End of my “Road warrior” hopes

So that was all kinds of awful...

EMU is not as bad as their record coming in, but they were bad and if UB was a mid tier MAC team they would have won that game last night.

You have a lead, all the momentum, and you got Boubacar Toure to foul out with a ton of time left in the game. There is no reason UB should not have pulled away and come back to Alumni as the road warriors I believed them to be.

Well no reason other than lazy defense, poor shooting, and poor ball control.

We can go into the house of one of the MACs best schools and beat them on their home court in front of a huge crowd. We can also limp into a completely empty area, play one of the worst teams in the conference, and get humiliated.

Yes, we were humiliated.

When one of your best players is subjected to “hack a shaq” because they can’t shoot free throws, that’s humiliating.

When you turn the ball over three times late in a close game, that’s humiliating.

When the opposing team runs around your “big man” in the paint like he’s standing still, that’s humiliating.

UB needs to feel humiliated, maybe they need it to light a spark and play like they are a hungry team that has to earn wins, rather than just show up like last year.

The question is who can step up to fill the Wes Clark / CJ Buckets role of slowing things down with smart play in those moments when the tide turns against Buffalo. Because right now, we don’t have that.

We have “quicksand”

The last two minutes of that game was pure and total quicksand.

You try to fight back, but the harder you fight, the deeper you sink. Until you can’t move... you can’t breathe... because you’re in over your head. — Shane Falco, The Replacements.

And it’s not the first time UB gets that deer in the headlights look in the closing minutes of a game. It’s cost us at least three conference games this season.

There is NO leadership on the court, and a lack of emotion at times when things are not going our way.

The bench is quick to get up and into the game when a big shot falls, or Josh Mballa swats a shot away. But that’s easy... What’s hard is finding that player who’s going to rally the team around them.

We have the talent to be better than this... And the “Chemistry takes time” excuse only works if things are getting better.

They. Are. Not.

Losers of two straight games is 6th in the conference and still have road games at Kent and Bowling Green left, they have a home game against Akron (who will be spoiling for revenge).

I don’t see UB getting into the top four this year, which means a campus round game, probably at home, then onto Cleveland (if we can win in Alumni). We are not good enough to blow anyone in the MAC out and have proven to be pretty ineffective in close games.

This, my fellow fans, looks to be a disappointing rebuilding year.

Hopefully Whitesell and the players prove me wrong