DePaul Blows Providence Out of the Building, Ruining Friar Alumni Day

Nothing Better Than Ruining Homecoming

After initially being down to the Friars, Eli Cain hit a 3 pointer to put DePaul up 13-12.  From that point forward, the Blue Demons never looked back.  The Demons went on a 25-7 run to go from 2 down to 16 up over a 8:09 stretch.  The Friars got a couple of baskets to close it to 12 with 8 seconds to go in the half.  Eli Cain then calmly sunk a buzzer-beating 3 pointer to close the half and put DePaul up 15 at the break.

This is generally where your DePaul Blue Demons get cocky and take some crap shots and turn the ball over, but today was a new Day!  Cyrus his a layup and Strus hit a 3 to quickly put the Demons up 20 in the 2nd half.  After trading baskets, Strus hit another 3, Maric hit a layup, Strus hit his 3rd consecutive 3, and Maric made a cool jumper, to put DePaul up 31 points with 13:45 left in the game.

The 18-2 run to start the 2nd half put the game away.  At this point, the Win Probability chart had DePaul at a 99.9% chance of winning.

Of course, DePaul Nation, all 23 of us, tried to convince ourselves that we wouldn’t blow it.

Alas, the closest the Friars came was 15 points, as the Blue Demons prevailed, 80-63.

The Setup

101 short of a sell out to see the DePaul Blue Demons smoke the Providence Friars on Alumni day.  Ha!  DePaul has now split with the Friars 3 years in a row.  Note to Providence decision makers:  should’ve picked a conference push-over like DePa…I mean Georgetown!  A team that you have swept the past couple of years!

Gambling Corner

The line dropped from -9 to -6.5 as word got out that Jalen Lindsey would be unavailable due to post-concussion protocol.  If you had DePaul and the Over (143 points beat the over/under by 1!), you were a happy human.

The Player of the Game:  Marin Maric

DePaul had 4 guys in double digits, but the man in the middle finished with 18 points on 5-6 shooting, 8-8 from the free-throw line, 8 rebounds, 2 steals, 2 assists, and 1 block.  He finished with a game high 155 Offensive Rating (100 is average).  Excellent Work Big Man!

The Good

Best Shooting Night of the Season

DePaul could do no wrong, shooting 70 percent from 2 point land and 44.4% from 3 point land for the game.  Where was this all year?  DePaul only gave up 6 turnovers in the 1st half as well, although they did get sloppy in the 2nd half with 13 turnovers.

You know how to shoot a High Percentage?  Dunkfest at the Dunkin’ Donut Center!!!

https://twitter.com/lazybluedemon/status/962540172889001984

DePaul’s 3 Point Defense Was Spectacular (or Providence was just real crappy tonight)

If you read my preview to this game, you would have read that Providence came into this game shooting 36.1% from 3 point land.  Tonight, they were missing their best 3 point shooter, Jalen Lindsay, who on the season shoots 45.9%, but still, the Demons shut the Friars down.  With 4 minutes left in the game, Providence was 1-15 from 3 point land, for a whopping 6.67%.

They finished 2-18 on the day, for a pathetic 10.5%.  Last time they played the Demons, they shot 38.9% and had several back breaking 3’s when the Demons were making runs.

Eli Cain Was the Main Man (1st Half Only)

Cain had a spectacular 1st half.  4-4 from the field including 2-2 from 3 point land along with his awesome buzzer beater.  10 total points on perfect shooting with 1 assists and only 1 turnover is a nice 18 minutes.  He got the Demons off to an awesome start.  The 2nd half didn’t go as well, other than he did have 4 additional assists (and 3 additional turnovers.)  But just as he got cold, Mr. Max Strus was getting hot.

Max Strus Was Loose (2nd Half Only)

Strus started cold in the game going 1-4 in the 1st half making one 3 pointer while still contributing to the team with 3 steals and 4 rebounds.  The 2nd half was a different story.  Picking up where Cain ended off, Strus got scorching hot with three consecutive 3 pointers.  He ended the game with 17 points and 3 assists and a 120 Offensive rating.

McCallum Had a Perfectly Average Game

Tre’Darius McCallum sported an 100 Offensive Rating, which is perfectly average.  However, he makes the good category due to the fact that he sported a Zero point Zero in the prior game.  Glad to have average back!

The Bad

Providence

The Friars were awful.  It was glorious.

This is how their shooting form kind of looked, very wild, and incoherent.

Alpha Diallo

Providence’s Sophomore small forward, Diallo, had the 0-9 performance with 5 turnovers.  He had the lowest rating of many low ratings for the Friars.  The only thing keeping himself from the dreaded 0.0 were two free throws.  This was his worst game of Big East play, and he will probably sneak into Coach Cooley’s office and destroy the game tape.

Blue Demons Had Way Too Many Second Half Turnovers

DePaul had a very clean first half with only 6 first half turnovers, which contributed to their 15 point lead.  In the 2nd half, especially in the last 10 minutes of the game, the Demons were way to loose with ball ending up with 13 second half turnovers.

They were clean in getting the lead to 31, and relatively clean up until the last 5 minutes.  Then in the last 4:23 of the game, the Demons gave the ball away 7 times.  Thankfully, the Chicago Boys had a 23 point cushion going into the last minutes of the game, or things could’ve gone different.

Paul Reed Had a Below Average Game

Not abysmal, but this blog has become the leader of the Paul Reed fan club, and as the founding member, I need to spread some shade his way when he is not the absolute perfect player that I envision him to be.

Reed had 3 turnovers, which I am sure is the reason that he only was given 10 minutes of playing time.  He took a 3 pointer, and he made it.  It was only his 2nd three point basket of the year, and in my LAST blog entry, I pleaded for him to not take anymore this year.  Clearly he is not reading my blog.

Reed did have 2 steals.  He disrupted multiple shots.  He scored 9 points, and he should have played more.  That all being said, he was the only Blue Demon to rate below average with an 82 Offensive Rating.

If DePaul has more games where its worst performance is an 82, the Demons will be doing just fine.

Tweets of the Game

For the 1st half of the game, this is exactly how the game felt:

I have to agree with [Redacted], DePaul basketball SHOULD LOOK LIKE THIS!

We Are Now at the Chicken Tender Portion of the Post:

Looks like DePaul just Crapped on Providence’s Tournament Resume.  You are very Welcome!

If you are going to throw shade at the DePaul Blue Demons, you had better not be a Friars Fan, 3 years in a row we have split with you Dominicans.

In Conclusion

Third year in a row, that the Blue Demons split with the Friars.  It was a dominate game in which our main guys each contributed and defended for long stretches.  I love me a victory.