Huskies Pull Away in Second Half

Going into last night's game against Arizona I had this feeling that Huskies were going to come out and punch the Wildcats in the face early and often. I wasn't sold on 'Zona being our main rival for the Pac-10 crown, but as records go, they were the only other 1-loss team in the conference. So I was a little shocked when I turned on the game in the second half and the dawgs were only up by one, 45-44. I'm not sure how the game had played out so far, but I figured that either 'Zona was better than expected or we were simply not executing well.

That all changed around the 14 minute mark when Matthew Bryan-Amaning was fouled hard on a breakaway. It seemed to charge up the team and really get the crowd into it (not to mention, it led to the strangest moment of the game when Isaiah Thomas "mistakenly" took the foul shots intended for MBA). Over the next six minutes, the Huskies opened their lead from 3 points to 9 points and the result was never in doubt. The thing that I took from the game is how balanced they are. MBA took over the game for a few minutes. Then Isaiah. Then Venoy on two consecutive plays. Then Holliday. It really was a team effort -this current team is not relying on one player like they have in the past several years (Q-Pon, Brockman, Roy). That is an major asset come tournament time when defenses will surely be tighter.

The play of the game for my vantage point was when Isaiah Thomas dove out of bounds to save a blocked shot, got up, ran down the court, drove the lane and found Holliday for a wide-open three. He appears to be having a lot of fun and really has taken on the role of point guard following Gaddy's injury. It's almost as if a light bulb went off in his head telling him that the Huskies are a better team when he is creating shots for others. I am loving how he is playing and loving this team in general (along with Bucknell, they are part of my my current love triangle).

Final stats from the game:
PTS - Thomas 22, Holliday 22, MBA 18, Ross 8, Venoy 7
Reb - N'Diaye 8, MBA 7
Assists - Thomas 10
3-pt FG% - 30.4%
FT % - 65.4 (it remains a big key, year after year)