You make a good point. It always amazes me that by the time a guy gets to the college level he has been shooting foul shots for years. Truthfully , I averaged eighty four 0/0 when I played and it is my biggest gripe when I see a team lose by a couple points and they have players missing both ends of their attempts . It also is amazing that the Memphis coach says he doesn’t put much emphasis on foul shots. That may come back to haunt him.

What I think he’s saying is that there needs to be better officiating and besides knowing the rules and being consistent, they also need to understand the context of the game.

So what Tom and Chris say is right about refs letting the kids play. But the point isn’t that the Hoyas didn’t make their free throws, or that there were bad calls in favor of Georgetown as well. It’s that the refs need to do their homework and come into a game knowing if they should call it tight or loose, if they should let players get away with pushing the big man or if they should whistle it.

I think Tony was just using this game as an example for showing how refs are not at the level of the players in NCAA basketball, and that needs to change.

I am talking about Georgetown letting an opponent score 25 points against them in the second half and blowing a 17 point lead. I am talking about
Davidson making their free throws and Georgetown not.
I have many many questionable calls by the refs that went against Georgetown opponents but no after game comments. Face it, the luck they usually have did not show up .
As for shooting 63 o/o , that may have played well if they were able to get off more shots and shot better from the foul line.

1. Of course it’s done. Trust me. We know.

2. Who wants to watch referees blowing the whistle, stopping play every 15 seconds for some incident that doesn’t affect the outcome of the play in any way? All we are asking for, as we were in the wake of last year’s Ohio State game, is to let the players, not the refs, decide the game, especially when the fouls are imperceptible on the replays. Would we have beaten OSU had Hibbert and Oden been allowed to go head-to-head? Who knows? But it would have been nice to see. we deserved to see it. And I resent the refs for keeping us from seeing it.

3. You mention that you noticed Georgetown “getting a lot of ‘sweet’ calls.” I assume you’re referring to the following. let me refresh your very poor memory

a. Georgetown v. West Virginia – The Hoyas had a 1 point lead. Was Ewing’s block a clear goal tend? I think the best a neutral could say is “maybe.” And “maybe” is not good enough for officials to overturn a play, especially with the result on the line.

b. Georgetown v. Villanova – Tie game, Hoyas in possession with the clock running to zero. Villanova does not win that game if that (admittedly poor) call is not made. The game goes to overtime. On Georgetown’s home floor. Where they were undefeated this season. That said, I was angry at that call. Let the players decide the games. I think we would have won in overtime, who knows? And that’s the point – we should be able to know.

4. The facts of the Davidson game are that the underdogs shot 30 foul shots. They shot half as many against UNC (in a game which they lost by four points), 12 against Duke, 4 against UCLA. How do *you* explain this discrepency? Did Davidson have a post presence that I missed?

5. In addition to the 3 offensive fouls called on Hibbert, there were 4 others, bringing the total to 7. That means that, discounting the offensive fouls, Georgetown’s “unreliable” offense was actually responsible for 13 turnovers, not 20 as the pundits have so often claimed.

6. Georgetown shot 63.4%. Davidson shot 38.6%. So what are you talking about?