Elijah Pepper highlights:

Ezra Manjon sure looks like he'll be a nice replacement for TJ:

Who is knicked up?

You're right about the hole in the middle. I would say that 2/3's, if not more, of the offers Les makes is to guards.

Anything can and usually does happen in the wild, wild Big West but, unless we make some dramatic improvement on offense especially, we will be in the middle of the pack at best.

Irvine and Santa Barbara are both very solid. Irvine is disciplined and deep and Santa Barbara has been winning without their top scorer, Max Heidegger, who has been out all season from a concussion. UCSB,s coach, Joe Pasternack, has gone out and brought in several 3 and 4 star recruits and transfers in just two years at the helm.

Fullerton has been a mixed bag up to this point but they have 3 terrific scorers in Allman, Ahmad and Rowe. Any of those 3 could play in the PAC12. Long Beach always has a lot of very athletic players and may be in the mix also and the same is true of Hawai'i and both of those programs usually have several PAC12 caliber players on the roster.

We've got a lot of catching up to do at the moment.

Agree. When Siler is ice cold, why not?

3-20 from AJ and Siler pretty much sums the problems this team continues to have scoring. We played decent defense and held their leading scorer to 10 points under his average and held the Huskies to 13 points under their average but we went over 7 minutes at one point in the second half without scoring.

The thing is, we returned most of our scoring from last season. As a team last year we shot 47% from the field. This year we are shooting 38% overall. Last year we shot 37% from 3. This year we are shooting 28%. TJ has been the only fairly consistent scorer on the team this season.

We had plenty of open looks tonight and were missing badly...airballs and offline clunkers that barely drew iron. The drop-off from in scoring from last year is shocking.

Last year we averaged 72.3 ppg and this year we are only scoring 58 ppg. It's going to be very hard to keep teams below 58 points to have a chance to win.

Les believes first and foremost that defense wins games but the ball has to go through the hoop with some consistency also and, so far this season, that has not been happening.

35-34 NIU at the half. Mooney just missed a wild half court shot at the buzzer. The Ags have done a good job of controlling the pace and taking their time on offense. NIU hasn't been able to get out an run as much as they would like. Ags shooting 43% and NIU is shooting 50% but the Huskies are beating the Ags on the boards 21-11.

Good contributions from the Aggie bench: Squire has 6 and Mooney has 9 with two other 3's just rimming out. We need some offensive help from AJ and Siler in the second half. They both were missing badly in the first half.

Hope the Ags can hang in there and squeeze out a nice road win.

Go Ags!

Thanks for your reply. I would think that the saliva build up in the horns would freeze also and you wouldn't be able to blow it out the spit vent. Does the band also have cold weather clothing for temps as frigid as it's going to be in Cheney?

I have a couple of questions for any current or former Band-uh members out there about playing in extreme cold. I've had a little experience over the years with various musical instruments: guitar, didgeridoo, harmonica, Boehm flute and Irish flute, and I've tried several brass instruments and reed instruments too but I've always played these instruments indoors.

Anyone who has ever played a wind instrument, be it a silver flute, reed or brass instrument, knows that the development of a good embouchure is critical to producing a good tone. My question then is how in world are the band members able to play their wind instruments when their face and lips are tight and cold in frigid conditions outdoors? It was tough enough for me to be able to learn produce good tone on a flute, for example, in ideal indoor conditions? I'm not sure I could get a sound to come out of it if my lips were feeling frozen!

Also, how does the cold affect the tone and playability of the instruments in cold conditions? I know that my acoustic guitars will change pitch as they warm up from body heat as they are held and played. I would also think that the valves on instruments like trumpets, tubas and baritones, for example, would be difficult to play as the valve oil viscosity gets denser when the temperature drops in very cold conditions.

Just curious....

Brrrr...does it rain at between 20 - 30 degrees or do you get sleet and snow?

How great is this...over $7000 in the first 20 hours. Damn...Aggie Pride is alive and well...so dang proud of the Ags and their fans that 2 buttons just popped off my shirt!

Every time he talks he has my full attention...awesome...

Wow...EWU has had 19 straight playoff game at home in the FCS Playoffs...that's an unreal!

I think Hawk is here for the long run. This is home for him and he bleeds Aggie Pride. Of course, I suppose just about everyone has their price but Hawk seems to have arrived at the stage of his life where big bucks and a bigger stage aren't the main motivating factors for him. He's been around the block and has experienced success and disappointment that comes with the territory in the big leagues. It's dog eat dog in the Power 5 leagues.

I believer him when he says that he what he really wants to do now is bring greatness back to Aggie football and recognition to the entire university while preparing young men to eventually take their degrees and go out and help make the world a little better place. He's here to stay.

Tim Plough is a rising star in the offensive coordinator ranks. I'm sure he'd like to be a head coach someday and I expect he will get some enticing offers very soon. On the other hand, he's an Aggie and we all know what a strong influence that is. He also has a young family and Davis is about as good a family community as can be found anywhere. Who knows, maybe when Hawk finally pulls the plug, Plough might be somewhere in the wings ready to step up or come back to his roots.

The refs we had in the UNI game were from the Patriot league and it looks like the refs for the EWU will be from the Southern Conference. The Southern Conference crew previously worked the Duquesne @ Towson game and the JMU @ Colgate game.

The UNI game is the only game for Patriot league crew for the entire playoffs. I think they're receiving additional training in judging FG accuracy... :rage:

http://www.refstripes.com/forum/index.php?PHPSESSID=501c0d4c9d695b143e2f38b0a13d91f0&topic=14211.msg143754#msg143754

The main key to the game to me is the how well we do on both sides of ball in the trenches. Jake needs time to make his reads. I think we'll be in trouble if they are able to consistently bring pressure and Jake has to throw early because the pocket is collapsing.

Our D line will have to be more stout than they were in the first game too. We need to be able to slow their running attack down a bit at the LOS so their RB's aren't slashing through the holes and getting up to a full head of speed in the first few yards . They were running ball at will on us in the second half of the first game.

The dual threat that Barriere poses for us is a tough problem for any defense. Will our D line be able to get some pressure on him and make him make a few unwise, hasty decisions and will we be able to keep containment if and when we are able to bring some pressure?

We won't win a shootout with them. We need our defense to make a few big plays and create a couple of turnovers that, hopefully, our offense can take advantage of.

Good on ya, aggie08! A whole bunch of small donations would add up quickly.

I just sent them $100. The one and only Band-uh has been entertaining me since I first arrived on campus in the fall of '72. God knows they make a big difference in the atmosphere at the Aggie sporting events especially especially when the seats are half empty.

Glad to help out and I hope we can get a group up to Cheney.

Go Band-uh!

Here's great stats comparison that was posted over on the AGS game thread: