FRIDLEY, MN: Can the Bulls Move Into One of the Top Spots in Fridley?

Fob Five vs. Bandits

Fob Five was very close to what would have been a big win for them last week. With the loss last week though it is basically playing for pride now. This team definitely has the integrity to keep showing up and bringing it come game day. They are a good team that just never seemed to get everything together. Maybe they are missing something or maybe they just need more time. It should be interesting to see next season, if they are back that is.

This week Fob Five get to try and play spoiler against the Bandits. For the Bandits this is a much needed win. At 2-3 they need at least one more win to get into the playoffs talks and as this is there easiest opponent left on their schedule if they don't get this one I wouldn't expect them to get the rest.

Good news for the Bandits is that with the addition of Steven Kelsey at point guard this team looks much better. Last game the Bandits scores had a much easier time finding good looks and ball movement looked much better. Against Fob Five, who preach defense and patience, good point guard play is very important and they will need Kelsey to keep up his play from last game.

Bandits by 6

Rip'n vs. Secret Agents

Last week the Secret Agents got blown out. This wasn't a change from the weeks before nor will it be different this week. But this won't stop the Secret Agents from showing up and playing hard.

Rip'n by 35

Celtics vs. Hand Down... Man Down

It definitely looks like the Celtics have righted the ship. After winning their last three games, all in pretty convincing manner, I don't see them having a slip up against Hand Down...Man Down this week. While they still don't look to be the Celtics of the past seasons they are still one of the best teams in rec.

For an upset to happen HDMD would have to play mistake free basketball and shoot a very good percentage. They have a couple good defenders but the Celtics have too many good offensive players for their defense to contain which means they have to play better than average defense and perfect offense and I just don't see that happening.

Celtics by 22

Greenhorns vs. Ninja Turtles

With back to back weeks of talking down the undefeated teams in Fridley for the Ninja Turtles the Greenhorns must feel like a break in the action. Playing defense first and letting the offense come off of turnovers have seemed to work for them against the best team in Fridley and I don't see why it wouldn't be the same this week.

Ninja Turtles by 20

Cobra Kai vs. Avengers

A couple weeks ago I asked Dustin Dupont who was the better defender himself or Ryan Jansen, to which he replied Jansen. This week he gets a chance to prove himself wrong however when taking on the Avengers and he no doubt will get the chance to guard Zhao Lee. This will be key as we saw in the Avengers only loss when Zhao isn't going the Avenger team, while still a good team, isn't nearly as good.

If Zhao gets shut down this week with Dupont on him the Avengers will need former MVP Chris Maher and Derek Batiste to take over. This might have been what they were lacking in the loss to the Ninja Turtles. I know they are more than capable of taking over games they just have to realize that they have to and do it. I wouldn't be surprised to see Derek Batiste on the front page of the Uhlife.com website.

Avengers by 10

Noisy Withdrawal vs. Bulls

And finally we get to the game of the night. Both of these team will be in debates for autobids for the playoffs. With which ever team winning this game all but locking up one of those spots.

Two very different outcomes last week for these teams. The Bulls had a 61 point win while Noisy Withdrawal came crashing back down to earth with a 33 point loss. The Bulls got there victory against the Secret Agents and were really never stopped offensively which made it more of a shoot around rather than a basketball game. I can never tell if these types of games hurt your team or help but hopefully for the Bulls it gave them confidence and they still have some energy left for this week.

Noisy Withdrawal seemed to have the game that I thought was inevitable. They shoot so many threes and finally were off last week. They are shooting 40% on the season but last week shot 20%, to win this week they will need to get that shooting percentage back up as the Bulls offense is one of the better ones in Fridley making this game a shoot out.


I think that Noisy will find their stroke again and make this game one of the more fun games of the year to watch. When Noisy is on they are very hard to beat. It is hard to stop a team that has so many good shooters and I don't know that the Bulls are a good enough defensive team to stop that many weapons but they might be able to out score them.

So in this game I'm going to go with the history and say Roderick Powell is going to have a huge game and pull out the victory for the Bulls.

Bulls by 4