samford +8-: i put this play in early when i saw early action push the line down a half point, but i admit there are a lot of moving parts here. we just faded samford sunday afternoon, after seeing a samford that was floundering early in the season headed back to a motivated old rival in jacksonville. the result was an easy win as jacksonville pounded the bulldogs by 31 as 8- point favorites. i watched some video of the game and samford played about as flat as they could play, expending very little effort on defense or getting up and down the court.
a little sidebar on why samford is floundering is called for at this point. at the end of last season, samford closed well in the season and socon conference tournament, going on to postseason play for the first time in years. with virtually everyone back this year, they were picked in the preseason polls to compete for the conference title. the two games into the season they lost wyatt walker, their 6'9" 240lb center picked preseason all socon, to an "undisclosed injury". its kinda weird - the lsu game he's the leading scorer, next game he's missing. no press release, no word except that he's out indefinitely. samford has been kind of a clusterfuck since as they regroup and retool to playing without walker.
now, on to memphis. samford is coached by scott padgett. being the dinosaur that i am, i remember padgett as a kentucky all-american on the '98 national championship team who went on to be a first round draft pick. he's been a recruiting machine at samford and is largely responsible for bringing the bulldogs back into the socon conversation. padgett's coach on that championship team - tubby smith, the current memphis coach. suddenly, it's starting to look like padgett has this game circled on his calender. it would certainly explain the walk-through in jacksonville. is padgett planning on going uptempo on the road against tubby's plodding memphis team, because don't mistake this tiger team for one of their fast breaking teams of former years. also, this is the tigers' 3rd game in 6 days. their last game was a double overtime win over mercer saturday (the day before samford's jacksonville game). if i was planning on running in memphis, this would seem like the time to do it. with clemson the 3rd game of samford's road trip, either they bring it tonight or face heading back to birmingham with 3 routs in a row to chew on.
note that samford and mercer began this season as equals among those who know the southern conference. now mercer is #95 {pomeroy}, samford is #234. walker is a stud, but his loss doesn't account for that differential. samford was catching 8- vs #110 jacksonville st; same number here vs #154 memphis. memphis laid 2 points vs mercer.
note i consider this a high risk play given all the intangibles, its' just how i like to handicap with the minor conferences that i follow.
glta
a little sidebar on why samford is floundering is called for at this point. at the end of last season, samford closed well in the season and socon conference tournament, going on to postseason play for the first time in years. with virtually everyone back this year, they were picked in the preseason polls to compete for the conference title. the two games into the season they lost wyatt walker, their 6'9" 240lb center picked preseason all socon, to an "undisclosed injury". its kinda weird - the lsu game he's the leading scorer, next game he's missing. no press release, no word except that he's out indefinitely. samford has been kind of a clusterfuck since as they regroup and retool to playing without walker.
now, on to memphis. samford is coached by scott padgett. being the dinosaur that i am, i remember padgett as a kentucky all-american on the '98 national championship team who went on to be a first round draft pick. he's been a recruiting machine at samford and is largely responsible for bringing the bulldogs back into the socon conversation. padgett's coach on that championship team - tubby smith, the current memphis coach. suddenly, it's starting to look like padgett has this game circled on his calender. it would certainly explain the walk-through in jacksonville. is padgett planning on going uptempo on the road against tubby's plodding memphis team, because don't mistake this tiger team for one of their fast breaking teams of former years. also, this is the tigers' 3rd game in 6 days. their last game was a double overtime win over mercer saturday (the day before samford's jacksonville game). if i was planning on running in memphis, this would seem like the time to do it. with clemson the 3rd game of samford's road trip, either they bring it tonight or face heading back to birmingham with 3 routs in a row to chew on.
note that samford and mercer began this season as equals among those who know the southern conference. now mercer is #95 {pomeroy}, samford is #234. walker is a stud, but his loss doesn't account for that differential. samford was catching 8- vs #110 jacksonville st; same number here vs #154 memphis. memphis laid 2 points vs mercer.
note i consider this a high risk play given all the intangibles, its' just how i like to handicap with the minor conferences that i follow.
glta
