In my mind, this is a winnable game for the Cougars. Chicago State has beaten several teams already with higher NET ratings. It’s just going to come down to who executes the best.

I don’t know a lot about UTEP, except Coach Golding was quite successful at Abilene Christian before taking on this job. He hasn’t replicated the same level of success so far. I watched them versus NM State, but that’s the only game I’ve actually watched them in.

UTEP is 8-7, 7-2 at home, and has lost their last 2 games. Their NET ranking is 250. Chicago is around 290.
3 of UTEPS’s 8 wins are teams below D1. The teams have only met once before, with Chicago State winning that matchup in El Paso in 2006.

The UTEP preview of the game is an interesting read, as it broadly notes where the Cougars rank nationally in a wide variety of categories. While it’s some interesting information to know, most of it isn’t very flattering. That’s nothing to do with the UTEP write up as they are merely reporting that the Cougars rank over 300 (out of 363 teams) in a high number of team statistics. But they do rank highly on some as well, with steals and turnovers forced, and 3 point defense among the highlights.

https://utepminers.com/news/2024/1/5/men...unday.aspx

For their part, one thing I noticed first is UTEP 3 point shooting is poor-only about 28% for the season. That’s probably about where CSU shoots as well. They score about 75 points a game average, but that is buoyed by a couple 120+ outings against lower level teams. Chicago is averaging 64, so I’d expect a game in the mid to high 60’s for both. Probably no big advantage to either side there as both will likely be comfortable with a similar pace.

UTEP is turning the ball over 14 times a game, which will likely benefit Chicago Stare who is lower than that on the season. I believe the Cougars have had 7 or less turnovers several times this season, and the turnovers have been lower than their average in their more recent games.

The Cougars looked really good against Kansas State and lead for a good part of the game, including almost the entire first half. It was a 5 point game with under a minute, so the Cougars were very much in that game. Offensively, they looked as good as they have all season.

The very next night at Oklahoma State, they came out very tired and flat and immediately got down by 20 points and pretty much sealed their fate early. Although they were down by 25 in the second half, they did go on a run and cut it to 15 with around 7 minutes to go with the ball. They then missed a 3, gave up a couple easy baskets and finished with a 19 point loss.

Chicago should be more rested on the 7th. If they can play as well as they did versus Kansas State they might get a win. Oklahoma States big men were dominant and gave Chicago a lot of problems. But despite that, they did make a run and actually played pretty well for a good part of the game. If they play as well as they did in the second half versus Oklahoma State, they could get a win.

Let’s see who shows up. Cardet will have to play like he did in Manhattan and run the offense better for them to have a shot. Oklahoma State played very good defense on him-the best I’ve seen all season, and held the leading scorer to a season low. He will likely be anxious to have another big night, more like his 30 point outing versus Northwestern. From what I saw, no one for UTEP was defending as well as Oklahoma State guys did.

As good as Cardet is, they have some other solid players that can help free him up. Corbett has his moments, but he’s been pretty good overall for the team. Davis, Crawford, and Neal can all hit the open three when works around to them. Green hasn’t really played much lately, but I’m still a fan of his. He’s the only player with a positive assist to turnover ratio. He has a hard time staying out of foul trouble though.

This one is winnable one if we they play like we know they’re capable of.

(01-06-2024 07:24 PM)joshadam84 Wrote:  As good as Cardet is, they have some other solid players that can help free him up. Corbett has his moments, but he’s been pretty good overall for the team. Davis, Crawford, and Neal can all hit the open three when works around to them. Green hasn’t really played much lately, but I’m still a fan of his. He’s the only player with a positive assist to turnover ratio. He has a hard time staying out of foul trouble though.

This one is winnable one if we they play like we know they’re capable of.

I am a big Ked Green fan as I have stated many times. I just like watching him. I like his style on the court. But he does play a little looser than most coaches would prefer, and as a result gets too many turnovers. He make a lot of slick little plays, and they are fun when it works out, but he can turn it over a lot in the process.

But he moves the ball around so well and just has a good sense of how to get people open. It’s a lot more dynamic of an offense with him on the court for sure.

But those fouls…True, he’s not getting much playing time, but if you play 15 and have already fouled out, the end result is you still aren’t available on court, plus you’ve put the other team in the double bonus for a long time.

I do wonder if there is some personality clash between him and the coach as well.

That was a killer loss. Chicago gave the game away with turnovers. If UTEP hadn’t played pretty badly as well, Chicago would have been blown out. Chicago State definitely did a lot of good things in this game, but with Cardet out and 27 turnovers, it was a surprisingly close game that Chicago could have won until the final seconds. Honestly, if they hadn’t turned it over about 5 times in the last couple of minutes, they would have won.

First, how a team that has been pretty good on managing turnovers had 27 is beyond me. I get that UTEP is defensive minded and typically puts a lot of pressure on the ball, but a large majority of CSU’s were careless ball handing and bad passes. And yes, you could say the UTEP pressure lead to some of those bad passes etc, but not to this extent.

I do think that Cardet doing so much ball handling, with him out, some of the turnovers happened by other guys having the ball a lot more and not being used to that. And that’s another problem of being too dependent on one guy. Even though the offense probably even runs better without him, these types of problems pop up now in a winnable road game, instead of being worked out earlier in the season.

Jahsean and Nobel Crawford played good games. But honestly, they had their share of turnovers. Crawford missed 2 jams that should have been made.

I still cringe every time I see Jean Charles handling the ball because he doesn’t have good instincts at all. He belongs in the paint more, not out front. He doesn’t have a guard instincts or skills. He can defend and rebound OK, but I was prefer him to not have the ball on offense too much. He’s really good, physically, in a lot of ways, but his turnovers drive me nuts. Not even the amount, but they just look like such boneheaded moves usually.

I am sure neither coach was very happy with the level of play in this game. It was sloppy and careless all around.