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The most telling statistic from last night's game was not that we were out-rebounded (especially on the offensive end of the court) or that our three-point shooting was atrocious. It was that we had THREE assists!! Granted, if you don't make baskets, you don't get assists and our FG% was 36%, but I didn't see the "potential assists" from the passing of the ball to the open guy. I saw a lot of driving shot attempts into the lane with three guys bigger and taller than the ORU shooter. I saw a lot of driving with no shot to take, but the shot was taken anyway. These were shots taken by players that knew better but they didn't feel like they could feed the ball to someone that had a better opportunity. Not a lot of confidence amongst the players in each other right now. Something has to give here......

I don’t think anyone was expecting ORU to go undefeated again, compete for 1st place in the Summit, or make the tournament. Not being competitive or even fundamentally sound with a roster of players that have won in the past is something else.

I'm not calling for coach to be fired. But I do think at the end of the season a very extensive review needs to occur. Coach did not come into a situation where the cupboard was bare, he has 3 solid vets and 2 of them are considered top 10 players in the league. Watching this game tonight; and all season, the effort is poor and inconsistent, the style of play is ineffective individual basketball, the fundaments are terrible, and the attendance understandably looks to be beginning to dwindle. No coach needs 2-3 years to understand a team has to play D and rebound to be successful! My concern is this team's talent level may be our best for some time to come. After the season if I were in the administration, I would want coach to provide a very detailed action plan outlining how he can improve the program moving forward with specifics that can be communicated to the fan base, because what I'm seeing is a rapid decline of our program into the abyss of low major irrelevance. IMHO ORU basketball is better than this and not playing at all near our potential!!

ORU lost a lot of talent last year including 4 of their top 6 guys which was: 53 points, 22 rebounds and 8 assists per game. The Eagles returned: 31 points, 13 rebounds, and 7 assists. That usually equals a rebuild unless you are Duke, Kansas or Kentucky and can just go and find whoever you want.

This video from July may be coming back to bite us. Several of you voiced concerns about it at the time and you were right. I believe the context was that the guys were tired and needed a break , so a day or two was taken off. I’m guessing some of our competition was not taking days off in July. I'm not attacking our coach, he is new and has to figure things out like any person at a new position would. I don’t want Paul Mills lite, I want Russel Springmann. I think coach will find himself and realize that what worked for Mills won’t work for him and that is entirely acceptable. Springmann has worked his entire career with elite basketball minds. He is the right man for the job. Next year has the potential to be a very, very tough year depending on who leaves and who comes into the program. The silver lining is that the team that tore us apart last night was very young last year and didn’t win a lot of games but their core is young and they could be a force for a long time now. One of my biggest concerns is losing the crowds at the Mabee. I drove down to Tulsa last year to watch ORU beat NDSU and seeing 8k+ fans in the arena was phenomenal and so fun to be apart of.

The level of saccharine sunshine-pumping even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary would be impressive if it wasn’t so baseless. I guess we’re just supposed to believe the company line as opposed to our lying eyes. Hard Truth: there’s a greater chance of ORU losing out to end the season than winning more than one game the rest of the way.

Those of us who voiced our concerns in this thread from November were instructed to just wait until February, when "this ORU team will look much different...than they look now." Well...now it's February. Remind us again what we were supposed to be waiting for?

Definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

Or….they might just lose out and be one and done at conference tourney.

Well stated ORU40, I completely agree. My fear is that this is more than just a temporary slump, we are actually regressing rapidly.

I hope she gets some more height

You can’t have two starters average over 38 min per game and expect to hold up at the end of the year.

No way that happens, barring some type of moral failure. It is very difficult to maintain a constant winning program with changes in coaches at the mid-major level. A review of the past four coaching changes bears this out. Of the last four coaches, Self, Hinson, Sutton, and Mills, only Hinson had a winning record in either of his first two years. I share the disappointment that many of you feel in the performance of this years team, however I am not ready to throw HCRS under the bus. I have to believe that it is a huge transition from being the assistant coach to being the head man. We saw this in the baseball program. If you were to go back and reread some old baseball threads, there were those who wanted to get rid of Folmar early in his tenure- which clearly would have been a mistake. HCRS is probably more disappointed in this season, than all of us together, but it will take time for him to make the program truly his. I believe that when this happens, we will all be members of the HCRS fan club.

I've been following on live stats but now I want to see the epic comeback!!!

Following live stats just isn't the same. Is there a radio broadcast we may be able to stream until this gets fixed?

Same here on my PC.

Having the same trouble on iPhone and Roku

Is anyone having any luck with getting the game on the SLN app? Mine keeps giving me an error. Would like to put it on for this long drive back home!

I was only able to watch briefly yesterday. I had to drop before the 14 run onslaught. I did notice that the broadcast had the scoreboard on the screen which I appreciate and it did look like they included more angles for at bats. Continuous improvement from the production team is appreciated by those of us who watch the games on TV. I'm expecting the local fans to be loud and proud today. On Friday, there was a loud and annoying female Evansville fan who dominated the sound of the crowd on the broadcast. I expect her to be drowned out today. Thank you.

Man this is well said and spot on! My brain is so tired from trying to figure this team out. At this point all I want is positive change whatever that may be. The coaches are getting paid fairly well and I am counting on them to fix this by any and all means.

I don’t quite get the “they’re not listening” or “don’t get it” idea. Anyone who is playing D1 basketball has likely played 8+ years of organized basketball, MANY of them their whole lives. We are not talking about middle schoolers, they KNOW the fundamentals, they just are not doing them or therefore not being held accountable(that we can see at least). I can still hear my high school coach yelling “force left, box out, pass and cut” from 17 years ago. When I played those things were engrained in my mind, I knew what coach wanted. He wasn’t afraid to bench our star if they were off. I don’t know what is “in their mind” as they play. I hope and honestly feel like coach can turn it around, but let’s call a spade a spade, this current team has not been coached “up”.

4 games out of 1st place. 2.5 games out of 3rd place. A road win at Omaha would set up a nice run to end conference and get some momentum heading into Sioux Falls.

I know we have a 6'6" HS girl and 6'3" Juco player coming in this year along with a couple of others that the team is looking forward to getting in. Height is coming soon!!

This is the issue. There’s really not an excuse for this roster to be one of the two worst teams in the conference. This is basically throwing away all the building Mills did over seven years out the window and starting at ground zero. I think that’s a given at this point. There just aren’t as many offers out there.

Right now the Eagles would play South Dakota in the 8 vs 9 matchup on Friday night in the tournament. So, they should have a chance to win that one. I hope the Eagles can learn from a lot of teams in the league who have found 6'6 to 6'9 type players that can handle the ball, drive, shoot 3s and rebound. UND has a boat load of guys that can do that. When ORU is trying to box out with 6'2 players vs the Hawks 6'8 guys it just does not work. It seemed ORU was giving up size and length at every position and that will get you beat 9 out of 10 times. Plus Kareem at 6'5 is trying to drive on and overpower guys much stronger and bigger than him. It just does not work.

Yes jmg1984, I hope so as well. I think she is getting a lot out of what she has and cannot wait to see what happens when the entire team is filled with her recruits.

Like dental work without Novocaine.

I watched Coach Musick being interviewed after the game on the TV broadcast. I continue to be impressed with her. She is all about the basics, fundamentals, playing at a high level and basketball iq. Give her another year to truly put her team on the floor. I think WBB is headed in the right direction.

This is hard to watch.

That's 1 miracle you can't expect

Last night, there was a stretch from about 6 minutes left in the game, until around 2 minutes left, where it felt like the guys had a chance to come back and steal the win. The defensive intensity was great, and the rebounding was solid during that stretch. However, the offense was not good enough. I’m convinced after watching the game last night that there are a few things that would help the team (I could be wrong about all of these): This team should be playing a Baylor style 2-3 zone most of the time. Or some other zone that funnels drives to a shot-blocker and enables our guards to be more aggressive on the ball and in helping off the ball. Ashton Smith should be the starting center. His physical dominance and defensive intensity are unmatched by any of the other bigs. Issac McBride needs a break in each half. Especially from being the point guard. I think giving Amboree 3-4 minutes in each half to run the point would be beneficial for this season, but also looking towards next season. This one may be controversial, but I think the offense is better off shooting more threes than driving into the middle of the defense and shooting a really difficult shot. I like passing into the post more too. I don’t like all the drives into 2 or 3 guys. Basically, more passing the ball around on offense and guys shooting off the catch. Also, the trapping defense is really good. They should spring that on teams randomly throughout games.

"Sweet Jerry Cakes" on play-by-play, with his trusty color man Lawrence "Night Train" Lane. Classic college basketball broadcast team! BTW, Night Train is STILL officiating high school basketball games in and around Tulsa, in addition to substitute teaching, working as a sales clerk at Ross department store, and doing the PA at Booker T. Washington H.S. football games. The man is a machine...

I've been going back and forth on this topic quite a bit. Is the lack of recruiting news cause for concern or not? Below is the breakdown of what is going on in the Summit League and how ORU stacks up to our conference foes. ORU- We have 9 open offers with no commitments. 2 Juco and 1 high school SR for 2024, 6 offers for the class of 2025. We know for sure we are losing Kareem and DJ. Mcbride and Phipps are seniors but I think they can technically play one more Covid year. Omaha- Also 9 offers with no commitments. 3 juco, 1 HS class of 24, 5 offers to class of 2025. 1 senior (Nick Davis). Denver- 1 offer to a HS senior, 3 high school commitments for 2024 (all guards). They have 3 seniors ( Brenchly, Bruner, Addo-Ankrah). No known offers for the class of 2025 and beyond. Kansas City- 3 HS senior signings and 2 juco guards signed for next year. Somewhere around 25 existing offers for a mix of juco, 24, 25, and 2026 recruits. (they have 4 senior players) Who knows what they are doing there.... St Thomas- 4 signings, all HS seniors. No other offers for any other years. They have 7 seniors. South Dakota- 2 signings both HS seniors. 2 graduating seniors on the team. 1 other offer for a recruit in 2026. South Dakota state- They have 4 high school senior signings. 6 or 7 offers for players in 2025 and 3 seniors on the roster. (Mims, Easly, and Appel) I think those guys have been playing since 2014... North Dakota- No signings for next year, 6 or 7 offers for 2024 and 2025. 3 seniors but I believe Ihenacho will be back on a Covid year. North Dakota state- 3 high school SR signings for next year, no other offers at all. Only 1 Sr on the roster (Skunberg) So, what does this tell us about the state of ORU basketball? Are we gambling on the transfer portal instead of signing high schoolers? Will we work the JUCO angle harder as our first signing (Bedford) has been a success? Our Summit League foes still seem to be keeping things the same and signing HS's during the early signing period. Are they behind the times or are they doing it the right way? Technically ORU is in the bottom third of signings for the future along with North Dakota and Omaha. I don't have answers to any of those questions but I have some thoughts. I think ORU is uniquely situated geographically, institutionally, and maybe even spiritually for transfers from other schools. The Dakota schools probably aren't a popular option for transfers outside of those kids who grew up in that region. Almost all of the transfers that did go to the Dakota schools were originally from cold weather states. ORU's 3 transfers from last year were from Texas, Tennessee, and Maryland, geography doesn't appear to play into it at all. Another consideration, does Springmann find it more valuable to sign players who redshirted or played sparingly as freshman on Power 5 teams to be further ahead in their development than a high school senior? Are JUCO players more interested in just having a shot to show that they can play then chasing high NIL deals? I'd be interested to hear all of your thoughts. Ultimately, wherever we are recruiting from, the coaches need to develop them into whole players or none of it really matters.

We do! Let McBride, Thompson and Bedford play ISO ball, and whatever happens happens

We really don’t have an offensive system, do we?