2022-23 Season

I didn't get to watch the South Dakota game, but here are my ratings for the home loss to #179, a Q4 loss. Looks like Dallin Hall had a really good game thus earning his starting place in the next game. Rudi Williams wasn't too bad either. Jaxon Robinson struggled. Has he ever met a shot attempt that he didn't like? He's averaging 6.2 3PA hitting just 32.3%.


BYU South Dakota.PNG

Here is our home Q3 loss to #138 Utah Valley. Traore was a our best player, but in the second half we struggled to even get him the ball. They had a 7 footer fronting him and we just couldn't cope with that. Saunders got the start but with that performance he may not get another one. But who does start? We need a true center and quick guards. And some sort of offense that looks like we're actually trying to do something besides pickup ball...


BYU Utah Valley.PNG

The Creighton game was an intense one! BYU weathered a strong opening by Creighton who came in struggling making 3s but somehow found wide open shots against BYU and knocked them down. BYU took a late 11 point lead and then proceeded to turn the ball over 6 times in less than two minutes to just about give this one away. Richie Saunders, who had Creighton in his top 2 when he was recruited, had the same rating as Williams, but less minutes. He was quiet in the first half, but came on strong in the second half doing a little bit of everything. The 3 wasn't really falling for him so he took the ball to the rim. Hey, I've been preaching that good things happen when the players/team do this! Hall, despite coming through in the clutch had the lowest rating. His play that drove me nuts was when Creighton was full court pressing and he just stood still with the ball for like 3 seconds and then yeeted it to no one for a TO.



Also, I'm starting to track total team free throw attempts and fouls for BYU and their opponent each game. In this game BYU had 23 FTA and 28 PF while Creighton had 32 FTA and 21 PF. Yes, their best player fouled out on ticky-tack arm reach, but IMO Creighton fans have no reason to complain. Sometimes FTA and PF can be down to how aggressive a team is in the paint, but sadly many times its down to the refs.


BYU Creighton.PNG

Creighton is now a NET #44 so this currently qualifies as a Q1 win! BYU is up to #189 so this would be a Q3 loss for Creighton.

What a turn around! A very good win. What jumped out especially for me was the defensive effort and the rebounding. I suppose the team will work on breaking full court presses next week :). Williams played like a leader. Second half Saunders was a jolt of needed energy. And Stewart’s defense was really solid. I criticized the team last week for their play and here they deserve some well deserved credit.

I didn't see the UVU or South Dakota games, so I'm just going to pretend they never happened, and the BYU I saw against Creighton is definitely the real one.



This has got to be one of the most athletic teams BYU has ever had, right? It was weird seeing us against a top team and not looking like we were moving in slow motion compared to them. I liked it!

I went to this game and I was cautiously optimistic. I didn't realize that the orange/yellow seats were being replaced with the nice comfy blue seats so that was great! I was a little disappointed with the turnout. The student section was mostly full. But there were lots of empty seats including the entire row in front of me. When I initially went to buy single game tickets there were only a handful of bench seats available. The ticket office told me that this is the most season tickets that they've ever sold for basketball. I know it's a bit of a down season and there was a bowl game going on, but come on, this was against Utah!



On to the game...I thought that we played excellent team defense. Utah is a pretty good team. They were #20 in the NET rankings before the game and are now #32 so that puts this just outside of a Q1 win. Rudi Williams has really taken to playing off the bench. Great game scoring and ZERO TOs! Saunders struggled again. Hopefully he'll be more consistent down the road.



Note: I did not see Gavin Baxter and it looks like he announced his medical retirement on Dec 8 appearing in 7 games for Utah.


BYU Utah.PNG

I'm not even going to talk about the Western Oregon game. Why do we have TWO division 2 games in the middle of the season? This is looking like our weakest OOC schedule in a long time and we still have struggled. Even with a stronger WCC I'm going to say that we need to keep our conference losses to 3. I hope that the Utah game was a turning point for this team, but right now even the NIT is not a lock. Keep on winning and everything will take care of itself!



Next up: #321 (2-6) Lindenwood. I almost did my MBA there, but chose Saint Louis University instead.

In answer to the question, "Why do we have TWO division 2 games in the middle of the season?": Pope and Holmoe have said for several years that it's very difficult to schedule Q1 teams to play ooc games in the Marriott Center. This is a problem we'll no longer have once we go to the Big 12.



Insofar as trying to schedule teams to build an NCAA tournament resume, I think Pope and Holmoe were hoping to get at least two victories in the Bahamas. That did not happen. The losses to South Dakota, etc., only compound the problem.

I agree, I don’t think we can drop more than 3 games come conference games. We have a lot of work to do.



The potential is there.

I was out of town for Christmas and actually missed all three of the last games. But here are my stat reviews.



We beat #336 (2-9) Lindenwood at home (Q4). Dallin Hall gets my Player of the Game award. He made his only FG, a 3, and had 9 assists to 0 TOs. I'll take some more of that, please! Waterman was just edged out as he had a good all-around game with 13 points, 7 rebounds, 3 blocks, and also no TOs! Trey Stewart gets the Struggled to Perform. Unless he drastically turns things around I honestly won't be too sad if he enters the transfer portal at the end of the season. He just doesn't have "it."


BYU Lindenwood.PNG

We beat #200 (4-8) Weber St. at home (Q4). Traore led the way with 17 points and 8 rebounds and an impressive 7/7 from the line. Robinson struggled. He is a very hot or cold shooter and he will just keep shooting when he's cold.


BYU Weber St.PNG

And BYU started off conference play with a win against #252 (6-8) away (Q4). Hurray for Spencer Johnson being back. 15 points and no TOs off the bench. Traore had a rare bad game. Looks like he was in foul trouble and 4 TOs didn't help.


BYU Pacific (A).PNG

This was a difficult game to watch as neither team wanted to score in the first half. I had the second half on in the background while playing a board game with my family so I didn't really see what changed, but BYU ended up with a comfortable win against #163 (6-9) Portland at home (Q4). Gideon George was the only player with a PER above 10. Waterman struggled the most although Robinson wasn't too far behind.


BYU Portland.PNG

Next up is #95 (10-5) LMU away. BYU is #93 (10-5).

On Thursday BYU lost away to 11-6 #100 LMU (Q2). I'm not even upset with this loss. My expectations for this team have just been lowered to where it feels like we are about on the same talent or execution level as LMU. I no longer feel like we are underperforming. BYU is a #100 NET team and I just don't expect them to be much better than that. As far as the game, it was close in the first half when BYU attacked the paint by feeding Traore and the guards like Hall driving to the rim. However, in the second half we decided to settle for 3 point shots while LMU went to the FT line time after time. BYU had 9 FT attempts to LMU's 23 and 21 PFs to just 12 called on LMU. Either BYU wasn't aggressive enough in the paint or the refs were biased. Traore was our best performer, but he needs more than one FTA. Waterman was the worst performer with at least 15 minutes and in the next game the commentators mentioned that his back has been bothering him. But 41% FGs, 15% 3FGs, and 55% FTs as a team is just not going to cut it.


BYU LMU (A).PNG

On Saturday BYU won away to 6-10 #212 San Diego (Q3). BYU showed a great defensive effort holding SD to just 19 first half points. Traore played really well but only got 18 minutes. Did he get in foul trouble in the first half? I wonder if he has a stamina issue or lingering injury as he has not played 30+ minutes in a game since UVU. But Atiki had his best game of the season. He didn't force anything, went 4/4 from the line and had an ally-oop dunk! Dallin Hall struggled shooting just 1/6 from the floor. He continues to have a positive Ast-TO ratio, but he is just struggling with putting the ball in the hoop (unless the game is on the line then he is clutch!).


BYU San Diego (A).PNG

BYU is now 11-6 #90. Next up is 13-3 #13 Gonzaga at home! Fun fact: Saint Mary's is higher in the NET rankings than Gonzaga at #8!

BYU lost at home to #9 (15-3) Gonzaga (Q1). Last year we got blown away at home so losing by just 1 is an improvement. But to be up 10 in the second half and then let it slip away hurts. Jaxson Robinson is supposed to be a good defender, but two of Gonzaga's late 3s were his fault. On one occasion he came to provide help defense, but someone else had also come with help defense so the ball handler was triple teamed and Robinson way over committed and his man hit a corner 3. Then, he didn't step in front of a screen to allow Gonzaga to hit the go ahead 3. Maybe I'm being too nitpicky, but I did notice he was at fault for both of those. Robinson did have a fine game overall though. Also, that last play, that can't be how the coach drew it up...either no one was getting open for a pass or Spencer Johnson horribly mismanaged that.



Still, Johnson gets the Best Performer award scoring 18 points on 7/11 shooting including 3/4 3s, 6 rebounds, and 5 steals! But we only went 5/10 at the FT line as a team. That has got to improve. Traore really should start taking our technical FTs as he's really the only good one on the team. Dallin Hall gets the Struggled award having the lowest PER for a player with at least 15 minutes, but with a rating above 10 he really didn't play that bad. Waterman only played 12 minutes, but they were a really bad 12 minutes missing both shots and turning the ball over 3 times. He has really gone downhill after having a few good games earlier in the season.


BYU Gonzaga.PNG

BYU won at home to #161 (5-12) Pepperdine (Q4). BYU started off strong and had a 13 point lead at HT, but where this felt like a game that we could have won by 20+ most of the second half was very close until the final couple of minutes where BYU made a push to get the lead back to 10. BYU had 14 more FTAs then Pepperdine and actually made 78%. If I had a nickel for every failed cross-court pass...Sometimes the pass was right to a defender and sometimes it was into the stands. Please don't try to play up tempo for the rest of the season, we just can't do it. Traore was a beast scoring 19 points on 8/12 FGs and 3/4 FTs and grabbing 9 rebounds and 3 blocks. I was just thinking to myself before this game that Rudi Williams should get more minutes and come off the bench earlier and then he lays an egg. 2 points and 4 TOs, ouch.


BYU Pepperdine.PNG

Next week's games are against #79 (14-5) Santa Clara and #130 San Franscisco (11-9). BYU is #91 (12-7).

On Thursday BYU lost to 15-6 (4-3) #79 Santa Clara (Q2). SC had a clear strategy to not let Traore get the ball as they were doubling him on entry passes. And it worked as he only had 3 FGA and 2 FTA although he still managed to have an impressive PER. For a while BYU stayed with them by hitting threes, but after that dried up it was a done deal. I'm actually surprised that the game was as close as it was. Williams had BYU's best game scoring 24 points off the bench and having more assists (4) than TOs (2)! Atiki struggled getting 7 boards, but no points and 3 TOs. This team and TOs...sigh...


BYU Santa Clara (A).PNG

On Saturday BYU lost to 13-9 (3-5) #112 San Francisco (Q2). BYU actually had more FGs than SF (28-23) but SF had more 3FGs (12-5) and FTs (24-13). After TOs BYU is also showing a horrible ability to defend the 3. Rudi had a terrific game scoring 28 points on 10/13 shooting and just one TO. While it's great to have a spark off the bench I think it's time to start him again. Hall played less than 15 minutes so I spared him my Struggled to Perform award, but he had 5 very bad TOs. He wasn't even pressured. I don't think any of them were steals. He just threw each of them away to nobody. He visibly looked frustrated on the bench and he really needs to take a step back and make some adjustments. Waterman gets the red mark scoring just 1 point in 24 minutes. Why was he playing C for the last 8 minutes or so instead of Traore? This isn't the first time Traore has spent long periods on the bench despite not being in foul trouble. Anybody have any word on this?


BYU SF (A).PNG

BYU has just one game next week, against 17-4 (7-0) #6 Saint Mary's. BYU is 12-9 (4-4) #98.

Been a while since we’ve had a season this bad.



Losing to SC and SF. Eeeshh. At this rate we will be lucky to make it to the NIT.

BYU lost by 1 to 19-4 (8-0) #6 SMC at home (Q1). Robinson, Waterman, and Atiki were all suspended for violating a team rule. I was most worried about not having Atiki as BYU is already so low on tall/big players. Walk-on Tredyn Christensen filled in for 7 minutes and scored his first basket of the season. I thought that maybe we were going to see Braeden Moore, but if he's not going to make an appearance when we're this short-handed I guess he's just not going to play this season.



Give Pope credit for putting fight into this team as they didn't fold when they went down early in the game. The pick and roll strategy worked pretty well against SMC's freshman guard. Hall scored a career high 23 points and gets the best performer award, but he has got to practice his FTs this off-season. He can nail a clutch 3, but cannot hit 2 consecutive FTs. Trey Steward mostly played good defense, but that foul on a 3 point shot near the end of the first half really hurt especially as we lost by 1 point. It was a real soft touch after the shot. I saw this mentioned elsewhere, but it would be nice to see a rule change in cases where the foul clearly didn't affect the shot like this so that the team gets the ball back, but no FTs. It should be treated as a non-shooting foul. For the most part this was an extremely well officiated game. They let them play and bump and only a total of 24 fouls were called. I enjoyed that part of the game. Saunders got the start, but did not perform well at all scoring zero points and grabbing just 1 rebound in 28 minutes. I like his energy, but he's gotta show more for it.


BYU SMC.PNG

Coming up next week BYU has 16-7 (6-3) #84 LMU at home (Q3) and 11-12 (4-4) #210 Pacific at home (Q4). BYU is 14-10 (4-5) #94.

People aren’t going to like looking for moral victories, but we are two points from having beaten both SM and The Zags and in both of those games it took clutch shots of the opposing team to win it and at least with regards to the SM game to play as they did without our two largest players…..well hats off to the effort and coaching. Heartbreaking losses, and being so close doesn’t help much if at all, but man this team is close….

It shows that they can compete. You never know what will happen in the conference tournament.

On Thursday BYU beat 16-9 (6-5) #99 LMU at home (Q3). This was BYU's first win this season where it just felt like they dominated from start to finish. Robinson was dropped from a starting role for the first time this season with Waterman taking his place. It's hard to question that lineup change with the results of this game and the next one. However, Waterman still had the lowest PER of any player with at least 15 minutes. He is struggling mightily offensively. He did get 1 block and 2 steals so I guess you just gotta trust the coach on this. Williams continues to come off the bench and he had the highest PER scoring efficiently and getting 4 assists and 1 steal to ZERO turnovers! BYU only had 7 team TOs! Wow, look at what happens when TOs are kept to under 10!


BYU LMU.PNG

On Saturday BYU beat 12-13 (5-5) #203 Pacific at home (Q4). BYU didn't quite dominate from the opening tip like they did against LMU, but their lead never dipped below 10 in the second half. Waterman started again, but got into quick foul trouble and none of his shots were even close to going in. He got 8 minutes which is probably about what he deserved. Traore only had 2 points in the first half, but finished with 19 to go along with 12 boards and the highest PER. Robinson had the lowest PER for 15+ minutes shooting just 4/11 and 1/6 from 3. Again, BYU kept their TOs to under 10 and this time they forced 18. If BYU is going to even have a sniff at winning away at Gonzaga and SMC they will need to continue this trend.


BYU Pacific.PNG

Next week BYU plays 8-17 (1-10) #211 Pepperdine away (Q3) and 19-5 (8-2) #11 Gonzaga away (Q1). BYU is 16-10 (5-5) #85.

I forgot to add that BYU's screens and pick and roll has suddenly gotten better the past three games. I've complained since the Dave Rosa era that we set some of the softest screens, but kudos to making an improvement in that area!

Gonzaga lost another game? Was it St Mary's?

scott715 wrote:

Gonzaga lost another game? Was it St Mary's?

Yep, they lost 78-70 in OT at SMC.