November 25th, 2017: Jacksonville State at East Carolina (Seton Hall Thanksgiving Classic)

Just the Facts, Ma’am: In a fast-paced, defensive-minded game, Jacksonville State came away with a balanced 82-73 win over East Carolina. Taylor Hawks and Ki-Ki Patterson each had 13 points to pace the Gamecocks. Ariyana Williams notched 15 off the bench to lead the Pirates.

For names being the same, purple, passionate family, stomping the bleachers, doppelgangers, consistent inconsistency, and surprises, join your intrepid blogger after the jump.

Every Thanksgiving tournament with a hosting team must, perforce, have a truly neutral game. People are starting to stream out as Jacksonville State takes the court to stretch. Theoretically East Carolina should be here as well, but I don’t see them. I see their support staff and commentator types, but no basketball players.

I do like East Carolina’s purple. It is to my everlasting sorrow that I follow so very many teams and none of them wear my favorite color.

No, Quanny, you can’t play two. Jacksonville State has too many players on their roster to add you on anyway.

Remind me to bring the seat cushions for next game. My ass hurts so much. These bleachers are the world’s hardest wood.

East Carolina has arrived. I’m not entirely certain what they’re wearing, but it looks like a hoodie and a t-shirt had a baby and then neither of them actually wanted to claim it. I think one of the purple Pirates actually cut the hood off hers.

Oh, cool. Seton Hall has the name and number t-shirts/warm-up shirts, for even easier identification of your favorite Pirate.

Rider’s staying to scout. Looks like Seton Hall is relying on the coaches for that. They bailed at halftime.

Speaking of halftime, Jacksonville State is up 44-35 in what’s been an entertaining game. A lot of shots are falling short, but the defensive intensity is fun on both sides. The Gamecocks are getting key baskets from Ki-Ki Patterson, who leads the way with nine, and Brianna Perry. East Carolina hasn’t had anyone particularly stand out, but they seem to really need to go to the strong side to hit their lay-ups.

A small group of ECU fans has discovered the remarkable resonance of the bleachers at Walsh and is happily stomping on them at every appropriate occasion.

There’s a white tape X on one of the chairs on the Pirates’ bench and a smaller one on another. I’m not sure what the deal with that is. (Yes, at least in this game, ECU is using Seton Hall’s bench, making it doubly the Pirates’ bench.)

Well, I’m not going to say this was the greatest game ever played, but it was certainly fun to watch. Both teams got up and down the floor in a hurry, and both teams played high-pressure defense. Jacksonville State came up with the big plays more consistently, and that gave them the win.

(That being said, JSU’s coach needs to switch to decaf. I speak as an expert witness.)

Leah Strain has one of the stranger shots I’ve seen, and she shoots her free throw the exact same way she shoots her jump shot. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a free throw taken as a jumper before. She’s feisty on defense, though, and wouldn’t let up on the ballhandler. Taylor Hawks kind of sneaked up on the game, coming up big in the fourth quarter. Morgan Towells was one of two players on the court today who wore #1 and had a small-to-medium-sized Afro with a blonde tint; just to make life that much more confusing for your intrepid blogger, she was matched up with her counterpart, Alex Frazier, on both ends of the floor. She took a lot of hard hits- the Gamecocks were, as a team, extremely willing to take charges (they were somewhat less thrilled about getting called for blocks).

Chloe Long, in terms of build, reminds me a little of DeWanna Bonner, in the sense that it’s hard to believe a human can be that skinny and still be a top-tier athlete. She’s not Bonner, not by a long shot, but her length at guard gives the Gamecocks options- given how ECU was playing, she saw a lot of minutes at forward. Rayven Pearson is a whole lot of woman. She’s a very solid option down low on both ends of the floor, and East Carolina didn’t really have anyone who could match up with her; their post players were more the long, lanky type that could keep up with the fast-break offense, and the one bulky player in their frontcourt was a good bit shorter. Her ability to get to the basket and to clear the offensive glass is going to be a problem for anyone who doesn’t have a bruiser to counter her.

Gretchen Morrison’s foul trouble on defense kept her out of the game for long stretches, but JSU’s coach was able to insert her at opportune times when the Gamecocks had the ball, and she answered with timely corner threes. She and Strain sort of platooned. Ki-Ki Patterson got off to a strong start to get the Gamecocks rolling, and had a knack for quieting East Carolina. She was far better penetrating the paint than she was from beyond the arc. Brianna Perry had a nice little game- quick hands on defense and big shots on offense. I feel like I’m repeating myself a lot, but Jacksonville State was very balanced, and everyone really stepped up who played substantial minutes.

I’m not entirely sure how or why the player named on Jacksonville State’s roster as Tyler Phelion spent the day being called Coco, but, hey, I spent four years watching Centhya Hart for St. John’s, so I really can’t argue with a college kid choosing to go by the nickname Coco. She started off on fire, hitting their first two baskets, and did a good job of getting to the line. There’s something about her that suggested that if her team needed someone to step up and have a big game, she could be that someone. Tasha Magruder made defensive plays in the second half, deflecting passes and grabbing rebounds.

The Ohio Valley might be very interesting this year, if a team that hasn’t traditionally been one of the ones we hear about all the time is building something like this. I like their balance, I like their heart, and I like that they have a post player like Pearson that they can go to in order to disrupt the opponent. I’m trying to imagine an eeny-weeny guard like the ones UT-Martin used to have running headlong into Rayven Pearson. It doesn’t end well for the imaginary guard.

Necole Hope was the one who had the enthusiastic fans in the bleachers behind the Pirates’ bench (at least, I assume that was why one of them was allowed down on the court after she took a hard hit and hit her head- don’t worry, she shook it off, went back into the game, and made some big defensive plays). She’s got to be more careful with her fouls, but I like her defense. Ariyana Williams hit a couple of threes in the fourth to keep the game close, and was the recipient of many fouls (and thus many free throws). Lashonda Monk was busy on defense, which got her into foul trouble.

Tania Pierre-Emile saw a little time in the first half and more in the second, and set the nice screen that opened up Williams for her first three. I’m not sure if they normally use her more, or if there are reasons she wasn’t playing as much, but I think she could be good for them, to facilitate their shooters. Mickayla Sanders was really the only one out there with bulk, but given ECU’s style, that wasn’t terribly helpful. Destiny Campbell and Desiree Corbin each saw a few spot minutes that were mostly unremarkable, except when Corbin committed an incredibly stupid foul after a shot by Phelion. She got pulled shortly after that for a Teaching Moment.

Thais Oliveira would be so much better if she could do anything with her left hand. In the first half, she kept going to the right side, even if it meant crossing the basket through the defense. In the second half, she at least realized she had to try to shoot from the left side, whereupon we discovered why she doesn’t do that. It was bad. I sort of think I like her midrange pull-up, but I don’t know how I feel about centers having midrange pull-ups. She helps them keep the game moving, which helps. Dominique Claytor brings size as a guard, though ECU claims to run a four-guard set. She’s the closest thing they have to another forward, I guess. She had a nifty steal in the third quarter, and brought toughness to the floor.

Justice Gee has a pretty bad-ass name. She fueled the speed of the Pirates’ attack- they pressed, and they ran, and they kept the game very high-octane. It did not help the tattered remnants of my exhausted sanity that she matched up with her fellow #0, Taylor Hawks, whenever Hawks was on the floor. Too many players. Not enough nameplates. Please, coaches, put names on your jerseys. Alex Frazier played at full speed ahead at all times. It bit her in the ass a couple of times when she got called for really blatant charges- in case you were ever wondering why they call it a player control foul in college, you can pull up footage of her third and fourth fouls. I’m pretty sure at least one of them would qualify. Raven Johnson had a nice fast break play in the second quarter, with the steal and the lay-up, but otherwise I remember nothing about her.

East Carolina is certainly scrappy, and that’s the kind of team that at least manages to inexplicably cover against UConn, even if they can’t quite beat them. That’s the standard you’re going to be held to in the AAC if you haven’t proven you can do anything else, sorry to say.

Dear officials: can we please call fewer hand-checks and more hands to the face? Before someone gets seriously hurt? At least in this one they did eventually start calling much of the contact after two straight possessions where an East Carolina player smacked the back of her head on the floor. (Oliveira hit her head right before Hope hit hers.)

It was sort of fun to get distracted by spotting Seton Hall players in street clothes as they wandered in and out of the scene. The coaches tended to stay put more.

I’m intrigued by both of these teams, and I’m looking forward to their contrast of styles with their appropriate opponents. Rider’s physicality will probably not be welcomed, appreciated, or tolerated by East Carolina.