Cannons Call

“The best way out is always through.” -Robert Frost

@TylerDurden @Channel5iveNews 💯

@Channel5iveNews I admire how he doesn’t listen to anyone’s bullshit lol

Clavicular ends Channel 5 interview after Andrew says he is satisfied with his looks

BREAKING: In NYC at the “No Kings” rally, demonstrators waved Communist flags. No kings, but yes Communist dictators.

@pamelam35 Wrong, you’ll soon find out it’s showcase time for the boilers soon

Today's CBB lesson: how they score matters more than how much Purdue vs Arizona UN 153.5 The style mismatch is key. Arizona is paint-dominant and scores from 3 near dead last rate. They'll drive and post right into Purdue's stronger interior, never exploiting Purdue's biggest defensive weakness. Meanwhile Arizona's No. 1 defense suffocates everything. Purdue's 3 point heavy offense runs into the same wall it always does against elite defenses. Arizona protects the rim. Purdue turns it over. Under.

@BuriedTreys You forgot about Jacobson a rim protector that is 7 4

Purdue / Arizona (San Jose) Purdue continues the momentum as they ultimately edged out a more athletic Texas team that surely gave them a HELL of a scare. Tramon Mark was limping on one leg, and still played like he had 3 legs, if ya catch my drift. While the Boilermakers actually contained Swain to an extent, I did have concern around their ability to guard wings & bigger (especially on-ball) guards in general, and they just let another big-guard-nearing-wing-size run absolutely wild on them (Mark). On the other side, what is there left to say about Arizona? That they lost a close game at Phog Allen on Big Monday (pretty sure Self is 946-0 in that spot) in a game they led by double digits early in the 2H? That they lose to Tech with Toppin when Tech trailed by 7 with 3.5 minutes left? That’s what you’re nitpicking with this team. Have shown the highest floor of anyone in the country and probably the 2ndbest ceiling behind Michigan’s ABSURD month-plus run late in noncon play stretching into early conference play Cats want to run in transition, assault the rim, and force opponents to make contested shots over their positional length. Purdue is 95th percentile in fastbreak points allowed per 100 per CBB Analytics. Check. Purdue is also 10th in Defensive Near Proximity Frequency per Haslam. Check. Purdue has also hung onto some of the no-middle principles they implemented last year without a real rim protector (TKR playing center full-time). Again. Make Zona play in the half court. Keep them away from the cup. And be capable of outshooting them b/c you’re almost certainly DOA in the shot volume department On the surface? Sounds completely viable for Purdue matchup-wise. They’re already used to not being great in shot volume. Boilermakers have run hot 3P% delta splits all year…because they can, especially when Fletch isn’t shooting like Dylan Darling. They’ve crushed during this mega late season run almost solely on the back of their offense as their defense ranks 133rd over the past month (11 games). Maybe their Senior Core edges it out late in a slow half-court game with their careers on the line. Still comes with a massive ‘MAYBE’. They are certainly more than capable of winning this game as this was the preseason #1 team in the country to start the year fwiw. There is also one thing staring at me DEAD in the face that is difficult to shake And that brings us to the Purdue defense that, bear with me, has packline principles, but technically isn’t a packline, but also plays somewhat like a packline in many regards. They’re a gnarly rim denial defense, but that’s also due in part slightly because they just…don’t have rim protection, as simple as that is to say. Can’t protect the bucket? Stop teams from getting there. They probably should drop their big more frequently, but Purdue will hedge plenty in this matchup to flatten out Burries & Bradley's ball screens. What’s the easiest way to beat that? 1.) You get into the paint to essentially bait the defense to send help on the driver, inevitably opening up much less contest on Catch & Shoot 3P opportunities. OR 2.) You possess a guard with such elite burst & handle that you can just flat-out split defenders. Certainly the path of most resistance, but if you want the best example of this? Go back and watch Braden Smith in the 2H of that Houston tourney game last year. He’s not even an elite stop-start or burst guy, but he abbbbbsolutely carved into that Houston defense as you create man advantages literally every time you split a double (sometimes 2-man depending on roll action). Houston is also another team with no-middle principles defensively fwiw And that brings us back to the Zona offense. Can they split double teams? Yes but it's not easy and comes with added risk of turnovers. Shot rollers? Actually relatively mediocre for such an elite team. It’s a short list of teams/players who can carve through even a ‘show hedge’, much less a hard hedge or an ice. But Zona actually has 2 capable dudes in that regard, and the big men showing will be Cluff/TKR compared to, for example, the mobility of a Mitchell/Zuby or Cenac/Tugler. Although, that has more to do with the way they use their stocky frames downhill rather than being pure first-step guys. **If** Zona can generate consistent downhill looks, that automatically insinuates they’ve had success cutting through the Purdue quasi-packline, who has had enormous problems this year containing bigger, athletic slashers who excel off the bounce. I think it's interesting that when Zona plays these defenses who push teams away from the rim, are you actually forcing Zona into more math-driven offense given the elevated 3PRate? While they can typically get whatever they want at the rim, it's a scary proposition if that team started shooting more 3s as they're plenty capable outside of their bigs Pretty confident in saying that Zona will just play their bigs straight up defensively against the Purdue post touches. When Purdue took off offensively, you saw a lot of the role guards knocking down their perimeter shots. That's really the extra gear of the offense. Aside from the points you gain from those guys hitting 3's, it also softens up the matchup inside for TKR and Cluff. Cats defending 1-on-1 in the post should allow them to stay home on shooters Last major note I'll make. I still feel pretty strongly that this Purdue defense still has some uncurable issues on that side of the ball, but they have played at such a high level offensively that the defensive shortcomings haven't been as under the microscope as they probably should be. Frankly, they don't have a single defender worth a shit unless you're getting good Cluff who isn't fouling. Purdue is not only really small on the perimeter, but then they also have 2 stone-footed bigs. Just a bad recipe when you're talking about having to contain multiple NBA guys basically at all times on the floor. We saw Purdue dice up a similarly sized Michigan team in the B10 tourney, but Zona is a much more passive drop coverage compared to some of the hedging Michigan does with their athletic bigs. Not quite the same matchup, but the crazy part of that Michigan game was that Purdue didn't even shoot it all that well. 28.6% on 14 attempts is really weak for that group. It was actually Cluff & TKR who combined for more than half of Purdue's points going right into the teeth of the Wolverine defense. Pretty eye-opening and something I think they at least TRY to replicate here Purdue's outs include hot 3P shooting, Cluff & TKR post touch success, surviving on the glass, and keeping the Zona guards out of the paint. The first is totally viable. The second is doable but difficult, third is attainable, but it's the fourth part of that which scares me the most. I just REALLY worry about these Purdue guards holding up against the size and dribble penetration ability of the Zona backcourt. Tend to lean Zona but I think this game stays pretty close most of the time. Feels like one where Zona kind of holds them at bay and leads by 6 to 16ish points for most of the game. Purdue will have some runs where they hit 3's to shrink the margin, but ultimately, it's tough to envision them getting over the hump given their win condition is heavily tied to their post offense & defense. I understand if you want to take TKR unders in this spot, but I just can't get there with the way he's been unleashed the last couple weeks since Purdue started this hot run. If forced to choose, I think the Cluff unders would be my preference as he should see more of Krivas and has more foul risk than TKR. Also think he is somewhat of a midmajor bully and hasn't Per the 'Zona will play 1-on-1 in the post', that also means really tough spots for the Loyers & Coxs of the world. Also pretty scary when both of those guys have shown the ability to hit a couple 3Pointers in quick succession if you do play their unders Interesting Koa Peat spot. Should draw more TKR in the post, and for everything that dude does well offensively, we saw what Purdue looked like when he was protecting the rim last year. They were...332nd in 2PD%. We've also seen him put up some big scoring tallies so think alts also in play to an extent. You're just going to have to run decently on the usage with how flat the shot distribution is on Zona. Probably will have some action on him one way or the other

@cblezbets Purdue to win outright

Someone gives you $5K, but you have to bet it all on one bet in March Madness today. Wyd?

@StockTalks21 Purdue just win baby

Good value with Illinois here? The left side of the bracket is a toss up. The right side is loaded. Just get to the championship game & see what happens!

@Stuckey2 AZ needed OT to be Texas Tech Purdue won by 30pts on neutral ct Toppin started and played both There is that fact

Everybody loves Arizona but what big games have they actually played in this year?

@JackDunkins01 Look up box score Purdue defeat of #1 Arizona in 2023 with these same players from Purdue then #2….dont guess

I’ve never felt more confident in my life in a Purdue loss Arizona has the better coach and better team and I expect them to win by 20+

@StockTalks21 No

Is this kid good? I don’t even understand what’s going on anymore.

@RockChalkBlog Too much

He might have a stroke on the sideline

Cameron Boozer every time Duke is down 1 point:

@BigBlueBud Purdue just did it….

Michigan is just so so complete. I don’t see how anyone else, save maybe Arizona, even slows them down. Dusty May is the man.

@theblockspot it’s John Wooden

Is Rick Pitino the greatest coach in College Basketball history??? I think he is.

@NYeoman Michigan State not gonna make it UConn taking them out now

What are Final Four tickets in Indy going to look like if it’s Purdue, Michigan, Michigan State and either Illinois or Iowa???? I’m going to go sooooo broke guys.

That Stanford CS graduating class of 2026 just hit the job market 394 total graduates. 23 have full-time offers. Twenty-fucking-three. The rest? 127 are doing unpaid "AI apprenticeships" at startups that promise equity. 89 pivoted to product management bootcamps they're paying for with credit cards. 52 are substitute teaching while "building their portfolio." The remaining 103 are driving DoorDash, bartending, or back home with their parents applying to customer support roles that require CS degrees Career services is telling them it's a "market adjustment" and to "stay positive" Same week Stanford reported a $43.7 billion endowment increase Two years ago this exact program had a 94% placement rate by graduation. Starting salaries averaged $185k. This year the 23 lucky ones? Average offer is $78k. At companies that didn't exist 18 months ago. Building "AI-native workflows" with teams of 4 people doing what used to take 30. The professors are still teaching advanced algorithms to kids who'll never write a sorting function While recruiters scroll LinkedIn looking for "AI prompt engineers with 5+ years experience" One kid told me his database systems professor just got replaced by a chatbot that grades assignments faster The irony is suffocating

@Jmcfall5 @RCbeancounter The head NCAA official is a Arizona alum

@fatbaldguyracin It is sooo bad and predictable

Refs never fail to go for Duke here we go 6 min left w that bs

AND WE’LL DO IT AGAIN!

WOW. Holy shit. The UAE is now saying absolutely NO CEASEFIRE against the Islamic Republic of Iran. Ambassador Yousef Al Otaiba confirms UAE will join efforts to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a lifeline for global oil. A gives confirmation of a $1.4 TRILLION UAE investment commitment in the United States. This is wild. Arab countries are paying the US to bomb the Islamic Regime. Source: Reuters / WSJ H/t @War_Radar2

Holy shit, the Federal Reserve's purchases of short duration T-Bills just hit $381B! We're now almost $60B above the height of the 2020 REPO bank crisis "virus". What is going on in the banking system?