Paradise Lost

First thing's first, a recap of the action in Puerto Rico almost 72 hours after it ended is weak. I grant you that, and I apologize. Full refunds for all of our readers. But sometimes in life you find yourself with the following dilemma: Stay out until 6:00 AM drinking, gambling, and who knows what else in a city you know nothing about and will likely never be in again OR go back to the hotel room and blog up a storm. When I found myself drunk as a skunk and searching for a cab in a dangerous looking part of San Juan as the sun was starting to come up Monday morning, I could tell I'd made the right choice.

I was trying to think of who or what to blame for UD's 1-2 record in Puerto Rico, and I could find only one culprit: AC/DC. Confused? Well it's all too obvious if you think about it, my young friends. See, you probably noticed that games in this tournament were on Thursday, Friday, and Sunday. No Saturday games? What gives? The reason for no Saturday games was that the Coliseo Puerto Rico had been booked for a concert by none other than AC/DC. On the surface, this seemed great because it gave the fans on the trip an extra day of vacation. But I now firmly believe AC/DC cost the Flyers a W against K-State.

In the first half of the KSU game, UD put on one of the all-time lackluster performances I've seen in my time following the team. It looked like a team on vacation ... one which had been enjoying a little fun in the sun, playing blackjack in the hotel casino, visiting Mickey Perry's mom, or even was already on Thanksgiving break. The Flyers did what they've done in three out of four games now and dug themsleves an early hole (trailing by as much as 15 at one point). Only against Creighton were the Flyers able to come back and get a win.

It looked to me like Villanova was just a better team than UD. Though I don't think Dayton matched up particularly well with KSU, I'm not sold that the Wildcats are the better squad. I think if this game is played on Saturday with a focused Flyers team, the outcome might be a little different.

As far as the games go, the free throw and outside shooting were abysmal. How a team of scholarship Division I athletes cannot make two out of three free throws on a consistent basis is still beyond me. 104 of UD's 232 field goal attempts have been threes; opponents of the Flyers have taken 64 in 214 attempts. And UD is the team that CAN'T shoot. I wish it had taken ten games to get to 104 3-pointers attempted.

Does Dayton practice its offensive sets against a live defense? Obviously I'm not the first person to ask the question, but I'm actually serious. How many lazy, telegraphed passes did this team throw over the weekend? Those who watched the games on TV, could you tell where every dribble/pass was going before it happened like we could in the gym? It's one thing to have turnovers; they're inevitable. It's another thing to watch a team full of upperclassmen lob lazy pass after lazy pass and watch those TO's turn into dunks and lay-ups on the other end.

Not sure about you, but I envision a practice where the Flyers run plays against no defense for a half hour scoring bucket after uncontested bucket. Then they break out into two groups. One of the groups has a dunk contest (in lieu of practicing free throws) while the other group is just Luke Fab on the other end of the floor bombing 30-footers while the walk-ons chase down his rebounds.

K-State's guards got absolutely worked by Ole Miss on Friday. I think Pullen and Clemente had something to prove on Sunday and they took it out on the Flyers.

At halftime of the game, the braintrust from the Puerto Rico Tip-Off was charged to select two fans to shoot against one another in a free throw contest. They picked the loudest and most obnoxious-looking fan from each team's representation. Naturally, Tim was chosen. He went out on the court and proved he was a true Flyer by missing two free throws. The Wildcat fan, who looked like he was barely sober enough to stand, followed suit so I suppose the contest ended in a draw.

K-State's students represented hard. I have never felt better about a possibly crushing loss than I did about 15 minutes after the end of that game. Those dudes came to P.R. to party and accomplished their goal. I know it means absolutely nothing, but they made four dudes from Ohio into KSU fans - and not just because it'll help the Flyers in the RPI.

Not going out on a huge limb when I say the Flyers get healthy with a blowout win over Towson. But did you ever think the Miami game would be this important? A loss there would drop UD to 3-3 and possbily cripple its chances for at-large bid come March. Welcome to fandom of a mid-major team with a razor thin margin for error. I have a feeling the roller coaster ride that will be the 2009-'10 season has only just begun.