Offensive woes plague Washington basketball once again.
One of the things that have sadly become synonymous with Washington basketball (and Husky sports in general) over the past few years is that they can’t score, and after a 71-64 loss to Northern Illinois it seems this is still the case. The Huskies were 20 of 75 shooting from the field and an abysmal three of 20 from the three-point spot, their free-throw shooting didn’t fare much better either only hitting 21 of their 36 attempts.
Where will the scoring come from?
Coming into tonight we weren’t sure where the bulk of the offense would come from yet but it turns out that person is Terrell Brown Jr. Brown scored 22 points in the loss to NIU. Now this seems like pretty good production, and it is, the problem is that no one else on the team scored more than 10 points. You’re not going to win many games like that.
Moving forward, I would like to see Nate Roberts used more in the paint as he ended the game with 10 points and 19 rebounds and needs to use his size and strength to put missed shots back up and in.
The good and the bad
On a positive note, it was clear to see that NIU is a better team than the one that only won three games a year ago. It was also a good sign to see the Huskies win the rebound battle, out-rebounding NIU 51 to 37. On the downside, Washington basketball still isn’t great, and unfortunately, if the offensive issues don’t get resolved quickly then we are in for another long year.
Quick turnaround
The Huskies don’t have much time off before they are to take the court again. Their next game is on Thursday, Nov. 11th against Northern Arizona, a team that just lost to Arizona 81-52. I will come out and say that this game is a must-win already for Hopkins and crew. If they drop this next game against NAU, I think we can start the coaching search because the season will be a bust after only two games. You can survive one embarrassing non-conference loss, but a second loss and you’re in quite a big hole early on.