Sunday, January 1, 2012

December in Review: Improvement

Don't believe what anyone tells you- the Mocs improved drastically during the month of December. Sure the numbers don't really show that. The Mocs 4-4 record in the month of December is hardly one to leap for joy for.

But in the two biggest games of the month, at Charleston and at Kentucky, the Mocs were anything but embarassed. They took the Cougars to double overtime. They did not get humbled by Kentucky.

The loss to Georgia Southern was not great, but was expected. The Eagles are much improved this year. They can win a lot of games in the SoCon this year.

The loss to Mercer was not great either, and was probably their worst performance of the month. But the Bears are a solid team that is capable of beating a lot of teams. The Mocs should not have expected to win that game.

The wins over Spalding and Hiwassee were not impressive in terms of who they beat. However, they did not struggle with either team.

The wins over Longwood and Utah Valley were dominant and thorough. People want to downgrade the competition, but the Mocs beat the Lancers by more points that Virginia, Vanderbilt, or Seton Hall. Utah Valley was receiving votes in the Mid Major Top 25 in the preseason, so this was not a gimme win.

All in all, hard to complain about the performance this month on the whole. Yes, things could certainly have gone better, but it is also clear that the Mocs are a much better team than they were when November ended.

This is a huge month for the Mocs coming up. We'll see where they stand then.

Grade: B-. If the Mocs had beaten Charleston, the Mocs would have earned a B+. If they could have beaten Mercer and Georgia Southern, they could have gotten up even higher. This was not a bad month in terms of performance, as the performance was much higher than I expected when I predicted a 3-5 month, despite the fact that they just won one more game than that. It was a bad month in terms of results. That's why they get a B-. The results weren't quite there to earn higher.

GO MOCS!

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