Velcro’s USF Bulls Sports Blog

Our USF Bulls clawed their way past ECU today with hustle on both ends of the court and a zone defense that took ECU almost the entire first half to realize they had to shoot their way out of it.  USF rotated very well on the ball reversals and entry passes, and deflected many passes, although they don’t show up on the stat sheet.

 The zone defense finally showed some flaw with about 2 minutes left in the first half when ECU made 3 consecutive 3’s from almost the identical spot in the corner.

But USF regrouped with some smooth shooting from Jesus Verdejo to take the lead into the half.

 In the second half, the Bulls switched up and played some man-on-man defense, and it really caused problems for ECU who had just gotten used to the zone. 

Kentrell Gransberry had 15 pts, 10 boards, 2 blocks in 24 minutes.  He was just too strong for ECU in the post.  They did a decent job of double teaming him most the night, but he still found a way to generate offense.

Chris Howard has been looking pretty good and confident this season.  In the first few games, his turnover margin wasn’t great, but he has been filling up the stat sheet both with scoring and assists, and tonight was no exception.  9 Assists from our floor leader compared to just 1 turnover, which came on a travelling call while he was inbounding the ball in the 2nd half.

As a team, USF had 22 assist to go against 9 turnovers.  Much better than the early games. 

The team seems to be gaining confidence, and I am impressed with Orane Chin’s play.  Tonight he had 17 pts, 7 rebounds, 3 assists to go with 3 turnovers in 34 minutes.  Pretty good performance from the true freshman.  The other true freshman, Dominique Jones, registered, 10 pts, 8 rebounds, and 6 assists in 25 minutes.   Both frosh are now established as major contributors.

The major concerns from this game were that Bozeman finally looked human, or sub-human actually, from beyond the arc.  He was a scorching 13 of 17 on the season and today he went 0-5.  13-22 isn’t too shabby though, and he’ll rarely go 0-5 in a game.   He’s just too pure of a shooter.

Things are only going to get better when Aaron Holmes enters the mix in a couple weeks.