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after clay geting blew out the pas couple of years how do u feel this one will play out? will clay come out one the winning side or will northwest?

I am not sure what NW has besides Crabtree. Clay will double up on him and it will be up to the rest of the NW players to step up. It will depend on how Crabtree handles the pressure. I think Clay might have too many weapons this year and will be hard to shut down. They will have 4 boys scoring double digits on average every game. I look for Clay to take this one by about 8 or 10 points.

I will take Northwest by 5.

at clay or at NW ? I'd say the home team wins whichever way.

I'll take Clay by 2

Clay by 3 in OT. Bussler hits a three to win.

I am taking the SOC1 in this one.

@ NW. Im takin NW.

I say clay should win this one the fact are that NorthWest lost alot of scoring in leslie and the other crabtree boy along with their pg last year hall and Clay is also returning 4 out of 5 starters from last season.

On the seops pickem page I counted about 26 of 30 going with Clay. I hope they don't let us all down.

Northwest lost alot, however, they have 1 returning starter(Crabtree), their 6'th man from last year(Blankenship), another returner who played numerous minutes in varsity(Brown) and another player who played some quality minutes as well(Miller). Northwest also has 2 guards who probably have the best strokes in the league in Blankenship and Miller. I'll take NW 65-52

Even if Northwest is down a little bit they are still a Divison 2 (most years) school playing against a pretty small Division 4 school. Should be a good game and would be a nice win for Clay on the road. I wouldnt bet the farm on Clay winning at Northwest.

Northwest 48
Clay 40

Northwest won every quarter, by 3, 2, 1 and 2 points. Very physical game with very loose foul calls. Clay had every chance to come back and win this game but only shot 15 for 54 from the field and 2 for 12 from the three, and that won't win you many games. NW wasn't much better with 18 of 47 from the field and 1 for 9 from the three. The most telling stat was even with Clay's height advantage they got outrebounded 31 to 41.
On the plus side for Clay, they only had 8 turnovers and they shot 8 for 10 from the foul line.
I was puzzled why Clay chose to foul NW in the last minute, and then come down and drive the lane for a layup when they were down 9 points. They really needed to hit a couple of threes to get into the game, but only attempted one in the last minute. It's hard to come back only picking up one point at a time. NW didn't shoot well from the charity stripe but did manage to hit at least one each trip at the end of the game.

Good job Mohawks. I was wrong again....lol

If Clays big men don't get more physical under the basket and learn to use their big bodies to box out they are going to get out rebounded by smaller teams all year. Both are big kids, but are slow and not very athletic. I think Clay might be better off using 5 guards at once and running the ball up and down the court.

I was impressed by Clay tonight even though their shooting percentage was low and only lost to a much bigger school by 8 points. Clay should do really well in their SOC. Congrats to NW on the win.

Burg_Grad_77 wrote:If Clays big men don't get more physical under the basket and learn to use their big bodies to box out they are going to get out rebounded by smaller teams all year. Both are big kids, but are slow and not very athletic. I think Clay might be better off using 5 guards at once and running the ball up and down the court.

The guards didnt do their job keeping Luke Brown off the boards, Graham and Porter kept Crabtree off the boards, Luke Brown probably had 12 offensive boards last night and neither Graham or Porter was matched up with him all night, they both also kept Crabtree from rackin up the points, THe big men are doing their job, but nobody else blocks out how can you expect them to get a rebound 2 on 5 or 1 on 5?

It's only the first game of the season and it was against a DIV2 team, so don't get into the blame game. No one on Clay really did "their job" last night. Two starting guards on the bench first four minutes didn't help. (Show up early, not "on time"). Shot selection was bad for everyone. Way to many forced shots and players trying to do too much. It was evident early they weren't going to call fouls, so you can't force up shots hoping for the calls. Nobody boxed out very well and the taller team got outrebounded 41 to 31. The game will be replayed on Channel 24 tonight at 7pm. I suggest everyone sit down and watch then and ask yourself what could "I" have done better, and then work on that in your next game. Go to http://www.watchthezone.com to see this years schedule and times.

Livin LRG wrote:

Burg_Grad_77 wrote:If Clays big men don't get more physical under the basket and learn to use their big bodies to box out they are going to get out rebounded by smaller teams all year. Both are big kids, but are slow and not very athletic. I think Clay might be better off using 5 guards at once and running the ball up and down the court.

The guards didnt do their job keeping Luke Brown off the boards, Graham and Porter kept Crabtree off the boards, Luke Brown probably had 12 offensive boards last night and neither Graham or Porter was matched up with him all night, they both also kept Crabtree from rackin up the points, THe big men are doing their job, but nobody else blocks out how can you expect them to get a rebound 2 on 5 or 1 on 5?

I have to disagree with you. The big guys need to box out so the guards can sneak in and get a rebound, not the other way around. I have watched these kids since they were freshman and the big boys just aren't any stronger or more physical now than they were then. As big as the Graham boy is if he had worked on his strentgh in the off season he would be a force underneath the basket, but instead he gets out muscled and out hustled by smaller kids and pushed around under the basket. I partly blame the coaches for that for not getting him on weight program to increase his strentgh, agility, and mobility.

As for them keeping Crabtree from racking up the point, I believe the radio said he had a double/double with 12 points and 10 rebounds, so they didn't keep him off the boards. They can improve, but only if they want to and from what I've seen in the past 4 years evidently they don't.

But i do think Luke Brown was an x-factor in the game with all the boards he had on the offensive game but alot of it was he out hustled the clay guards and just wanted the ball more then they did