We’ve had two more games since my last post. The first one, we led until just a few minutes left in the game, when our team basically just ran out of gas and couldn’t convert on offense. It was a very frustrating game because we outplayed the other team, but they had a big size advantage and the refs allowed them to beat up on us throughout the game. In the end, they simply wore us down and ended up winning by three (we’d led by as many as 12 in the second half).
This week, we got our second win and it felt pretty good. As with most of our games this year, we jumped out to an early lead by playing efficient offense and very good man defense. We didn’t score many points–30 on the game–but we only gave up 20 points total, eight in the first half. Personally, I had a good game on the “intangible” level, but I only scored two points. I was very tired before the game and I never really had my legs under me. I took a few three-pointers, but it didn’t take me long to realize it was going to be tough to hit them since I was so flat. I started head-faking a lot and that allowed me to dribble-penetrate into the paint and get easy looks from close-range or dish out to an open teammate. I typically chose to pass because I wasn’t having much luck with the inside shots. My only points came on a head-fake where I drove all the way to the hoop and laid it in. It took me too long to realize that I should’ve been dribbling one more time and going for a lay-up rather than pulling up to shoot. Their 2-3 zone was soft in the middle and I wasn’t taking as much as I could from it.
Anyway, we got a win and we’re up to 2-4. We can still finish the season ranked third and get a decent seed in the playoffs if we win out.