Tennessee/Stanford women's basketball vs. Men

I don't disagree.

I was just asking what kind of women's basketball you enjoy watching. You made this prediction on Monday about the women's final game: The quality of play in tomorrow night's game will suck.

 

John Wooden clearly knows less about the game than you, Zag.

"I think they play the pure game, more so than the men. The best college basketball in my opinion is played by the better women's teams."

 

OK let me spell it out again -- the women's teams like Tennessee, Rutgers, LSU, Connecticut, Maryland, North Carolina --- i.e. athletic women's teams play the same style of basketball that you are bitching about men's teams playing.

They are NOT more fundamentally sound then men's teams and they do NOT play a more team brand of basketball -- they rely on their athleticism and their athletes to make plays (which by the way is fundamental basketball -- i.e. my guy can beat your guy and will continue to do so all night because you can't stop it...). That doesn't mean they are NOT fundamentally sound, it means they have good athletes and like men's teams they are able to impose their will on their opponents. That is basketball in its purest form -- my athletes beat your athletes -- not a hyper control-freak coach calling plays every time down the floor and calling for 15 passes before a shot.

 

And it wasn't very good, either as both teams missed a lot of lay-ups, Stanford turned the ball over a million times but I enjoyed it anyway.

 

OK

 

Define nether regions.... Grand Valley State a d-2 beat MSU in an exhibition game this year. Davidson isn't even a mid-major and they nearly made the final four. I think even the smaller schools in the nether regions would dominate a girls team. SIZE, SPEED AND STRENGTH.

It doesn't matter how well a woman can shoot or dribble, if she cant pass quick enough, strong enough, shoot quick enough, run fast enough, jump high enough, our outmuscle a man.

 

The question posed was whether or not the LSU - and Memphis - men would benefit from basic fundamentals, including making free throws.

LSU made three of its eight free throw attempts in the final 10 minutes of the game while Tennessee missed both of its attempts. A one-point Tennessee win might have been changed with a respectable performance by LSU from the line.

Memphis made three of its seven free throw attempts in the final three minutes of regulation against Kansas - a game that went to overtime. Again, any respectable performance from the line, which I will clarify would be at least 80 percent but would obviously go so far as to include one made free throw - would have at least given the Tigers a four-point lead in the last 10 seconds of the second half.

Both teams would benefit from such fundamentals. For LSU, it's a national title game that it might have had a chance to win. For Memphis, it was for a championship win.

 

Zag,
You still aren't getting what I'm saying.
Tennessee playing an athletic style has nothing to do with this argument. They aren't using alley-oops, are they? They aren't doing 360 jams or no-looks passes (at least not as often) like the men.
I disagree that one-on-one basketball is fundamental. There is nothing wrong with it, but fundamentals are about things other than "I'm the better athlete."
Obviously you and I are never going to agree on these points, though.

 

The famous John Wooden quote........

I was waiting for you to pull this bullshit attempt at political correctness out of your ass. When did Wooden say this? How many women's games do you think he has really watched in say the last 20 years?

In the 1980's, the women's game looked a lot like the men's game did way back in the 40's and 50's -- where teams passed the ball around and waited and waited until they got the best shot possible.

But guess what -- in the past 20 years, the women's game has become increasingly athletic, increasingly based on quickness and individual talent just like the men's game.

Players like Rebecca Lobo these days are dinosaurs. The new breed of women's basketball players are the sleek, quick, athletic players that old-timers like Wooden consider to "not be fundamentally sound like the good old days." which is a crock.

Basketball is a different game today than it was in the 60's and 70's and this need for old-timers to wax poetic about yesteryear is almost as annoying as the Christine Brennan's of this world insisting that women's game is more fundamentally sound than the men's.

 

I get exactly what you are saying -- and it is crap. No offense, I am not trying to be a jerk (surprisingly) but this idea that the only way you can be a fundamentally sound team is if you pass it 15 times and only take a wide open shot each time down the floor is ridiculous.

And no Tennessee women aren't alley-ooping because they can't play above the rim -- but they are going one-on-one, they are doing no-look passes, they are playing the game as if they are on the playground, just like the Rutgers women, the Connecticut women, the North Carolina women -- they are all pressin' and runnin' -- and that is great fundamental basketball if you have the athletes to do it. And the women's game is becoming more and more like the men's in this regard -- women's coaches are looking for the best athletes these days.

Go check out an ACC or an SEC (except Vanderbilt) or a Big East women's game involving the best teams -- they ain't playing that old style, archaic game any more.

 

Appros of nothing, but I went and watched a D2 women's game at the local gym this season and was distinctly unimpressed with the skill level. I have certainly seen good high school teams that could have beaten either of them, and one was ranked like No. 7 in the country.

 

I've lost the point of your argument now, zag. So you admit that the best women's basketball teams can run up and down the court - does that mean that there's potential for them to be able to run with a men's team? And, if so, could a little bit of defense throw the whole plan into whack?

If anything, I think it's been proven that there are some ways the women's team would win.