One shining moment
Pick one, any one moment from Vanderbilt point guard
Mario Moore's 18-point second half, and you wouldn't get an argument here. How
about any of his three consecutive 3-pointers early in the second half? Or his last
3-pointer that gave the Commodores a 58-53 lead with 4:34 remaining? The
choice here, however, is one that most will likely get overlooked but is a
testament to Vandy's defense, which was the difference in the game. With a little
more than seven minutes remaining and the Commodores clinging to a 49-47 lead,
Moore, following the command of coach Kevin Stallings, switched off his man and
intercepted a pass for Western Michigan's Mike Williams, who had been torching
the Commodores all day. Moore went the length of the court and hit a layup
with Williams breathing down his back to give Vandy a 51-47 lead. From that point, the Commodores outscored the Broncos 22-11 to seal the win.
Player who impressed me
Even though his team lost, no one on either squad
has a brighter future than the Broncos' Mike Williams. The 6-foot-8 Williams scored in
every conceivable way in the first half: driving to the bucket, posting up
and hitting jumpers. He even drove straight at Vanderbilt's 7-foot-2 goliath Dawid
Przybyszewski and scored right over him. Williams tallied 16 of his team-high
24 points in the first half, and, for good measure, he limited Vandy's top
offensive weapon, Matt Freije, to just four points in the first half. Freije, however, got the better of Williams in the second half. Using his
size advantage and getting a little weak-side help from teammates, the 6-foot-10
Freije limited Williams to just 3-of-10 shooting in the second stanza.
Courtside confidential
Vanderbilt coach Kevin Stallings played up the No
Respect card to his team this week. On Tuesday, he gave each player a sheet
of paper with five quotes from college basketball analysts who had picked 11th-
seeded Western Michigan to beat the sixth-seeded Commodores and reprinted each
person's bracket. "It lit a fire under us," junior forward Corey Smith said.
"It seems we've been underdogs a lot this year." ... Just wondering: How
good would Kansas be if the Jayhawks could have kept Freije, a senior from
Overland Park, Kan., averaging 18.1 points a game, at home? ... If Williams can add
some muscle to his 190-pound frame and improve his outside shot (he took just
five 3-pointers all season, making one), he's got an outside shot at the next
level. ... Good luck trying to find scores from the other NCAA games at the TD
Waterhouse Centre in Orlando. The arena, site of the first and second rounds,
does not have a scoreboard showing out-of-town scores.
Long-term prospects
Vanderbilt faces No. 3 seed N.C. State (a 61-52 winner
over Louisiana-Lafayette in a game that didn't earn many style points) in the
second round, and the two teams have very similar offenses. The two big men
from both teams -- Freije and Przybyszewski for the Commodores and Julius Hodge and
Marcus Melvin for N.C. State -- play more on the perimeter than they do in the
post. The game could be decided by which team is able to dictate the pace of
play; N.C. State likes a more deliberate style of play while Vandy likes to run.
Another performance from the streaky Moore and the Commodores defense against
the Wolf Pack could be enough, but much more difficult to come by.
