calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Aug 2, 2020 12:13:14 GMT -5
This may offend some people on here sensibilities but Europeans are no where near as selfish as Americans! They tell them put on a mask it will save your lives. Guess what They do? They put on a mask. That tell them social distance and close business... guess what They do? They understand the greater good over what about my rights! That's why Florida and Texas are each getting 3X the amount of daily positive COVID cases as the entire European Union. Outside of the NBA who is doing it right in the bubble, I have no faith that the other sports leagues (college included) will complete their seasons if they even start them at all. Our society’s response has been a shocking illustration of our moral decay. All so true. My brother-in-law is quite close to an AAU coach out of Utah who just lost one of his players--a talented 2020 4* recruit from New Mexico murdered at a large party at someone's home Friday night in violation of all that state's restrictions on gatherings. People just don't get it.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
Posts: 4,351
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Post by calhoya on Jul 23, 2020 15:46:56 GMT -5
I like the press and while I agree with 2003 that it was not real effective at the outset of last year with a full roster, I attribute much of that to the trials of getting a new team together on the floor. Recall that 3 starters returned but we had 7 new players. More telling I think was the effectiveness of the press down the stretch even when playing a rotation of 5-6 players. I also think that pressing this year could be a challenge with new players and unknown abilities, but as one who considers this a critical year for the coaching staff, I want Ewing to have the opportunity to institute his style of play on both ends of the court. If the present is bleak and if some are correct that the coaching staff is assured of at least two more years, then I at least want another glimpse of where this coach wants to take this team in the future.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jul 22, 2020 9:07:32 GMT -5
Motivation should not be a problem for coach or players after the year that has passed, and the general lack of respect that the program is receiving in the national media. I look forward to watching Ewing coach a group of kids who want to be here and hopefully bring an unselfish mindset and a strong work ethic to the team. I admit to being concerned about the unknowns with many of these players and the failure of the coaching staff to have gained much traction in the rebuild during three years (particularly in developing a credible defense), but will start the season (assuming that the season actually starts) hoping like hell that Ewing will prove to have the coaching chops to mold this team into a surprise that garners national attention and starts the path back to being relevant in the post-season each year.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jul 21, 2020 9:14:38 GMT -5
So many challenges facing this coach and this program but it starts here with recruiting at the local level. Local kids will generate local enthusiasm--something missing for several years now. I have no idea whether Ewing's incoming recruits signal a recruting philosophical pivot away from the higher profile kids like some of those who have recently departed after struggling to fit within the team concept or whether these are simply the "best of the rest" after failing on so many higher ranked targets. In either event, there is little representation from the DMV on this team and unless the team unexpectedly produces a winner on the court this year, the lack of local talent will not help fill seats (assuming that this is allowed) or gain mention in the local media.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jul 16, 2020 7:17:47 GMT -5
We have to WIN!! And look cohesive doing it with the players we have. We have several midrange players this year. I wish we had another 6-9 outside-in player, but I think we have talent on the incoming squad. This is a tough scenario we're almost to face but if coach has chosen recruits well(stars or no stars), things will get better. Absolutely true. Bottom line for recruiting is that kids want to play and they want to play on winning teams. Can't question the effort of Ewing and his staff in recruiting as it seems they have contacted and offered dozens of quality players each year. Can't question the system being run as it is a faster pace and more likely to be appealing to today's high school athletes. No issue on exposure as virtually every game is televised and the coach gets much more media visibility than his record would otherwise warrant. What's missing is some evidence that this is a winning program again. Quality players who fashion themselves as having a professional career want to be playing in mid-March. Georgetown cannot offer that yet. Ewing can gain a lot of credibility among future recruits this year if he can coach up a team comprised of mostly unheralded players.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jul 10, 2020 8:52:54 GMT -5
Funny but so true. This is and should be a "prove it" year for Ewing. Unlike last year when a heralded returning group appeared to guarantee a successful season that imploded on and off the court, this year there are virtually no expectations for success. Ewing has the opportunity against a weaker BE to prove that his desire and determination to be the head coach of this program is matched by his ability. No alpha dog guards competing for the spotlight. No off court distractions. No pronouncements of the Hoyas return to glory. Absolutely no one outside of the most optimistic and dedicated Hoya faithful is expecting any significant success. Coach-up a group of unheralded players and a handful of veterans and be anointed again as the savior. Fail to do so and while a vocal segment of the shrinking fan base will say it's time for a change, many, including an Administration trying to justify the hiring in the first place, will characterize the year as the restart of a rebuild gone awry through no fault of the coach. As weird as it is, I think that this is actually a real opportunity for the coach to regain some momentum lost a year ago. Depends on what you mean by "prove it". I think JT Jr. said something along the lines of, "You can whip a mule all you want but it's not going to win the Kentucky Derby". What I'd like to see is reason to hope for the 21-22 season. That means some of the underclassmen really develop and show promise. Wahab is going to get all the playing time he can handle. I want to see that he can be a focal point of the offense by 21-22. I'd love to see some of the freshman look like they could be high impact players for the following season. Hopefully Ewing can also get the team to be better than I expect...but that's going to be tough. Yes reason for real hope is good enough for me. While that does not mean a Top 3 finish, I think evidence that the young players are developing and older players are improving is necessary. The bar is not that high but look at what Ewing did in the first 5 games after all the transfers last year. Showed some promise and made watching an underdog Hoya team fun--no reason he should not achieve that this year with a team which is hopeully deeper and devoid of super-egos. Waiting until 2025 as suggested in post above(which I suspect/hope was said in jest) is hard to fathom. Nine years to prove that you can turn around a program? Nine years of being paid in the upper echelon of coaches without proving you merit the job? Ewing was a risk taken by Reed and the Administration. He is paid very well and has basketball hotbed and a beautiful facility in a high visibility conference. Fans have a right to expect that he can justify the hire in 4 years.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
Posts: 4,351
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Post by calhoya on Jul 10, 2020 7:05:15 GMT -5
Come on guys. We are missing the silver lining here. We were just inoculated against Underachieving. Funny but so true. This is and should be a "prove it" year for Ewing. Unlike last year when a heralded returning group appeared to guarantee a successful season that imploded on and off the court, this year there are virtually no expectations for success. Ewing has the opportunity against a weaker BE to prove that his desire and determination to be the head coach of this program is matched by his ability. No alpha dog guards competing for the spotlight. No off court distractions. No pronouncements of the Hoyas return to glory. Absolutely no one outside of the most optimistic and dedicated Hoya faithful is expecting any significant success. Coach-up a group of unheralded players and a handful of veterans and be anointed again as the savior. Fail to do so and while a vocal segment of the shrinking fan base will say it's time for a change, many, including an Administration trying to justify the hiring in the first place, will characterize the year as the restart of a rebuild gone awry through no fault of the coach. As weird as it is, I think that this is actually a real opportunity for the coach to regain some momentum lost a year ago.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jul 8, 2020 12:37:26 GMT -5
He might be more efficient. At HU he probably was option 1 or 2. At GTown he is no more than 3rd option... I don't see any reason why he couldn't/wouldn't be our 1st option. Our 1st two options (Jahvon & Jamorko, as I see it) are a combined 36.2% from the field in their careers, with neither of them having shot better than 38.3% in any season. Stanley made more field goals last year than either of them have in their 3-year careers. This isn't Baylor & West we're talking about. (If you're putting Wahab in there, fine. I don't think outscore J&J tho.) Understand your point that neither Pickett nor Blair was shooting at a high percentage last couple of years but stats are often deceiving. I really hope Stanley comes because I think he would add versatility on the inside, but let's not get carried away. Stanley's stats, while impressive, are not against the same level of competition. Based upon his stats, seems like Stanley was taking most of his shots inside. Last season Stats for Stanley: 3Pt: 15/45--33%--Pickett and Blair each took far more 3Pt shots than Stanley (109 and 190) FG: 295/514--57.4%--Pickett and Blair each took 200+ fewer shots than Stanley (no one on the Hoyas was within 200 shots of the number Stanley took) FT: 144/224--64%--Pickett and Blair shot (76% and 87%) Hoyas need scoring options but no one coming in at this point should be viewed as anything other than a piece of a program that is clearly rebuilding.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jul 2, 2020 18:21:57 GMT -5
Jamorko is flexing some leadership. Yes it will be needed with a very young and unproven team.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jun 29, 2020 11:41:36 GMT -5
Good thing we run a pro-style offense now. Now if we can only get Wright, Freeman, Monroe and Porter to come run it!
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jun 27, 2020 18:59:16 GMT -5
Crouch may prove to be the best move made by Ewing to date.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jun 25, 2020 15:40:31 GMT -5
Just more bad news for the program.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
Posts: 4,351
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Post by calhoya on Jun 22, 2020 16:28:46 GMT -5
No but unfortunately accurate. No where to go but up I guess is the glass half full outlook. It's really sad to see how far this program has fallen. Were we ever projected to finish last in recent years? What is particularly disturbing is that this is not projected to be a strong year for the BE. Ewing's work is cut out for him and in some ways maybe his job will be easier this year than last when expectations were much higher.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jun 12, 2020 20:19:00 GMT -5
My dad used to explode with every story of what Ewing had to endure from ignorant fans of opposing teams. Big John’s handling of that situation made him a hero in our house.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jun 11, 2020 10:53:56 GMT -5
Has to avoid the needless fouls as still think the drop-off from him to the two back-ups will be significant.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jun 7, 2020 18:11:21 GMT -5
Why focus on the assistants? They are Ewing's choices. Shouldn't Ewing be able to have the assistants he wants? I am not happy with recruiting and not happy with the lack of progress, but still believe as long as the school wants to proceed with Ewing as coach, he must be allowed to pick his team and his staff. Give this coaching staff one year to show significant progress. If they don't, you replace the entire staff. Going after the quality and effectiveness of assistants picked by the coach is avoiding the bigger question.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
Posts: 4,351
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Post by calhoya on Jun 6, 2020 8:07:24 GMT -5
I hope that there is some tape out there showing that this kid can shoot from deep. Every shot in the video above is either on a drive to the basket or inside 6-7 feet.we learned already from Akinjo that small guards do not fare well driving into the lane in BE play.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
Posts: 4,351
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Post by calhoya on Jun 4, 2020 8:35:15 GMT -5
One thing to watch is that the team played much better and consistently once Ewing shortened the lineup this year. The larger lineup had chaotic substitution patterns and wildly inconsistent play. I agree it was a hot mess but I think that is not necessarily a function of playing a larger line-up but rather who the coach was putting on the floor and the selfish/ego issues that arose. So much of what went wrong last year at the beginning of the season can be attributed to the Akinjo/McClung dynamic, the limited use of LeBlanc, integrating Yurtseven into the lineup as a very different type of post than Govan and simply not having a pass-first PG. Not trying to excuse Ewing because I think much of that chaos was based on poor decisions by him in terms of recruiting and player use, but I hope that the Hoyas continue to try and play a longer rotation and the uptempo aggressive game on both ends that we only had a glimpse of last year.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
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Post by calhoya on Jun 4, 2020 7:23:32 GMT -5
My prediction is that by the end of the season we will know all we need to know about Ewing, the coach, and his abilities to lift this program back to respectability. Lineups and minutes are not as important as the challenge that Ewing and his coaches have taken on by filling the team with mostly unheralded and hopefully underrated kids that appear to meet the profile of high IQ, high effort players. If Ewing can do with them what he appeared to be doing with the team before the loss of Yurtseven and McClung, there should be no doubts as to the upside/direction of the coach and the program. If not, well then you have to seriously question either the coaching upside or the recruiting decisions. Not looking for a Final Four team but just significant progress with an unselfish team that shows the skills necessary to compete for the Top echelon of the BE on an annual basis--as they did for many years.
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calhoya
Diamond Hoya (over 2500 posts)
Posts: 4,351
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Post by calhoya on Jun 2, 2020 10:31:17 GMT -5
Seems like a highly unlikely possibility that Ewing goes to New York, given that the Knicks ignored him for 15 years and he has yet to succeed as a head coach at the collegiate level, though there are clear differences in the demands of the job. Also, he just made commitments to 7 new kids for next year and would hopefully feel some sense of obligation to them--unlike many college coaches.
As for the possible future without Ewing as head coach, I disagree that his departure dooms the Hoyas to hopelessness. His tenure has not yet been a success. Unless the Administration continues to believe that its coaching searches should be constrained by links to the past, the departure of Ewing would not necessarily be a barrier to success, but rather an opportunity to hire a proven college coach or a rising star from the ranks of the mid-majors. Other programs have survived the loss of an icon, as can the Hoyas.
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