The win over Milwaukee was nice but I'm still a little worried about this team going into the final four MAC games. Milwaukee is a bit banged up and while I think, in our house, we beat them healthy or not the win may have looked more convincing because of those injuries.
I am really hoping that this is not going to be another 'skid into Cleveland'. We saw it last year, and the year before that. The Bulls start out conference play hot get noticed and then suddenly shut down. They were easily on pace for 20 wins this season before an awful final play led to a one point loss against the Cardinals.The Bulls have not been the same since.
They punted away a game at EMU (The refs did not help but you have to play with the refs they give you) and they managed to let Ohio get a little revenge by choking away a pretty sizable lead against in the second half. If I did not know any better, some might argue that I don't, I would say the other teams in the conference have figured us out.
It's pretty safe to say that Coach Witherspoon is safe, and rightfully so. It's pretty painful having never won the MAC, especially after coming so close on more than one occasion, but by every other measure Spoon has done a superb job. He has taken this team from probation to the championship game twice. He has outright won the MACC regular season once, and shared it once.
His record over the past three years is 55-33(.625) and while we are all disappointed that UB is not leading the conference this season they were picked last in the MAC in the preseason polls.
If the Bulls sweep their final four, which will in and of itself be a major task, and get a bit of help.Coach Witherspoon can win, or share, his third regular MAC title in the past decade. It all starts this week against Kent.
The Flashes are smarting after their defeat at the hands of Drexel, their second consecutive loss. Before the Drexel game Miami did the entire conference a favor by taking out Kent to put themselves, and the Flahses, just two games ahead of Buffalo, Akron, and Bowling Green.
The last time these two teams played the Bulls destroyed Kent. The defense held the flashes to just 35 percent shooting and Mulkey put up 27 points. Even with Filzen riding a hot streak the Bulls are going to need Mulkey to step back up, his shooting has been off lately and that has had a huge hand in our recent skid.
On paper this is a game that the Bulls should win. They seem to do everything better than Kent save holding onto the Ball and the Flashes are in the mist of a huge skid right now, one which seems to match that of the Bulls.
UB Needs Byron Mulkey to step up. He has been the missing man over the past several games. Don't look at the points in his stat line look at his shooting percentages.
He is shooting under forty percent in his last three games. Aside from a lights out performance against CMU its been three weeks since he's shot over 50% from the floor. Filzen has done his part trying to carry the team but Mulkey is they guy that has to ride if we have a shot in cleveland.
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