Tad Boyle tried to warn people about the things that were wrong with his team for weeks. Simple things, big things, small things but none too costly as the Colorado Buffaloes entered Brooklyn 3-0. But every single thing that Boyle wanted was wrong with his squad came to fruition on Monday in ugly and glaring fashion early, coming out as flat as a three-day-old soda.
Beat down by Notre Dame 89-83 in the semifinals of the Legends Classic, Colorado came out putrid early and didn’t have enough time to recover late.
“It was a tough loss, we started out slow, we came out flat,” Xavier Johnson told 760 postgame. “They were hitting shots, they can shot and we didn’t execute our defensive game plan, and when you do that you end up down 15 quick with a great shooting team. That’s where we messed up, big time.”
Two quick Wes Gordon fouls took out the big man early and Boyle, as he almost always does with a player that has two fouls in the first half, refused to play him for the remainder of the first period. Gordon’s absence meant a lot of Tory Miller and Lucas Siewert, neither could step up to level needed necessary as the Irish dropped 50 in the first half. ND had a barrage of shots fall, not just from the inside as they nailed six threes on 12 shots in the first.
Lazy turnovers and mistakes cost Colorado as players like George King and Derrick White added up as an anemic offensive game supplemented the lackluster defensive effort in the first half. At times Notre Dame lead by as much as 18 in the first half.
“The first half, 50 points at halftime and they’re shooting 54%, come on, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what the problem is,” Boyle said to 760. “We have to play 40 minutes of basketball.”
The Buffs tried to make a comeback in the second half but every jab they threw was received and countered with an uppercut. Colorado cut it to 11 behind some solid play by Johnson but Steve Vasturia put Josh Fortune on skates then V.J. Beachem dunked all over Deleon Brown and the momentum looked like it would disintegrate
“Notre Dame came out executing with toughness and we didn’t,” Boyle said. “We missed a lot of bunnies tonight we need to get tougher when it comes to finishing in the paint, whether there is contact or not, we gotta put the ball in the basket and we didn’t, we had some really easy ones get away.”
But it wasn’t over quite yet.
More Johnson coupled with an all-the-sudden step up in effort brought Colorado back to six on an 8-0 run. They’d continue cutting at the Irish bringing their lead to just five with just two minutes left. Johnson had 14 in the second half, most of which came late.
White would make up for his first half coming up big in the second half and having a huge and-one that would’ve cut the score to four with a little over a minute left. But a lane violation took away his free throw. But that still didn’t detour the Buffs as White was back at the stripe seconds later to hit two free throws and a stellar defensive effort gave Johnson the ball down three with a wide open shot from the wing with 60 seconds left.
He missed.
Colorado would never get it back to within one possession despite several chances.
The Buffs got out-hustled. They didn’t even come close to their defensive and rebounding numbers and the result was exactly what would be expected in that scenario. A loss.
“We were awesome in the second half,” Johnson said. “But it wasn’t enough to win.”
There were positives from the game. The fight, to even come back in the game was impressive. White, King and Johnson were all impressive in the second half. The three combined for 58 points on 20-of-42 shooting over the course of the game. White had eight dimes, King 11 boards and Johnson chipped in everywhere.
The end game here is obvious, it’s time to heed Boyle’s warnings, this team needs more time to develop and they will end up okay. Either way, in their first true test of the season the Buffaloes, failed spectacularly early but their second half effort showed the learning curve on this team is short. The game proved they’re likely to develop as the season moves forward.
