Magenta Unos 65, Drakies 62

Well, if you haven't heard yet, one hell of a finish in todays game. Kaylon Williams of Evansville banked in a prayer from half court with no time left to help Evansville top the Bulldogs, 65-62.

What's with these Purple Aces? Not only can they not show up to a game on time (which, where I'm from, is called a 'forfeit'), but they don't even call glass when they throw vicious bricks up there. What an unfortunate end to the game.

To make it even worse, we were absolutely jobbed on the other end by the refs. Craig Stanley made a move to his right, but Holzinger anticipated it and totally jumped in his way. Good defensive instinct, but he wasn't there and was definitely moving as Stanley bowled him over. No call. Holzinger then took the ball and slid three feet on the ground. No call. Holzinger then called time out. Timeout, Evansville. I shit you not.

I sit two rows up in the corner and I could see Phelps get in the ear of the official:

HE FOULED HIM! HE FOULED HIM AND THEN HE TRAVELED!

Now, usually, I'm not one to bitch and moan about officiating. I can't stand it when fans blame a whole loss on the officials calls. Now, I'm not trying to do that here -- the real culprit of Drake's loss is that they let Evansville go on a 10-0 run (BS halfcourt shot included) to close the game. They got way too tentative and went into shutdown mode about one or two possessions before they should have.

That's the real culprit tonight. But it doesn't help to sit right in front of the worst call (well, technically, no call) I've witnessed this season. Makes this loss that much tougher.

I'm a baseball guy, huge St. Louis Cardinals fan. One thing you'll generally see when you follow a baseball team closely is that sometimes you run into a team that is much worse than yours on paper, worse record, etc... But, they tend to still sweep the series or beat you overall on the season. It comes down to the fact that you just don't matchup that well with them, despite the fact that you tend to match up to the rest of the league a lot better than they do.

Well, Evansville has been that team for several years now. I don't know what it is, but we NEVER match up well against them (except last year, which, come on, you have to disregard for this point). This year has definitely shown that. Hopefully we can finish strong against the Valley, and if we're lucky, avoid having to matchup against these guys for a third time in March.