Saturday, March 1, 2014

Bakersfield: Three keys and a prediction

There is still something to play for New Mexico State.

I think if the Aggies win, shorthanded after the suspension of KC Ross-Miller and Renaldo Dixon, and coming off of Thursday night's brawl in Utah, it would say something of the toughness of this team.

But I don't see it happening.

Bakersfield lost by 3 this year at NMSU and Bakersfield has been a tough place for the Aggies in recent years.

Bakersfield beats a reeling NMSU team 68-63

Stay out of foul trouble: Everyone plays tonight. All seven of them. Ian Baker couldn't make the trip west from family in Washington D.C. making the guard rotation Daniel Mullings, DK Eldridge, Kevin Aronis, Travon Landry, Matej Buovac. Inside they have Sim Bhullar and Chili Nephawe. We know that Nephawe can play 40 minutes if need be. But Bhullar won't make it without some help, maybe from Buovac and even Eldridge if the Aggies want to play small for stretches. Needless to say, foul trouble for either big man would be tough to recover from.

Ball security: Kevin Aronis will start for Ross-Miller and Daniel Mullings will start at point guard. Mullings has been up and down at PG this year as the Aggies want to give him time there, but Bakersfield could be the type of team to give him trouble. Bakersfield can pressure full court and that seems to be when Mullings turns it over, in traffic. Freshman Travon Landry did some nice things against Utah Valley. NMSU will need everyone to take care of the ball after 14 turnovers the first game against Bakersfield.

Rebound/3 point D: I expect NMSU to play a lot of zone to both keep the big guys fresh and everyone out of trouble. But playing zone leaves teams open to giving up offensive rebounds and giving up 3 point looks. Bakersfield was  even with the Aggies on the boards in the first game with 14 offensive rebounds and Bakersfield made 6 3s.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Jason, fair objective analysis, I was figuring we would win by 20 or lose by 20. Damn glad it was the latter. Way to keep em together Menz, and way to rally team.

Anonymous said...

DUH !You beat Bakersfield for god sake. Most sports fans in this country don't even know that Baskersfield has a college let alone even care.

Anonymous said...

Anon 11:04,

The Bakersfield response to the UVA basketball debacle and subsequent riot made me proud, it is true.

Alan

Anonymous said...

I'm also glad the Aggies won as they showed some resilience and mental toughness. I would like 2 make 2 other points. I'm a little surprised and disappointed in how many bloggers reacted to his mistake. It was a terrible mistake in the heat of the moment and he was disciplined. Some of the comments made about him and his character were, in my opinion, extreme and out of line. The second point is to address the so called demise of the proud Aggie basketball tradition. NMSU was an elite basketball program in the late 60s and early 70s under Coach Henson. He is the only coach that has ever taken an Aggie team past the first round in the NCAAs( I will get to McCarthy in a little bit). Folks that was close to 45 years ago. Since then we have been an average to below average program. From 1975 to 1988, with the exception of 1 year, we had no NCAA or NIT appearances. This was in the MVC and Sun Belt. We did finished tied for 1st one year but we were mostly a 2 - 5th place finisher and had little or no success in the conf. tourneys. Then we got to the McCarthy era and we were so successful and Pan Am was filled, we went to the sweet 16. Check that, the NCAA vacated all those appearances because we had a coaching staff that focused more on winning at all costs rather than academics and an institution that chose to ignore the problem and NMSU was put on a 4 year probation. Coach Henson came back at $1 a year and he was also impacted by McCarthy because the NCAA took 19 wins away from him the first year back because of the previous administration. That leads us to the current NMSU. Theus started us back and Menzies has established a good program with good kids. Am I frustrated by some of the results? Yes but I don't think the answer is firing him. Why fire the most successful coach at the university? If you're going to do that, why not fire every coach and the AD and start all over? NMSU has a lot of problems becoming a viable athletic program. Until the football program becomes a larger revenue producer and starts winning games NMSU is hamstrung. In the mean time, I'll ride the roller coaster of NMSU basketball because I'm an Aggie fan and have seen what has happened in the past.

Anonymous said...

3:40, Well argued....and I am with you for the most part....I think it is extreme to vilify Ross-Miller for his momentary hotheadedness. There is no place for that kind of sore losery but it doesn't make him a bad guy. Just a guy needing a life lesson....hopefully one learned here!

I don't think MM is a successful as you suggest....the record is fool's gold in a different way than McCarthy's accomplishment was fool's gold...for the latter it was because of his ethical latitude shall we say toward's academics and for MM it is situational having nothing to do with him....

The problem is the competition we face or lack of it....

What I would like to see as a true first step is either getting out of the WAC....this is about 2-3 years late in the coming at this point! You just can't know how good or not good the MM Ags are until we have in-conference competition that is at least as good as Sun Belt if not Early WAC, Late Big West, etc...

So I see it.

Alan

Anonymous said...

Thank You Anon 3:40, for being factually accurate, for being timely and for being objective. The Henson years round one were magical, Lou Henson's story is ever as amazing as the Bear's in those early years. His sacrifice and savior in the recent years are very much appreciated by all Aggie fans. I am unfortunately saddened by your McCarthy years comments. They are factual and accurate, but man they hurt, because we ALL in Aggie-land including the ney-sayers were all on board during that magical run. But yes, you are right. I miss those guys but rules are rules. The current version of the Aggies have had few academic casualties, a few delayed eligibility players but pretty damn good success. The WAC Menzies came into were conquered by MM and Co., the current version of the WAC is watered down and evolving, but hey its what we got right now, we expect to win it in the tourney.

Crazy Canuck said...

Really guys there's no place for what Ross-Miller did on the court that night. Totally undisciplined and unsportsmanlike if I were coaching he would ride the pine the rest of the season. This kind of reminds me of the Watson incident last year what did Menzies do he played him anyway great character coach and your players reflect it on the court.

Anonymous said...

The NMSU situation now is less than ideal (agreed amongst most Aggie Alumni), but the script is right on course for the post season. Place second or third in the WAC.....get it together for a three game stretch in the tourney, and have a chance to use our height and athleticism to manufacture a possible win in the dance. We have a formidable and skilled Nephawe down low, Mullings as a drive and finisher or a drive and disher....DK as a wildcard, and a giant who doesn't play close tohis potential. Imagine Iif Sim sprinted up and down the court with a purpose, and aggressively demanded the ball in the post......if so, he would be the super power that God created him to be. The one thing we don't have is a Billy Keys, Sam Crawford, or Laroche to run the show.......or Randy Brown, James Moore, or Jonathan Gibson or Elijah Ingram to take over a game, but I am looking forward to the new Ross-Miller with a serious chip on his shoulder come tournament time. It's all good. Thanks for the blog spot Jason. GO Aggies!

Anonymous said...

Jason,
Your "Sleeping Giant" article is very timely and very appropriate at this time of the season. I also believed we were going to lose 2 possibly 3 games over the course of the conference schedule. Granted I didn't expect to lose to the teams we've lost to, but hey that's why we play the games on the court and not on paper. The Aggs seem to either win the game in the first 5 minutes or literally play to the level of the competition, (i.e. Seattle and UNM) Maybe the competitive games will help the Aggs when they have to play up in terms of competitiveness. Thanks for the wake-up reminder, hopefully the Aggs take the challenge here through the home stretch.

Anonymous said...

Jason you are very spot on in this blog, my coworkers and i agree very much with all you say all the time