Actually, I was somewhat happy with Sheldon's offensive contributions tonight. He even hit all 3 free-throw attempts on his one trip to the foul line in the second half! But their #0 (freshman) dribbled past our #0 (senior) to get to the rim throughout the game. In fact, Boals switched JJ Kelly on Carbuccia on UMass's final few possessions. Not sure if Kelly's ready for that type of assignment, but he gave Carbuccia a quicker and longer look.

Don't be surprised if UMass goes on a nice stretch of wins. Despite starting off 0-4 in the MAC, they're still 9-7 with a lot of close losses.

Great win! Pavs again saves the day with his FT shooting down the stretch. Simmons looked good, especially on offense. His D seems sporadic -- good sometimes, and mind-numbing bad at other times. It seems to me that he's slowing coming around to look like he did when he played for UT. Sheldon looked very good on offense with a few threes, and then he starts bombing from beyond NBA range in a very uncontrolled fashion. Burris had some very impressive moments in the first half. His star seems to be rising. I agree with those who think Kuany should be getting more time. However, I'm now beginning to believe in the upside of this team.

I can't believe that arrogant UMass has started out 0-4 in MAC play. For years their hoops was too good to be brought along with football to the MAC. And, this year their very impressive non-conference record would seem to have said that they were going to be one of the MAC's best or maybe the best. So far, that has not proved to be the case. I would not be surprised if they pull things together and are the team to beat in Clevland.

A post game comment from the UMass board:

“When you're the new team, coming in with a bigger bag, a higher paid coach, and thinking you're gonna run the MAC, teams will be gunning for you and taking it personally.”

Umass is NOT trash. Far from it. It is wild that they are 0-4. I think they are going to return home and take out all their frustrations and absolutely murder Ball State on Saturday.

Really like what we saw from the offense, ball movement to create open looks and then actually MAKING them for a change.

Simmons was the player of the game. Super productive in the paint, bringing a double yteam defense in the 2nd half that limited him but he still contributed with some really good boards and a key chase down of a long loose ball.

If you consider JJ & Burris one player (they were mostly 1 for 1 subbing last night), they are the player of the game which is exciting from 2 freshmen. 10-14 (5 for 8 from 3) 27 points. I continue to believe JJ is the best pure basketball player on this roster with a super high ceiling. For Burris, I am excited for the shot-making ability and he seems to play pretty good defense.

Pavs was the clutch guy again with the big 3 and swishing the free throws. He struggled to get shots up. I usually don't like fadeaways much but his is so high percentage he should do it more often when he can't get to the rim.

Hadaway 3 bad games in a row but this one especially bad. He has had butterfingers and poor court vision to go with the continued hoisting of 3s. He is shooting more than 50% more than last year and more than 75% more attempts from 3. He needs to get back to the type of player he was the last 2 seasons. I'm not dumping on him to the extent others are, and expecting him to sit down beyond normal rest is delusional - Not gonna happen. But as I said before, he is streaky and emotional and those type of players need some nuance and flexibility to their playing time. Before you go throwing him in the trash can, understand there will be games this season that we will win behind a dominating performance from Hadaway.

Very happy to escape with this one. This was my expectation in the predictions thread - "1-6 start sky is falling, then 10 game winning streak we are the greatest ever, then standard home/away MAC experience down the stretch." Pretty much exactly as I expected minus the BG loss. To that point, just as we over-panicked at the 1-6 mark, we should not get overly excited at the 8 out of 9 run and understand the tougher road ahead. Buffalo will be another tough one, gotta protect home court.

Congrats on a well fought game and see you at seasons end, in Amherst, Massachusetts.

This is where I am with Hadaway. I'm not sure if it's him or Boals, but he's far too prone to trying to run the offense. I suspect the coaching staff -- rightly -- has asked him to step up as a senior leader, but he's trying to do too many things he's just not good at. And he's doing them at a high volume. He's our third option on offense, and should be getting his points as a slasher and on second chance points.

That said, there's no world where he should be sitting. Hadaway is our best and most versatile defensive player and needs to be on the floor. I don't understand what people are seeing in Kuany that makes them think he can do even half of what Hadaway does.

My hope is that last night's success on offense makes the path forward clear. Offense through Pavs and Simmons, with Hadaway and Kelly as 3rd and 4th options. Breath to spell Simmons because of how hard he has to work on offense, and then nothing but shooters off the bench -- Burris and Connors.

Even if he's healthy, I think Elliott should be the odd man out. He just destroys the spacing, and we looked a lot better last night with shooters that have gravitational pull for the defense.

People are forgetting that UMass has a very accomplished coach.

Frank Martin has 342 wins, all D-1 and most of them in the Big 12 and SEC.

I'd still like to Breath alongside Simmons for a few runs a game. To your point, Simmons works hard on offense. Breath can co-exist with that by taking on the opposing teams best post player defensively.

He probably would've had the equivalent to 7 turnovers by combination of fouls, TOs, points allowed on D, doing nothing on offense, etc. Its also a bit unfair to compare Hadaway's worst game of his career because on most nights that doesn't happen.

He's definitely athletic and tall and I can see the potential but he just hasn't done enough IMO to earn more than what's he's being given. I'd have to assume that if he was killing it in practice he would be out there more.

*Bump

Hate the dumb technical to foul out during his career game. But we called this performance. Captain Chaos doing Captain Chaos things.

He needs to go to an anger managment workshop.

Agree…love Captain Chaos, but he’s a senior now and he still shouldn’t be doing this stuff. The coaching staff has to be on this as well.

With all that said, Captain Chaos delivered big time against Buffalo.

His temper does get the best of him, at times. Has he ever committed a foul that he admits to? I love his intensity. He just needs to be more in control. I do remember one recent game where he was ready to slam the ball on the floor right in front of the official and get a technical, and he caught himself and pulled the ball back up just in the nick of time. Maybe that's a good sign. He's very lovable as a Bobcat and you know his heart is in the right place. He's not like that a-hole Denny Rusch from the early '70s who was just a plain dirty ball player and the only OHIO player that I ever called to be hanked from a game because he was an embarrasment to the institution. I actually stood up and yelled at Coach Snyder to pull him after he punched an opponent right in front of me out of the view of the two officials working the game. No, Captain Chaos is a good kid, with a good heart and he plays clean, if just a little out of control.

You bumped the wrong quote.