AltoSaxa
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Post by AltoSaxa on Feb 15, 2016 16:57:46 GMT -5
nypost.com/2016/02/14/what-happened-to-these-college-hoops-powerhouses/
Comments on recruiting are certainly valid. I feel the more germaine question from the opinion article is whether or not fans believe we have top 25 talent. To me recruiting speaks to the health of the program over time. The comment on top 25 talent, however, speaks to the current year. Is it acceptable for a team with top 25 talent to be struggling to make the tournament? I would also add are the results of the past six years commensurate with the talent pool the team has had?
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guru
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Post by guru on Feb 15, 2016 17:08:51 GMT -5
nypost.com/2016/02/14/what-happened-to-these-college-hoops-powerhouses/ Comments on recruiting are certainly valid. I feel the more germaine question from the opinion article is whether or not fans believe we have top 25 talent. To me recruiting speaks to the health of the program over time. The comment on top 25 talent, however, speaks to the current year. Is it acceptable for a team with top 25 talent to be struggling to make the tournament? I would also add are the results of the past six years commensurate with the talent pool the team has had? Ouch. The writer's not wrong. Nor is he wrong listing the Big East in his "Stock Down" section - and the two are related. We have utterly failed the new conference exactly when it needed us the most - as a flagship school as the new league established a foothold as a legit power conference. We have been a bad team in two of the first three seasons of the New Big East, and the conference has sent just one team to the Sweet 16, with this year's results pending. One thing's certain: We won't be helping in that department. Another failure of our program when it mattered most.
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vv83
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Post by vv83 on Feb 15, 2016 17:16:18 GMT -5
nypost.com/2016/02/14/what-happened-to-these-college-hoops-powerhouses/ Comments on recruiting are certainly valid. I feel the more germaine question from the opinion article is whether or not fans believe we have top 25 talent. To me recruiting speaks to the health of the program over time. The comment on top 25 talent, however, speaks to the current year. Is it acceptable for a team with top 25 talent to be struggling to make the tournament? I would also add are the results of the past six years commensurate with the talent pool the team has had? We have good talent, but the roster is out of balance. No real point guard, too many guards who cannot beat their man off the dribble, too many guards who cannot keep their man out of the lane. Our two primary bigs can't defend the pick and roll and can't defend the rim without fouling. That combination of deficits has killed us this year. I think JTIII gets it - he has been trying to recruit real point guards and guards who can attack/defend the lane. Mosely looks like a guy who can do this, and Lykes (or another guard somewhat like him for 2017) certainly fits this mold. Govan has improved defensively as the season has progressed, while Mourning/Agau are the kind of smaller, more mobile defenders that fit the modern game better. I think next year's roster will be more complete than this year's because we'll likely have significantly better D from the Pg position (mosely vs. DSR) and the center position (improved Govan, Mourning, Agau vs. Hayes and freshman Govan). We'll certainly lose something offensively, but we have enough other potentially effective offensive players that on the whole, I think we have the potential for a solid team next year because we won't have such glaring defensive deficiencies.
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EtomicB
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Post by EtomicB on Feb 15, 2016 17:39:16 GMT -5
Recruiting is very much a relative thing, does G'town recruit "extremely well" compared to UK or KU? The answer is definitely no.. Does G'town recruit "extremely well" compared to GW? That answer is definitely Yes.. The big question is how does G'town stack up recruiting wise compared to the other teams in the BE conference? The answer is they do very well in that category despite all the obstacles you posted about above.. The Verbal Commits page below shows the avg stars per recruit for each team in the BE(it avg's the ratings given from ESPN, Rivals & Scout).. You can look up any school in the country.. It says G'town is #1 in the BE but it's really Villanova if you take away the 2 walk ons that are on scholarship for them this season.. verbalcommits.com/conferences/big-eastG'town has a higher star rating per recruit than Xavier, Prov, Butler, UVA, Pitt, Gonzaga, Uconn, Mich. St., Michigan, Wisconsin & many others.. To be fair so does Marquette so maybe "youth" is a fair reason for why this season hasn't gone as expected.. Either way I don't think recruiting is an issue for G'town.. Recruiting was an issue for a while (other than the freshmen, sophomores and the class that just graduated, you had to go back to the Monroe/Clark/Sims class to find a recruiting class with any depth), but I think that while it could be better (we've missed on quite a few guards where we didn't close despite making the final 3/5 schools), it's obviously improved with the past two classes. To me there's a difference between not getting recruits and getting the wrong recruits.. 3 out of the 5 kids brought in for the 2012 & 13 classes were 4* kids(DSR, Domingo & Cameron) that's not bad at all.. We can't make it seem as though all those kids were project types.. Before posters throw the "that's why JT3 changed the staff" reasoning out there just remember that Domingo & Hayes were JT3 recruits & Cameron was recruited by Broadus..
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DanMcQ
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Post by DanMcQ on Feb 15, 2016 17:42:46 GMT -5
The actual curse may be the relative youth (both in terms of class and court time) of the depth, not the depth itself. The youth question is a reasonable debate. Personally I tend towards it's February now, at some point the youth thing goes out the window doesn't it? But think it's a perfectly reasonable thing to debate. Honestly, every team has weaknesses. Youth, or only one star player, or depth generally, height , athleticism , injury, foul shooting etc etc etc. it's just unfortunate that we seem to get bitten by some or multiple every year. I think youth is just one factor and as a subset of youth, by 'court time' I meant that some of our veterans (Hayes and Cameron are the major examples) have relatively little and thus are young players even though they are upperclassmen.
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sweetness
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Post by sweetness on Feb 15, 2016 17:59:59 GMT -5
College basketball (and the NBA) is a guards game - I can't see how anyone can really disagree on that. The years we've flamed out in the tourney it's because the other teams had faster, more explosive, and better shooting guards who torched us.
In terms of this year, being so thin at guard and having DSR run the point have led to disastrous results. Hopefully the recruitment of Mosely and Lykes is acknowledgement of that, but I can't believe it took so long.
I also think the Princeton is easy to defend, but that's another topic I guess.
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SaxaCD
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Post by SaxaCD on Feb 15, 2016 19:34:20 GMT -5
College basketball (and the NBA) is a guards game - I can't see how anyone can really disagree on that. The years we've flamed out in the tourney it's because the other teams had faster, more explosive, and better shooting guards who torched us. In terms of this year, being so thin at guard and having DSR run the point have led to disastrous results. Hopefully the recruitment of Mosely and Lykes is acknowledgement of that, but I can't believe it took so long. I also think the Princeton is easy to defend, but that's another topic I guess. It's really easy to defend when you run it at about 60% effort. Lot harder when you run it properly, but for that everybody has to be in sync, and I haven't really see our guys run it well all together for long stretches since Monroe was at the Hilltop.
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sweetness
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Post by sweetness on Feb 15, 2016 19:39:52 GMT -5
That's a fair point - but I increasingly feel as though the offense works in theory and not in practice. Look at the lack of success of Carmody at Northwestern and Robinson at Oregon St as prime examples.
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SaxaCD
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Post by SaxaCD on Feb 15, 2016 19:56:14 GMT -5
That's a fair point - but I increasingly feel as though the offense works in theory and not in practice. Look at the lack of success of Carmody at Northwestern and Robinson at Oregon St as prime examples. I actually thought Carmody did about as good a job as anybody can do at Northwestern. I think records of future coaches will bear that out there. I do think the sped up shot clock negates a lot of the positives a less athletic team can get out of the Princeton, because they can't lull a defense to sleep anymore. But I think, if played more uptempo, it can still be very very effective and efficient. As I've noted (probably ad nauseam this year), I've seen guys shake loose multiple times each game for easy baskets (backdoor or otherwise) that they don't get because we have nobody who wants to deliver that crisp pass. My biggest criticism of JT3 isn't in-game stuff, or philosophy or even motivation -- it is that his system requires quick decisions and ball-sharing, and we haven't recruited those kinds of players in a while. We may not need a "pure pg" for our system, but then we DO need a forward who passes JUST LIKE a point guard (and that's even tougher to find). We need multiple guys who can drop dimes and can force defenses to commit, in order to get to the "react" part of the "read/react" offense. And aside from anything Princeton, we need guys willing and capable of defending -- be it guards who keep guys in front of them and/or a true rim protector who erases gambles up top.
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sweetness
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Post by sweetness on Feb 15, 2016 20:23:06 GMT -5
Having a ball control point guard and a few more guys who can knock down perimeter shots would cure a lot of ills.
One other criticism of our offense is that at the end of games - when things get tight and more physical - our lack of a traditional, penetrating point guard really hurts. It's hard to shake free and/or deliver a precise pass in those moments, as our offense relies upon.
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DanMcQ
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Post by DanMcQ on Feb 15, 2016 20:56:03 GMT -5
Frankly the offense ran the best when DSR was off the ball for most of the last 10 minutes of the PC game. I think we need to see more of that.
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beenaround
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Post by beenaround on Feb 15, 2016 23:10:38 GMT -5
Actually, the team played extremely well in the second half with DSR on the bench. Not suggesting we bench our top scorer...just pointing it out in response to the comment about playing best against PC with him at the two guard.
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hoyainspirit
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Post by hoyainspirit on Feb 15, 2016 23:53:02 GMT -5
After being down 20 at the break, we shaved 3 pts off the Providence lead during the 6 mins DSR sat in the 2nd half, outscoring them 11-8 during that stretch.
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DanMcQ
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Post by DanMcQ on Feb 16, 2016 8:19:03 GMT -5
Point taken, but the common thread was that DSR not on ball initiating the offense.
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drquigley
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Post by drquigley on Feb 16, 2016 10:21:43 GMT -5
After being down 20 at the break, we shaved 3 pts off the Providence lead during the 6 mins DSR sat in the 2nd half, outscoring them 11-8 during that stretch. I didn't record the game so I can't check but I recall thinking during our comeback that we were doing it with DSR on the bench. Are you sure DSR was out only 6 minutes and we only shaved 3 points off the lead?
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Post by aleutianhoya on Feb 16, 2016 10:31:54 GMT -5
After being down 20 at the break, we shaved 3 pts off the Providence lead during the 6 mins DSR sat in the 2nd half, outscoring them 11-8 during that stretch. I didn't record the game so I can't check but I recall thinking during our comeback that we were doing it with DSR on the bench. Are you sure DSR was out only 6 minutes and we only shaved 3 points off the lead? Yup. That's what happened.
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calhoya
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Post by calhoya on Feb 16, 2016 11:01:27 GMT -5
Frankly the offense ran the best when DSR was off the ball for most of the last 10 minutes of the PC game. I think we need to see more of that. Agree. Been saying this all year but others believe that he is far superior to Tre or Peak in that role. I think that both are capable of playing decently at the point and the benefits of getting DSR off the ball far outweigh the risk of allowing slightly lesser players to play the point.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Feb 16, 2016 11:35:20 GMT -5
It felt like a bit more because the effort on both ends they brought changed the momentum of the game. They got it down to 7 before Bullock hit that 3 in the corner right before D came back in. Peak and Ike started to assert themselves and the offense started going through them more.
I think the overall point is this, if I was an opposing coach I wouldn't be afraid of an offense that involves Dsr with a live dribble 22ft from the basket at the top of the key. He doesn't have the speed to blow by and if he does he doesn't have the size to finish in the lane. You can pretty much play him straight up because really in that scenario all you have to worry about is the jumper. I would be afraid of Dsr coming of screens or off the catch on the wing were he can jab step and shoot or 1-2 dribble pull-ups
Offense going through Peak would be more scary to me because he has both (Speed to blow by and ability to finish) and although imperfect because he's not a natural passer he makes defenses react to what he does and that opens thing up for everyone else. You can always see the energy of the team pick up once he starts getting in the lane and finishing. It's just a different feel imo....
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wnyhoya
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Post by wnyhoya on Feb 16, 2016 12:04:18 GMT -5
This is changing the subject but wanted to get some other opinions on this. Thinking last night about how we've really struggled this year and even two years ago, to me some of it has to be attributed to the unbalanced recruiting classes we've had the last few years. Not just the guys we got (that discussion has already been drawn out ad nauseum), but the sheer numbers of the classes. Last year we brought in 3 with Jessie, Marcus, and Kaleb. The year prior we brought in 5 with Ike, LJ, Tre, Paul, and Trey. The year before that we only brought in Reggie. The year before that we brought in DSR and BJ and then Domingo and Bolden, both of whom transferred. I really think those two transfers have hurt us more than we thought they might. We only took Reggie the next year bc we had 4 guys in the prior class and there really wasn't a great need. When in reality if we knew the class of 2012 would only be 2 guys I'm sure Coach would have brought in another 2 guys with Reggie. But since they transferred it started a domino effect with us having to load up in the class of 2014 with 5 guys. I think last year's class is healthy with 3, as I think this is the number we should strive for every year in a perfect world. But with us taking 5 two years ago we now will only end up taking 1, maybe 2 this year which effectively keeps us off balance. Those guys transferring has left a void in senior leadership this year as we only have BJ and DSR which I think has hurt us. And the same thing might happen when Jagan and whomever else we get in the class of 2016 becomes a senior. Just wanted to throw this out there and see if anyone else had any opinions on the matter
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hoyaboya
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Post by hoyaboya on Feb 16, 2016 12:56:11 GMT -5
Interesting perspective from the front page of hoyasaxa.com:
From the Providence Journal, the newspaper's college basketball podcast spends some extra time discussing the Georgetown Hoyas, beginning at the 23:55 mark.
"I just can't understand Georgetown as a program, to me I look at them and I see a Dodge Viper being driven in second gear," said writer Bill Koch. "I don't understand how this team can be 14-12...their top eight players are players other programs couldn't dream of recruiting. They have no point guard, they have no consistency...for this league to continue to be viable, to be a national power, Georgetown has all the resources to be on par with Villanova, and it's just not happening."
"This is a disappointing group but if you really look close at it, it's explainable because they don't have a point guard," said writer Kevin McNamara. "You can't play without a point guard."
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