The next game should tell us a lot about this team. If they are able to rally back and put Missouri state down after what they did to us earlier, they’ll have great momentum down the stretch. If they lay another egg, we are no longer in the drivers seat for the league, and we are going to look very vulnerable going into the tournament.

I try to cut this team a little slack because it has to be incredibly hard playing night in and night out in this conference with a target on your back. We definitely are “the game” on everyone’s schedule and we are getting everyone’s best shot. I would be curious to know if we lead the league in total attendance for all our home and away games in conference. I’ve watched several non-Loyola valley games this year and it looks like we’ve consistently been the biggest draw for the other team’s home games.

We really need this win on Sunday. We definitely draw the largest crowds wherever we go, after last year everyone wants an upset.

Rest of the season.
Missouri St.....LU, UNI, Indiana St , Illinois St, Drake
Drake......Valpo, Bradley, Illinois St, Indiana St, Missouri St
Illinois St.....Bradley, Indiana St, Drake, Missouri St, SIU

Missouri St plays 3 of last 5 games against present top 3
Drake. plays 2 of last 5 against present top 3 (plus a surging Bradley)
Illinois St. plays 2 of last 5 against present top 3.
LU plays 1 of last 5 against present top 3 ( plus a surging Bradley)

Valpo dropped to 6-7 tonight with loss to Indiana St. Tough to make up 3 with 5 to go

Easiest path: Loyola, Just win.

Then there were 8.

We should have closed out this game. I expected us to drop one of these away games, but this one was winnable. Bradley is good and playing like they should have been at the beginning of the year.

It really came down to a few possessions. We need confidence to hit open shots and go hard to the basket, We missed too many open shots, Other than a few defensive miscues, our defense played well. Playing on the road in the Valley is difficult. It is harder midweek. The referees make a few calls for the home team. It seems to happen every game for every home team, including us. We need to overcome it. I thought this game had a few more questionable calls that changed momentum - the Custer flagrant was silly. The travelling on Krutwig as he got pushed out of bounds as another bad call. There was a blatant offensive foul right before Bradley hit a three. They add up and we are not good enough on the offensive end to give up three or four possessions.

With that said, I think Porter has decided on his rotation. I think these are the 7 players who will get the bulk of the playing time from here on out. I see Skokna and Frank growing confident in their roles. When Williamson gets back, it will be 8.

I think we will finish out 4-1.

Whatever team wins Arch Madness will be the team that gets hot right at the end of the season... Bradley and MSU are the hottest teams right now; I feel like we still haven't played our best ball yet. HOPEFULLY we find that at the right time.

This game on Sunday is our biggest game since the Final Four game. Missouri State is red hot, confident and already has a 70-35 win over us. We need to shut them down and retake a two game lead on top (well technically a one game lead if Drake wins, but we have tiebreaker over them).

Our offense was so inept when we played in Springfield. I hope the coaching staff has watched that tape a hundred times and has an offensive game plan ready to go. We know our defense can hold serve (as long as they aren't hitting 50+% from 3...).

If we win, we have a stranglehold on the conference race (2 games up with 4 to go), we'd be a game or two away from Lucas being back (and hopefully Krut losing his mask) and shaken off a bit of the stink from the worst performance in 20+ years.