Another busy week at ‘The U’ regarding basketball, baseball and football. Some good, some bad but allCanes.
– Men’s basketball fell hard in the second round of the NIT on Monday night, getting spanked, 78-60 by Minnesota. The Canes were never in this one, flat from the get-go, shooting miserably and trailing non-stop. Head coach Jim Larranaga felt his team wasn’t “mentally ready”, coming back flat and lethargic after semester break. Miami missed its first seven shots, while Minnesota went on a 12-0 run to start the game.
The Canes bounced back with a 11-0 run, but crumbled again as the Gophers put together another 12-2 tear and never looked back. UM also missed its first fourteen three-point attempts, not sinking a three until eleven minutes were left in the game.
Larranaga also pointed out that the Gophers scored most of their first-half points on dunks and layups, which shouldn’t have been the case as the Canes are a fundamentally sound team defensively, especially on the interior.
It proved to be a disappointing end to a disappointing season. Miami missed the NCAA Tourney due to a few miscues both early and late in the season, with suspensions and injuries taking their toll. Still, there was solace to be taken in a good NIT seeding and a desire to reach the finals at Madison Square Garden. Instead, Miami brought its worst performance of the season at a time when it needed it most.
The other downer in not excelling further in the post-season; the fact that leading scorer Durand Scott will carry over his suspension into the 2012-2013 season. Scott has served three games of a six-game suspension and will now miss the first three games next season.
Back to the drawing board for Coach L and his team, who stated, “This was a fun first year for me here, but we have a lot of work to do i the spring and summer if we’re going to be the kind of team we want to be,” said Larranaga. “This is very disappointing.”
– Even more disappointing, the Lady Canes falling short in the NCAA Women’s Tournament, not even making the Sweet Sixteen in a season where a Final Four berth was a goal, as were whispers of winning it all.
Miami seemed cursed out the gate this post-season. Losing guard Riquina Williams to a suspension for a team violation was part of it. So was flawed seeding, which sent the Canes to Spokane, Washington for the opening rounds of this year’s tourney, where a second round match-up with hometown Gonzaga proved too much for Miami to handle.
The Bulldogs ripped the Canes, 65-54 and Miami simply couldn’t adjust to the loss of Williams for a second straight game.
Miami fought late, going on a 7-0 an 6-0 run, giving the Canes brief leads, but from there UM converted only one field goal over a five-minute span, while Gonzaga rolled 20-8 to end the game.
The Canes made no excuses in the loss, but with so much talent departing next season — Williams, as well as forward Sylvia Bullock and guard Shenise Johnson — this was the year Katie Meier and her girls needed to make a run.
Blame it on a bogus seed or an ill-timed suspension, but in the end it all adds up to another colossal disappointment as the Lady Canes needed to go further this season.
– Spring football is back underway but the real news on the gridiron has to do with the recruiting trail and Miami landing another legacy-type play is the signing of Ray Lewis III, son of legendary Canes linebacker Ray Lewis.
The younger Lewis is a 5-foot-9, 175-pound running back / safety at Lake Mary Prep and he gave an oral commitment to head coach Al Golden and staff on Tuesday. Lewis rushed for over 2,000 yards as a junior and would head to The U in 2013.
– Fans have been abuzz this week regarding offensive coordinator Jedd Fisch and talk about the implementation of more tight ends in the offense. It’s been forever since names like Bubba Franks, Jeremy Shockey, Kellen Winslow II or Greg Olsen stole headlines and scored touchdowns. Fisch wants that to change and has spent a lot of time this off-season using his NFL connections, picking the brains of top-notch offensive coaches.
“A lot of times we’ll talk schemes and situational football,” Fisch said. “Other times, I’ll ask questions like ‘Hey, how did you guys do this?’ — see if we can take a few ideas.
“Obviously what New England did with its tight ends is something that stands out. You’ve got to study that. You’ve got to see how they utilize them — and that’s something we’ve done this offseason.”
Are current tight ends Asante Cleveland and Clive Walford up for the challenge? We’ll see come August. Fisch would like to see the two combine for about fifty receptions this fall, almost twice as many as Hurricane tight ends saw in 2011 (28 catches, 266 yards and two touchdowns last year.)
Cleveland was praise for his off-season efforts, praised by Golden as being right up there with safety Ray-Ray Armstrong, who coaches said shined the most. Walford has also added twelve pounds this off-season and coaches feel both are in better shape and more football-ready this year than where they were this time last year.
– Some good ink on running back Eduardo Clements in the Herald on Wednesday, referring to the likely starter as “fearless and focused”. The piece, by Susan Miller Degnan, talks about the rough Overtown upbringing Clements endured and how he found a way to avoid trouble, by focusing on football.
Clements doesn’t fear competition, of which there will be some at running back in 2012 with Randy “Duke” Johnson and Danny Dillard on campus. Veteran back Mike James returns, as well.
– Other football tidbits … redshirt freshman Dallas Crawford has been taking snaps at running back, but there’s talk the former defensive back will most likely end up at slot receiver … Fisch talked quarterbacks recently and had praise for Ryan Williams, who Fisch says has, “Done a nice job. Manages the game well, stands in the pocket tall, has good vision, makes some tough throws. He doesn’t leave the pocket really, so it’s nice. He sits in there. He’s comfortable in there, knows how to have slight movements in there to find throwing lanes. That’s fun to watch.” Fisch did point out that Stephen Morris does have the stronger, “elite” arm, making sure to let everyone know that it’s at minimum a two-horse race going into fall.
– Lastly, on the baseball front the Canes moved up to No. 9 in the USA Today / ESPN coaches polls, while catcher Peter O’Brien was named ACC Player of the Week. O’Brien recorded a .529 batting average over a five-game span, finishing last week with three home runs, three doubles, nine RBI and twenty-one total bases.
Miami also got a win last night in Boca Raton, beating rival Florida Atlantic, 8-5, highlighted by a three-run fifth inning. Both teams had a dozen hits, but the Canes sealed it with three runs combined in the seventh and eighth. Next up, a home series against Maryland this weekend, starting Friday night at The Light.