Recap of BYU-Air Force 2/9/2011

Team Effort
The game highlighted a lot of the skills of this BYU team.  Rogers ability to shoot.  Jackson's ability to hit threes and play defense.  Noah's shot-blocking ability.  Davies efficiency around the basket.  Abouo's athleticism.  Magnusson's rebounding skill.  Zylstra's whiteness.  Martineau's hairstyle.  Everybody who dressed played.  Everyone who played made a positive contribution of some sort.  When BYU plays like that, there are few teams that BYU couldn't play with.  The only thing: BYU doesn't play beautiful basketball like that against those few teams that are much better and athletic than them.  Still, it is impressive that they put it together like that on the road in conference play, against a top-100 RPI opponent.

Heating Up
Stephen Rogers and Jackson Emery appear to be back to their hot shooting from earlier in the year.  Noah also hit a triple for the first time in what feels like forever (it looked like the first time he felt comfortable, set, and confident in shooting one in a while as well: 20-point leads can do that to a guy).  Jimmer got more open looks from three in one game against the Falcons than he has the entire rest of the conference season combined.  This is a good stretch for BYU: they need to get it rolling in this three-game stretch against the bottom half of the league (@Air Force, Utah, @TCU) before they hit a 3-game stretch against the top half (CSU, @SDSU, New Mexico).

Letdown
BYU should be leary of a potential let-down game.  I believe one of the reasons they performed so well against Air Force is the exact reason they may lay an egg against Utah.  Air Force played with BYU at home, so BYU had to play with extra motivation on the road.  However, BYU, and The Jimmer, dominated Utah on the road, so they may take them more lightly at home.  I realize the difference between the teams right now is large, but BYU cannot let Utah think they have a chance in that game for one minute.  Also, with a bye coming up after the game, some of the mentally weaker players may start "vacationing" a bit early.  I don't see any reason to rush Collinsworth back from injury with how Abouo played defensively.  However, as much as I do not want to say this, they could probably use Anderson in the post against Utah's two 7-footers, if he is able to go.  It is the only matchup of Centers where he may be the more athletic...