ConnorNolte's Blog

08
Nov
Exhibition Game

We had our exhibition game tonight. We played Newberry College, a D2 program. We got off to a slow start but ended up winning by around 20. This was much different from last years exhibition where we lost to USC-Aiken. Hopefully this will set a much different tone for the season. I was happy with how I played. I shot the ball well and also rebounded well. All week in practice our coaches were trying to get Noah States and I ready to guard their best player, Clement Martin. I think he ended up having 14 points but was only 3-10 from the floor. Our freshmen played well and I think it was good for them to get experience in a game atmosphere. My sister and my dad came up along with my dad's parents. Its always good for us players to see our families every now and then. We are going to practice tomorrow and go over some film. Tonight I'm just going to hang out with some of the guys and enjoy the win.
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03
Nov
Closed Scrimmage

This weekend our team headed up to Charlotte to scrimmage VMI. We practiced Saturday morning, lifted weights and left for Charlotte Saturday evening. Charlotte isn't a bad trip from Furman at all. It took us about an hour and 45 minutes on the bus. When we got to Charlotte we got dinner at Macaroni Grill. By the time we left dinner and got to the hotel I was completely exhausted. My roommate for the trip was Tony Anderson, a redshirt junior point guard. We watched the end of the Texas Tech - Texas game and fell asleep. We woke up at 7:45 to get some breakfast and we were at UNC-Charlotte by 9. We scrimmaged in their practice gym but I took a peek at their main gym. It was WAY bigger than I would have expected. Their arena looked about the size of UGA's Stegeman Coliseum. We knew VMI would be aggressive and press alot but we were not expecting them to do it on every possession. It was a little disappointing because we were unable to run our man offense at all. It was fun to finally play somebody other than ourselves though. I'm really glad that basketball season has started so I can stop following football. Wisconsin's football team has been a huge disappointment this year to say the least. They might get into a bowl game if they win out. The Packers lost a close one to the Titans and are now tied for second in the division. My fantasy football team lost this week unless Clinton Portis can score 22 points for me tonight. It should be a good week of practice this week as we prepare for our exhibition game against Newberry this Friday.
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28
Oct
NBA Season Starting / Hurt Thumb

The NBA season starts tonight. For the longest time I considered the NBA a joke. I thought it was a bunch of extremely talented players running around going 1 on 1 and playing bad defense. I watched just about every game of the playoffs last year and I'm actually pretty excited about the NBA right now. ESPN the magazine and SI both have my Bucks having a terrible season. I hope that's not the case. It will be interesting to see how Richard Jefferson and Michael Redd do together. We've been practicing for a little over a week now. Everything has been going pretty well. My shot is looking pretty good lately and I've been working on my defense. The only bad thing about practice so far is that on the second or third day I hurt my thumb on my shooting hand. Last year against Appalachian State I partially tore some ligaments (aka a bad sprain). I played the rest of the season with tape on my shooting hand. Well the same thing happened and it looks like I'll be wearing the tape again this year. Even though its on my shooting hand, it doesn't affect my shot at all which is obviously really good. Last week we had an Athletic Service Board meeting. Every school with Division 1 athletics has one of these. Basically a couple members from each team meet and discuss issues that are important to athletes, put together community service initiatives, help publicize games, and put on events for athletes such as an athlete only field day at the end of the school year. Last week we talked about the annual SoCon fundraiser. For the last few years each school collected the tabs off of soda cans. This year we are going to sell pink shoelaces for $1 in support of the Kay Yow/WBCA Cancer Fund. If you don't know who Kay Yow you really should watch this video. She was diagnosed with cancer for the 3rd time in November during the 2007 basketball season. She missed 14 games and came back to coach while still undergoing Chemotherapy. I'll be back later in the week.
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20
Oct
First Few Practices

Basketball season has officially started now. We had practice at 8 on Friday night, again on Saturday at 11 and again today at 1. We've been putting in more of our offense, concentrating more on defense. We are split into a purple and gray team and we have been keeping score by negative points for turnovers and poor execution and positive points for taking charges, getting loose balls, making shots, and offensive rebounds. We do this when working on things like transition defense, half court offense and scrimmaging. We didn't do this as much last year but I really think it increases the intensity of practice. After practice today Noah States and I went to a Church in downtown Greenville that was launching their Church league basketball program. We were only there for a little while but its always fun to be involved with something like that. I am a Christian and being a good role model is something that is very important to me.
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15
Oct
Its Basically Here

Basketball season is here. Official practice starts this Friday night. It seems like every year, guys like Gary Parrish write articles about how programs like Ohio State and other high major basketball programs skip Midnight Madness and have a normal practice instead. Furman used to have it but we had practice last year instead. We aren't having it again this year. I don't mind not having Midnight Madness. It is no secret that we had a really bad season last year. If we're going to have a better season, its going to take alot of things but one of them is being in sync with each other, which comes from practice. We maxed out in the weight room on Monday and Tuesday. I increased my 1 rep bench press 10 pounds up to 225 (don't laugh). My vertical leap stayed the same at 30?. I was able to increase my squat by 20 pounds to 385. The new bench and squat maxes are personal highs for me. Tomorrow we have our team picture and weights. Last year I got alot of grief for my facial hair (See Photo by visiting connornolte.com) and I was apparently "dangerously close" to not being in our team picture this year. I cleaned up a little bit but I didn't get rid of the facial hair completely. I'll let you know how practice is going in a few days.
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Exhibition Game

Closed Scrimmage

NBA Season Starting / Hurt Thumb

First Few Practices

Its Basically Here

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