F A T T S

[PeteRI]

I thought it only fair that we have a dedicated post for my favorite -- and our best -- player.

[Rhodymob05]

The kids faced a lot of scrutiny on this board including from myself, but he’s been awesome . Keep it going Fatts.

[SmartyBarrett]

He should come off the bench.

[Taylor Swift]

I thought it only fair that we have a dedicated post for my favorite -- and our best -- player.

You are a good man! I love Fatts.

[RhodyFanNotAlum]

He's not my favorite player, but he is really growing on me as he matures and plays smarter, less selfish ball. If you had told me midway through last season that I'd be as impressed with him as I am now, I wouldn't have believed it.

[reef]

Definitely playing the best of anyone on our team this year and very fun to watch

Go Fatts !!

[section(105)]

.....no question his game right now is carrying us, actually hate to think where we would be without his points etc......for me, it is apparent that the ball in his hands is necessary, at this point, as Jeff finds his way back to his game, and the trio of Harris, Tate, and Martin are thus far for me are a collective disappointment........

[rambone 78]

Toppin will be playing his way into the lineup, and if Walker is good, then the above three's minutes will be reduced.

[PeteRI]

Fatts is a joy to watch. His intensity and exuberance are undeniable, as is his courage to routinely drive against players ONE FOOT TALLER than him. And his steal against Trae Young, followed by a step-back 3 and in-your-face yap remains one of my favorite sports moments. I'm just happy to be in his world.

[Taylor Swift]

I saw someone on Twitter complaining about Fatts. It was a Rhody fan, not sure if the Twitterer is on this board or not, but I completely defended Fatts. I cannot stand when keyboard couch warriors go on social media and complain about student athletes.

"Fatts was horrible last year" - the man scored 41 points against St. Joe's.

[steviep123]

I saw someone on Twitter complaining about Fatts. It was a Rhody fan, not sure if the Twitterer is on this board or not, but I completely defended Fatts. I cannot stand when keyboard couch warriors go on social media and complain about student athletes.

"Fatts was horrible last year" - the man scored 41 points against St. Joe's.

Agreed - did Fatts have a season last year that wasn't up to our expectations (which may or may not have been unrealistic)? Yes. But he also turned it on at the end and he certainly has learned a lot and has been excellent this year. If he keeps it up over the rest of this season and next, he will be remembered fondly as one of the Rhody greats and we will have a great chance of success!

[Obadiah]

One bright spot last year was that Fatts did improve his 3 point shooting in the last 5 games of the regular season (16-36, 44%) highlighted by his awesome performance against St. Joseph's where he hit 7 of 13 attempts. While he started this season cautiously, he's now moved up to 12-35, 34%. Not bad given he was at one point the worst in the country. An animated, high performing Fatts is something to see!!

[hrstrat57]

Some of the worst sports takes ever have been right here on our happy chat forum.

Point guard talk, Fatts talk and much more it makes for laugh out loud entertainment. I’m certain that much of it is so stupid it’s troll stuff to just get a response. Somebody said Fatts was a D2 player last year LOL! He’d go for 50 a night at D2 level! Point guard talk is like saying the Red Sox need a better field goal kicker!

Hopefully the players and staff and relatives are steering clear of this joint. We’ve had some targets of Keaneyblue chat get pretty snarky (and wounded) in the past. I believe it impacted the team on occasion but I see no evidence of that with this years group.

Go Fatts go!

Great stuff!

[ace]

Some of the worst sports takes ever have been right here on our happy chat forum.

Point guard talk, Fatts talk and much more it makes for laugh out loud entertainment. I’m certain that much of it is so stupid it’s troll stuff to just get a response. Somebody said Fatts was a D2 player last year LOL! He’d go for 50 a night at D2 level! Point guard talk is like saying the Red Sox need a better field goal kicker!

Hopefully the players and staff and relatives are steering clear of this joint. We’ve had some targets of Keaneyblue chat get pretty snarky (and wounded) in the past. I believe it impacted the team on occasion but I see no evidence of that with this years group.

Go Fatts go!

Great stuff!

You think comments on this message board impacted past teams?

[Blue Man]

I think Fatts' criticism last year was warranted - simply because this is the player we NEED him to be for us to be a good/great team. He's playing like an A10 1st teamer and potential CPOY.

This is his team now, and we're going to go as far as he will take us. Him having the bullseye will help the younger guys develop. Him being able to handle the pressure of that is exactly why he is the way he is.

[Bill Koch]

Atlantic 10 honors for Fatts Russell.

[PeteRI]

Coach Hurley said during his freshman season that one day Fatts would be the A10 scoring champ. Wonder if this will be the year ...

[Rhody2003]

Does Fatts have to sit out the first half of the WVU game?

[LoveThoseRams]

Does Fatts have to sit out the first half of the WVU game?

Koch reported that A10 refs said there will be no further discipline for Fatts

[Rhody2003]

Thanks. Good news.

[SandorClegane]

Further discipline? Sports have become soft.

Wake up ref! Quit being a wimp.

[rambone 78]

Why do we always seem to get shitty refs at the Ryan?

Aren't home teams supposed to get the calls?

The only good thing about today? They won. That won't make the highlight reels for the season.

[section(105)]

......fwiw; even with the crappy 920 AM reception on the way to Chophouse, I think I heard Don make reference to ‘all the good refs’ were assigned to the various tournaments......sometimes a look back upon these type ejections, a lesson learned approach can be used with the player......in this particular case, I would say nothing.......Keep on being a Fatts, Fatts.....

[bkoeppen]

......fwiw; even with the crappy 920 AM reception on the way to Chophouse, I think I heard Don make reference to ‘all the good refs’ were assigned to the various tournaments......sometimes a look back upon these type ejections, a lesson learned approach can be used with the player......in this particular case, I would say nothing.......Keep on being a Fatts, Fatts.....

the only positive is he played 32 mins instead of the usual 36 or 37 and we still won

[ramster]

Why do we always seem to get shitty refs at the Ryan?

Aren't home teams supposed to get the calls?

The only good thing about today? They won. That won't make the highlight reels for the season.

I’m not one to blame Refs for favoring one team over another. I think it all averages out in the wash.

Absolutely not that “home teams are supposed to get the calls”.

I have Refereed basketball and Umpired Baseball and Softball. If anything I was more conscience of the Visitor and Home Crowd influence and tried to keep the crowd noise in a balance in making calls but Referees and Umpires are only human and they do make mistakes, hence replays, different reviews based on the time left in the game, etc.

If the Refs were bad yesterday as many contend then the questions:
Were they equally bad to both teams?
Did they favor one team over the other?
Are there specific calls that would lead you to think they were favoring one team over the other?

Personal Fouls:
URI - 15
Manhattan - 28

Free Throws:
URI (28-39)
Manhattan (5-10)

Not saying the number of personal fouls or the number of free throws should be used to judge the performance of the Referees but URI had 4 times the number of free throws as Manhattan 39 to 10

The calls that led to the Technicals were both on turnovers by Fatts when he drove the lane:

6:53 (59-46) Turnover by Fatts. Steal by Pauly Paulicap. Manhattan Scores

6:30 (59-48) Turnover by Fatts. Steal by Pauly Paulicap again.

6:17 (59-48) Technical on Fatts who was still not happy about the no-calls on the previous steals. Manhattan makes 2 FTs

6:08 (59-50) Dowtin hits a 3 pointer assisted by Fatts. Now (62-50) 30 second Time out by URI but Fatts walks near Ref who called the 1st Tech and us clapping to get the Fans 3 feet away. Stone Freeman and the telecast show the replay a couple of times including the sue contact. Of course, we at the game cannot see this. As a Coaching Staff they should have seen the activity going on between Fatts and the Ref. It was obvious Fatts was still upset. With the Time Out the Coaches should have been reeling Fatts into the huddle.

Should the Ref have called the 2nd Tech? In my opinion no. He should not have called the 2nd Technical, the first Technical yes. He should have walked the other way, avoided Fatts at the 30 second Time Out. But Fatts should not have walked up to the personal space of the Ref either in my opinion knowing the tense situation between himself and the Ref. If I was Fatts as a player I would have done the same thing as Fatts, and I got thrown out of games too. Referees do not like to be shown up. Fatts put the Ref in a situation in which the Ref reacted as he did. My guess is Fatts walked close to the Ref purposefully and did the Clap for him to see, otherwise why the eye contact.

Fortunately the call did not affect the game outcome. Lessons to be learned for Referee Staff, Fatts and the URI Coaching Staff - not all lessons equal but things could have been handled differently by Ref, Fatts, Cox, URI Bench Coaches and the other Refs who could have pulled the Ref aside for a “mini conference” when the 30 second timeout was called by URI.

It’s true Danny Hurley would have gone ballistic, but Hurley often had a way with the Refs joking with them, having his arm around them as he talked during Time Outs and lulls in action. TV and Twitter often showed Hurley going ballistic but rarely showed the Hurley buddy buddy approach with Referees that occurred off camera.

6:08 (62-50) Manhattan missed both Technicals - 13 point lead

Final Score (64-73) - 9 point lead

[hrstrat57]

As a ex official as well I have no problem with either tech if Russell or Cox were warned. The only technical foul a official should call without warning is for profanity directed at a official or threats. Otherwise the proper officiating technique is to say “knock it off” at least once.

We still don’t have a first hand report from a forum member who was sitting near floor level in the SW corner of the building. Without knowing exactly what was said to who and if warning was given it is all meaningless debate.

I do however have zero doubt that the final minutes of the game should be reviewed for multiple reasons discussed here.

Time for Turkey

Go Rhody

[rambone 78]

ramster, I was being facetious when I said the home team should get the calls......

[ramster]

ramster, I was being facetious when I said the home team should get the calls......

I know, I was just ribbing

[ramster]

As a ex official as well I have no problem with either tech if Russell or Cox were warned. The only technical foul a official should call without warning is for profanity directed at a official or threats. Otherwise the proper officiating technique is to say “knock it off” at least once.

We still don’t have a first hand report from a forum member who was sitting near floor level in the SW corner of the building. Without knowing exactly what was said to who and if warning was given it is all meaningless debate.

I do however have zero doubt that the final minutes of the game should be reviewed for multiple reasons discussed here.

Time for Turkey

Go Rhody

Good points.
Problem with this situation was it all happened so fast. I did not see Fatts or the Ref having any strained interactions earlier in the game
I’m not sure which no-call fired up Fatts the most, the first one, the second one, or both.
With all the replays and tapes available these days I’m sure the A10 will review this in detail. They will look at how the Refereeing Staff performed On the two no-calls too. If they see that obvious fouls occurred then maybe it was too quick to react to Fatts’ behavior.
If there were clearly no fouls, then still should look at the quick Technicals. Can also read the lips of Fatts on camera I would guess.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

[hrstrat57]

No question in my mind the league will review the game.

Strong red flag when a team is cruising to a easy cover morphing into a losing team attempting to score a uncontested bucket at the buzzer which apparently would have resulted in beating the spread. I can’t remember a situation where a meaningless basket was scored at the buzzer, a final score (beating the spread) was posted and the points were then taken off the board. The score was particularly meaningless as the Jaspers had already achieved closing the score to single digits. You would expect them to roll up shake hands and be happy with a competitive final score against a superior opponent in the opponent’s gym.

I’m sure it happens and there is likely nothing there but it merits detailed review by the A10/ MAAC

[PeteRI]

Appreciate the KB ref input. But I strongly feel the ref should have ignored Fatts for the second T. Absolutely no reason to be so sensitive and obviously itching to be more important than the player.

[PeteRI]

And to get back to the original intent of this post:

Despite getting inexcusably tossed from the game with 6 minutes left, Fatts still managed to score 20 points in his fifth straight game.

[Billyboy78]

All I saw was Fatts and Jeff coming over to pump up the crowd. The ref just happened to be in the same area at the time. I didn't see Fatts say anything to the ref.

[RhodyRams916]

And to get back to the original intent of this post:

Despite getting inexcusably tossed from the game with 6 minutes left, Fatts still managed to score 20 points in his fifth straight game.

He would’ve hit 30 points if he wasn’t rejected

[section(105)]

And to get back to the original intent of this post:

Despite getting inexcusably tossed from the game with 6 minutes left, Fatts still managed to score 20 points in his fifth straight game.

......ties a Rhody record?......the in house trivia last nite had which former player had five consecutive 20 pt games.......Will Daniels....who know?

[Shinze88]

Should the Ref have called the 2nd Tech? In my opinion no. He should not have called the 2nd Technical, the first Technical yes. He should have walked the other way, avoided Fatts at the 30 second Time Out. But Fatts should not have walked up to the personal space of the Ref either in my opinion knowing the tense situation between himself and the Ref. If I was Fatts as a player I would have done the same thing as Fatts, and I got thrown out of games too. Referees do not like to be shown up. Fatts put the Ref in a situation in which the Ref reacted as he did. My guess is Fatts walked close to the Ref purposefully and did the Clap for him to see, otherwise why the eye contact.



Agree with this 100%, from where I was sitting it appeared Fatts made it a point to walk toward the ref and clap loudly so there was no way for the official to not notice. Really no need for that and I think he needs to show more maturity and leadership in that situation. Do you really think the ref is going to want to T up a kid like that for no reason? Fatts plays with alot of emotion and I love that about him, but think he could have used better judgement in this instance and I'm sure that was the message Cox gave him after the game.

[Billyboy78]

And to get back to the original intent of this post:

Despite getting inexcusably tossed from the game with 6 minutes left, Fatts still managed to score 20 points in his fifth straight game.

......ties a Rhody record?......the in house trivia last nite had which former player had five consecutive 20 pt games.......Will Daniels....who know?

That was the last time somebody did it. Not sure it's a record. I'm guessing somebody on those Keaney led teams did it.

[PeteRI]

The trivia question last night was for 4 games in a row.

[Rhody83]

I think the ejection will motivate Fatts and he will learn from it. I feel like Fatts is going to deliver consistently.
For Rhody to have a good year Jeff and Cyril need to deliver at a high level consistently.

[TruePoint]

What is there to learn, exactly? I don’t think he did anything wrong.

[Section104]

What is there to learn, exactly? I don’t think he did anything wrong.

That college basketball refs, especially in the A10, aren’t very good and there’s a possibility they’ll kick you out if you give them even the slightest chance to do so.

[DC_Rams]

What is there to learn, exactly? I don’t think he did anything wrong.

That college basketball refs, especially in the A10, aren’t very good and there’s a possibility they’ll kick you out if you give them even the slightest chance to do so.

We don’t have A10 specific refs though. These guys do P5 schools throughout the season as well.

[SandorClegane]

First off,I don’t think the 2nd tech was warranted. I watched the whole thing live. However, I do agree with 83 in that Fatts will learn from this. If we lost the game, people would be angry.
Prior to the 2nd T, after Jeff hit the three, the ref was locked in on Fatts. Stared him down as the team walked toward the crowd. As Fatts was clapping toward the stands, he shot a look at the ref. Ref T’d him up immediately.
While Fatts didn’t necessarily do anything wrong to deserve the tech, he can’t put himself in that position in games that we need him...he needs to walk away. I don’t think anyone thought we were going to lose to Manhattan at that point up by 13.
However, if this were PC or WV, we need Fatts in the game.
I also don’t buy that Cox or anyone else was to blame. This all happened in 2 seconds so it’s not like anyone could have stopped this. The ref wanted to T him up again and the look gave him the opportunity. Just my thoughts.

[ramster]

Cox called the Time Out. Coaches should have seen the Fatts was still pissed off and called him straight to the bench. Just as Assistants get between the Head Coach and the Ref in Football, Basketball and Baseball, Assistants and/or Cox could have shielded Fatts from the Ref.

If this had been a close game the Tech Foul Shots would have hurt.

Most definitely Fatts deserved the first Tech

His losing the ball to steals on two consecutive drives to the basket with no fouls called was why he was pissed. Has to control himself if calls don’t go his way.

Learning experience.

[Blue Man]

We still don’t have a first hand report from a forum member who was sitting near floor level in the SW corner of the building. Without knowing exactly what was said to who and if warning was given it is all meaningless debate.

Go Rhody

We do though. Bill Koch and Chris Disano- both extremely professional, impartial, and experienced basketball minds came out as strong as I’ve ever seen them - on Twitter and in post game - on the absurdity of the 2nd call - and at best the “questionable” nature of the first. Especially without a warning.

That was an absolute trash job.

Again, my point still stands that there were pivotal no calls/phantom calls right around the spread that helped close the gap for the Jaspers.

I’m not worried about the foul discrepancy as I was about when fouls were called/not called.

The wildest thing about this is we may have found a softer ref than the one who ejected me from the WVU game for commenting on the amount of hair gel in his hair.

[PeteRI]

Fatts has scored 20+ points in 6 straight games. He's averaging 21.1 points per game - and that's with 5 points against Maryland and getting ejected with more than 6 minutes left against Manhattan. (He still managed to score 20.)

Coach Cox knew what he was talking about when he said what's in my sig tag last year.

[ramster]

[rambone 78]

Fatts is on his way to being 1st team A10 if he keeps it going.....

[Rhody15]

How much he has improved has been incredible.

20+ points, 3+ steals, 5+ assists, minimal bad shots (although are they really bad shots if he’s the only one producing?), shooting percentages remarkable.

Been very fun to watch.

[bigappleram]

For further perspective on how good he has been, Fatts is currently 2nd in the country in steals per game at 3.50. Trails only his A10 counterpart, Jacob Gilyard from Richmond, who checks in at 3.57. Fatts is also currently 28th in the country in points per game at 21.1. The turnaround from an up and down sophomore year has been nothing short of remarkable. What has been a huge key to it has been Fatts defense, he has been a major disruptor in the half court, and it often is leading to some easy offense for him and others.