SAN ANTONIO -- Turns out Joey Dorsey wasn't David. He wasn't Goliath. Hell, he wasn't even Jake Voskuhl.
One day after verbally flicking Ohio State center Greg Oden in the nose, Dorsey backed up his big talk with zero points, zero blocks and three rebounds in Memphis' 92-76 loss to the Buckeyes in the South Regional title game.
When Dorsey got those three rebounds, I have no idea. When he was on the court for the 19 minutes credited to him, I couldn't say.
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| Joey Dorsey isn't thrilled after the game, but he patiently waits for the media blitz. (AP) |
Dorsey accepted the fist pound but didn't accept the challenge that he himself had thrown out Friday, when he called Oden "overrated" and said that he, Joey Dorsey, was the Goliath of this matchup. Dorsey said Oden was "the little man."
Dorsey had said he would get 20 rebounds against Oden, and maybe he could do that. If they played five more times.
Dorsey had said he would hold Oden to a handful of points, a handful of rebounds. Oden finished with 17 points and nine rebounds. But then, Oden has huge hands.
Outrageous and arrogant before the game, Dorsey had the sense to be classy and humble afterward. When the doors to the Memphis locker room opened 15 minutes after the game ended, Dorsey was waiting for the media. He had even turned his chair away from his locker, toward the middle of the room. He was going to handle this, and he was going to handle it head on.
"He's a great, great player," Dorsey said of Oden. "I didn't know he was that strong. I tried to keep a body on him, but he came with a counter."
Oh, and all that trash he had talked the day before? He was only joshing. Didn't mean it.
"Of course he's not overrated," Dorsey said. "I was just getting myself fired up for a big game. Greg knew what I was saying. I was trying to get us both fired up."
A shameless television reporter from the Memphis area suggested to Dorsey that his words had been taken out of context -- presumably by me, since I asked the question that started Dorsey's nonsense, was one of the few reporters to hear it, and then wrote an entire story about it -- but Dorsey refused to grab the TV homer's life preserver.
"They (reported) exactly what I said," Dorsey said.
So there.
Meanwhile, in the other locker room, Oden said he wasn't insulted, angered or even motivated by Dorsey's pregame banter. And his teammates backed him up on that.
"We were more upset than he was," said OSU guard Jamar Butler.
"We were furious," said OSU backup center Matt Terwilliger. "He didn't seem to care much either way."
So there's your story: Dorsey didn't fire up Oden. He didn't make Oden any better than Oden normally is. With 17 points, nine rebounds and one block, Oden was right around his season averages of 15.6 ppg, 9.8 rpg and 3.4 blocks.
But Dorsey didn't fire himself up, either. After going out of his way to draw attention to himself, Dorsey wilted like a weed. It was the first time all season he went scoreless, and his second-lowest rebounding total in 37 games.
The thing is, Memphis was playing well enough -- and Oden was just quiet enough, at least for the first 30 minutes -- that a strong game from Dorsey might have tilted this thing in the Tigers' favor. With less than eight minutes to play the score was tied at 64. Memphis' Jeremy Hunt was on his way to scoring 26 points. Chris Douglas-Roberts was wreaking havoc in the lane and Willie Kemp was making four of five 3-pointers.
With 15 offensive rebounds and just 11 turnovers, Memphis took a lot more shots (65 to 51) than Ohio State, and made 10 of 22 from 3-point range. Ohio State played one of its most complete games of the season, but the Tigers were right there. All they needed to win this game and get into the Final Four, perhaps, was a little push from Joey Dorsey.
Instead he gave them an anvil to the head. The game was effectively over when Dorsey went up for a dunk against Oden with 4:15 left. Ohio State led 74-66, but a three-point play would have put the Tigers right back in it. Oden was whistled for a foul on the play, his fourth. It was a huge moment.
Until Dorsey missed the dunk. And then missed both free throws. And then was benched for the final four minutes. Afterward Dorsey gave a quick hug to Oden -- he told reporters he said a couple of congratulatory sentences to Oden, but that's a lie -- and then exited the Alamodome floor through a baseline tunnel. Above him, an Ohio State fan waved a sign that said, "Dorsey isn't ready for No. 20."
Oden wears No. 20.
"It was a matchup of two great big men," Dorsey said afterward. "I was just trying to help my team win."
No more talking for you, Joey. You've already said so much, and done so little.
