BET: Georgetown - Villanova 3/8/23 Discussion
Mar 3, 2023 14:10:16 GMT -5
Loyal Hoya, TrueHoyaBlue, and 2 more like this
Post by grokamok on Mar 3, 2023 14:10:16 GMT -5
It's been a long time since I've posted, here. There was a pretty rough end to the 2020 season -- not just for Hoya bball, of course. I managed one post since to pick at one of my scheduling pet peeves, not even bothering to exult in the 2021 BET title (a world-turned-rightside-up moment when Q found an ability to kick the ball out, Dante seemed only to take appropriately-available drives to the hoop and the defense seemed to be able to close out on the three).
I've stayed on, though, watching threads. Something about the reference, above, to '07 stirred a memory (still marred by the block call on our star when it more clearly was a charge on Oden, though Conley was the more devastating to us; I'd like to have seen a rematch with the Gators in the title game), and it sparked me to recall the difference between that year and the next, when Jeff -- still playing in the NBA, even now! -- had taken the opportunity to be in the draft a year early (with kudos for returning to finish his degree, allowing me to put him in my all-time starting five, along with Ba-Ba, Sleepy, Reggie and Patrick).
I can't fault Jeff for that, but we might very well have won the NCAA title had he stayed. We'd not have been out-toughed in the Calishady game, we'd not have been out-hustled in the second half of the Col. Sanders game (PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY, DO NOT BRING IN THIS MAN AS OUR NEXT COACH!), we'd not have been flustered into 12 first-half turnovers leading to a lower-Canada court-storming, and, though we may have allowed the Panthers their home win, you can bet we'd not have been out-rebounded into a BET finals loss. And that woefully under-seeded and home-standing Davidson team? Even if it was we, instead of Kansas, who played them in the Elite 8, the plays that really killed us, there, were the kind that Jeff's Senior presence would have stopped; not the now-greatest-pure-shooter-in-history bombs, but the all-too-open-for-the-easy-short-jumpers/layups/putbacks by his supporting cast.
I'm wondering if that split between the '07 & '08 teams marked a real changing point. We went from the refinement of Princeton on steroids to, well, something else. There was that "It's a coronation!" game against 'Nova a few years later where that fully re-emerged, but, belying Raftery's comment, it was gone pretty much as soon as that game was over. Despite periods of success based more fully in III's preferred approach, it was the beginning of a long road to mediocrity, where he just couldn't get the combination of athletic and well-trained together with consistency. The players that *might* have come to the Hilltop went elsewhere with greater regularity (I know -- long history of this -- Hill, Anderson, Noah, etc. -- but not to the exclusion of landing our own), and the one that sticks out in my mind the most is Ochefu; I'd love to have had Hart, but if there was a Hoya-prototypical player on that Wildcats championship team, it was the tough, workmanlike, unselfish big man.
The lightning-in-a-bottle 2021 tourney aside, it seems to me that Ewing, likewise, had more success when he got III holdovers understanding his approach to the game, making them rounder and more capable, overall. Of course, that was brief and at a much lower level of success. The players he brought in, himself, just didn't broaden their skillsets, and I think there must be an inability to communicate well with younger players (seen years ago with the salient "Do you work on that shot?!?" remark to MD). Maybe he could have done something more unidimensional if the personnel debacle of late 2019 hadn't occurred; the first half of the contest against the Blue Devils looked promising before we fell into the typical trap of being worried about the way the refs seemed to favor them instead of keeping to our own game (seriously, this is something that predates K, and it's befuddling how coaches don't address that psychology well enough with their players). This isn't an excuse for the past few years, just an observation, and only one among many that would be relevant, I'm sure.
I'll expect to see someone new in the coach's seat next year. I'll wish Patrick well. I'll hope that we find a young coach with their own unique approach to the game and an abiding interest in the development of the whole player on the court and the whole person off. I'll desire that that come with a healthy dose of the dominant defense of old and a nod to the efficient offense of not-quite-so-old. I'll prefer it if that person doesn't have strong ties to those programs I consider to be our rivals.
Mostly, I'll hope that I'll be willing to re-up my kids' Hoya Kids Club memberships after a year off. I couldn't keep them in a situation of learning all the wrong approaches to the game, I needed better to be able to point things out with the assistance of replays and from the relative comfort of the living room, and I was grateful that, for the first time in their lives, they found it in themselves to wander off to something better to occupy their minds when there was little of interest to see. May they find the future of the program more compelling, whether we return to dominance or not.
In the meantime, I have no interest in our losing any game. I'll be frustrated at almost every turn, I'm sure, but I'll be rooting for the Hoyas the whole way, lightning getting caught twice or no. Start things off by beating the 'Cats!
I've stayed on, though, watching threads. Something about the reference, above, to '07 stirred a memory (still marred by the block call on our star when it more clearly was a charge on Oden, though Conley was the more devastating to us; I'd like to have seen a rematch with the Gators in the title game), and it sparked me to recall the difference between that year and the next, when Jeff -- still playing in the NBA, even now! -- had taken the opportunity to be in the draft a year early (with kudos for returning to finish his degree, allowing me to put him in my all-time starting five, along with Ba-Ba, Sleepy, Reggie and Patrick).
I can't fault Jeff for that, but we might very well have won the NCAA title had he stayed. We'd not have been out-toughed in the Calishady game, we'd not have been out-hustled in the second half of the Col. Sanders game (PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY, DO NOT BRING IN THIS MAN AS OUR NEXT COACH!), we'd not have been flustered into 12 first-half turnovers leading to a lower-Canada court-storming, and, though we may have allowed the Panthers their home win, you can bet we'd not have been out-rebounded into a BET finals loss. And that woefully under-seeded and home-standing Davidson team? Even if it was we, instead of Kansas, who played them in the Elite 8, the plays that really killed us, there, were the kind that Jeff's Senior presence would have stopped; not the now-greatest-pure-shooter-in-history bombs, but the all-too-open-for-the-easy-short-jumpers/layups/putbacks by his supporting cast.
I'm wondering if that split between the '07 & '08 teams marked a real changing point. We went from the refinement of Princeton on steroids to, well, something else. There was that "It's a coronation!" game against 'Nova a few years later where that fully re-emerged, but, belying Raftery's comment, it was gone pretty much as soon as that game was over. Despite periods of success based more fully in III's preferred approach, it was the beginning of a long road to mediocrity, where he just couldn't get the combination of athletic and well-trained together with consistency. The players that *might* have come to the Hilltop went elsewhere with greater regularity (I know -- long history of this -- Hill, Anderson, Noah, etc. -- but not to the exclusion of landing our own), and the one that sticks out in my mind the most is Ochefu; I'd love to have had Hart, but if there was a Hoya-prototypical player on that Wildcats championship team, it was the tough, workmanlike, unselfish big man.
The lightning-in-a-bottle 2021 tourney aside, it seems to me that Ewing, likewise, had more success when he got III holdovers understanding his approach to the game, making them rounder and more capable, overall. Of course, that was brief and at a much lower level of success. The players he brought in, himself, just didn't broaden their skillsets, and I think there must be an inability to communicate well with younger players (seen years ago with the salient "Do you work on that shot?!?" remark to MD). Maybe he could have done something more unidimensional if the personnel debacle of late 2019 hadn't occurred; the first half of the contest against the Blue Devils looked promising before we fell into the typical trap of being worried about the way the refs seemed to favor them instead of keeping to our own game (seriously, this is something that predates K, and it's befuddling how coaches don't address that psychology well enough with their players). This isn't an excuse for the past few years, just an observation, and only one among many that would be relevant, I'm sure.
I'll expect to see someone new in the coach's seat next year. I'll wish Patrick well. I'll hope that we find a young coach with their own unique approach to the game and an abiding interest in the development of the whole player on the court and the whole person off. I'll desire that that come with a healthy dose of the dominant defense of old and a nod to the efficient offense of not-quite-so-old. I'll prefer it if that person doesn't have strong ties to those programs I consider to be our rivals.
Mostly, I'll hope that I'll be willing to re-up my kids' Hoya Kids Club memberships after a year off. I couldn't keep them in a situation of learning all the wrong approaches to the game, I needed better to be able to point things out with the assistance of replays and from the relative comfort of the living room, and I was grateful that, for the first time in their lives, they found it in themselves to wander off to something better to occupy their minds when there was little of interest to see. May they find the future of the program more compelling, whether we return to dominance or not.
In the meantime, I have no interest in our losing any game. I'll be frustrated at almost every turn, I'm sure, but I'll be rooting for the Hoyas the whole way, lightning getting caught twice or no. Start things off by beating the 'Cats!