Sloppy, but Victorious

The Lady Petrels have made it through another week of the season and their record remains unblemished. Sitting at 7-0, the Petrels have gotten off to one of the best starts in school history. But I'm gonna be greedy, I want more! I'm not just talking about extending this unbeaten streak; I'm talking about the level of intensity during the games. Both games this past week have left me with an uneasy feeling in my stomach. Yes, we came away with two victories against two in-state rivals. However, the Lady Petrels often didn't look like the team that is currently 7-0 and ranked 25th in both the USA Today/ESPN poll and the D3hoops.com poll. To be honest, they looked tentative at times and against two teams that I expected them to beat that's not a good thing.

I understand that every game is not going to be the team's "A" game, but it can be the team's "A" effort. Don't misinterpret what I'm saying, both games were not played effortless, in fact, the second half against Emory was some of the best basketball the Lady Petrels have played all season, but did it have to wait until the second half? There were just some extended moments in both games where we looked flat. We're not going to sneak up on anybody, teams know that we are a good team and they know that they have to come out playing hard from the start if they are going to have a chance to win. Physically, we are not the biggest or strongest team but effort and intensity have been the hallmark of this Lady Petrels team the past couple of seasons, and that is what has made them such a tough and competitive team.

The bottom line is that the Lady Petrels got two more wins this past week and they remain undefeated on the season. Maybe the scary thing is that the Petrels are still getting the desired results even while not playing their best basketball. This is a very talented and capable team, and I still expect big things from them this season. Keep up the good work ladies!

My child is going to Beat the Crap out of Your Honor Student!

Yes, it's that time of the year again as the Emory Eagles will grace us with their presence tomorrow night at Dorough Field House. This cross-town rivalry is always a fun event, especially when the good guys win. As an Oglethorpe grad and former basketball player I know how much this game means to our teams and students. It seems that Oglethorpe often lives in the shadow of Emory here in Atlanta, and this game gives us our chance to cast our shadow over the Eagle Nation. This match up always reminds me of Rocky IV, there's the well funded Soviet (Emory) with all of the training facilities and amenities you can imagine and then there's Rocky (Oglethorpe), the little guy who's always having to prove himself; he works his butt off and uses determination and desire to succeed; it's the Oglethorpe way.

I have a personal dislike for Emory for various reasons, but one Oglethorpe vs. Emory moment stands out for me. It was a nice spring night a couple of years ago and Emory and Oglethorpe were battling it out on the baseball diamond. A few Emory Students who made it over to OU for the game decided to head out early. As they passed by the loveable OU fans that were camped out above the right field wall, they decided to make some snide remarks about the struggling OU baseball team. Before I go any further with the story, in case you don't know, the OU fans that hang out above the right field wall are not the fans you want to incite. So after these pompous Emory students put in their two cents about OU athletics, a Petrel fan retaliated with some verbiage of his own, a comment that skipped over cleverness and went straight to the down right personal attack you that you expect from the right field wall fans. It went something like "Nice shnozz beak face," as the student did have a large nose, to which one Emory Student replied "It's all right, it's okay, you're gonna pump our gas some day" (a chant I hadn't heard since my high school days). As the Emory students high-fived and congratulated each other on what they thought was a masterful and clever insult, I realized that these students truly considered OU to be inferior to the "Evil Empire" that is Emory.

Now I'm not gonna sit around and be treated like someone’s little sibling; I'm tired of playing second fiddle to Emory so tomorrow night when the Eagles make their way into Dorough Field House to tango with our #25th ranked Lady Petrels I hope our ladies give them the beating of the year. I'm demanding the presence of the Dorough Delinquents. I'm not trying to incite any riots, so Delinquents please keep the comments respectful and cleverness is always a plus but cheer your asses off, make the Eagles envious of our fans, and let's assist the Lady Petrels in staying undefeated on the season. The crowd Friday night vs. BSU was awesome, but I know we can do even better. I'm challenging the Petrel Nation to make an appearance like they've never made before, help our ladies send Emory home completely defeated, wishing they had never picked up a basketball before.

Here's a little message for Emory and their fans; when you're on your way home completely defeated tomorrow night, and you try to make yourself feel better by saying something like, oh I don't know..."It's all right, it's okay, they're all gonna pump our gas some day," just remember that we're a bunch of honor students too.

Show me the D3Hoops.com top 25

With two great wins this opening weekend in SCAC play the Lady Petrels should make an appearance in the D3Hoops.com top 25 poll this week. The Petrels are flying high and looking great thus far in the young 2007-2008 hoops season. At 5-0 and with great wins over Piedmont, a National Tourney team last season, and former D-I Birmingham Southern, the Lady Petrels are demanding respect and I'll be willing to bet that the D3hoops.com voters have taken notice.

With an average margin of victory of 25 pts the Lady Petrels have not only won their first five games, they have made a statement. These blowouts are not the result of a team playing its top seven players for 30 plus minutes; Coach Sattele has been able to get his younger players in the games early and often. Only the Birmingham Southern game was primarily played by the Petrels top seven, and Birmingham Southern is a Good team that has already defeated the D3hoops.com #11 McMurry University on a neutral site.

You can't expect every game to be a blowout and I guarantee they won't be. The SCAC has some really good teams that will definitely challenge the Petrels this season. I will admit that I thought Rhodes was going to be one of those teams, and maybe they will be come February but right now the Lady Petrels are playing at an intensity level that their opponents aren't ready for. It's been fun to watch thus far, and I have every bit of confidence that they are about to get their due respect in this weeks D3hoops.com top 25 Poll. Keep up the good work ladies and let's notch two more victories this week over cross town rival Emory on Thursday and in-state rival LaGrange on Saturday.

Give me the Whistle

So the Lady Petrels are off to a great start (3-0) on this young season, but I'm going to limit the amount of praise I give them in this post because I would like to talk about referees today. If any referee assigners out there ever read this, which I seriously doubt, please stop sending your C team to referee our beloved Lady Petrels basketball team. This is not me ranting about bad calls because of a loss, no, I'm complaining even after the Petrels stomped Piedmont last night in Demorest. The final score was not truly telling of the beating, but I digress. This was the second game this season where the Lady Petrels have had to suffer through some poor officiating. In all fairness, the first such game came in Virginia a couple of weekends ago and the referees weren't in shape enough to keep up with the torrid pace that both teams were playing at, so both teams were the recipients of many unfavorable calls. If you're not there to see the play, then you guess on the call and you make some wrong calls and that's what happened. Last night, however, was just odd.

For starters, a three second violation was called at one point on the Lady Petrels as a player drove into the lane and kicked the ball back out to a perimeter shooter. The player was probably in the lane for three seconds, but who calls that. I thought the unwritten rule was that you don't call three seconds until it becomes so obvious that the opposing team and fans are counting for you. That play really wasn't a big deal in the game, but it added to the humor that was last night’s referee crew. The big issue for me last night was the insane amount of blocking fouls, off the ball fouls, and loose ball fouls that were whistled.

Had that referee crew been officiating a men's game last night, the game would have been decided by each team’s third-team as all starters and second-team players would have been sitting on the bench with five fouls apiece. The Lady Petrels are an aggressive basketball team, and when the referees take that away, you take away a lot of what has made them so successful the past couple of seasons. Notice I called them aggressive, not physical, there is a big difference between the two and last night's referees couldn't comprehend that. It was not as if the Lady Petrels were out there pushing around a bunch of 3rd grade kids on crutches, they were playing against a team that was just as capable as they are and our ladies were penalized because of there aggressiveness.

If referees were to actually call every foul as defined by the official rules of basketball then they would be blowing their whistle very 10 seconds in Today's style of basketball. The game has evolved, and yes, that means the women's game has evolved too. This is not 1950's basketball anymore. Our Lady Petrels would dominate Gene Hackman's Hoosiers (we've just got to cover Jimmy Chitwood on the perimeter). Just because one team does not play an aggressive style of basketball does not mean you penalize a team for playing aggressively and last night our ladies were penalized. In fact, they were penalized many times for just being out on the court, the whistle just kept blowing. As a referee, you have what they call discretion and just because something is a foul according to the official rules does not mean you have to call it; you get to ask yourself is this "foul" affecting the play in any way, if not can I maybe just give the player a verbal warning to let them know I'm watching? Basketball is an extremely tough game to referee, it's fast paced, lots of rules and all of the action takes place on a small playing surface (in comparison to baseball, football, soccer). That being said, I understand that referees are not going to make every call, but last night they almost did, and that doesn't go over too well in today's game. Not every "foul" is a foul. Ok, I’m done bitching now.

As tough as last night was with the foul situation The Lady Petrels got a great win over a Piedmont team that appeared in last year's National Tourney. Good win ladies and let's get two more great wins this weekend.