mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 27, 2011 15:23:37 GMT -5
Agree with Dan. He's not our best player by a long shot, but he is better as a role player than people give him credit for. Very scrappy, decent rebounder. I think his minutes are about right.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 26, 2011 21:24:48 GMT -5
BTW, what did Evans do to warrant the T?
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 26, 2011 21:22:35 GMT -5
For a variety of reasons related to dental surgery, the weather, and logistics, I didn't make it to the game. The power went out at home, and my laptop wireless service doesn't support espn3. So I followed here and on game cast. Very pleased with what I . . . discerned, wish I could have seen it. Box showing JC perfect on FGs, Hollis close.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 26, 2011 13:00:17 GMT -5
I am satisfied with 12-15 points and 8-10 assists and a turnover free game from Chris. Ya think?
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 19, 2011 13:00:46 GMT -5
Really pleased to see this thread - great job JV!
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 18, 2011 22:11:06 GMT -5
Henry has had his moments this year but all in all it isn't a great night to call him our best anything. I suspect he's still better than Moses, though M has big upside.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 13, 2011 23:02:57 GMT -5
I think it's ridiculous to say that we have a systematic problem. Last year we closed the regular season plus the BET ranked #14 in the country. In 2008 we won the BE regular season and closed the regular season plus the BET ranked #8. In 2007 we won the BE regular season, BET, and went to the final four. In 2006 we went to the sweet 16.
That's not good enough for ya? Sheesh. Yes, we had a down year in 2009, and yes, we got upset in a single-elimination tournament a couple of times, once to the hottest team and player in the tourney when our big man was glued to the bench with dubious foul trouble. But that doesn't make or break a season, much less a program. The truth is that we have been very successful since III arrived.
And I didn't even want him hired. I thought it was time to break with the whole JT thing altogether and start afresh with someone outside the "family." I was tired of having pops always looming over the program, like he still seems to. But I was wrong about III. He's been really good and we now have a consistent top-20 program that, in a lucky year, can be even better than that. In the meantime we haven't had a single academic, ethics, or crime scandal, unlike, say, 'cuse, UConn, or most of the NCAA football teams.
I call that success, not failure.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 13, 2011 0:14:47 GMT -5
Some almost-random thoughts:
1. I'm not sure we are capable of playing with the last-9-minutes defensive intensity for 40 minutes. We can do more and should, but let's be realistic.
2. One big problem with this year's team, as compared to last year's (and I think we had a good year last year, not a terrible one as many seem to feel), is that we lost our most productive and arguably best player. The difference between last year's Greg and this year's Hollis-Henry-Nate is huge. We shouldn't be surprised at a dropoff.
3. Speaking of Hollis, he was a complete nonfactor tonight. I actually thought Jerrelle contributed more than he did.
4. Remember pre-season when people were talking about Austin being all-American and one of the best Hoyas ever? That was probably wishful thinking - he's good, and great in some games, but not *that* good consistently - and for whatever reason he is just plain mediocre lately. His shooting is gone and his slashing has become rare. So we lost our best player AND our second-best player just isn't producing above a journeyman level lately. (I hate his mouthguard thing, too; Greg was the same way, and Jason is a little bit, too. I'm thinking it must be considered cool in some quarters.)
5. I'm encouraged by the way we fought back at the end of the game, too. JV, everyone's whipping boy lately, was playing with sheer determination out there. Agree he's far from an all-conference center but he's not as bad as people suggest. Chris was the leader of that part of the game, though.
6. III got upset at the traveling call on Julian because he thought Julian was pushed. I didn't see the push but I did see him shuffle his feet. Whatever - I remember at least two calls where we got a break, an obvious goaltend that was overlooked and an out-of-bounds situation when the ball should have been given to Pitt but wasn't.
7. Pitt is really good. Gibbs gets his shot off about as quickly as anyone I can remember. There's a reason why he's so hard to defend. And they execute on both offense and defense really well. They had a lot to do with our inept play in the first half, aside from all those frustrating missed free throws.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 9, 2011 18:12:02 GMT -5
Despite 2 turnovers in 8 minutes, Markel did look good yesterday. But to my eyes it is the first game where he has looked ready for more playing time. If I were coach I might start increasing his minutes now but I'd also do so incrementally.
Now Vee's a different story: he has more experience and looks quite ready to me. But the problem is that his minutes have to come from Austin or Jason (or both if we slide Hollis to the 3, which we frequently do when one of those guys comes out). I'm not sure we want both Austin and Jason out for significant stretches.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 8, 2011 16:06:08 GMT -5
I don't think JT3's in-game coaching was any better or worse than when we were winning big games. But I do fault him for not getting our guys ready to play and focused. We were just terrible at basketball fundamentals, hurling passes to nowhere (or to a teammate's back!), failing to box out even on free throws, fumbling the ball. At times we looked like the Keystone Kops out there today.
I'm not ready to give up on Chris - he has had some great games this year - though I agree today certainly wasn't one of them. And Austin is just an enigma to me. It's not his demeanor, which is just fine with me when he's being a cold-blooded assassin, but his game just seems way, way off for some reason. He's not executing. And as for Markel, yeah, he showed well in his 8 minutes today despite two turnovers, but there's no way I think he's better than CW at this point.
A bit about the game atmosphere: the WV fans showed up in full force as usual, but at least it wasn't the drunken crudefest that the game 2 years ago was. However: giving seats *in our student section* to WV fans is inexcusable. I don't care if school is out of session. There is no way in hell that our students should have to sit off to the side, as they did today on one end of the court, while opposing fans sit in their regular seats. That was disgraceful.
Likewise to the GU Business school, which has the four seats to my left. Why the hell is our B School giving its tickets to West Virginia fans? If B School people aren't using the seats, they don't deserve to keep them.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 8, 2011 15:21:18 GMT -5
We definitely forced the entry passes to the cutters today, and WVU was prepared. I'm not sure I see a long-range trend with forces - but today? Absolutely.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 3, 2011 22:33:04 GMT -5
I think HT should have played more during the end with Lubick. When JC was out and it was JV/NL/HT/AJ/CW it they cut the lead down and even took the lead. The points JC scored in the end, he gave right back because of his defense. Im starting to think that going big may be the best lineup for us with NL at the 4 and HT at the 3. Me too.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 3, 2011 22:30:17 GMT -5
Nor grammar.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 3, 2011 22:29:30 GMT -5
Agree with all of you on this. I don't get it. Even Starks gets more minutes and he's not nearly as good at this point.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 3, 2011 22:26:55 GMT -5
Thanks Royski. Not very classy of him to be posting "Fuk Gtown" if he's a recruit, but maybe that's just me.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 3, 2011 22:20:03 GMT -5
Who the heck is Jabril?
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 3, 2011 22:12:04 GMT -5
So, Nolan Smith and Kyle Singler won't make NBA rosters because they played four years of college basketball. Got it. How is John Scheyer these days Hey, ever hear of a guy named Roy Hibbert? Pretty good center for the Pacers, I think.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 3, 2011 22:03:22 GMT -5
Austin was 2 for 10, with one assist and 4 turnovers. It's really hard to fathom. Chris wasn't much better. We seemed to be totally befuddled by their zone and, as many have pointed out, just horrible coming out of timeouts. Not a great coaching performance on our side.
I liked what I saw from Hollis and Julian; Jason played really good offense near the end and grabbed seven rebounds. But he also was burned on defense (as many have also pointed out) and had 4 fouls.
St John's deserves some of the credit. They really knew how to play us. While our coaching seemed subpar tonight, theirs seemed excellent. That team is only going to get better, and we may not be the only ones they embarrass.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Jan 1, 2011 17:51:15 GMT -5
I think Hollis and to a lesser extent Jason are the weak links right now. Julian actually played quite well for much of the game - he made #33 irrelevant with good positioning and denial. He was also by far our best rebounder. Henry had his moments, especially late but also looked lost on occasion; I like him better off the bench. Jason did get his offense going in the second half, but his outside shooting has largely vanished. Actually, that's true of everyone not named Austin Freeman.
I think it would be interesting to see a lineup with Hollis at the 3, but I don't know that he's better than Jason right now. Replacing Hollis with Nate seems the best bet to me if a change is to be made, which it probably isn't.
Austin and especially Chris saved the game for us - DePaul did the most damage with Chris out of the game and, when he came back in, he basically took the game over until we had a working margin again. I have hopes for Markel in the long run but he just isn't there yet. Vee seems ready for much bigger minutes, but JT3 doesn't have confidence in him at PG, meaning his minutes would have to come from Austin (not going to happen) or Jason.
The game was affected by fouls, I thought - 3 of our bigs and 3 of theirs had four or more fouls. In the first half we were called for twice as many as they were. The block/charges seemed inconsistently called to me, but that's hardly new in NCAA basketball.
DePaul is going to win some BE games this year. Purnell is a good coach.
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mapei
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Post by mapei on Dec 24, 2010 19:10:50 GMT -5
We can play better. I'm not sure about *much* better. That would have to assume that we do all the things we did well against Memphis with no slippage, plus do several other things that well. In my book, that's not called "better" but "perfectly." I don't need perfection to give a high grade.
More realistic would be that we rebounded better, and defended better in the first half, but that Julian and Jerrelle don't play quite as well. Or that Austin gets 18 instead of 24. I'm giving us an A-.
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