Springfield Heads East for Showdown with Louisville in "Must Win" Game
Heading into Tuesday, the Springfield Storm and the Louisville Land Sharks both find themselves out of the playoff picture, both sporting identical 3-6 records. It's been a somewhat disappointing season for Springfield, coming off what was quite possibly one of the most dominant Div. IV seasons in BuzzerBeater history. Last season Springfield went undefeated in the regular season (for the second season in a row) with a point differential of 1,134. Unlike the season before though, Springfield also went undefeated in the postseason, finishing with a sparkling 26-0 record. The team retained most of it's talent from that championship, except for former league MVP PF/C Ignacio Bello who was shipped out in the offseason and has since been replaced with Omer Riza Filinta and most recently, Shao Zibo. The latter of which has only played one game with the Storm. While it's to soon to tell if the risk will pay off, Filinta is doing his best to fill Bello's huge shoes (size 17 to be exact), as he is currently in the top 10 in the league in rebounding. This past Saturday was the first game in which both Omer Filinta and Shao Zibo suited up for the Storm, Springfield fell to Frosty BC by a score of 75-88. When asked about his team's loss, Coach Clouse said "Our performance was absolutely unacceptable. I take most of the blame. We went into the game completely unprepared for the attack that Frosty BC threw at us. I blame myself for that. I was outcoached. But our guys still have to execute. They didn't take care of business after we adjusted things on the fly at halftime, which is also unacceptable. This team has enough talent to hang around in this league, and you absolutely have to win games against teams you should beat. I feel that we were the better team in that game. I also feel like we're the better team tonight. We have to take care of business." When asked how he planned to slow down Center Ambrose Oneal, Clouse said "He's a phenomenal player. Probably the most naturally gifted Center I've ever watched. He's only 25 too, so he's going to be dominant for a while. And he'll continue to get better. But I feel that our new guy (Shao Zibo) can play a solid game against Oneal with some good help defense. Oneal is their main threat, so he's everyone's responsibility. Not just Zibo's. I'm not trying to be disrespectful, but he's the guy we've focused a majority of our gameplan on. He's surrounded by 4 other starters that wouldn't even be starting if they were on my team. So all of our starters need to step up and hopefully take advantage of some mismatches."