Day Two on the Road

Well the game last night didn't go as we had hoped but I think we can take away a lot of things and learn from them as we have many areas where we can be much better. Our offense was not in the flow last night as we could not get anyone going from the outside for most of the game, we know this was going to happen some night and last night was it. When the offense sputters this is really when we need our defense to step up and shut people down but last night we were terrible on that end of the floor as well. Finally this was our worst effort of the year rebounding the basketball, we were just terrible. We did not have guys crashing at all on the offensive end and defensively we did not get a body on anyone, they were so much more aggressive getting to the ball and wanting the ball. We need a much better effort if we want get a win tonight as Mary University is very tough to beat at home.

Well here is what we did yesterday, as you can see we have a lot going on the entire day and it makes for a very long day when you add in the travel after the game.

9:00 – Wake up, our guys actually get to sleep in a little bit longer then this if they want but most are up at this time. Some go down to get a little continental breakfast while others might be working on some homework or just hanging out

10:00 – Call Leaf calls to each room to make sure everyone is up and getting ready for breakfast which we will be leaving for in 30 minutes in the hotel lobby

10:30 – Everyone in the lobby ready to go over to IHOP. IHOP is located in the same building as RG’s used to be so hopefully it will still be some good food.

10:50 – Each guy is putting in there order. I hear a lot of chocolate chip/banana pancake orders, brings me back to when we were in Massachusetts last year when we are at a little local place that had the best chocolate chip/banana pancakes I had ever had. I actually had them six days in a row out there so I figure why not go for them again and see how these compare to the ones from Springfield.

11:10 – Orders start to come on out. I see we have a good selection of different items; some went with the classic eggs, bacon, hash browns and a couple pancakes. Some other went with omelets that are huge, really huge actually. Order of the day goes to Luke Doedens who goes with the Ruttie Tuttie or something like that. Curt gets a close second for his chicken fajitas omelet. Make cakes were decent but I would go with the Springfield version any day of the week.

11:40 – Back to the hotel for a about an hour before we leave for shoot around, bus leaves at 12:40 so guys have a little down time to get homework done.

12:40 – Load the bus for shoot around over at the Barnett Center. On the way there we see a guy riding a 4 wheeler right down the middle of the street, must be legal in South Dakota to do that.

1:00 – Start our shoot around which will go on until 2. We go with the usual routine.

2:00 – Shoot around over, now back to the hotel for some more down time. Usually during this time our guys might take a nap or keep working on that homework, others might play some card games or watch TV as well. As for me, I am just working on the blog from the day before.

3:30 – Time for pre-game meal. If you are a fan of the team I am sure you have heard about our pre game ritual of going to the nearest Subway. The players have to have it before each road game no matter what town we are in. As for the coaches this is the time of day where you are still stuffed from breakfast and you question eating again but you do anyway because everyone else is doing it. Let me tell you it’s tough to not gain weight on a road trip if you are not a player because it seems like all you do is eat.

4:00 – Get pizza order from players. I know you just get done eating and then you have to think about food again but this is the way it is on these trips. The pizza order is always something interesting to see as some guys go with the same thing while others will always change it up. It also depends on where we can get the best deal for the pizza as well because we do have a budget that we must keep. For this night the pizza is coming from Pizza Ranch. The order of the night comes from Bryce and Ben who go with Canadian Bacon and Mushrooms.

4:30 – Back at the hotel to rest up before the game. Many guys take a quick nap during this time while others use it for whatever they want but this is the time they spend to start getting ready for the game. For us coaches it is time for “Cash Cab.” Not too many big winners on today’s episodes, I think the highest amount won was $750 after they won the video challenge. The best episode involved an elderly couple, the wife was all about playing the game, and the husband just sat and said nothing the entire game.

6:15 – Load the bus for the Barnett Center for the game.

7:25 – Women’s team pulls off a nice win. Some great outside shooting and defense really helped out them out tonight. Shot of the night comes with a little over a minute left with WSU up four, Magic picks up a rolling ball with 3 seconds on shot clock and throws up a wild 3 that goes in to put them up 7.

8:00 – Tip-off

9:45 – Game is over, as everyone knows by now it was not a good night for us. Something was not right with our guys and we couldn’t do anything well on either end of the floor. After a quick talk off to the bus for the 3 hour trip farther away from Winona.

10:10 – Bus is loaded, pizzas are being handed out.

10:45 – Still in Aberdeen as out bus driver cannot find way out of town. Don’t know why but this is very frustrating as we are not going to get in until 2 now for sure.

11:00 – Finally we are out of Aberdeen and in the middle of nowhere. It is really dark out in this part of the country and not a lot of people around too.

11:05 – Put in the movie “The Express” a true story about the former great college star Ernie Davis.

1:10 – Movie is over; it was a good movie to watch I would suggest this movie to anyone who is a big football fan. I for one did not know the Ernie Davis story until I watched this movie, the guy sounds like he was an amazing player.

2:07 – We finally hit the city limits of Bismarck. Now we need to check in and get everyone up to their rooms and hopefully they can get a good night of sleep.

2:40 – Finally hitting the bed for the night. Hope tomorrow goes better then today.

Overall it was a disappoint night for our guys. We didn’t have any energy and we didn’t do the things we had been doing well. The biggest thing is we cannot worry about last night and we can only worry about our game at 8 tonight. I must say the people at the Super 8 in Aberdeen are awesome, out of all the spots we stay in the year they are always the best to us. So if you ever have to stay in Aberdeen stay at the Super 8 they will take care of you.