Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: WVUAFM Tuscaloosa.
[00:00:15] Speaker B: Welcome into the low tide here on 90.7. The capstone. Nicholas Persley, Elliot Miller, Adam Hambright, as always, gentlemen, how are we doing?
[00:00:24] Speaker A: A lot better this week than we have, you know, previous weeks coming in. I know football team had already, you know, beat Missouri and they had the bye week, but you know, just seeing like the first, like really dominant performance, you know, put me in a good mood this weekend.
[00:00:41] Speaker C: Absolutely. I'm out here. I just got done from subway eating my. My danger witch.
[00:00:46] Speaker B: Okay, so what in the world is that?
[00:00:50] Speaker C: That's. I'm feeling dangerous.
[00:00:52] Speaker A: Oh, gosh.
I don't even know about the weather.
[00:00:56] Speaker B: I don't know. Yeah, that's a good point. Well, the weather out okay. Nope, nope, nope. Yeah, we're shutting that down immediately. So Alabama gets a big time win. They go into Death Valley. Jayla Monroe runs for four touchdowns, nearly 200 yards on the ground. They win big time. 42, 13, 46.
[00:01:15] Speaker C: Let's put an asterisk on the 14 real quick.
[00:01:20] Speaker B: Yeah, that second touchdown was. It was. It was tough.
[00:01:22] Speaker A: I don't know if you saw the clip where it's Brian Kelly on the sideline yelling at the ref and he's, he's saying the game's over and they're still rushing gate and I'm like, you're still throwing to the end zone, Brian?
[00:01:34] Speaker C: Yeah, just kneel it, man. Give up.
[00:01:37] Speaker B: Just give up. Like the LSU fan base did in the third quarter.
So, you know, obviously, big win. One of the easiest wins Alabama's had in a while in a game that was pitched as one of the biggest games of the season. A true college Football playoff eliminator.
What was the most impressive thing or what surprised you most about this game?
[00:02:00] Speaker A: You know, for me, it was really, you know, I mean, it was very similar to how they came out against Georgia, but, you know, they were actually able to put together a whole game. Right. And especially on the offensive side, Nick Sheridan and the way that he was calling plays, I know there was a couple times where they were still in third and long, but it really looked like offense knew what they wanted to do. They didn't stray away from it. Jalen Milroe, they really called plays to his strengths. And then when he did throw it, he wasn't trying to force anything. You know, he was taking the checkdowns. I know he had the one deep pass that should have been a touchdown, but with the rain, you know, a little hard for Ryan Williams to catch, but like, you know, just you know, not putting too much pressure on one person in this game and really sticking to that game plan. And, you know, the second year in a row, LSU just can't stop Jalen Miller.
[00:02:51] Speaker C: Yeah, mine's going to be kind of a combination of two things, I think. For one, they did a really good job exploiting what I would consider LSU's biggest weakness that has been seen. They have really struggled with trying to contain mobile quarterbacks. That was seen with Lenore Sellers from South Carolina, seen with Marcel Reed when he came in with A and M. This was round three, and they still couldn't figure it out. And so I'm glad that the game plan kind of revolved around exploiting that and then continuing that. I would say, on the other flip side, the defense did, in a sense, lock in and play a complete game, forcing the turnovers that you need standing strong. I'll ignore the seven that they gave up at the end with, like, 20 seconds left. That's irrelevant. In my mind, they really only gave up six.
[00:03:35] Speaker B: So, yeah, for me, I think it's a pair of two things, and they both kind of have to do with lsu. First off, it was just how unprepared they came into this game. Clearly, you know, Brian Kelly says after the game, look, if you're watching the game, you're like, what did these guys do for two weeks? And, I mean, if you're an LSU fan, I don't know how you can come away anything but extremely frustrated with the game. And you saw that play out in, you know, one of the most iconic environments in all of college football, Death Valley. You know, Ryan Kelly had never lost a night game there. Had this aura. You know, it was built up. I was debating, you know, before the game, I was like, is this going to be a better environment than Neyland? And, you know, I think it could have been, but it wasn't because of how the game played out. You know, LSU came into this game completely unprepared. Like you said, Jaylen Murray runs all over them, which, you know, you could already tell from the second half of that Missouri game that he was kind of starting to get back to feeling himself. They were more willing to involve his legs in the offense again, you know, he hadn't been healthy in a minute. It was very clear. If you watch the Tennessee game, no competent offensive coordinator draws up a game plan that Jalen Milroe throws it 45 times if he's 100% healthy.
And then LSU just goes out and lays an egg. I mean, they had they were completely unprepared to play this game. And it should really be an indictment on Brian Kelly, given how important this game was to lose in this fashion.
And then it was just so surprising to see that place completely emptied out. I mean, after Nussmeier threw an absolute hamburger like on the six yard line after a fantastic drive where they can.
[00:05:19] Speaker C: Converted to four, Lawson on the, on the goal line.
[00:05:22] Speaker B: Yeah. Where he jumped like 10ft in the air to catch it. Yeah, it was impressive.
But yeah, after that happened, I mean, the entire life of that place kind of sucked out. I mean, it was really impressive in the pregame. You know, they had the fake Tiger there. That wasn't Mike. Omar, which we can. Omar Bradley. He has a last name too. We can get into that maybe.
The environment I thought was what it was built to be. It was really impressive. The energy was high going into this game. And then after that first drive of the third quarter, I mean, it just started to completely empty out. And by the fourth quarter, I swear there could not have been more than a thousand LSU fans left there. For a place that holds 100,000 people and it just turned into an Alabama party, it was a pretty fun environment. After they won, obviously, Melro coming diving in the student section, it was great. But I think that was the most surprising thing for me is just how convincing this victory was. Because I don't think that we've had a game like this from Alabama all season.
[00:06:29] Speaker A: No, not, not a full game. You know, we've had, we've had those glimpse like the, you know, mainly first quarter, but you know, first half against Georgia, going in, you know, up with the big league that they did in that one, you know, you've had, you know, Wisconsin, they kind of handled. But obviously Tyler Van Dyke, you know, he goes out early then, you know, in the other SEC games anytime that they've like they got up 14, I think in South Carolina, end up having to hold on by two.
Got three turnovers the first half against Tennessee, only up seven, nothing at halftime, end up losing that game. You know, it was just Missouri. You struggled the first half. You finally started putting stuff together at the end of the, like the second half of that Missouri game. And then with the bye week and then, I assume, you know, like they really focused on what worked in that second half against Missouri. They got people healthy. They knew that they were going to be able to exploit LSU because they can't stop running quarterbacks, like Elliot said. And then, you know, just full game dominant. And this is when we needed to see it. Right? I mean, now there's Mercer on the road, Oklahoma and Auburn that injure season. But like finally seeing the dominant performance you've really been waiting on this close to the end. Hopefully that means that this team is peaking now and not that first half against Georgia and they're able to carry that into postseason play.
[00:07:46] Speaker C: Yeah, I think obviously everything looks great on the outset after this game. And I would agree there's a lot of reason to be impressed with what occurred. I will say though, when it comes time for playoff implications, because this team looks like they can beat anyone. Right. Especially when you look at who's left on the schedule. As Adam noted, I can promise you that whichever team that they play first in the playoff is not going to let them do that. There has to be other components. If there was one, if there was any gripe that I had from a play calling perspective, I know that it was raining and everything. There is a lot of times that like those screen passes, they do not work. They were sniffed out frequently, immediately, and it was kind of predictable to a certain degree.
I would like to see the field stretch a little bit more. Now granted that could just be a function of it's pouring down rain. You know, it was obvious. You know, the one deep ball that was thrown, Ryan Williams kind of just slips. It's like all slippery and everything.
But I am, I am happy that it seems like it was a good mix of everything. There were short throws, there was running, it was running with the like both the running backs and the quarterback. Although I will say Haynes and Miller had a rough time running the ball in that game. So that would be something else to watch out for.
[00:09:06] Speaker B: Yeah. But I would say the one thing that's a big positive that you can take from this game, aside from just Milro seemingly being back 100%. Right. He showed something different in this game that we have not seen in quite some time. Maybe since the Georgia game. Really, I mean, to run for four touchdowns and I believe one of them was like 70, 72, 72 yards. There's another long one in there as well.
It was very impressive. And it just kind of shows you that once Alabama gets their key weapon back and you know, going, it just opens everything else up. It makes every other part of the game so easy. And the other thing that I'll say is that I was super impressed with the defense. I mean, early in this game, the opening kickoff, LSU takes 50 yards. They got another, I believe it was like a 45 yard run and they hold him to a field goal at the five yard line. That was big time. They only score six points in the opening half. I really only six points in, you know, what wasn't garbage time. So very impressive performance from the defense and three turnovers, which the offense scored 21 points off of.
[00:10:17] Speaker A: Another thing that since we're kind of talking about, you know, getting ready for the playoffs, like if this team is finally getting to where they need to be before a playoff game, you know, College football playoff bowl comes out last week. Alabama's obviously number 11. They're going to move up a little bit at least. Hopefully they went out, they can keep improving. But that projected first round matchup, like, with that ranking, it was like, oh, you're going on the road to Austin, Texas. I know Georgia kind of handled him in there. Maybe Alabama could do the same thing. But that's not really an environment I would want to go into for a first round playoff game. So if you're now getting up there to where you need to be and like, you can win out whether you make the SEC championship game or not, if you can just get it to where you got a home playoff game in that first round. Because right now it's looking like, you know, probably four SEC teams, like, unless there's more losses, I think we can kind of see how it's going to be for Sec 4, Big 10, and then you're just going to have the champions from the other two power conferences, Notre Dame, if they went out, and then a group of five. So, you know, hopefully they could, you know, keep the progress that they've made over the last, you know, couple weeks and then get a home playoff game in that first round.
[00:11:31] Speaker B: Yeah. One thing I will say though is that honestly, I like Alabama's chances a lot if they were to go to Austin, because genuinely, I'm not super convinced of the quality of Texas this year. I mean, they lost by 15 points. It was never really a game against Georgia. Carson Beck threw three interceptions in that game. And obviously Georgia looks quite different at the moment, especially considering the context of the Ole Miss game. But Texas is also a team that has not played a single team that is or does not have a win over a single team in the AP Top 25 as of this week.
Obviously, just because you didn't play anybody doesn't mean you stink. But I'm not, I'm not sold on.
[00:12:14] Speaker A: I would just rather play it at home. Like, if you do end up playing Texas, I'd rather have them back in Brian Denny than Going to Austin.
[00:12:19] Speaker C: And you better believe that if. Despite how we may feel about Texas, because I feel like I've made my. My opinion very clear on this. Like, very similar to yours, Nick, on them. I still, I can almost guarantee you that Sarkeesian is going to make sure that Milro cannot run like he did on lsu. I can promise you all of these teams that we're projected to be in right now are taking notes and are like, we are not going to let. If we have to play Jalen Milroy, we are not going to let him do that.
Because when you take that away and then you force maybe the 45 throws, like in a game, that's where things start to get a little bit hairy. However, if the defense plays how they did, I'm not really sure that there's another team in the top 12 that could hang defensively the way Alabama played defensively against lsu.
[00:13:07] Speaker B: Yeah, I think, honestly, it's clear to me that if this is the Alabama team that you get in the playoffs and you better watch out, because given the fact that there doesn't seem to be an elite team in college football this year, I mean, in my mind, I would have them favored almost against almost any team in the country on a neutral site right now. Obviously, that's, you know, we've seen other things from this Alabama team, but especially compared to last year, you know, because this Alabama team has more weapons than last year's team does. You know, I mean, obviously you have Ryan Williams, you have a true number one wide receiver. You know, Alabama's shown they can win games in different ways.
So it makes me feel better about, you know, if. And that's a big if you're able to stop, you know, Jalen Milroe, that there could be other opportunities. And especially, you know, we didn't really get to see it in this game because of, you know, the conditions.
You know, if he's back healthy, potentially his accuracy could also be back healthy. He looked good in pregame warmups, I'll give him that, and look decent in the game. So, yeah. Other thoughts?
[00:14:22] Speaker A: I mean, I'm just, you know, looking. Looking at the game. You know, it was just. It was what I wanted to see, you know, all year. And, you know, we finally got it. Now it's just, can they keep doing it? I know Oklahoma has not really looked good.
Like, nobody's really worried about the Mercer game. Everybody's kind of looking at, as, you know, another bye week. Obviously, players and coaches do not need to be thinking like that, but everybody on campus is everybody that's actually like a broadcaster is seeing this week as that. You really just want to make sure nobody gets hurt this week and you can, you know, stick like, have a good game plan. Nobody gets hurt. Hopefully everybody's out by halftime. Like all your starters go into Oklahoma. I want to see him do it again on the road. Obviously, Oklahoma is not as good as LSU has been, but, you know, as long as you just continue to see improvement. And then Auburn, that's. That's a. That's one. You know, it's going to be in Bryant Denny this year, so we don't have to worry about Auburn. Jesus down there.
You know, hopefully Auburn doesn't run every trick play they've got in the book just to try to upset the end of our season.
[00:15:30] Speaker C: Yeah. I'll be honest, like, knowing the potential that Alabama has and then seeing the way that especially Oklahoma and Auburn have played this season, quite frankly, I think any margin of victory less than 14 points is a cause for concern because there should be no reason that those games should be that close. Understandably, Auburn is the noted rivalry game. Still.
I do not think that Hugh Freeze isn't. Is a good coach by any stretch of the. Imagine. I don't know what is going on over there. They can't figure out their quarterback situation. They can't figure out just how to hang with any team. And then OU is still. They're like a hospital wing when it comes to players. I don't, I can't. Do they have any of those wide receivers back? Because I know one of them in that Missouri game got his head knocked off right there at the end in garbage time. So, like, now what are they now down seven receivers? So, like, I mean, who are, who are they playing with? Are they asking people to just. Hey, we got tryouts. If you can, if you can run a route, catch a ball like you're on the team. Is that how that's working over there?
[00:16:33] Speaker B: If you have a crimson jersey, show up, show up to practice.
[00:16:36] Speaker C: Exactly. If it's crimson and cream, join the team. Okay. Like, I don't know, but you obviously. What just what Adam said, you want to see this level of play continue, and if there's any, any wavering thoughts where it kind of slides downhill, that to me would be the biggest cause for concern heading into the playoff.
[00:16:55] Speaker B: Yeah, 100%. You don't, you know, you don't want to take any chances with these games. Obviously with Auburn, you don't want to have any horseplay.
So I'm Sorry, it was right there. I had to do it.
So, yeah, you just want to, you want to see them continue play out strong through the end of the year. Now one thing I do want to bring up right before we go to break, you know, they kind of flash the graphic during the broadcast of, you know, odds to make it to the SEC title game. Alabama having the second highest percentage of chance to make it to the title game. Obviously there's a lot that has to happen in between now and then.
But one thing that I was kind of thinking it might be better for Alabama to not make the SEC title game because in my mind, right, if Alabama was to lose, like let's say they went out, they lose the SEC title game, even by a short margin, I would say there's a pretty good chance that they missed the playoff altogether versus if they were not to make the SEC title game, there wouldn't even be the chance to take the extra loss.
[00:17:56] Speaker A: And that'll be an interesting thing to look at because, you know, a bunch of like the SEC in particular, they decided that they weren't going to go to a nine game conference schedule, really because they wanted to see how the committee was going to treat the 12 team playoff. And you know, if you have a team make it with two losses to the SEC championship game, lose and then completely left out when like, let's just say like Alabama after this week is probably going to be in the top 10. Like a top 10 team makes it to their conference championship game and then loses. SEC might just be like, we're not going to have a championship game anymore. We're going to make sure that, you know, these teams can make it in, are our best teams. We'll see what happens. But you know, I would hope that Alabama could just win it and then get that first round by. But you know, I definitely see where you're going. You don't want to take that chance of being.
[00:18:45] Speaker C: I have a feeling there is a level of partiality I think that the committee will have towards some teams. I think maybe if Alabama, I feel like in the case of Alabama, if they make the championship and they lose, they'll probably let them in kind of at the tail end, but they'll probably be let in. I think if it is A, however, if it is a team like Texas A and M that makes it and then loses, they're going to be left out.
[00:19:08] Speaker A: So yeah, I mean the big, the big thing like looking at the SEC standings, right?
So right now you've got three teams with only One loss in the conference in conference play, Texas A and M in Texas. Alabama doesn't play either one of those. One of those is going to lose when they played last week, Tennessee. If Alabama has to get ahead of them, you know, they hold the head to head. They would need to lose two more conference games. Their last two conference games on the road at Georgia and then on the road at Vanderbilt.
[00:19:39] Speaker C: So is the ideal situation that, you know, obviously that the last game, Texas, Texas A and M, that will be a knockout to whoever is going to make the SEC championship. It feels. But then, then the conversation becomes okay, it's going to wind up being Tennessee or Alabama. Do you almost hope that Tennessee Beach, Georgia wins out, makes the title game, probably loses to the winner of the Texas, Texas A and M game.
[00:20:06] Speaker A: Like, even if they, you know, lose to Georgia, they would still have to lose to Vanderbilt for Alabama to jump them.
So it's.
Anyway, you know, I think we can agree, you know, if you're already in the top 10 and you don't have to play that conference championship game, it's probably going to work out better for you.
There is still the chance that we end up having like a six to eight team tie for first place. So that'll be interesting if that works out. And if we get to the fifth tiebreaker, I think it's either the fifth or the sixth tiebreaker in the sec. It's just random draw. So that would be hilarious.
[00:20:43] Speaker B: Could you imagine, like, so who's going to. How would you set, like, the random draw up? Like, who would be the funniest person you could have to, like, do the draw?
[00:20:52] Speaker C: Theo Vaughn?
[00:20:55] Speaker A: I don't know, but I would rather have, like, you know, I know you've watched the movie, but Friday Night Lights, when they all have to go to the gas, the gas station, just flip a coin. Like, have them all come to Birmingham to SEC headquarters. Flip a coin.
[00:21:08] Speaker B: I mean, I would just, like, there would be so much.
You would almost have to like, employ like an outside, like, firm to, like, do the draw to, like, make sure it wasn't, like, rigged. No, like frozen envelope.
[00:21:23] Speaker C: Yeah, go talk. Go. Go talk to people over in like the Chinese Basketball League or something. Like, get the Shanghai Sharks on the line, like they, like the gm and then tell him, hey, hey, you're picking which team's gonna do what.
[00:21:36] Speaker B: No comment.
No comment.
All right, so I'm going to cut this off before it gets any weirder. When we come back, we got Alabama basketball to talk about finally. So we're going to talk about that when we come back. Stay with us here on 90.7 the Capstone. This show is a sports production of WVUAFM 90.7 the Capstone, a division of student media at the University of Alabama. Support us by leaving a review rating or following us on X at WVUAFMSports. Welcome back into the low tide here on 90.7 the Capstone. Nicholas Adam Elliott here to talk some Alabama basketball. But Elliot, did you have something.
[00:22:43] Speaker C: Yeah, speaking of basketball, you know, for our listeners out there who were listening at the tail end before the break, you know, I mentioned the Shanghai Sharks and their general manager, that would be Lee Chunjiang. Okay, so Lee, if you're listening out there, I want you picking if there's a tiebreaker, I just want you to.
[00:23:04] Speaker B: Know that, well, we'll be monitoring the situation, especially if your phone starts ringing in the next like five minutes.
[00:23:10] Speaker C: Thank you.
[00:23:11] Speaker B: Okay, so Alabama basketball, they've got two games under their belt. The first one they play played UNC Asheville. This is a team that's kind of around the lower end towards two hundreds of. Ken Palm did make the tournament last year.
They beat them 110 to 54 in a game that was not a very. Do we want to just combine the two games, kind of talk about general of the teams or would we rather talk individually? I'm up for either.
[00:23:42] Speaker A: Let's just combine them.
[00:23:43] Speaker B: Okay.
So they beat UNC Asheville 110 to 54 in that first game and that was this past Monday. And then this past Friday they took on Arkansas State and they won 88 to 79 in a closer game than most people would have thought. So so far from what you've seen from Alabama, you know, kind of similar to Alabama football, what surprised you the most?
[00:24:12] Speaker A: So, I mean, right now, you know, I really just like how well they're playing, you know, this early in the season. Obviously they have not got to the meat of that schedule, especially like when they're going to play teams like Illinois, when they play them in Birmingham, they're going to go and play Purdue, Creighton, you know, they got a bunch of tough games getting up. But you know, first two games, especially that first game, you know, scoring 110 points and then, you know, defensively holding unc Asheville to 54, had them score less points in the second half than the first. You know, one thing on the defensive end, you know, with Clifford transferring in, you know, he's been really good. You know, download, we can't really tell a whole lot about what's going to happen in the big games because not even Nate Oates knows, like, what his main lineup is going to be. He's kind of like rotated in. But like when you can see so many different, like, rotations out there and how, you know, the continuity kind of like just continues, like with all these other players, especially like with, you know, the new, like, transfers and freshmen coming in, you know, I just like how everybody's been able to gel together. They've looked a lot better on defense, I think, than what they did last year. I know they played a lot better in the tournament last year defensively, but now seeing it earlier in the year, you know, even though we're not seeing the best offense, they're going to go up. You can kind of see, you know, they're much more difficult, like down low, you know, like the presence of Clifford down low to get those blocks, you know, Grant Nelson finally not having to play a five position, he's able to, you know, move around and like all those returning players, like, you know, Jaren Stevenson, like he is, he's played really well these first two games, which, you know, he didn't really start shining until, you know, a couple games into the tournament too. So I'm just, you know, hopefully stay healthy and just continue, you know, improving. You know, just like in that first game, everybody that got in scored and they went all the way. I'm pretty sure everybody on the roster that's not getting red shirted now or injured got into that game and score. It's just like, I know, let's see, Mark Sears only scored, you know, 20 points. Four of the starting five had double digits in points. And it's just like, you know, no one, like, if it needs to happen, Mark Sears is going to be able to take over. But it's not just one guy, you know, you're able to spread the wealth a little bit.
[00:26:35] Speaker C: I would say when the goings good, the goings great.
When you look at the two games, especially statistically, very much two very polar performances, in my opinion. I think everything from the first, obviously very small sample size. This is not very representative. There are still guys injured. Starting rotations are still being adjusted and tweaked.
The first game shoot pretty much lights out. You know, 63% from the field, 44% from three, holding UNC Asheville to 27% from the field and 23% from three. Kind of gives you an idea of how wide that margin is. Right.
You know, you mentioned at the start, Nick, Arkansas Stake A game a little closer than what a lot of people would have expected.
[00:27:19] Speaker B: It was tied up with seven minutes.
[00:27:21] Speaker C: Seven minutes. Yeah, that's about right. Yeah.
Both teams were around 40%. Arkansas State was actually exactly a 40, Alabama 41. Arkansas State actually outshot Alabama from 3. 21% to 19.
So you know, it's one of those things that was a concern that I had last year and I had a feeling that the downfall of the team in the tournament was going to come down to is the three ball just not falling. And it's very. And that's totally okay if you want to live and die by like the three point shot and everything. That. That is definitely a strategy to a certain degree. But it does show in the margin of victory on how efficient that is. It did feel like there were a lot of shots in the Arkham just simply because I was there. It's like you got a guy open like in the post or down low, just make the pass. You don't need to just throw up the three to try to extend the lead a little more.
I'm sure with time it'll be picked up and that will get fixed. Out of course only two games so far, but that's just something that I've noticed.
[00:28:25] Speaker B: Yeah. You know, specifically to talk about that, you know, NATO kind of mentioned in the post game that he felt like they played pretty selfishly in the. In the second game and that things could have been a lot better. You didn't see a lot of great passing. They did take more threes, which was a concern from the first game. They only took 18 threes when NATO's teams, throughout his career, at least at Alabama, have averaged about 30 threes a game, which seems a little insane, but you know, it is true. And they didn't shoot it well from three in this game either. One of the things that was insane is that if you were at this game you knew like, like I'm pretty sure you can steer, still hear the whistles in your ear, the free throws.
52 Combined fouls on the night. Arkansas State was in the bonus after like two or three minutes played. It was insane. And then both These teams shoot 63% from the line. It was tragic, let's just put it that way.
[00:29:25] Speaker C: Sure. I actually to kind of speak on that too. I don't know if someone can look this up. I actually don't know what the going average rate of free throw shooting in college basketball is right now.
It did feel like there's a lot of missed opportunities, especially when you're getting to the stripe that many times, you know, you really want to convert. Like they are called free throws for a reason.
It did feel like there was a lot of missed opportunities just on like going to the charity stripe and just not converting any of them. Letting Arkansas State go down the floor, get like a, get a hard bucket, come right back, throw up a three clank. You know, it was just kind of this back and forth of that, so. But I don't actually know what the, what the NCAA wide, you know, I.
[00:30:13] Speaker B: Actually don't think that they track that really.
[00:30:16] Speaker C: I would think that there would have to be something out there.
[00:30:18] Speaker B: Could you take a guess at what the worst.
The worst free throw shooting team in all of Division 1 basketball is currently.
[00:30:25] Speaker C: Shooting from the line? 10%.
[00:30:28] Speaker B: Not quite that bad. I will go like a 25, 27. So pretty close.
[00:30:34] Speaker C: Who is it?
[00:30:35] Speaker B: It's Wagner.
All right, Shout out. Wagner basketball. The Wagner Seahawks, you know, this game.
[00:30:42] Speaker A: Both teams, you know, 63.6%. Obviously you want to see, you know, better. So we were at. Alabama was at 63.6, Arkansas State, 63.9. You want to see better from the free throw stripe on that one, you know, 28 to 44. Not going to cut it later in the season. But I do think with so many fouls that were called and sending people to the line, that kind of stagnated the offense a little bit. You know, not able to really get into a rhythm when you're going down the court and every time it's a foul and then you free throw or you're trying to set up a new offense. Not really like in that first game, even with, you know, only shooting 18 three pointers, you know, we're able to score 110 points. And that was a lot of like able to run through an offense, get, you know, swing the ball around, get people mismatched on the defenders and then you're able to get, you know, closer, like more manageable shots at the basket. And in this game, it really wasn't able, like you weren't really able to get your full offense in and to get those matchups to win. Like, you're just trying. You're making half your shots at the free throw line. You know, you're just not able to get through what you should be able to do in a regular game. And like Arkansas State, you know, Coach Hodge, former Alabama assistant, you know, had his team ready to play. They went down early. Sixteen, you know, came back, like, didn't get flustered by being down that much and you know, very physical team and that kind of contributed to all those fouls getting called.
[00:32:10] Speaker B: Yeah, 100%. So the one other thing I'll ask is, so far from what you've seen from the team through the first couple of games, the two exhibitions and these two games, who's been the most impressive player for you so far? I'll start.
For me it's LeBaron Filon. Okay. This is a freshman came in, he was the third ranked guard in his class, you know, 6, 4. He started both of the games and it's very clear to me why he has started both those games. Because he is an elite two way guard. Okay. He, his hustle and his energy on defense.
Obviously. NATO, you know, he's a guy who you're not going to play if you don't play defense like straight up. He's been on the record saying that quite a bit in the past. But you know, I asked him about what he liked from lebaron Filon and he really just hit on the fact, you know, this is a guy who you know is going to play defense. Elite two way player and a good offensive player at that. You know, in the second game he said it was one of the worst performances he's seen from him so far. But you know, this guy is a freshman starting on the number two basketball team in the whole country.
So obviously there's a lot of room for growth there, you know. And this was a guy after the first game NATO specifically mentioned as being a guy who he thought could play serious minutes in the NBA, had has really good chance to develop as a two way guard, especially if he can start to shoot it the way that he's shown that he can in practice. But it's super impressive for me that a guy this young was able to come in and kind of just immediately fit, you know, to parallel to basketball or to parallel to football. It's almost like, you know, Ryan Williams immediately coming in, taking a major role on the team. This is a guy who's starting for the number two team basketball team in the country. He's playing big minutes, 30 minutes on average I believe played 30 minutes in the Arkansas State game and has just looked super impressive. So that's been who I'm most impressed with so far.
[00:34:14] Speaker A: Yeah, I probably would have went with him, you know, if you hadn't. But you know, a guy that I really like seeing and I've already mentioned him tonight, Clifford Amiori, you know, the transfer from Rutgers, two time Big Ten, all defensive team you know, comes in, you know, that was something that was missing on that team from last year, especially when they went up against teams like Purdue, you know, but didn't really have somebody that could go up with Zach Eady. Didn't really have somebody that could handle the guy from UConn, you know, did the best that they could. You know, we're still in those games for the most part, but, you know, you really wanted them to go out and pick up somebody on the defensive end they could come in. This guy comes in first two games, he's, you know, offensively, 16 points in the first game. Ended up getting 12 against Arkansas State. He also had eight rebounds in the. Against UNC Asheville, nine rebounds against Arkansas State. So, like, very consistent first two games, almost getting a double double. And then on that defensive end, he's gotten two blocks in the first game, one block against Arkansas State.
You know, just even when he's not getting those blocks, you know, teams are taking a second before they're like, do I really want to drive in with somebody like that down there who's, you know, I want to say he had like over 90 blocks at Rutgers. You know, just a guy that, you know, he's an interior presence that's going to make teams second guess if they really want to go inside on the paint. And, you know, first two games, I think he's really showed how much better this team can be on the defensive end.
[00:35:43] Speaker C: I'm going to go with one that's a little bit different. Had some key moments in the tournament run last year, but I'm going to go with Mo Diabate. I thought. I think he's really stepped up, you know, in the bench role.
I don't know, I feel like on the second unit there's a little more, I guess, consistency, you know, from that, like, I guess forward slash center position, you know, with him. And so that's can kind of impressive that they're able to have that continuity between, like, there's not like huge lulls in scoring between like their, their starting unit and their backup unit. I'm not really sure what Nick is doing here.
[00:36:22] Speaker B: Okay, so we've got like five minutes left before we're gonna go to break and, you know, beef of the week, all that fun stuff. So I have three things that I potentially want to talk about, and I've put them in this jar. We only have time to talk about one of them. So, Elliot, you can draw from this jar and we're gonna.
[00:36:40] Speaker C: By jar, he means an empty CD disc. Protector.
Okay.
[00:36:46] Speaker B: And I think they're all three very, very solid things to discuss.
[00:36:50] Speaker C: Is this. Is this Miami playing in the SEC championship?
[00:36:54] Speaker B: No.
Which one did we get?
[00:36:59] Speaker C: This says Omar.
[00:37:02] Speaker B: Omar Bradley, the tiger. Okay.
[00:37:05] Speaker C: Did. That does not. That is not a D. That looks like a T, man.
[00:37:09] Speaker B: Well, let me see this.
[00:37:10] Speaker A: Don't worry. Don't worry about the handwriting. You do what it says.
[00:37:13] Speaker C: That's actually my beef of the week.
[00:37:14] Speaker B: Yeah. You know what it said? You know what it said. I won't reveal what the other two. What the other two one said, but they were. They were. They were pretty good. It would have been good either way. So obviously, LSU hasn't had a tiger on the sideline in quite some time. It literally, it turns out the governor of Louisiana, his pet project, literally, was that he wanted to return a live tiger to the field at lsu.
The school was completely against using Mike. And they're on Mike the seventh. Seventh now, I think so. Has an enclosure literally across the street from the stadium. So what do they do? They import a tiger from Florida whose name is Omar Bradley. I can't believe. And this guy, who they have, who they got to bring in this tiger, he's only had a couple of tigers escape from him. So, like, the numbers were pretty good. What did you guys think of the tiger on the sidelines?
[00:38:24] Speaker A: Well, for me, you know, if it's going to be a tiger, it's got to be Mike, right? You know, you get this guy, you know, apparently he's gotten out twice. You transport him in and I don't know what other events Omar has been at, but you take him to a stadium with 100,000 people, fireworks and stuff, he had to be heavily sedated.
[00:38:46] Speaker B: Like, okay, here's the thing. I actually learned this. Okay. Did you know that it is against federal law to sedate a tiger for the purposes of exhibition?
[00:38:55] Speaker A: So an un sedated tiger with 100,000 screaming people and fireworks and all that other stuff they had on the pregame. And then, like, if he was fine with that, he had to watch LSU perform like that.
[00:39:08] Speaker B: Oh, man. Only for two minutes.
[00:39:10] Speaker C: I mean, I think at the end of the day, though, right, you know, I think the magic ran out for lsu. You're. This is not Mike, right? This is a fraud. This is fake Mike.
Like, Omar Bradley just does not roll off the tongue. Omar Bradley, the tiger. And then there's Mike the tiger. Okay? I'm rocking with Mike. And quite frankly, if I'm an LSU fan, I'm disappointed not only in Brian Kelly, and the LSU offense and defense. I'm disappointed in Omar Bradley, the tiger, because he just did not give him the spark that needed.
[00:39:41] Speaker B: Well, okay, so I think even Mike went into hiding after he saw that LSU performance. I walked across the street and tried to find him in the enclosure. He's probably asleep. But even he. You know, he was out of there in the third quarter. He was. He was not ready for this. And the other thing I got to say, Mike, suit up.
[00:39:58] Speaker C: They could have used him out there.
[00:39:59] Speaker B: Yeah.
The one thing that I'll say about. About this whole situation is that they go to all this trouble. They literally potentially committed a crime bringing a tiger across state lines. Potentially. Because PETA, you know, obviously, they were all over this one, as were many of the LSU fans. There was even a peaceful protest going on outside the stadium.
[00:40:24] Speaker C: Awesome.
[00:40:25] Speaker B: They filed. So apparently they have a state law in Louisiana that prevents, like, the import of tigers.
[00:40:33] Speaker C: Specifically tigers.
[00:40:34] Speaker B: Well, it's a bunch of animals, but tigers are in there. So PETA filed a complaint with, like, the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries. So, you know, I'll. I'll stay, you know, locked in. I'll keep. I'll keep y'all informed with any updates that comes on that. But then, okay, you go to all this trouble, okay?
And he's literally on the sideline in the pregame for, like, two minutes. Okay. They used to position. They used to put the tiger right, like, right outside of the visitor locker room, which is just sick. Okay. By the way, like, I. I gotta put this out there. I don't think. It's probably not okay to have a tiger, like, in a stadium with a hundred thousand people present in a cage. It's probably not inhuman animal cruelty, let's put it that way.
But if you're gonna go to all this trouble, don't take him away after two minutes, and you gotta, like, actually do something cool. They literally, like, they alerted everybody to the fact, like, they didn't even try to pass it off. Like, this was Mike. They didn't even, like, leave it. Like, what's. Like, leave it up in the air. They literally, like, called out this fraud. Like, during the pregame, they were like, we brought a live tiger. But let's. Let's take a look at this video package for Mike, who this tiger is not. And it. I mean, yeah, they.
[00:42:02] Speaker A: They tried to pull off, you know, you know, what the old bait and switch. Well, I mean, you know, at least they let you know, but, like, this.
[00:42:09] Speaker C: Sounds like your beef of the week, Nick.
[00:42:11] Speaker A: I think all Three that he had in the thing could have been his beef of the week.
[00:42:14] Speaker B: They were all good. They were all good. They could have ended up good. Um, it truly was an eventful week in controversial sports topics that involve college football or college athletics in general.
The one thing I will say is, okay, why can LSU not have the tiger, but, like, Texas is allowed to have bevo, Colorado State has real Rams, and Colorado has a bison. Like, I.
[00:42:43] Speaker C: Why are we not allowed to have an elephant?
[00:42:46] Speaker B: Greg Baron, if you're listening, the. The elephant needs to happen. I'm sure they've got one at what is in their zoo in Birmingham.
[00:42:54] Speaker A: There is. They have. They have a. They have three elephants.
But here's the thing. Like, what are you going to put the elephant in? Like, do you have something big enough on the sideline for an elephant? Or are you just going to let them out there and be like, yeah, we're just going to hope these people can hold him down and not let them, you know, stampede through the sideline?
[00:43:13] Speaker C: I mean, and that. This is. This is a fair point. I.
Big Al is enough for me, quite frankly, as I'm sure Mike is enough for the LSU faithful. So, you know, no need for fraudulent Omar to pull up and, you know, ruin all the fun. I don't know, man.
You want to talk about the weather?
[00:43:35] Speaker A: No, I do not want to talk about the weather. It's been trash all week, you know.
[00:43:40] Speaker C: Is it too warm for you? Is it. Is it too humid?
[00:43:43] Speaker A: Is it. It's overcast, it's rainy. It was humid the other day. I went for, you know, just a little, you know, 10 mile walk on Friday. Friday, you know, it was a little hot out there for me, you know?
[00:43:55] Speaker C: Yeah. I mean, the air is just a little bit sticky. And I think for me personally, like, I'm okay with it being a little overcast. It's a little cooler in the morning. Right. But then in the end, you know, when it gets all humid, like after I come in, after, like a walk, you know, I feel like. I feel gross. You know, I want to sit down and, like, not feel like I just, like, waded through a swamp, you know, to get to my destination.
[00:44:21] Speaker A: Can we get Elliot his own show? Like, he just had, like a weather with Elliot show.
[00:44:26] Speaker B: It could go crazy.
[00:44:27] Speaker C: The Weather Channel. Wait, Weather Channel.
[00:44:29] Speaker B: Okay, speaking of humidity, also, I'll throw this extra part in there. Well, you know what? Maybe that'll be my beef of the week. Okay, well, speaking of beef of the week, we'll be right back after this Break. We got to cut off this weather conversation. We got to get rid of this. No more of this. We'll be back very shortly.
[00:44:59] Speaker A: WVUAFM Tuscaloosa.
[00:45:14] Speaker B: Welcome back into the low tide here on 90.7 the Capstone. Nicholas, Adam, Elliot, just yapping in here.
[00:45:23] Speaker C: You already know what time it is.
[00:45:25] Speaker B: You know what time it is. It's beef of the week. I need to, like, have some, like, hilarious thing to play.
We'll work on it.
[00:45:32] Speaker A: Figure it out.
[00:45:33] Speaker C: We'll figure it out. Is it a work in progress?
[00:45:34] Speaker B: Yeah, it's a work in progress.
Beef of the week. Who wants to go first?
[00:45:41] Speaker C: I think Adam should go first. He seemed really, really exhilarated about his topic.
[00:45:45] Speaker A: But see, you were, you know, ready to kind of trash some. Some people that you've had some interactions in.
[00:45:53] Speaker B: Elliot.
[00:45:53] Speaker C: Yeah, I'm not even going to get into the debacle known as the flag football refs. I'm not even. I'm not. I'm just not even going to get into that because, quite frankly, it's not worth my time. And I don't care. Actually, I do.
[00:46:05] Speaker B: Careful, the rec center might find you.
[00:46:09] Speaker C: Don't care. What are they gonna do? Throw a flag? Oh, your sportsmanship. Radio went down. Yeah, okay. But my beef is this is very topical. You know, today my Pittsburgh Steelers and Adams Pittsburgh Steelers did defeat the Washington commanders.
And you know what? I was watching with plenty of people, and it's one of those things where, you know, people will. They love to complain about every little eensy weensy little thing and nitpick every little thing that you say during the game to fit a certain narrative of theirs and then act like a sore loser after the game is done. I don't know. It just, you know, it's one of those things, like.
[00:46:54] Speaker B: Oh.
[00:46:55] Speaker C: Like I would say, there were a lot of. It was a very big flag party. If you watch the game, they probably threw a flag on every other play, if I had to guess. There was a lot of questionable calls going both ways. One of them helped out the commanders, notably. One of them helped out the Steelers, notably.
But then to come out and say, well, the commanders lost because of the refs. Oh. Oh, my goodness and everything. Steelers fans, they saying that the refs were bad. They can't be complaining. Brother, brother. They're unequivocally bad, like, all the way around, dude. You can say that the call is bad and move on. It's not that deep, I promise you. That would probably be my beef.
Thank you.
[00:47:36] Speaker B: Golf Club.
[00:47:37] Speaker A: Okay. So, you know, with mine, it's, it starts off with something that we've talked about before on the show. And it all started, I mean, there are instances before this where it has happened, but this year specifically at the Texas and Georgia game where certain people started throwing objects onto the field because they disagreed with the call. Now it has happened like we said it would. I believe, you know, Nick said, you know, when he brought it up his first time, that it would happen multiple times. We've had it in a game with Clemson, Louisville, we've had Ohio State, Nebraska. We had it with Alabama and LSU this past week. And even when you watch the replay, you can see the face mask. Brian Kelly is still arguing that it wasn't a face mask and fans are throwing stuff on the field. And then it also happened in the Texas Tech Colorado game. Now they did have their regular tortilla toss, which is fine, you know, that's fine. But then there was a separate instance in the game where they were throwing, you know, trash on the field. And you know, I don't know if there's been any like actual things that have come out. Like I know there was talk about them banning people from the, from Texas when it happened. I don't know if anything has happened to any other game there, as far as I know, has not been any penalties assessed. There has not been any fines assessed that I know of. But then in this game, the Texas Tech Colorado game, apparently there were some half full like beers that were thrown out there.
And when Deion Sanders confronted the refs about it, the refs said, well, your players are blowing kisses at them when they score touchdowns. It's like that is not a reason to not to not do anything about trash. Being that that should not be your response to a head coach when he says they're throwing stuff that could hurt our people. Like, well, your players are blowing kisses at him. That was just, you know, it was. It's a bad look. It's obviously like, it's just bad all the way around. But like if this is how the refs are even viewing it, like something has to happen to where they're. Like something has to happen to make it stop. And I don't know if it's going to be the fines or people like not being able or like if the NCAA is going to come out and say that there has to be some type of penalty on the team, that it's their fans doing it. I don't know. But it's getting worse.
[00:49:59] Speaker B: Okay, I've got a mini beef. Okay, first off, Omar, fraudulent fraud squad and potential legal trouble. Let's see, what's my other beef gonna be?
[00:50:12] Speaker C: Did you forget your other beef?
[00:50:14] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Okay, two beefs. Two beast A. My hotel had zero fast food options in with that were open at one in the morning within 20 miles. That sucked.
And third. And finally, we need to do something about the press areas. The opposing team press areas at different college football stadiums. There was no air conditioning in the one at LSU with the humidity, about 50 reporters who were all soaking wet, and multiple football players. It smelled absolutely putrid in there. And I sweat. I sweated at least two gallons. I surely lost £15.
With that being said, that's all the time we've got here on 90.7 capstone, the low tide.
[00:51:06] Speaker C: What maybe one of the worst outros you've ever done.
Let's go on the low light compilation. Wow.
[00:51:13] Speaker B: Okay, that's. That's crazy.
[00:51:17] Speaker C: How's that crazy?
It's not crazy. It's just the truth, man. Good night. Tri said area.
[00:51:24] Speaker B: Well, I'll see you next week.
