Game 21: GMU (15-5 / 6-1) vs Loyola Chicago (12-7 / 3-3) on Wednesday, January 29, at 7:00 PM.

[GMUgemini]

Maddox looked lethargic and lost on offense (1-9 from the floor, 4 points). He’s too talented and important to this team to be a no-show in such a crucial game. If he even had an average game, we would have won by double digits in regulation.

Nobody shot well from the field other than Haynes and Begg, so we were fortunate that KD and Billups made enough plays on both ends in OT to bail us out.

Totally agree. It also doesn’t help with your bigs combine for 0-7 from the FT line in regulation.

 

[DRK331]

Jalen Hayne's crazy 4 points in the 2nd half:

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Jalen Hayne's crazy 4 points in the 2nd half

EBA was rocking after this!!!

 

[Milt Mudflap]

The teams combined for 62-158 (39.2%) on all shots (field goals and free throws).

 

[DRK331]

Brayden O'Connor knocks the ball away, KD Johnson with the layup

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Brayden O'Connor knocks the ball away, KD Johnson with the layup

 

[GunstonsGhost]

Real head scratcher on why Begg didn't see more minutes in the second half after giving us the spark in the first half.

Ah well, good grind-it-out game. Still #1 in the A10 baby!

 

[psyclone]

Emmanuel Kanga was first row in attendance, and solidified the best decision he could make, after having visited both programs

How tall is he? I saw 3 young guys at halftime walking the concourse and 2 of them were very tall. I was thinking 7 feet...if they weren't players, they should be!

 

[tblack33]

Lots of poor offensive play across the board, but KD Johnson won this game when it counted. Sole possession of first place going into homecoming. Good teams find ways to win. This team is fun as hell to root for.

 

[hoopsjunkie75]

Jalen Hayne's crazy 4 points in the 2nd half:

Video:

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Jalen Hayne's crazy 4 points in the 2nd half

EBA was rocking after this!!!

That was my favorite possession (well, two possesions) from regulation. Makes a great highlight reel from an otherwise sloopy a** game.

 

[Jack Strop]

OK... I'll post it...

Men's basketball post game press conference vs. Loyola Chicago, 1/29/25 | By George Mason Athletics | Facebook

Men's basketball post game press conference vs. Loyola Chicago, 1/29/25

www.facebook.com

 

[MasonSAE4]

Not pretty by any stretch of the imagination. HORRIBLE free throw shooting and VERY questionable line-ups and subs by Skinn at times. But, most importantly we won the damn game. I'll take it.

Couldn’t believe he took that timeout when the Loyola coach was about to pull a big dumb dumb and not foul with like a three second differential in shot and game clock. Totally let them off the hook there.

He’s a pretty good in-game coach but gahdamn sometimes I think he went to the Andy Reid school of clock management.

 

[Verdad]

Emmanuel Kanga was first row in attendance, and solidified the best decision he could make, after having visited both programs

Thats who that was hahha, gave him the tshirt my 8 year old got bc it was an XL (and we have several already)

How tall is he? I saw 3 young guys at halftime walking the concourse and 2 of them were very tall. I was thinking 7 feet...if they weren't players, they should be!

They went down to great the team after the game and went into the locker room. When I saw the tallest of the 3 standing next to Gio I realized he was taller, so gotta be close to 7’. They stood up to cheer at end of the game and we had to look around them, couldn't stand up and see over even though we were a row higher haha

 

[undertherock]

The last time we started 7-1 in A10 play was the 2018-19 season under Dave Paulsen. We ended the year 11-7 in the conference.

 

[Sport31]

Good win when offense was as bad as I have seen it this year. The good we won and defense was superb,the bad 11 for 22 from FT line, the ugly 3 for 20 from 3 and the entire offense. I agree with most comments KD saved us tonite in OT. What I most like about this team on any given night someone eventually steps up and delivers. We are not a one man team, we are truly a TEAM.

 

[jruby]

Always play like complete a** vs those clowns. KD nutted up again and won game. English or Paulsen team rolls over and quits.

 

[TweederGMU]

Emmanuel Kanga was first row in attendance, and solidified the best decision he could make, after having visited both programs

Damn, that's who sat in front of me. He had two of his buddies/teammates with him and assistant coaches kept looking back at him some in the 2nd half. Then some of them came over and hugged him after the game.

Figured he was a recruit but couldn't see his face, he never turned around once. Seemed very shy. We gave one of his buddies a shirt we caught from a cheerleader and they all looked confused with the gesture. That explains it lol.

He's every bit his height, huge. 7 foot for sure.

Knew we would be rusty but damn, that's a different level of rust. Can't let that happen again if we want to be a Top 4 team, the better teams will eat us alive if that happens.

Pretty sure we were up 8 with like 3 mins to go and how we pissed away that lead is just awful, a lot of wide open layups under the basket Loyola hit, seems guys just missed their assignments/not switching.... may of been fatigue. Need to close out games better, better focus and situational awareness from all players.

Begg needs to play more, seems he has turned a corner, he had some really good moves and his shot is falling. Starting to become a 3 level scorer. Why he was pulled while he was hot is dumbfounding. Dude scored 5 points in like 30 seconds.

Woody not being in at the end of the game was also a head scratcher, he was playing really well and playing tight D but for some reason they kept Anderson in way too much at the end. Could tell from Woody's body language on the bench he was not happy and feel for him, he should of been in.

Billups finally hit a 3. However, he missed a bunch of putbacks around the rim that you just gotta make at this level.

The Free Throws is alarming at this point in the season.... how they can't consistently make them is head scratching how we are so bad.... it's going to cost us games against better teams if we can't figure it out.

Refs sucked, they missed so many calls..... Brayden, Haynes, Billups were getting hacked and left at least 4-5 blatant foul calls they missed where they swallowed their whistles.

 

[The Great PATSby]

Ugly but a win is a win. Props to KD for his OT Performance. We can’t always rely on defense to carry us.

Couple things I want to see improvement on.

Our inbounding continues to be awful. Almost every time we have 2, sometimes 3 guys just standing there while the others aren’t even making fast/hard cuts to get open. At least set screens to get a man open.

Our shot selection was not good. Lot of ill advised shots tonight. Wish we would do more back door cuts when driving to the rim. So many times tonight we had a player drive to the rim only to be met by 2 or 3 defenders. I feel like KD is the only one that will drive and dish. Coach L’s offense did that a lot when he was here. I’m surprised Tony hasn’t utilized that.

 

[Mason2006Patriot]

Tony Skinn is 2-0 at home (undefeated) when Bucket Hats are given out before the game

(Beat #16 ranked Dayton at home last year with them and today's overtime 58-53 win against Loyola Chicago)

We need Bucket Hats for every game!!

Glad I went to the game yesterday. I will be wearing the hat at the beach this summer.

Overall, a win is a win. Next up is davidson

 

[GMHoo]

Wow. KD this, KD that. Really? If he was as good as you make out there would have been no overtime. No consistent defensive effort and not a point guard, dribbles too much without penetration or passing to a teammate. Reminds me of RP. Yes he benefited from teammates efforts in OT. Overall an anchor on the speedboat of GMU bball. Team foul shots continue to be a problem along with inaccurate passing. But 7-1 sitting atop the A-10 is nothing to sneeze at.

 

[mkaufman1]

Last night was just an old school rockfight. Mason shot overall 34% from the field, 15% from 3, and 50% from the line but yet found a way to win. Just noting that they did go 5/7 in OT1 which basically carried us.

Lots to improve and adjust but few things

1) 7 turnovers. Much improved. If we dont' take care of the ball last night, we don't have a prayer.
2) We go as far as our top 6 in the rotation will take us. Whether its a key defensive stop, a key rebound etc. Haynes, O'connor, Anderson, Newton, Johnson, Billups etc.
3) Its obvious KD has settled into being PG2, although playing a lot of minutes at that role. Its not always going to be pretty with him (and yes he does play like a buffoon at times @FreeGunston12 ) but I'd much rather his 80% good and 20% bad. You could tell his leadership, experience and ability are helping us. We just need him, period.
4) We figured out how to win when Darius Maddox was 1/9 from the field and scored 4 points. We need him, but we found a way without him. That isn't going to happen very often.
5) We held Loy chi guys like Sheldon Edwards and Jayden Dawson to 1/9 and 1/11 from the field, respectively. If you remember guys like that killed us on the road last year. Overall they shot 21% from deep and 32% from the field. Our defense was on point last night as everyone said.
6) We did get out rebounded 48/41 last night which is a little bit surprising. Considering the type of game and the length of the game going into overtime, it was bound to happen.

7-1. Teams that are mid pack or less are going to want to have a rock fight with us and we will have to find a way to gut it out. Every team in the league will play a different style and it won't be the last time we have to play a game like this. Good teams find ways to win even with these types of challenges. We have a good team.

Hopeful that Mason can continue to take care of business against Davidson.

 

[GunstonsGhost]

I expected the turn out to be a little larger than 3,423 last night with class being back in session, all the promotions that were being run, and the team being hot right now atop the conference. I thought we might hit 5K this game. I guess GW brought the extra thousand people to the last game.