used by tons of coaches and journalists and things like that,
Speaker 8: and so I was able to leave my previous job
Speaker 8: doing consulting for NBA teams to focus full time on
Speaker 8: the college website, which has been.
Speaker 5: Awesome, fantastic. Are you going to go to college football?
Speaker 5: Could you?
Speaker 16: You know, I've been askled by a lot of people
Speaker 16: for that, and my current answer to.
Speaker 10: That is no.
Speaker 8: And I think a lot of that is because I'm
Speaker 8: a fan of college basketball, but I'm not an expert
Speaker 8: on college basketball, and I really do think it's important
Speaker 8: that you don't just throw mass at a sport and
Speaker 8: expect it to spit out accurate results. I really understand
Speaker 8: the spoort of college basketball and really plugged into the
Speaker 8: sport of college basketball, and I think, you know, having
Speaker 8: an expert knowledge of that and then bringing.
Speaker 16: In all of this statistical know how, I think is
Speaker 16: an important.
Speaker 8: Combination in order to be successful in the space. And
Speaker 8: so I'm a little resident retident to just start in
Speaker 8: another sport that I'm not as comfortable in, because I
Speaker 8: do think you have to be very careful and mature
Speaker 8: about your approach with these days, I would.
Speaker 6: Think baseball might be the best comparison. Seems like they're
Speaker 6: always talking about the analytics of baseball. Still baseball topic,
Speaker 6: you know, that could be something that you know, hey,
Speaker 6: we need a you know, a lightening shortstop, or with
Speaker 6: something I don't know throwing it out there.
Speaker 16: So yeah, baseball is definitely the most.
Speaker 8: Advanced for in terms of using analytics for sure.
Speaker 5: So give us your website one more time, one more time.
Speaker 8: Yeah, evanmeia dot com. That's where you can find all
Speaker 8: the stuff player ratings, team ratings, lineups, game predictions, lineup analysis.
Speaker 8: When March Madness comes around, a lot.
Speaker 16: Of stuff will be there on to help your bracket.
Speaker 16: Also links to all of my other social media platforms
Speaker 16: on their Twitter, Instagram, all that stuff, so you can
Speaker 16: find everything at evanmeia dot com, e v A n
Speaker 16: M i ya dot com.
Speaker 5: Great Evan, thanks a bunch as always your great love
Speaker 5: to have you on the show.
Speaker 16: Yeah, I appreciate you guys.
Speaker 5: Thank you taking over with mind Cal Just just cool
Speaker 5: stuff to me, I know, amazing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well go take a break, maybe take a call
Speaker 3: to talk more about this crazy stuff. It's good stuff.
Speaker 2: If you're an.
Speaker 3: Arizona men's basketball fan, you know it's been successful for
Speaker 3: nearly forty years. Now take a look back at the
Speaker 3: Loudolsen era. In my new book, Lessons from Loot, it
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Speaker 3: years as Arizona's beloved coach. Lessons from Lut is an
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Speaker 3: Want one, Email me at Steve dot Rivera ninety five
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Speaker 1: Steve Rivera, He's got his eye on the ball on
Speaker 1: Tucson Sports Station yet Fox Sports fourteenth fifty.
Speaker 3: Hey, welcome back to I in the back here on
Speaker 3: Fox Sports fourteen fifty. I'm Steve Rivera, you're Dave Silvert,
Speaker 3: got Kobe till the end, got about ten minutes, yeap,
Speaker 3: about seven minutes, seven minutes. If you guys want to
Speaker 3: give us a quick call, please do five to two
Speaker 3: zero four one six seventy four forty will take the
Speaker 3: call or two talk about what's going on. I love
Speaker 3: to listen to Eavan. I gotta subscribe to that. It's
Speaker 3: not pretty expensive now, it's fun if you if you're
Speaker 3: really into it, like the analytics and numbers. I don't
Speaker 3: understand half the stuff that's episode, but you need to
Speaker 3: get some free I mean you have the free step up. Yeah,
Speaker 3: go ahead and give me Arizona's ten. You said, what
Speaker 3: else is up on the free site?
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean Arizona's ranked tenth in his UH in
Speaker 5: his rankings.
Speaker 6: And it's interesting because I don't know what what the
Speaker 6: OBPR and the DBPR. Yeah, we got an offensive player,
Speaker 6: defensive whatever. And it's interesting because of the ten players
Speaker 6: that he lists, and they only play really eight. The
Speaker 6: last two are Toby Waka and Trey Townsend.
Speaker 2: On this list.
Speaker 6: I mean, his best players according to these ratings are
Speaker 6: Vassar Bryant kJ Caleb Crevius who doesn't play it's done,
Speaker 6: and then then Bradley and del Orso and Conrad Martinez
Speaker 6: and then Toby and.
Speaker 3: Trey Y and Bradley's what seventh in that group. I
Speaker 3: remember last year when I was the tournament and I
Speaker 3: used him for a story and I gave I asked
Speaker 3: Tommy a question about did you realize that Bradley was
Speaker 3: the like the like, the strawest sturgs and he's the
Speaker 3: most valuable We don't need, we don't need analytics and
Speaker 3: tell us that. But now he's not even this year,
Speaker 3: he's part of it. Okay, we got Hello, you're.
Speaker 5: On the r nine of the ball.
Speaker 7: Who's this?
Speaker 10: Yes, Brian, how's it going, Brian?
Speaker 5: What's the word?
Speaker 10: Well, it was a good game last night.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know what, Brian, let me say this. Can
Speaker 3: I poopoo all over this? Baylor didn't have their best
Speaker 3: big guy. He didn't play at all.
Speaker 10: I know, I know, I know, I know they didn't.
Speaker 8: But you know it's part of the game, the game.
Speaker 5: You're exactly right, Okay, go ahead.
Speaker 10: I mean you know, I mean you look at the
Speaker 10: game we lost with Kansas State. We didn't have Townsend
Speaker 10: lost by two. I mean, you know, he might have
Speaker 10: made a difference in the middle. Who knows. Yeah, but
Speaker 10: you know after you know, you watched last night's game,
Speaker 10: and I was at the Houston game, and Houston's a
Speaker 10: good team. Are they a great team?
Speaker 5: I don't.
Speaker 10: I just don't see it. You know, they're going to
Speaker 10: have a problem if they get stuck with a referee,
Speaker 10: with referees who don't allow that kind of play.
Speaker 8: They're not going to do well at all.
Speaker 10: Yeah, yeah, they you know, I mean, Arizona should have
Speaker 10: won that game, should have could or whatever. It can't
Speaker 10: make a free throw, you know, they lost. You know, announcers,
Speaker 10: you know, they kept on saying, well they lost four
Speaker 10: points on the free throws at the end, Well they
Speaker 10: lost five points on their pre throws because they look,
Speaker 10: they missed the first end of a one and one
Speaker 10: in that game.
Speaker 5: Yep.
Speaker 16: And that last night's game, you know, it was nice
Speaker 16: to see a really nice balanced game by the team.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, what not to poop it again, but
Speaker 3: Baylor is not a good offensive team. They couldn't score
Speaker 3: and they're not and there's nothing the great defense, but
Speaker 3: they but they survived it, you know, right, but they
Speaker 3: went on the road. Yeah, huge, huge deal, I'll give
Speaker 3: you that. Yes, that's a.
Speaker 10: Big that's so big because you know, that just makes
Speaker 10: that makes us look better when it comes to the
Speaker 10: tournament and where they're gonna put it low. Arizona won
Speaker 10: all these games in the conference on the road, which
Speaker 10: will help us out a great deal.
Speaker 3: So, Brian, I know you're realistic. I don't even know
Speaker 3: why you call us because you're too realistic. But but Houston,
Speaker 3: you watch Houston game. You're at the Houston game. They
Speaker 3: played Houston. You know they're up. They just kind of
Speaker 3: lost it at the end. To me, not that it's
Speaker 3: a win, but it's near a damn win because Houston
Speaker 3: is not not an easy team to be anyway.
Speaker 10: No, it's not, you know, it's they're not you know.
Speaker 10: Somehow we have to get ourselves out of the idea
Speaker 10: that when we drive down on that baseline, that for
Speaker 10: some reason we get stuck down there, you know, and
Speaker 10: then all of a sudden there's two guys guarding one guy. Well,
Speaker 10: and you count the baseline two as three guys guarding
Speaker 10: one guy, and we just put ourselves in difficult spots.
Speaker 10: We can't get the ball back out. You know, I
Speaker 10: thought we took ourselves away from working the ball inside
Speaker 10: more than we should. We should because that team, Okay,
Speaker 10: they're physical, we understand that, but they're not big physical. Okay,
Speaker 10: there's tallest guys, what's six ' eight. Well, we got
Speaker 10: a seven footer who's playing some really good ball right now.
Speaker 10: You know, I thought we should have gone more inside.
Speaker 10: I mean, we still couldn't hit a three. Of our
Speaker 10: life depended on it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I do think though, I do you think that
Speaker 3: they're going to try to free up or so more
Speaker 3: for the catch and shoot, you know, because he can
Speaker 3: just get open and shoot.
Speaker 5: Don't even he said that. I think, yes, this morning
Speaker 5: and the last night. Just get open and we get
Speaker 5: to the ball. I don't even think. Just shoot, Yeah,
Speaker 5: just get it and shot.
Speaker 10: As long as as long as he didn't at the dribble,
Speaker 10: we're fine. Yeah, right, Okay, he's he's a terrible ballhander.
Speaker 5: Yeah no. And he's not a good defensively. Yeah.
Speaker 6: If teams are playing zone, he's got to be a factor.
Speaker 6: I mean that's kind of why he's here, is to
Speaker 6: be able to make that shot over the zone.
Speaker 10: So right, right, you know, I thought Love played a
Speaker 10: good game last night and I missed some shots but
Speaker 10: penetrated real well.
Speaker 8: Move the ball around.
Speaker 10: Bradley played better, you know, I thought Theaysart played really well.
Speaker 6: But yeah, I thought maybe the difference lately watch was
Speaker 6: that Caleb wasn't jacking them up near the end like
Speaker 6: in the last maybe six minutes. Every time he had
Speaker 6: the ball. My thought was, just don't don't shoot it
Speaker 6: from there now, you know, bring it inside.
Speaker 5: You know he no can was it?
Speaker 6: You know, just don't don't fire it up from twenty
Speaker 6: five feet now you can drive in and maybe you
Speaker 6: know he's so effective that way too. He's good and
Speaker 6: he's a good passer when he gets in the lane.
Speaker 6: So he has two or three turn was that he
Speaker 6: should never It was just yeah, he know that one
Speaker 6: he had that one segment where he had like a turnover,
Speaker 6: a steal and a turnover like in fifteen seconds.
Speaker 12: It was.
Speaker 10: It was graazy, right, you know, also too of it.
Speaker 10: You know, they had what five games left? I guess
Speaker 10: it is, Yeah, yeah, they have three home and two away.
Speaker 10: Yeah you know I'll take a three and two.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Well you might have to, And it depends on
Speaker 3: the circumstances. But yeah, if they could steal one with
Speaker 3: the big guys, that's even better.
Speaker 8: You know, because you know you was playing better ball too.
Speaker 10: Yeah yeah, yeah, you know they bea Kansas the other night.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they're playing them at Michale, so they have that
Speaker 3: you little right thing for us. Yeah, Brian, thanks, we
Speaker 3: got to go. Appreciate your call. Thanks for listening. Yeah,
Speaker 3: a couple of quick comments. People love the interview with Evan.
Speaker 3: He was just he's the smarter one in the room.
Speaker 3: If you're if you're a college basketball fan, I would
Speaker 3: want to be his friend.
Speaker 5: Yeah. I was just gonnask him.
Speaker 3: I think he do this is by himself, but it
Speaker 3: seems like he had we he said we. I'm sure
Speaker 3: he's How are you going to I don't know, put
Speaker 3: that baby together.
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 3: It'd be fun to watch him in action. You should
Speaker 3: go down and do a story. Yeah, sure, yeah, give
Speaker 3: you the money. I'll go to Baylor. I could have
Speaker 3: done that last week.
Speaker 5: Are we good? We've got no time or we got
Speaker 5: time to break?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Okay, thanks Dave Dune. Yeah, David goes back quickly when
Speaker 3: you have a good show. Thank you Kobe for getting us.
Speaker 5: Through this, and we'll talk to you guys tomorrow with
Speaker 5: more stuff to talk about. Thanks guys,