Only at Marshall can you score 93 points and hear about legitimate problems with the offense.
That was the case Saturday night when the Thundering Herd gutted out a 93-89 victory over the Charlotte 49ers. It won't help the Herd nab a first-round bye in the Conference USA tournament - those hopes are all but dashed - but it was good for the psyche.
It was good for this team to win despite not feeling it played well.
So what's wrong with shooting 52.5 percent and scoring 93 points? Something has to go right, doesn't it?
Yes, but you'll get a bunch of possessions playing Charlotte, another run-and-fire team. Marshall squandered many of those, turning it over 19 times that led to 25 points by the 49ers. Those turnovers allowed the 49ers to fire 11 more shots than the Herd, despite grabbing only six offensive rebounds.
It was a tough road trip for the Herd, which lost 86-65 to Old Dominion on Thursday. MU suffered 37 turnovers and dished out only 25 assists, a bad ratio considering that the Herd remains third in the league in that category at 1.26 per game.
Ryan Taylor committed six turnovers and Terrence Thompson was scoreless and in perpetual foul trouble. It was a game for Jon Elmore to freelance and for Stevie Browning to exploit soft spots in the defense, and they combined for 53 points.
The 49ers kept Austin Loop under wraps (1 of 5 on 3-pointers), but that takes a defender out of play. With Elmore and Browning in the lineup, I like the Herd's chances in a four-on-four situation.
Those two took over at times, but they can't carry the load all game, every game. As D'Antoni points out, the ball movement, the crisp passing, hasn't been there.
Mack McCarthy has noticed, too. As former Tennessee-Chattanooga and East Carolina coach, he has seen a little Herd basketball, 39 games on the opposing bench and perhaps that many as a television analyst. He was on the call for the American Sports Network at Charlotte, occasionally bailing out play-by-play man Mike Gleason.
(Gleason was so enamored with a 49er rejection he failed to notice the shot was heading downward, and therefore the officials called goaltending. McCarthy set him straight.)
McCarthy pointed out the ragged possessions, when the ball wasn't reversed or an open man was missed. He had called the Herd's recent loss to Middle Tennessee, so he has seen the MU offense in times of prosperity and poverty.
The Herd has an opportunity to set itself right in the final week of the regular season, with home games against Rice and North Texas, at 7 p.m. Thursday and Saturday. Fifth-place Rice is another fast-paced, 3-point-happy team; North Texas is tied for last and will not play in the league tournament.
"We just haven't had our mojo," D'Antoni said. "When you win a game like this, sometimes something will click. We're going to home for two good games. If we win two games, hopefully our mojo will be back and we'll be a little more fluid."
nnn
Herd fortunes might turn on one man's performance, and it's not who you think. No, I'm not talking about Elmore.
You might look at Ajdin Penava, the slender 6-foot-9 sophomore from Bosnia & Herzegovina. You could call him the seventh man, as he typically subs for Thompson or Taylor.
He has two double-doubles and it's no coincidence they came in Marshall's last two wins. In wins over Charlotte and Alabama-Birmingham, he scored a combined 27 points and pulled down 20 rebounds in 40 minutes.
In the Herd's last five wins, he is 15 for 27 from the floor, averaging 8.4 rebounds and 7.2 rebounds. He had one tough game among those, being blanked at home against Western Kentucky, though he did have seven rebounds.
In most of the five losses, he was invisible, hitting just 5 of 16 shots and averaging 4.4 points and 4.0 rebounds.
When he's on, he looks like the big man or "stretch-four" D'Antoni was looking for when he brought him to Huntington. He snags big rebounds, blocks a shot here and there, and can score inside and outside.
When he's not on, he looks like the tentative youngster who still needs to put on about 30 pounds.
With the Herd guaranteed only three games the rest of the way, which Penava shows up? The season may ride on it, believe it or not.
Contact Doug Smock at 304-348-5130 or dougsmock@wvgazettemail.com. Follow him on Twitter @dougsmock and read his blog at http://blogs.wvgazettemail.com/dougsmock/.