Seattle Pacific University Game Review

Final Score: UW-77 SPU-60

This will be a much quicker review than usual. UW plays Oregon in football today and tailgating is starting bright and early.

UW showed a lot of potential in last night's exhibition. They showed some good things as well as bad. Our offense is as potent as ever with a lot of scoring options. UW had 14 assists on 28 makes, which is around what our team did last season. Our defense was solid forcing 11 turnovers, 7 steals, and an amazing 10 blocks. SPU gave a valiant effort, but our team was much too quick, athletic, and skilled to overcome. Andy Poling and Jobi Wall each had 12 points for the falcons, but it took them a combined 10-31 to get the points. SPU's biggest key to remaining in the game was the superb job they were doing on the glass. UW managed to out rebound SPU 41-36, but the Falcons were fairly efficient at attacking the glass. The added height of their two 6-10+ players was a definite advantage.

Some quick hitting facts.

Four UW players had 10 or more points, three had 15 or more, and C.J. Wilcox led all players with 19. Wilcox still seemed to struggle offensively despite his high score. He was 5-12 from range, but missed some pretty open shots. This is something he needs to tack down, soon and preferably before any major non-conference game. 5-12 is 42%, a very respectable percentage, but Wilcox could have had another 2 or 3 shots go in without a doubt.

Terrence Ross led all players in rebounding with 8. UW also had 6 rebounds from Desmond Simmons and Tony Wroten Jr. UW only managed 10 offensive boards, a poor number in my opinion. The Dawgs felt the loss of Aziz N'Diaye and Matthew Bryan-Amaning in this instance.

A few thoughts on the players:

Our freshmen are pretty fresh, but some show lots of promise.

Martin Breunig really impressed me. He finished with 8 points on 3-6 shooting and 2-2 from the line (both were AND1's ). What I liked most was his ability to finish through contact. Breunig went strong to the hoop with both hands on lay-ins, which allowed him to finish his shots despite the fouls. Breunig held on solid as Tony Wroten threw him a pass with so much English on it, the Queen could have knighted it. Martin went to the hoop, made the shot, got fouled, and sunk his free throw. The place went nuts.

Tony Wroten Jr. will indeed be one of our top assist and play makers this season. He will also turn the ball over quite a bit. 4 assists and 4 turnovers. Admittedly, 1 or two of his turnovers were simply Tony getting two excited and overplaying the ball. He needs to slow down just a tad and make a bit smarter play. He will be one of my favorite players without a doubt. Wroten picks up where MBA left off getting super amped on big plays, yelling and chest pumping. It's fantastic and I'm glad to see someone is excited to make plays. Wroten also threw a great alley oop pass to Terrence Ross who was throwing down with authority all day.

Kemp has a ways to go before being a defensive threat outside the block. He plunders around a bit. There is a reason Simmons is the second post option. Kemp ran into foul trouble, picking up 4.

Jernard Jerreau had lots of foul trouble himself. He is long and lanky with a lot of room to improve. He only played 11 minutes so I don't have too much an opinion on him.

Hikeem Stewart is going to need to improve to be a legitimate point guard option.

Terrence Ross was monstrous. 6-8 shooting and a vicious transition dunk. After tipping the ball away, Ross chased the ball down, gathered it up, leaps up, jacks his arm all the way back, and slams home a brutal dunk. He was impressive throughout the game and as Romar said preseason, our wings will likely be our better post options. Ross, Wroten, and Simmons all showed the ability to finish inside as well as out.

Brendan Sherrer jumped in for the final two minutes and Alex Wegner got a minute as well. Andrew Andrews only saw 7 minutes of play time in what will be his only game this season.

All in all UW got the job done and won by 17. They had to opportunity to do more, but for a preseason game it wasn't a terrible outing. There is plenty of work to be done, but the fact that our players were able to play solid defense and get some good scoring in points towards a successful season. Our rebounding could use some improvement and Aziz N'Diaye is going to have a huge impact on how the Huskies play and succeed, that much is plainly obvious. People can criticize his offense all they want, but his defensive and rebounding contributions are immensely important. I liked what I saw out there. It was a bit sloppy as expected, but that is actually reassuring in a way. It means our coaches will continue to push our players harder everyday to get them to their full potential.

Go Dawgs!