Just one thing here: Xavier Basketball

The 73-71 loss was painful, as usual, but particularly more because of our horrible free throwing shooting. 

Travis Taylor was dominant, 9 for 11 shooting for 24 pts and 8 rebs. Semaj scored 15, Philmore 10, and Robinson and Davis 8 each AND we shot 60% from the field! And we lost!

The biggest reason was that we shot 64% from the line while Richmond shot 80%.

Very frustrating loss. We have a week to recover before heading to Pittsburgh to play Duquesne next Saturday.

Which Muskies team will show up tonight? The one that played solid for 40 minutes against Dayton on Wednesday, or the one that struggled on the road last week at Charlotte and St. Joe's?

The bad news is, unlike their hideous mascots (new or old), their team looks good. At least at home. The Spiders are 11-1 at home, including a win over VCU last week. The Spiders are not a great defensive team though and don't really rebound well either. Even still, Vegas has Richmond as a 3 point favorite with big man Derrick Williams expected to return from an injury tonight. Will the Muskies shake the road game jitters? At 5-2 and tied for 1st in the A10 with VCU, the Muskies control their own destiny with 9 conference game to go.

6pm tip-off on Fox Sports Ohio, let's go Muskies!

Wow! What a game! This rivalry never disappoints (unless you're a Dayton fan).

The streak continues. No Dayton wins over Xavier in Cincinnati since 1981.

The Muskies came out swinging and played with energy for 40 minutes. Dayton's hot 3-point shooting kept them right with us but rebounding and second chance points were the difference. XU 66  UD 61. X out-rebounded UD 36 to 18! (Dayton by the way is the #1 rebounding team in the A10, or was before last night) And how about this, the Muskies had 35 second chance points! (UD had 10) I don't think I've ever seen a stat like that. More than half of our points were thanks to second chances. X had 20 offensive rebounds! X actually rebounded their miss free-throws on back to back plays down the stretch before Dee Davis knocked down 2 FTs to put X up by 3.

Everybody stepped up huge last night:
Semaj Christon - 13 pts, 3 ast
Dee Davis (MVP) - 14 pts, 3 ast, and played some great defense on Dilliard
Jeff Robinson - 12 pts, 5 rebs, including some huge dunks
Travis Taylor - 8 pts, 11 rebs
Justin Martin - 8 pts, 5 rebs
Isaiah Philmore - 8 pts, 4 rebs, on 4-4 shooting in 18 minutes before leaving with an ankle injury
Brad Redford - 3 pts - didn't pour it on offensively but his 3 was big (just narrowly missed the only other shot he took) but his positioning on the court really opened up the floor and allowed others the crash the glass inside.

Was great to get the win in a rivalry game. Xavier is now 5-2 in the A10 and head to Richmond for a Saturday game at 6pm.

Go Muskies!

The current 2-game slide hurts and while the postseason is not looking probable right now, there's nothing that would feel better than to beat Dayton at home tomorrow night.

Dayton has had some ups and down this season. As of now, they are not a tourney-caliber team but they aren't real far off. Their 3 conference losses are to arguably the best 3 A10 teams. Some solid wins and a good finish in the A10 would likely get them to the big tourney. The good news is that Dayton is just 1-3 in true road games (although note that they played mostly good teams on the road, beating Alabama and losing to USC, LaSalle, and VCU). As was the case last year, their best player is PG Kevin Dillard, who leads the Flyers with 14.9 ppg and 4.8 apg.
 
As I'm sure you already know, the Muskies haven't lost to the Flyers in Cincinnati since the 1980-81 season. Semaj Christon grew up in Cincy so this rivalry is not new to him. Let's keep the streak alive! We need every Xavier fan to be as loud as possible in Cintas tomorrow night! 9:00 tip-off so let's get a late night victory everybody!

Also - check out Dante Jackson's twitter page. If the following Tweet is re-tweeted 1,000 times, Brad Redford and Erik Stenger have agreed to shave their heads in honor of Joe Hughes, a former Musketeer, battling cancer:

I have heard @B_RadXU12 says that if this gets 1,000 RTs he will shave his head for his former teammate @hughes_33 who is battling cancer!

 
LET'S GO MUSKIES!!!

I'm getting sick of seeing the Muskies lead and/or be right there for most of a game and then fall apart and lose. Same story again, Semaj and Trav score in double-digits but no one else does and we lose. The offense looks horrendous again, 34% shooting and 1 for 13 on 3s!

With Saturday's loss at St. Joe's, X has now lost 4 of their last 5 on the road. This up and down team is back in the "down" category for now.

Please God let the Cintas Cintas and the home crowd help the Muskies turn it around! Dayton comes to town Wednesday night for a late one, a 9pm tip-off. The Muskies are in a 5-way tie for 2nd place in the A10 at 4-2 so there is still hope!

C'mon Muskies!