ADVERTISEMENT

Why this loss Hurts...

IL Lusciato

Heisman Winner
Gold Member
Oct 31, 2011
10,326
12,536
113
Newark, NJ
I'm proud of the season, proud of the team, and it will go down as one of our best.

Why this loss Hurts so much for me, and definitely way worse for the players and coaches I'm sure is:

This effort. The entire team, this group, for almost all of the game, each contributed in the exact way that you'd want them to.

Mathis, after all the ups and downs if the season, hit Free throws, hit two key threes, and played great D, getting a huge steal and etc. Which is exactly what we would have hoped he'd do.

Harper, hit threes, drove the lane, played great D.

Geo hit big shots and was a leader. Young with huge threes, passion, epic drives to the hoop, suffocating defense...

Paul with that beautiful post up, a timely three, etc. Caleb with good D, and some good boards.
Myles playing through injury with solid defense and rebounding. Cliff grabbing boards, taking solid minutes and scoring on a nice dunk as well.

I know they all could have done better all game, but they each contributed as this group should and could, finally hitting that level again, like we'd seen earlier in the season from this group, and all wished would come to fruition right at the right time. It was beautiful to see.

What hurts so bad is that all of that fell short and didn't push through to the finish line on a few freak plays and bounces, and the fact that this team but it's stride almost magically last night, ended up being the last time we will ever see them together.

That hurts. Being a sports fan seems trivial, and maybe it is. But the emotional highs and lows are very real.
 
This hurt so much because the stars aligned and we all saw it.

Everything we as fans ever dreamed of was right there for the taking with our gritty bunch of guys we have journeyed with. These kids grew up before our eyes and were destined to do the impossible, make a huge run, defy everyone and everything.

that is why it hurts... not because of any player or thing that happened but that we had it right in front of us.... making the tournament and winning a game is fine and progress, but this isn’t the pros where you just build off the same roster. Our guys we love, JY, Geo, maybe Myles won’t be here next year, they deserved to be those guys for the nation to see.
 
This hurt so much because the stars aligned and we all saw it.

Everything we as fans ever dreamed of was right there for the taking with our gritty bunch of guys we have journeyed with. These kids grew up before our eyes and were destined to do the impossible, make a huge run, defy everyone and everything.

that is why it hurts... not because of any player or thing that happened but that we had it right in front of us.... making the tournament and winning a game is fine and progress, but this isn’t the pros where you just build off the same roster. Our guys we love, JY, Geo, maybe Myles won’t be here next year, they deserved to be those guys for the nation to see.

Yes. Well said. The way we played most of last night, we deserves another week with these guys. And the press and etc to see them showcased.
 
  • Like
Reactions: BearlyVisible
they deserved another game - no doubt about it.

for me it hurts so much because you just don't know when the stars will align again the way they did this year. Yeah we should have confidence that we can get back regularly, but you never know. And even if they get back, you might have put into "death brackets" and never have a line towards a sweet 16 much less EE or FF berth
 
  • Like
Reactions: IL Lusciato
It hurts because we care. I stared into space for 10 minutes after the buzzer blew with the TV off. My wife, though a Rutgers grad didn’t understand, left the room and went to bed. Time heals most wounds. I feel for the team. They will rebound. I am confident of that
 
they deserved another game - no doubt about it.

for me it hurts so much because you just don't know when the stars will align again the way they did this year. Yeah we should have confidence that we can get back regularly, but you never know. And even if they get back, you might have put into "death brackets" and never have a line towards a sweet 16 much less EE or FF berth
No they did not deserve another game. Why on earth did Rutgers deserve another game? You win : you get another game. It was a loss which should never happened and the fault is spread amongst coach and team. It’s not too hard to understand. Saying the team was entitled to further games is why people laugh at us. The bottom line is winning yesterday was a big thing and hopefully it sends a message to future Rutgers players and teams. The “ we have been here before mindset” is what is missing. Even though the players change the culture does not. Loyola of Chicago is a prime example . They believed from the start they were the better team all up and down their lineup. They were the better team from coaching to players.
 
For
No they did not deserve another game. Why on earth did Rutgers deserve another game? You win : you get another game. It was a loss which should never happened and the fault is spread amongst coach and team. It’s not too hard to understand. Saying the team was entitled to further games is why people laugh at us. The bottom line is winning yesterday was a big thing and hopefully it sends a message to future Rutgers players and teams. The “ we have been here before mindset” is what is missing. Even though the players change the culture does not. Loyola of Chicago is a prime example . They believed from the start they were the better team all up and down their lineup. They were the better team from coaching to players.
Getting hung up on semantics - for 35 minute it looked like they had it, obviously they did lose and did not advance but they were deserving. It didn't work out and that makes it painful. Rather lose by 20 and say - hey we had a good run but it did work out
 
  • Like
Reactions: BearlyVisible
The worst part is that all of the top seeds in the bracket had bowed out. There was honestly a path to be in the Final Four. Beat Syracuse who we already beat (w/o Geo & them w/o Boeheim) and we'd be facing Loyola, underrated for sure but still an 8 seed, or Oregon State, a 12 seed that wouldn't have been in the tournament unless they had won Pac 12 tournament. That was all that was standing in the way of a team who hadn't even made the tournament and 30 years from the Final Four! There will never be a path like that ever again. And in a year when the rest of the Big Ten fell on its face, we could have owned the basketball world. Even if we had lost to Syracuse there would've been a week of hype and publicity for this program.

Who knows when we'll even make the tournament again. There is certainly no guarantee and you'd have to think next year we'll take a fairly significant step back.

This is devastating.
 
In Malcom Gladwell’s book Outliers, he states that “the typical plane crash involves seven consecutive human errors.” Here is how our plane improbably crashed last night:

1. Myles missing wide open alley-oop.

2. Myles missing put back lay up

3. Myles throwing the ball at the Houston player out of bands and missing him by a couple of feet.

4. McConnell's horrible 3-point shot (and related not driving on an injured Jareau).

5. Baker doesn't box out during Grimes missed second foul shot and then fouls.

6. JY threw the ball away in the last minute

7. Geo losing the ball at the end of game


You can name others. Any one of these events don't happen, we win. It just wasn't meant to be.
 
I am over it. The kids represented themselves and the school well on the court.

It's sports. Shit happens. The guys left it all out there. That I have no doubt. This was the ultimate juice out of the squeeze.

Get more talent, better shooting, we win game like this. Hats off to the staff and team. This was their Everest.
 
Great to get a tourney win ... but RU teams seem to choke or get unlucky more than almost every other NCAA school. Men and women both blew double digit leads in last 10 minutes. Occasionally we see it go our way (ex. WSoccer beating UVA, Ash and Nick, FB vs UM in 2014) but over the years it feels like a 90/10 split.
 
  • Like
Reactions: theRU
A win within our grasp and the most reasonable path to the final four that we'll likely ever see.
Soul sucking.

Programs have to overachieve at some point to take the next step up as a program. It was within reach this year.
 
  • Like
Reactions: theRU
ADVERTISEMENT