I just felt sick after watching that game last night.
Purdue's final game in the Charleston tournament was one thing... Purdue jumped out to a big lead in the first half, but then in the second, Virginia Tech Could.Not.Miss. Seriously, we'd play good defense for 27 seconds, force them to jack up a contested 3, and they'd hit it. It's hard to beat any team that can do that.
But last night against FSU was different. They were frustrating us defensively the whole first half. We couldn't move the ball, we got sloppy and had lots of turnovers, and Carsen's shot wasn't hitting [yes he had something like 13 in the first half, but it was on a lot of volume]. In the second half, the team cleaned it up. We figured out how to get by them on defense, we figured out our lineup, and we ended up erasing their 12-point halftime lead, and at one point late I believe we were up 7.
And then we went right back to our first-half ways for the last 3 minutes of the game, and even THEN should have won. Only a boneheaded move by Cline, allowing FSU to tie him up when they had the possession arrow, and a good shot by FSU to go up 73-72 with 5.2 seconds left, turned the game.
It feels like a signature win was right there for the taking, in a game that we were underdogs, on the road. And we folded.
Now we have to go on the road to a red-hot UM, followed by MD at home and Texas on the road. This team needed to win at least one of this 4-game stretch, and now a game that they had within their grasp is a loss, increasing the pressure on the next three.