Posts tagged Nick Johnson
CU’s moment in the spotlight wasn’t very bright
Feb 23rd
No. 4 Wildcats Surge Past Buffs In CEC Finale
Coach Boyle: “We deserved what we got.”
BOULDER – Arizona started fast and finished faster Saturday night at the Coors Events Center, spoiling Colorado’s Senior Night and a day of ESPN College GameDay hoopla with an 88-61 romp past the Buffaloes.
It was CU’s worst home loss of the four-year Tad Boyle era, surpassing a 74-50 defeat by Stanford in 2012, and only the second Buffs loss in 18 games this season at the CEC.
It also was a night of firsts for the No. 4 Wildcats, who won for the first time in Boulder since 1973 and swept CU for the first time since the Buffs became members of the Pac-12 Conference in 2011. Arizona (25-2, 12-2) now is 3-0 in its last three meetings with CU (20-8, 9-6).
“The worst we’ve played”
“It was a disappointing performance by our team and I have to look square in the mirror on that,” Boyle said. “As their coach, I didn’t do a very good job tonight.”
The Buffs go on the road for their final three regular-season games, traveling to Utah on Saturday, then wrapping up at Stanford (Wednesday, March 5) and California (Saturday, March 8). The Pac-12 Tournament is March 12-15 in Las Vegas, and Boyle might need that long to digest this weekend’s letdown.
After crediting Arizona for its performance, he reflected on the magnitude of the night and the depth of the disappointment. The Wildcats, he said, “whipped us in every which way you can whip a team . . . our fans were so ready for this game, this win; we gave them nothing. That’s a sick feeling to go home and live with. I don’t know what to say.
“I haven’t been embarrassed many times as a coach, but I was embarrassed by the way my team played . . . we have to own it and accept it. The pit in my stomach has more to do with our fans and seniors. They deserve more (but) we deserve what we got tonight.”
CU has but two seniors – center Ben Mills and guard Beau Gamble. Mills made his first career start, played 7 minutes total and closed out the Buffs’ scoring with the first trey of his career. Gamble made his first appearance of the night in the final 3 minutes, entering the game with the Wildcats leading 78-53.
After trailing by as many as 17 points in the first half, CU cut Arizona’s lead to 31-26 at the half and to 37-33 early in the second half. But the talented Wildcats answered with a 14-6 run that put them ahead 51-39 and effectively put the game away with just over 12 minutes remaining..
Arizona came to Boulder as the Pac-12’s top defensive team, allowing just 57.6 points a game. But the Wildcats put on an offensive clinic in Saturday night’s second half, shooting an uncanny 84.6 percent (22-for-26) to end any thought of a Buffs comeback on an eagerly awaited day and night for them and their fans.
“Colorado’s a good team,” Arizona coach Sean Miller said. “We knew we weren’t going to run away with it that early, our offense really kicked into another gear in the second half.”
But, said Boyle, the Wildcats “were struggling to score coming in here.” And when the Buffs cut the deficit to four early in the second half, “You have to have a mindset to dig in and get stops. We didn’t do that.”
The Buffs also had their offensive problems, but the nasty Wildcats’ defense was to blame for many of those. “I can’t emphasize how good they are defensively; there are 11 other teams in the Pac-12 and then there’s Arizona,” Boyle said. “It’s not even close (on the defensive end). Our frustrations on offense led to a dunk-fest.”
Boyle said his team lacked patience offensively, pointing to a manageable nine turnovers as evidence that the Buffs rushed their shots: “We shot the ball so darn quick that we didn’t have a chance to turn it over. We took such bad shots and quickly, that it was like a turnover and they were able to get out in transition.”
Josh Scott (18 points) and Askia Booker (10) were the only two CU players in double figures while three Arizona players – led by freshman Aaron Gordon’s 23 – reached double digits. Nick Johnson added 20 and Kaleb Tarczewski had 13.
The Pac-12’s top defensive and rebounding team held CU to a season-low 32 percent shooting from the field (17-of-52) and out-boarded the Buffs 38-30. The Wildcats, meanwhile, finished at 60 percent from the field (35-of-58), including their incredible four-miss second half.
After falling behind 18-4 in their 69-57 loss at Arizona last month, the Buffs wanted no part of a sluggish beginning Saturday night. It happened anyway. There weren’t many ways the Buffs’ start could have been any worse.
Missing its first 15 field goal attempts and four of its first seven free throw attempts, CU fell behind 22-5 before freshman Jaron Hopkins hit a 3-pointer with 9:49 left before intermission for the Buffs’ first field goal. It was CU second-longest field goal drought of the season, following a 14:36 span last month in – where else? – Tucson.
But Hopkins’ trey from the left wing launched a 13-4 run that brought CU to within five points (26-21) with 4:39 left in the half. The Wildcats responded with four straight points and went ahead 30-21 before Booker got his first points of the night on a 12-foot jumper 2 seconds before the break.
That brought CU to within 31-25 – and given the way most of the half unfolded, a six-point deficit might have been a blessing.
Booker, who had averaged 19.6 points in his last five games, said the Buffs “got ourselves back into the game – we were down six at half, and that’s not a bad spot to be . . . but we just gave it away in the second half.”
Booker finished the half 1-for-8, Xavier Johnson 0-for-4. The Buffs’ 22.2 percent first-half shooting was their second worst of the season. For the night, Booker was 4-for-14 and Johnson 1-for-10 with five points.
“I think we got a little jump shot happy but I think that’s a credit to (Arizona),” Scott said. “I think we turned over the ball a couple times at some key points in the game and it’s mainly because they pack the paint, so that you’re pretty much there to take those shots. We should have attacked that more.”
Obviously needing a more efficient second-half start, the Buffs got it on a baseline jumper by Scott to pull to 31-27 – the closest they’d been since trailing 5-1. CU and Arizona traded baskets until Gordon hit back-to-back baskets – one a 3-pointer – to push the Wildcats ahead 42-33.
When Gordon hit his trey from the left corner, “I said here we go,” noted Boyle. “That’s not his game.”
But Arizona was about to find its trey touch – and more. Consecutive long balls by Johnson and Gabe York push the Wildcats back to a double-digit lead – 49-39 – then to 51-39 on a shorter Johnson jumper half a minute later. The Wildcats were 6-for-9 (66.7 percent) from beyond the arc in the second half and 8-of-17 (47.1 percent) for the game.
Getting stops was becoming a CU problem, and it was beginning to be compounded by the clock. If the Buffs had another rally in them, it needed to happen – and fast. It was nowhere to be found.
A 13-4 run, capped by a Tarczewski dunk, produced a 21-point Arizona lead (64-43) with 9:16 to play that went to 23 points (66-43) on a pair of Johnson free throws at the 7:50 mark. The Wildcats led by as many as 30 before the final buzzer, the Buffs never led.
Booker said the Buffs “didn’t have the most energy,” but didn’t blame that on any possible distraction from ESPN’s basketball GameDay crew being in Boulder for the first time.
“We’re used to all the cameras being here and all these people setting up their stuff,” he said. “It’s not like we’re doing interviews at half time or right before the game. We barely knew they were here, and yeah, we knew they were preparing but it has nothing to do once we step on the court and the ball goes up. It’s not an excuse.”
CU men fall to Arizona in PAC-12 tourney
Mar 15th
Courtesy: B.G. Brooks, Contributing Editor
Still holding hopes for a wild card berth in the NCAA tournament
LAS VEGAS – Let the waiting game begin. A year ago, the Colorado Buffaloes wrung the suspense out of Selection Sunday by winning the Pac-12 Conference Tournament and earning an automatic berth in the NCAA Tournament.
This year, it’s not that clear-cut, although the Buffs believe their NCAA case has been stated – even in Thursday’s 79-69 quarterfinal loss to No. 18 Arizona in the Pac-12 Conference Tournament.
Colorado’s Spencer Dinwiddie shoots a free throw. He scored 18 points for the Buffs
No. 5 seed CU rallied dramatically, cutting a 14-point lead by No. 4 seed Arizona to two in the final 63 seconds. But the Wildcats held on and left the Buffs holding their collective breath for one of 37 NCAA at-large bids.
“We’re one of the top 37 teams in my mind,” said CU coach Tad Boyle. “But it’s not for me to say.”
But Boyle did cite his argument for the Buffs, who finished 21-11 for their third consecutive 20-win season under Boyle. Last March, after punching the Pac-12’s free ticket, they advanced to the NCAA second round before being eliminated by Baylor in Albuquerque.
This March, Boyle cited CU’s strength of schedule (No. 19), the overall strength of the Pac-12 this season, CU’s league-low 15 home games and the return of Andre Roberson as reasons for the Buffs to be given strong NCAA consideration.
The Buffs finished the season 4-3 against Top 25 teams and were 9-9 against opponents in the top 100 RPI. CU’s pre-game RPI on Thursday was in the low 30s. It all appears to give the Buffs strong NCAA credentials. Yet as Boyle said, inclusion in the 68-team NCAA field isn’t for him or his players to determine despite “what we did over our whole body of work.”
Their work finished in dramatic if unfulfilling fashion as the Buffs overcame an enigmatic and sloppy start to push the Wildcats harder than they might have expected after the first 20 minutes.
Arizona, said Boyle, “played a hell of a game. You could tell from the very beginning they were ready to go.” But it took more than a little while for the Buffs to find the same gear; they trailed 39-28 after a first half that saw them commit 10 of their 13 turnovers (leading to 15 first-half Arizona points) and hit only five of 12 free throw attempts.
With 12:24 left in the game, CU fell behind by 14 before tightening up its defense, rebounding more tenaciously and eventually closing to within 71-69 on a pair of Andre Roberson free throws with 1:03 remaining. But Arizona’s Nick Johnson scored a layup between two CU defenders at the other end to push the Wildcats up four.
Then two free throws by Mark Lyons with 23.6 seconds left gave Arizona a comfortable six-point advantage. The Wildcats added four more free throws in the final 14.2 seconds to win by double digits.
“Coach Boyle always preaches defend and rebound, and I felt like that’s when started to do that and we had a run,” said Roberson, who collected his 37th career double-double (15 points, 11 rebounds). “I feel like we just didn’t do it consistently throughout the whole 40 minutes. That’s how we fell off in the first half, and that’s how we got back into the game in the second half.”
CU outrebounded Arizona 33-31, but allowed the Wildcats to shoot 45.2 percent for the game. The Buffs’ goal is to hold opponents below 40 percent from the field. Arizona also got 25 points from a bench that Boyle says offers “the most quality depth of anybody in our league . . . they go ten deep.”
When the Buffs were surging back, Wildcats’ guard Mark Lyons hit what Boyle called “the play of the game.” With a second showing on the shot clock and Arizona cradling a 68-64 lead, Lyons (14 points, three assists, one steal) took an inbounds pass and fired from the left corner. It swished and CU’s momentum took a hit.
Boyle called the quick inbounds play “a breakdown on our part defensively. We’ve practiced that situation. We just didn’t do what we were supposed to do and it cost us.”
Just over a minute later, after the Buffs had pulled to 71-69, Nick Johnson scored between Roberson and Xavier Johnson to push the Wildcats back up by four. Roberson said Nick Johnson “was stuck in the key looking for a teammate . . . he didn’t have any other option but to go up with it. Maybe I could have been a little more aggressive, but ‘XJ’ was trapping him. He just made a tough shot.”
The fourth-seeded Wildcats (25-6) play top-seeded UCLA (24-8) in one of Friday’s semifinals at the MGM Grand Garden Arena, which saw a record crowd of 12,915 on Thursday afternoon.
CU, which defeated Arizona 53-51 last season for the inaugural Pac-12 championship in Los Angeles, was led by Spencer Dinwiddie with 18 points. Askia Booker contributed 12 and Xavier Johnson 11. Arizona had three players in double figures, topped by Nick Johnson’s 18. The Wildcats hit nine of their 27 three-point attempts, while the Buffs were 5-of-12 from beyond the arc.
The Buffs took their only lead of the game on the first possession, getting a dunk from Dinwiddie on a baseline drive. From there, the afternoon looked as if it belonged to Arizona. The first half’s last half minute providing a snapshot of the Buffs’ early deficiencies. After closing to within eight (36-28) on a put-back by Roberson, CU forced a turnover and had possession with 23.8 seconds left before the break.
But Sabatino Chen couldn’t in-bound the ball in the allotted five seconds and Arizona regained possession. The Wildcats worked the clock to five seconds before Solomon Hill drove the lane for a layup. Roberson fouled him and Hill converted the three-point play, saddling CU with its second-worst (11 points) halftime deficit of the season.
The worst was 19 at Kansas, and that game didn’t end well for CU – a 90-54 smack down in Allen Fieldhouse.
CU’s bench, which was outscored 18-4 in the first half, took a hit when 6-11 Shane Harris-Tunks was hit in the head with 12:45 left before the break. He went to the locker room for evaluation and was not cleared to play in the second half.
Asked about Harris-Tunks’ condition, Boyle said, “Let me say this about Shane: We’ve had two blatant no-calls that have led to concussions on our basketball team (Josh Scott was the other) and I’m really disappointed about it.”
Harris-Tunks’ departure and two early fouls on the 6-10 Scott resulted in five rare first-half minutes for 7-0 junior Ben Mills, who had one point and two rebounds in that time. Boyle said he was “proud of him for doing it tonight in a very tough environment.”
With 12:24 remaining, a three-pointer from the left corner by Jordin Mayes pushed the Wildcats ahead 54-40. If the Buffs couldn’t see trouble ahead, they weren’t looking. But maybe that was a good thing.
Down by 14 after Mayes’ trey, Dinwiddie hit a pair of free throws, Xavier Talton scored a layup on a fast break, and Dinwiddie knocked down a three in transition.
Suddenly, Arizona’s 14-point led had been cut in half (56-47) with 10 minutes to play. The Buffs pulled to within four three times in the final 3:13, the last time on a Booker three with 1:50 remaining. After an Arizona turnover 30 seconds later, Boyle – with his team trailing 71-67 – called a timeout. Roberson’s two foul shots made it a two-point game, but that was as close as the Buffs could get.
Arizona coach Sean Miller said the Wildcats “beat an excellent basketball team . . . we needed to play extremely hard to beat a team like Colorado. You think about Colorado being seeded fifth, it really shows the depth and quality of our conference from top to bottom.”
Boyle and the Buffs hope the NCAA Selection Committee sees it that way, but they’ll have to wait to find out.
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CU Men Throw A Blanket Of ‘D’ Over Wildcats
Feb 15th
By B.G Brooks, CUBuffs.com Contributing Editor
BOULDER – On a cold, snowy Colorado night, if the guys from the desert needed a blanket, their hosts were happy to oblige. The Buffaloes draped themselves over No. 9 Arizona, smothering the Pac-12 Conference’s highest-scoring team and leaving a delirious Coors Events Center with a resume-enhancing, think-Big-Dancing 71-58 win.
As nasty as CU’s defense was in limiting Arizona to its lowest point total of the season, the offense provided by sophomore Spender Dinwiddie and freshman Xavier Johnson was Valentine’s Night sweet for the Buffs. Dinwiddie finished with a game-high 21, Johnson with a career-high 19.
But they had loads of help in different areas. Sophomore guard Askia Booker added 10 points, two assists and three steals, and junior Andre Roberson contributed seven points and a game-best 13 rebounds to move past Cliff Meely into second place (978) on the school’s board list.
“It was a great atmosphere for college basketball,” CU coach Tad Boyle said. “The whole state of Colorado can be proud . . . this had nothing to do with revenge, but everything to do with respect for Arizona. They’ll win a lot of games as the season unfolds, but we will, too.”
Particularly if the Buffs continue to play ‘D’ as they have over the past month. The Wildcats came into the game averaging 76.2 points a game and featured two of the league’s top nine scorers in Mark Lyons (17.5) and Solomon Hill (15.4). Lyons got 11 points, Hill 12 on Thursday night as the Wildcats were limited to 42.3 percent from the field.
CU entered the night as the Pac-12 leader in scoring defense (64.2 ppg) and field goal percentage (40.6). But Boyle said his team’s defensive effort on Thursday was nothing short of a milestone in his time at CU.
“From start to finish, yes,” he said. “We made them work for everything. When we have a break down defensively now, our players know it and it burns at them, which is a great sign. We were dialed in – and we made some shots.”
“Some,” indeed. The Buffs checked out at 50 percent from the field, including 59.1 percent in the second half when the Wildcats cut a 15-point deficit to nine on two occasions and closed to within six with 10:35 to play. Dinwiddie scored 19 of his total in the final 20 minutes and added a career-best seven assists.
Of his assists, Dinwiddie said: “I didn’t play too much different . . . I have got to give thanks to this person (Xavier Johnson); he made a ton of shots, a bunch of threes. Without him I don’t get those assists, a lot of those are him.”
The Buffs finished nine of 17 from behind the three-point arc, with Johnson going four-for-five and Dinwiddie two-for-five. Freshman reserve Xavier Talton each hit their only three-point attempt and Booker was good on one of his four trey tries. Talton’s trey was only his second of the season, but it was undoubtedly his biggest, coming after Arizona had closed to 45-39.
In winning its fourth straight and sixth of its last seven games, CU (17-7, 7-5) avenged its 92-83 overtime loss in Tucson on Jan. 3. Arizona (20-4, 8-4) lost its second consecutive game and was shoved out of a first-place Pac-12 tie with UCLA and Oregon.
The Buffs, defeating a Top 25 team for the second time in three games, improved to 11-1 in the CEC this season and went to 42-5 at home under Boyle. CU won 48-47 at No. 19 Oregon a week ago.
On Valentine’s Night, the CEC was the place to be. The sellout crowd (11,120) included John Elway and former Buffs linebacker Matt Russell, now Elway’s right hand man with the Broncos; former CU kicker Mason Crosby (Green Bay) and his wife; and former Buffs hoopsters Alec Burks (Utah Jazz) and Shannon Sharpe.
With the building’s decibel level cranked past deafening, they watched a first half that saw CU start by missing consecutive layups on consecutive possessions, then settle in and stifle Arizona.
By halftime, CU had matched its largest lead of the first 20 minutes, with its 30-23 advantage produced by a 10-3 run over the half’s last 6:12. Johnson and Booker got the surge started with back-to-back treys, followed by Shane Harris-Tunks’ baby hook and a Roberson stuff.
Johnson (12) was CU’s only player in double figures, but the Buffs’ defense allowed the offense any slack it needed. No Arizona player reached double figures in the first 20 minutes, with Lyons and Angelo Chol managing six points each.
The second-half start was nothing like the first for the Buffs. Scoring the half’s first eight points – three free throws by Dinwiddie, a Dinwiddie stuff and a trey by Roberson – they went up by 15 (38-23) with 17:52 to play.
The Wildcats needed a timeout – and maybe it helped. They got their first points of the half on a trey by Lyons, then another by Nick Johnson and cut the Buffs’ lead to 38-29 with 16:05 remaining.
CU’s answer: a long triple by Dinwiddie as the shot clock wound down and a step-back jumper by Booker. The Buffs’ lead went to 14 (43-29), but the Wildcats got two of three free throws from Grant Jerrett and a Lyons layup to close to 43-33.
Arizona pulled as close as six points (45-39) before Talton drained his trey, Dinwiddie following with a spinning layup, then adding a triple to restore a 14-point (53-39) Buffs advantage with just under 10 minutes to play.
Boyle lauded Booker for urging his coach to leave Talton in. “I was ready to put ‘Ski’ in, but ‘Ski’ said let him (Talton) go,” Boyle said. “I played him another three or four minutes . . . when you’ve got players like that, putting their best interests behind the team’s, you’ve got a chance to have something special. I’m proud of ‘Ski;’ that wouldn’t have happened last year.”
A layup by Talton 2 minutes later pushed CU ahead by 15 (56-41), giving the Buffs their largest lead of the night. Over the final 7 minutes, Arizona trimmed its deficit to nine points twice, but Johnson answered the second surge with back-to-back treys. When Booker hit a one-handed leaner, CU had another 15-point lead (68-53) with 2:38 remaining.
The Buffs had watched a 17-point lead evaporate in Tucson, but no way it would happen in the rematch. All that remained was for the CU student body to rush court – and this time no one questioned whether it was justified.
CU hosts Arizona State Saturday (7 p.m., ESPNU), and Boyle said the Buffs need another shot of Thursday night’s CEC energy: “We need that same kind of atmosphere; they (fans) were part of this victory.”
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