Sports
The Collegian: 4 It’s been almost a year since the man formerly known as Jesse Keipp left his nest under Reynolds Student section, and in that time there has been no more Bleacher Creature. Now, 321 days later, the rumors have started of a new contender for the title, leaving me with one question:
Is Justin Guglielmetti…
the
bleacher creature?
Curry needs a new tagline: “Whoa” Do you remember when “The Matrix” first came out and a bunch of conspiracy theorists began saying that the Matrix was real and the movie was just the filmmakers way of letting everyone know about it? I mean, I was three when it came out so I have no idea if this happened, but it seems like something that would. Anyway, I’m sure those people are having a field day with Stephen Curry this season, especially after his showdown with the Thunder last week where he hit twelve three pointers including a 35 foot game winner with a timeout left! Who does that?? Is there any other explanation besides this world being a computer simulation and Steph being the One? I’ve heard it said that he’s playing like a character in a video game with their skill sliders maxed out to 100 but even that doesn’t begin to describe his greatness; plug in NBA 2K16 and see if you can hit 67-percent of your shots from 28 feet out (yes that’s a real statistic). You can’t do it! I just hope that for the sake of basketball Curry finishes out his incredible career before moving on to our machine overlords. Get more out of baseball this year It’s March, the weather is beginning to warm up, and everywhere you look Spring Fever is in the air. You know what that means...it’s almost fantasy baseball season! In addition to, you know, actual baseball. I know, I know, fantasy baseball isn’t as popular as it’s football counterpart, but that doesn’t mean it’s not awesome! In some ways I think it can actually be a lot more fun because of how much more analytical and strategy-based it tends to be. You know that one guy who always autodrafts his team and ends up with Aaron Rodgers, Antonio Brown, and Rob Gronkowski? Yeah, there’s none of that nonsense in fantasy baseball, the most skilled players (i.e. me) tend to win out in the end. And that sense of accomplishment when you emerge victorious over the grueling and mentally exhausting 162-game schedule is just so much more satisfying than a fantasy football win, trust me. This year, if you feel like finally hopping on the bandwagon and playing the Cadillac of fantasy sports, I would recommend proven offensive performers like Mike Trout, Paul Goldschmidt, and Bryce Harper early on and leaving the pitching and “breakout stars” to the sorry saps who don’t know what they’re doing. Unless you are in my league, in which case do the exact opposite. We take the NBA’s players for granted A hush fell over the crowd as Lin Jingyuan, college student and aspiring professional basketball player, took the ball at halfcourt in the Chinese Basketball Association’s annual dunk contest. Before him, five men stood in the lane forming a tight line over which Lin would presumably jump. He started his run and thousands of spectators braced themselves to witness something utterly spectacular. What happened was... well...it wasn’t spectacular but at least it was memorable! Lin failed to clear the first man in the line, flying crotch first into the back of the poor guy’s head and desperately flinging the ball towards the hoop as he collapsed in a heap to the court.
Tulsa wins on senior day
After a crushing loss to Memphis that hurt their tournament chances, Tulsa responded with a 10-point win over USF on senior day to earn the third seed in the tournament.
AAC Tournament preview
The Golden Hurricane are the third seed in the conference tournament. We preview the path they will have to take to win the AAC. Joseph Edmunds Student Writer
After finishing off the regular season with a win over USF on Senior Night last Saturday, the Golden Hurricane men’s team were fourth in the conference standings. However due to SMU’s postseason ban for this season, they will take the third seed in the conference tournament next weekend. Before they begin the play in the tournament, we will preview the potential games and teams that they will face in order to win the Conference Championship and the automatic berth to the NCAA tournament. The Golden Hurricane will most likely need to make it to the championship game in order to earn an at-large bid at this point. The good news is that there is no team in the tournament that TU hasn’t beaten, but on the flip side they did not complete the series sweep of anyone in the top six seeds. After earning a bye for the first day of the tournament, the Golden Hurricane’s first game will be against Memphis (16–14, 7–10 AAC), to whom they lost last week on the road. The biggest part in the loss was the foul trouble that the Hurricane ran into, combined with injuries. They were called for 25 fouls throughout the game, and when D’Andre Wright and Brandon Swannegan ran into trouble, they had to run five guards because Rashad Smith was still recovering from injury. After that game Head Coach Frank Haith said “We played five guards and it made it hard for us. I thought our guards fought like crazy to even give us a chance. I applaud our guards’ effort in terms of competing and fighting against a much bigger and longer and athletic team.” That’s the biggest advantage Memphis will have in the game, as well as any other teams Tulsa ends up playing—size. While Tulsa has one of the smaller teams in the
Now compare that with the NBA’s slam dunk contest from All-Star Weekend in which we witnessed windmills from the free throw line and an under the legs dunk that would have looked at home in a high jumping competition. It sure is great to be a basketball fan in America.
conference, that hasn’t stopped them from winning games, and shouldn’t change the way they play in the postseason. The other thing the Golden Hurricane will need to focus on in this rematch against Memphis is containing forwards Shaq Goodwin and Dedric Lawson who put up 28 and 27 points, respectively in their last meeting. If they win that game they will most likely face Houston, the second seed of the tournament, in the semifinals. Houston (22–8, 12–6 AAC) and TU split their home games, with Houston winning 81–66 and Tulsa winning a week-and-a-half later 77–63. The biggest struggle the Golden Hurricane had in their loss was shooting only 33-percent from the field, and just 12-percent from beyond the three-point line. In the rematch junior Pat Birt went off tying his then careerhigh 27 points. After the win Haith said, “We were good
important thing and our ability to limit them to one shot and push back. Our guys were fighting like crazy, and we were very conscious in finding guys, locating guys and pushing back.” So while the loss of Smith hurt the Golden Hurricane in their games against Temple and Memphis, TU shouldn’t worry too much because Smith returned to the lineup off the bench in the win over USF last weekend. Cincinnati (21–9, 11–6 AAC) beat the Hurricane handily 76–57 in Cincy, but the Golden Hurricane responded with a 70–68 OT win at the Reynolds Center. After the loss Haith said “They physically whipped us. They were just more aggressive and played with great toughness. They set the tone early in the game the way they competed and how hard they went at it on both ends of the court. I think they were really aggressive on the offensive end how
“There’s not a single team in the American they can’t beat” on both ends of the court. I thought that our execution was much better here compared to when we played Houston the first time. This was a really good win for us.” Beating the Cougars in both total rebounds (33–22) and especially offensive rebounds (13–7) helped the Golden Hurricane control the game and put it out of reach for Houston. Beating Houston or a lower seed if UCF or Tulane end up with the upset, would send the Golden Hurricane to the championship where they would most likely play Temple, Cincinnati or UConn. Temple (19–10, 13–4 AAC) is the first overall seed in the tournament and of the three potential championship matches, the one that the Golden Hurricane would like to see. Temple beat the Golden Hurricane at home in overtime by four points, but TU won in Tulsa by 19 points in the rematch. Haith talked about the Golden Hurricane’s size after the win, “There is no question that we were severely undersized tonight without Rashad Smith, and we are not very big anyway. For us to win the game today we felt like rebounding was the most
they attacked and got offensive rebounds.” Cincy started that game off with an 18–2 run, and the Hurricane could not recover, playing catch-up for the rest of the game. In the Golden Hurricane’s win, the biggest factor was once again the rebounding. When a team of Tulsa’s size is outrebounding their opponents, who have the height advantage, they are able to limit their offensive possessions and put up points of their own. UConn (20–10, 10–7 AAC) beat the Golden Hurricane close at home after Tulsa beat them by nine in the middle of January. TU handled the Huskies at home, thanks to a huge run in the late minutes of the second half, and almost erased a 20-point deficit in the road loss. In order to avoid another tournament loss to the Huskies this year, the Golden Hurricane will need to prevent them from coming out of the gate hot. Because down the stretch TU can beat them. It’s not going to be an easy three-game stretch for the men’s team, but as they’ve already shown, there is not a single team in the American Athletic Conference that they can’t beat, and they need to play with that mentality.
Cougars in the second quarter, allowing only six points. In the fourth quarter, the Golden Hurricane’s defense was even more dominant, as they only allowed three points. Though they didn’t need to score much with the stellar defense they were playing, the offense was still flowing. Tulsa scored more points in the final two quarters then the first two, as they ended up doubling-up the Cougars, winning 76–38. The second round brought a matchup against the Temple Owls. In the meeting between the two teams in the regular season, Tulsa struggled offensively, and the Owls won by 20. Unfortunately, the script for this game was similar to the first one. Temple dictated the tempo of the game early on, and utilized a couple of large runs in the first half to take a large halftime lead, 36–19. The third quarter was more tightly contested, but the Golden Hurricane weren’t
able to pull any closer to the Owls, and went into the final quarter trailing by 20. They wouldn’t be able to make up that deficit, and Temple came away with a 78–52 victory to continue in the tournament. The loss ended the season for the Golden Hurricane. Seniors Kelsee Grovey and Ashley Clark, after playing in their final game as a Golden Hurricane, spoke highly of the program after the game. “We’ve had good experiences and hopefully helped change the face of the Tulsa program and made it a school people talk about,” said Clark. “The reason I chose Tulsa was to change the culture of the team and I feel like we’ve done that the last four years. We are leaving the program in good hands and they will be fun to watch next season,” said Grovey. Both Clark and Grovey sit in the top ten in school history of many statistics as their careers come to a close.
Women’s team’s season ends in loss to Temple
Joseph Edmunds Sports Writer courtesy wereblog.com
often come from strong defense, and good shooting from quality opportunities coming from the defense. That combined with the lack of depth and foul trouble at the forward position made it difficult for the Golden Hurricane to keep up in the second half. Memphis slowly pulled away, and took the 92–82 victory. USF then came to Tulsa to play the Golden Hurricane on senior day. The nerves showed early for Tulsa, as they came out tense during the first few minutes of the game. Senior Nick Wood started his first career game, and
As the game progressed, though, the team relaxed. USF’s biggest lead was 28–19, with less than seven minutes left in the half. From there, though, the Golden Hurricane closed the gap, and pulled within three at the halftime break. The second half featured a great shootJoseph Edmunds ing performance from the Golden HurriSports Writer cane, including 60-percent from the field and 50-percent from behind the three-point Nine seniors were honored before Satarc. The offensive burst, which totalled 51 urday’s game against USF, as the Golden points by the end of the half, included 21 Hurricane men’s basketball team closed the points from Brandon Swannegan, his career regular season with high. USF couldn’t keep up a win after falling to with Tulsa in the second Memphis earlier in the half, and the Golden Hurweek. ricane earned the 84–74 On the road facvictory. ing the Tigers, Rashad With the win Tulsa Smith was unable to reached the 20 win mark play for the second for the third consecutive straight game. His abseason, finishing the regusence left the Golden lar season at 20–10 (12–6 Hurricane with less American Athletic Conferdepth at the forward ence). With SMU disqualiposition, and proved fied from postseason play, crucial as the Tigers that record puts Tulsa as were led by their two the No. 3 seed heading into forwards, who comthe conference tournament bined to score 55 next weekend. Still prepoints. dicted to be on the bubble Tulsa played pointof being selected for the for-point with the Tiphoto by Matt Rechtien NCAA tournament, the gers in the first half, and The team celebrates the win after eight of the seniors gave speeches about their time at TU. Golden Hurricane need to even went into halftime play well and make a run in with a one point lead, 47–46. was the only source of offense in the first the conference tournament to solidify their Over the course of the season, however, five minutes, as he scored Tulsa’s only field place in the selection committee’s mind. high scoring shootouts have not been Tulgoal during that time. sa’s specialty. The team’s victories have
The women’s team won their opening game of the American Athletic Conference tournament, but their season ended in a loss to Temple on Saturday evening.
Like a majestic antelope, he leaps in the air to make something beautiful. Unlike the majestic antelope however, he has no vertical leap.
7 March 2016
The Golden Hurricane women’s basketball team advanced through the first round of the American Athletic Conference tournament with a win against Houston, before falling against the No. 3 seed, Temple. Tulsa dominated their first round matchup in the conference tournament. In the first quarter, the game appeared to be competitive, as only three points separated the teams. However, Tulsa’s defense shut down the