Author Archives: wallis

Insider: Journey Thru the Tourney

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WOW, WHAT A WEEKEND! I don’t know where to begin, but I do know that it’s Monday and it is great to still be ALIVE in the “bracket of death”! While most college kids will spend SB09 in Panama City, on a cruise, at home, or at a friend’s grandparent’s house in Naples — we on the Wash U hoops team are glad to be spending the majority of our spring break in the Northwest ‘burbs of Chicago. There’s nothing like playing in the NCAA Tourney, even if it comes at the price of my teammates getting tan (I’ve got nice bronze skin anyway, so who needs a vacation—right???).

When the pairings first came out Monday, I’m not going to lie, I was a little upset with the way the NCAA handled the Midwest and West regions. This is with no disrespect to any of the programs from the East or Northeast, etc. but it was extremely hard trying to explain to friends and family how and why the top seven ranked teams in the country only one could possibly make it to the final four. They’d say, wait so it’d be like if Pitt, UNC, UCONN, Duke and Louisville all were in the same regional—and still not believe me when I said “YES!!!”

After a good hour of pouting about not being able to play at home (since our women hosted) and being sent to the site of one of our two losses all year, we all flipped a switch and stopped feeling sorry for ourselves. I think we realized that when it was game time on Friday against Lawrence, they weren’t going to feel sorry for us so it wouldn’t do us any good to feel sorry for ourselves.

Preparing for Lawrence was really tough because of how well they play together as a team. I think they’re a lot like us. While we felt like our scout team did a good job preparing us, at the beginning of the game it was quickly realized how impossible it was for a scout team to really imitate ‘their stuff’ since they run their motion so well. They read the defense, took advantage of any mistakes we made defensively and made us pay when we didn’t get back in transition. While almost no one our team could hit a shot, luckily we had A.T. on our side.

I don’t know if I can really describe what AT has been able to do for us this season. If you’ve never seen him play–he plays the game the way it’s supposed to be played—at both ends of the court. He’s always been automatic as a spot up shooter—but now he’s a flat out scorer… he leads our team in blocks and even yanked down 10 boards on Saturday. He’s got the longest, gangliest (is that a word?) arms—which is why we say “Go, Go Gadget Arms!” when he gets his hands on balls he has no business getting. Bottom line is that he can hoop!

Anyway, we overcame some miserable shooting from myself and Tyler to somehow sneak away with a win on Friday. As I wrote about last year, the tournament is about surviving and advancing—and that is what we did on Friday. It was one of those games that I really felt like we got out played for 35 minutes or so overall, but thanks to a few good runs, a big time three from A.T., and some timely misses, we marched on to Saturday.

Watching the Elmhurst vs. UW-Whitewater game following ours was unbelievable. I’ve been to Salem the past two years, and that game featured two teams that could have taken down at least half the talent I’ve seen in the Final Four. It’s truly a shame (among a lot of other word selections I could’ve used instead of a shame) that those two played in the first round. It was an awesome atmosphere, it’s just too bad for Elmhurst’s seniors that it had to end like that—because they are a team that deserved to play more than one game in the NCAA Tourney.

With a turnaround of less than 24-hours we had to prepare for our most talented opponent of the year. UW-Whitewater featured some big time athletes inside and on the wings and our coaches did a great job getting a game plan together to help neutralize their athleticism. We jumped out to an early 11-0 lead and played some great basketball. We really frustrated them by doing a few different things defensively and even pushed our lead to 18 in the second half.

As all good teams do, UWW made a big time run midway through the second half. Somehow we held them off and only gave up the lead for 17 seconds on our way to another W. Again, we may have been the better team most of the night, but UWW had chances to win the game. We hit some timely shots, made free-throws and got a little lucky—which is sometimes better than being good this time of year. UWW was the most talented group of individuals, position by position, I’ve seen play at this level in the past four years—without a doubt. Survive and advance.

Looking forward to next week—it should be an incredible game Friday night. Wheaton obviously is a tremendous team and I’m looking forward to playing in a really fun atmosphere. We got to see them earlier in the season when they played at Webster in St. Louis and I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t watched two or three of their games on web cast. Between their threats inside and out—it’ll be a challenge, but one I know we’re up for!

Four more.

Take care,
Sean

P.S. Shout out to my boys Dylan Richter and Tom Blount—two people that have been major contributors on our team that are now out for the year. Dylan broke his foot in the first round game against Lawrence (and then proceeded to NAIL a three-ball before coming out) and Tom is having shoulder surgery this week. It’s no fun sitting on the bench from injury (I’d know from experience) but I know both of these guys are still pulling for us big time. GETCHUUUUUUUUUU SUM.

Insider: Stringing W’s

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Hey Hey—just checking in from St. Louis for the first time in a few weeks. While the weather was 70 and sunny here yesterday (amazing!) the only thing hotter is the men’s and women’s basketball teams. OK so that was a really lame start to the blog, but really—combined we’ve won 11-straight UAA games and everyone down here is pumped with the way things are shaking out. We have a three-game lead in the UAA and the women are still tied for first with Rochester. Let’s rewind and go through our past few weeks.

Two weekends ago we traveled to Brandeis (Boston) and NYU—everyone’s favorite trip of the year. My parents, aunt and uncle, went on the trip so it was a blast going to nice dinners with them in Boston and New York. When we go to awesome cities like these, Coach Edwards gives us a night free to explore as long as we’re back by curfew. I could see other coaches being strict and making their players stay in the hotels, but Coach makes sure we get to enjoy the unique opportunity to see cities we don’t normally get to, however we want to see them. Last year, Tyler and I went to see a musical on Broadway—very cool and not something most college kids from St. Louis get to do during the school year. Listening to show tunes and musical soundtracks may or may not be a guilty pleasure of mine.

Anyway, Friday night’s game at Brandeis was a really tough one. The students were rowdy and on top of the court. Aside from cursing about my mom–I was dealt one of my lowest blows when one kid yelled at me ‘Hey Wallis—I read your blog on d3hoops.com and it sucks!’ At first it got to me—but then I was pumped because it meant more people than my parents and sisters are taking the time to read this stuff.

‘Deis hung tough but my man Cam Smith, who was growing a dirty stash out like Larry Legend, hit a big time shot down the stretch to help us get the W. A lot of people that don’t know too much about our team know about me, or Tyler or Aaron Thompson (AT)—but team’s need a guy like Cam to be successful. He’s leading our team in rebounding, he hits backbreaking shots, and he gets after it defensively while frustrating the other team’s best player.

We bussed to New York early Saturday for shoot-around and walk through to prepare for NYU. I don’t think we were ready for the way NYU cut early on and we were down 10-1 before any of us had woken up for the Sunday morning game. A.T. put us on his back and before you knew it we were up 28-12. We held a decent lead the rest of the way and got back to St. Louis with a clean weekend sweep and a 7-0 record at the midway point.

For those that don’t know how the UAA works, at the halfway point the schedule flips around. So we played NYU the next Friday and Brandeis on Sunday at home. It’s an extremely strange dynamic—and gives us a taste of what it would be like to play a five or seven-game series—how they do it in the NBA. Since I’d been at Wash U, we’d never won both games in the back-to-back turn around, but this year we were able to do so. Last year we lost to CMU by 30+ on Sunday then beat them by 15 the next Friday—just weird.

We took down NYU in front of rowdy Field House crowd on Friday night and beat an undermanned Brandeis squad on Sunday. We have a big weekend coming up including our last two road games of the season. Tomorrow morning we leave for Atlanta to play Emory on Friday then on Saturday we fly to Cleveland for our game against Case Western on Sunday.

I wanted to take this opportunity to address a few questions I got from some readers about my recovering from injury and my play on the court. I feel like my return this year has definitely been a success. We graduated the National Player of the Year, have an enormous target on our back as defending national champions, and still have found a way to be 19-1, 9-0 in the UAA.

Personally, while I played quite a bit this summer—I really didn’t feel like myself back on the court most of first semester. Physically my body was fully healed, but basketball is a lot about confidence and I’m not sure I fully had it in my leg the first month of the season. Right now, however, I feel fantastic. I think it just took time to know that if I got knocked down going to the basket, my leg wouldn’t necessarily snap, but I’d get back up and hit free-throws.

I think there are a few significant ways I feel like my game has evolved from a few years ago due to sitting back and watching. The first is I really am focused on ‘playing forward’–a term I’ve heard Kirk Hinrich use. He means that if you miss a shot or make a turnover, to forget about it and just worry about the next play in the game. Obviously at the end of the game you should evaluate why you made mistakes–but during the game, it’s important that those mistakes aren’t changing your mindset.

Another thing I am conscientious about is to make sure I value the ball on every one of our team’s possessions. After sitting out I realized how costly it is when turnovers actually happen–even if they’re aggressive turnovers, trying to make a play happen. I think that’s one of the reasons my assist-to-turnover ratio is well over three this year where it was under two a few years ago.

Also—there was a question about our PA announcer Bruce Veach, and his absence at a bunch of our games this year. He’s an important part to the Bear basketball family and is going through a tough fight with cancer so he’s only been able to be at a handful of games. He’s got all of our support though and is a tough guy and he’s gonna make it through this. Besides, no one yells “AT FOR THREEEEEEEEE” like he does!

Again, feel free to drop me a line at walliss@wustl.edu if there’s anything you want me to address. Only a few more until March!!!!

Take care,
Sean

P.S. Wanted to give some love to Corey O’Rourke and Elliot Curtis, Carnegie Mellon’s PGs, for their podcast ‘Two the Point’
It’s pretty good stuff if you get a chance to listen.

Insider: Road Warriors

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It’s only been a few weeks but I feel like I have a lot to write about—so here’s blog #4 from an airplane someplace between Pittsburgh and St. Louis.

Home Weekend: We had two home games last weekend in conference against Case Western and Emory. The UAA is a very different conference than any other in the country because of the geography involved. We play Friday nights and Sunday mornings every weekend–this leads to very different game atmospheres for the two games. Last Friday night we tipped-off at 8 p.m. in front of 1,500 or so Wash U faithful— including about 1,000 students. Sunday morning against Emory, in the same gym, there were maybe 100 people in the stands at 11 a.m. for tip-off–probably four hundred more got there by half time.

It isn’t hard to get fired up to play in front of a crowd like Friday’s—unfortunately Case Western was a little more fired up than we expected. They shot the heck out of the ball in the first half, but we weathered the storm and pulled ahead with great defense in the second half.

Sunday we got off to a great start against Emory and never looked back. Coach Edwards says “UAA championships are won on Sundays” and I really agree with him. The teams that can be ready to play at a.m. and focused on the task at hand win those games.

Taking the road: This past weekend started our rough stretch of four-straight road games. Starting Thursday we were going to be spending six of 10 nights in hotels in Rochester, Pittsburgh, Boston & New York City. Seriously–that’s like an NBA schedule. Playing in the UAA we take for granted the amazing opportunity of being able to pick up and leave school to travel to some the greatest cities in the country—but when you’re on the road like this it gets tough between missing four days of class and not sleeping in your own bed.

The Rochester/Carnegie Mellon trip has not been good to us since I’ve been here. I’ve been lucky enough to be a part of two Final Four teams and another team that JUST missed the tournament—and those teams were a combined 1-5 on this trip, never winning at Rochester. Last year’s national championship team got smacked by CMU, on a Sunday, by 30+ points, so this was a big trip for us since they (UR & CMU) were both 2-1 in conference going into the weekend– with us at 3-0.

On Thursday, we met at our gym at 4:15 a.m. for our travel day from hell—a 6 a.m. flight from St. Louis to Baltimore…another flight Baltimore to Buffalo…and a two hour bus ride from Buffalo to Rochester. Somehow we got enough rest Thursday after our practice for our Friday night game (8:30 pm to 9:30 am sleeping—not bad!). We took advantage of an undermanned Rochester team and never took our foot off the gas—not too many teams win at the Palestra, so even if they were missing the conference’s leading scorer it was still a good win. We took an early bus ride Saturday morning from Rochester to Pittsburgh for a practice at CMU to prepare for our game this morning.

The game today was a big-time battle. Both teams traded punches in the first half and got into some foul trouble. They hit some shots—then we hit some shots and had a seven-point halftime lead. They then cut it to three points early in the second half—but over a two-minute span, we went on a 17-0 (yes, that’s right 17-0!!!) run to put the game to 20. That run was the most fun I’ve had playing basketball in a long, long time. Our defense was clicking, leading to turnovers, leading to fast-breaks, leading to wide open lay-ups and threes–it was just awesome. That run was all we needed and we held on for the win.

Rootin’ for the Women: Another cool thing about the UAA is how close we get with the women’s team. We travel together every weekend, watch every one of their games and go to dinners together on the road. So, just because we beat Rochester on Friday we were all bummed and kinda quiet on the bus to Pittsburgh Saturday a.m. since they lost a tough one that they almost had the night before–we call that a “sad” bus. But, since we both won on Sunday (and UR women lost to Chicago) we’re both now either in or tied for first place in the conference–so now I’m flying on “happy” plane with lots of laughter and–dare I say–flirting.

Notes:
– Congrats to Coach Edwards who was honored at the Baseball writers of Missouri’s banquet last week – you can see him in the background of this picture with some guy named Albert Pujols.

– Congrats to my roomie and best bud Tyler Nading on setting the all-time fouls record at Wash U… we’re all so proud of you!

– Before our Emory game I asked the refs about the trivia question I had last blog–and they were 1,000% sure that once the ball hits the ground it is NO LONGER a FG attempt and wouldn’t count if it were after the buzzer—and that it would be a two if time wasn’t an issue.

–On a personal note–it meant a lot to me that EVERY single guy on the Varsity team came to our team’s JV game on Monday night. When we were freshmen, Tyler and I would be the ONLY one’s that played in the Varsity game (aside from the coaches) to go watch our teammates since it is traditionally on a Varsity day off. It really shows how tight this team is, how the program has evolved and changed in my four years, and how every player on this roster is pulling for everyone else.

–HUGE game for us on Friday night @ Brandeis (4-1 in conference). If we can get a W, everyone else in the UAA will have at least two losses, putting us in good shape since five of our last seven are at home. We want to do damage again in March, but we are hungry for a UAA championship since we didn’t get one last year!

Take care,
Sean

Insider: Checkin’ in from the Lou

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Happy New Year to everyone from St. Louis! Yesterday was the first day of classes in the spring semester. While you’d think most students dread going back to class, the first day of class is the best. Most professors only hand out a syllabus and give a brief introduction to the course–all typically followed by letting everyone out early!! Yesterday both my Advanced Accounting Problems and Israeli Politics courses got out early so I’m in a good mood heading to practice.

A lot has happened since I last checked in. We topped Fontbonne, who was then undefeated and playing well, and then beat another SLIAC team in Eureka. We took on Elmhurst in the championship of their tournament and lost our first game of the season. They played a great game and did everything they needed to do to win. We did a great job limiting Brent Ruch inside, but just his presence opened up the perimeter for their shooters. It was a pick your poison type day as they shot 50% from three and escaped with a close victory. I know they’ve lost two close games in the CCIW already, but I’m sure they’re not an easy match-up for anyone they’ll play.

While we took the loss on the chin, I’d be looking forward to get another crack at them in March. Pretty crazy we were 3-1 against Illinois Wesleyan, Augustana, Elmhurst & North Park—four of the teams I figured would be near the top of the conference—but they are a combined 2-8 in conference play so far—I guess it’s a long season.

We got a nice week-long winter break and went back to campus December 29, two full weeks before regular students got back. Being alone on campus is actually really fun and relaxing. We do a lot of lounging and TV watching. This year a few of us started watching Sopranos from season one on DVD, while others caught up on the last Entourage season they missed. We tried to find different ways of keeping ourselves entertained—including mastering Super Smash Brothers on N64 (Pikachu is my character), dressing up classy for a New Years Eve Party with the women’s basketball team, and growing out intriguing facial fair (see picture of Zach Kelly at bottom of blog).

We got back in action with a win at Webster to start off 2009 on a good note. This past weekend we traveled through the snow to Chicago for our conference opener. Talking to Matt Corning, their go-to-guy, before the game I realized how frustrating it must be to go through what they’ve been through the past few months. Coming off a UAA title and only losing a few pieces, I figured they’d be a little down from last year—but the coaches still picked them to finish SECOND in the conference. Moral of the story: they are the most talented 0-12 team in NCAA History, any division, any gender—seriously. Am I saying they should be 10-2? No. But how they’ve escaped the W column I’m at a loss for words. Anyway, they kept it close for the first half but we slowly pulled away with some good execution in the second half.

Overall, things are going great for us. We’re first in the country as a team in assist-to- turnover ratio and second in assists per game (which is practically first since it is behind GRINELL!!!). I don’t think it is a coincidence either—our offense puts us in great positions to have everyone be successful. I think the special thing about our team is that we really “get it”. We know what we need on certain possessions and know who is capable of doing what. We have a lot of depth off the bench and are two-deep at almost every spot without losing much. Most importantly: we’re 11-1 and haven’t played our best basketball yet.

Looking forward to more conference play in the next few weeks!

Take care,
Sean

P.S. BASKETBALL TRIVIA QUESTION: I don’t know the right answer but was hoping this would be the place to get it–so please respond with your thoughts–It may take a referee to answer it. One of our players bounced in a ball from half court in a shoot around and we had a good 15-minute debate:

Wash U is down two with a second left and a Wash U player catches the ball off a Chicago FT miss at one end of the court and fires a one handed baseball pass high in the air the full length of the court. While the ball is in the air, the buzzer for the end of the game goes off. The ball then bounces inside the three-point line (untouched by anyone else since the full court throw) and then into the basket.

1) Would the basket count since the ball hit the ground after the buzzer went off but was shot before the buzzer went off?
2) If it counts (or even if it didn’t), would it be considered a three-pointer since the player’s feet were clearly behind the line when it was thrown, or would it be a two- pointer since it bounced inside the three point line before it went in?

Zach's really cool facial hair.

Zach's really cool facial hair.

Insider: Winnin’ & Havin’ Fun

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It’s been a while since my last entry so here’s a run through of our recent games.

Last time I checked-in we were 2-0 and heading to Augustana for a #1 vs. #2 showdown. The game was a blast—playing in front of 2,000+ fans, most of which were yelling obscene things at me (side note: what does it mean to be called a dirty Serbian? I’m not even Serbian and I don’t think womens tennis pro Ana Ivanovic, who is Serbian, is dirty), brought me back to my days in high school.

Augie is a great team and they play incredible defense. Over the past three years we’ve developed a really great rivalry with them and had four games decided by just a few points. As much as I love seeing my AAU teammate Alex Washington and a few of the other guys from Augie, I’d have to say I wouldn’t mind if I don’t see them again this year on the court. We won a great game in overtime which made getting back from Rock Island, Illinois at 4 AM all worth it!

The next weekend we traveled to Anderson, Indiana, for our thanksgiving tournament. Cameron Smith is from Noblesville, which isn’t too far from there, so we ate thanksgiving dinner with his family. We took on Aurora in our opener and pulled away in overtime. They had some fantastic individual performances and didn’t play like a winless team. While they struggled at the beginning of this season, they’re going to compete for their conference championship and I’d expect them to get better as the season goes on.

In the championship game we played Anderson, a veteran team that had only lost to UW-Platteville by a few points a couple days earlier. We got into some serious foul trouble but were able to fight through the adversity to get a W.

This past weekend we were at home (FINALLY!!!) as we hosted the 25th annual Lopata Classic. Friday night we took on an undefeated Hamilton team in front of a pretty hostile crowd at the WU Field House. We played extremely well and I believe they’re a much better team than the final score indicated.

The next afternoon we took on a young, but talented Illinois Wesleyan team. The hardest part wasn’t physically being able to turn around and play a game the next day (because we were relatively rested from the night before) but having to prepare for them in such short period of time. They ran a ton of ball screen motion, which we were extremely unsure how to play against the entire first half. We’re a team that uses preparation and our coach’s scouting report really well. Normally we’ll use defensive drills in practice to prepare for what a team likes to do—but we weren’t able to simulate or really get a feel for their motion. At halftime we made some great adjustments and were able to contain what they did a little better. We were just able to get a few more stops in the second half, which was the only difference in the game.

I’d have to say because of sitting on the sidelines and my injury last year, I really have been looking at things in a different way this year. If a few years ago I had a game where I had eight turnovers (like @ Augustana) or didn’t make a field goal (like against Aurora), I would beat myself up over it. I would think about it a lot, it would get me down and I’d even have it in my head the following game. But this year is different for me—I can honestly say it isn’t about stats, getting double-digit assists or being the leading scorer on my team—I just want my team to keep winning. I want to contribute and be a key part of one of the best teams in the country—and through seven games I think I’ve been able to do that, even coming off a pretty brutal injury. If that means I need to be getting AT shots or put Ty in positions to score– then that’s great by me as long as that’s what will be great for our team.

We play against undefeated Fontbonne on Saturday which is always a good test. Then we head up to the Chicago area for a tournament at Elmhurst. If we can win our first game against Eureka, we will most likely take on Elmhurst in a battle of top-five teams. Sure hasn’t been an easy schedule—but I know we wouldn’t want it any other way!

I’ll check back before the holidays. Shoot me an e-mail at walliss@wustl.edu if there’s anything you want me to touch on in my next entry. Good luck on finals to all.

Take care,
Sean