UCF

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justinhub2003 said:
I agree with all that. I just don’t that’s enough in this league that’s getting better.

I mean UCF is on the verge of being really frickin good.
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You obviously have to add to it every year but it is a good start. Like was said in the other thread, you get 1 good player a year, you can have a really good team. Add in a game changer every 3 years, jarron, SK type, you can have a good program. He needs to continue to add though
 
A lot of issues obviously but were doing pretty well running small. I hope Brannen can teach Eason the 5. Run with

Eason/Vogt/Rap
Davenport/Eason/small
Williams/MAW/Gabe
Harvey/MAW
Dejulius/Saunders
 
Despite the push towards the end I was still disappointed to lose.

Keith was absent for long stretches per usual. Mahan on the other hand stepped his game up early in the 2nd half and nearly single handily vaulted UCF to a 13-point lead.

Mobley on UCF (the white guy) only had one job all night and it was to be a pr*ck in Vogt's a**. Vogt was clearly flustered the entire time he was on the court and was held scoreless again, so I'd say that was good game planning by Dawkins.

Rap continues to be nearly unplayable.

Davenport was clearly benched midway through the 2nd half (or hurt?) and didn't return despite some glaring opportunities for him to star in small ball line-ups.

Not gonna win a lot of games when your starting PG and SG are 9/49 from 3 on the season.

Turnovers continue to be the death of the team. UCF outscored us 26-7 for points of turnovers.

It was nice to see Harvey finally find a rhythm.
 
Based on the silence in here, it seems people are already starting to not care or they've accepted that losing is just going to be the way of things this year.

One interesting post-game comment from Brannen was on Vogt. Said that we try to get him the ball a lot, but "They were being physical with him" and making it hard to get Vogt the ball. Vogt is 40+lbs bigger and 5+ inches taller than the guys "being physical with him". Vogt had post moves, but somebody needs to teach him how to post up. Vogt's weakness is the typical of this team.

At this point it's hard to see much positive. I have serious doubts about Brannen. I vaguely recall people assuring us that a new coach wouldn't involve a multi-year rebuild, that the transfer market could smooth over any transition. Maybe it would have if Brannen had gotten more than 1 transfer out of 5 who looks like he belongs on the court.

We've seen coaches start a program and build it up in a year - Texas Tech. How much slack should Brannen get? I don't know, but the amount I think he should get goes down with every loss. With this team, I don't think there's a guaranteed win on the schedule, but there are quite a few games you can safely bet on as losses.

A rebuilding year is okay, but the disaster we are watching seems more likely to end it demolition - mass transfers out, than rebuilding.
 
If Vogt is not scoring, rebounding, or protecting the rim he is a big big liability. The last two games were awful. So with Dou gone and Rap more of a backup.... I am sure Brannen didn’t think much about Eason learning the 5. But here we are.
 
Rap is worse than Vogt hands down. Rap's defense is simply terrible. He gets beaten so badly on the drive he might as well be watching the layup line. Vogt is bad enough on defense that I thought another player couldn't be worse, but Rap has proven game after game that he can be.
 
skyblade said:
Rap is worse than Vogt hands down. Rap's defense is simply terrible. He gets beaten so badly on the drive he might as well be watching the layup line. Vogt is bad enough on defense that I thought another player couldn't be worse, but Rap has proven game after game that he can be.
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The issue is rap at least gets a few boards.

Mikey Saunders outrebounded Tari & Vogt & tied with Rap.


I mean, let’s be real. Tari ain’t the savior either. He’s made a lot of bone headed plays & fouls
 
Of the 5 losses so far, I have the greatest issues with the 2 conference losses.

Both USF and UCF have some good players, but all things considered, I am adamant that we are better than how we played in each of those games.

I don't have an issue with the roster Brannen assembled. The 2020 recruiting class appears satisfactory at minimum and Dejulius is a good talent for this league. Even Rap, as disappointing as he has been, has shown flashes of competency for this level.

As others have noted, there seem to be major issues with Brannen's player development.

Keith has been thrown into a role that he is physically capable of thriving in, but between the fouls and large lapses of productivity in the half-court offense, he's clearly not received the coaching that would help him take that next step as a player.

Vogt has significantly regressed. I know playing alongside better players last year favored his game, but Brannen seems to be making little effort to consistently integrate him into the offense. UCF had no one in their rotation tonight who should've been giving him issues at the rim. Vogt has the ability to be a game changer when he's consistently getting the ball close to the hoop. Brannen deserves criticism for not exploiting the advantages Vogt provides.

Both guard positions have been handled poorly thus far as well. Dejulius has shown he can be effective driving and finishing at the rim, but he's not getting the right outside looks in his current role. We need to run more sets that allow him to play off the ball and receive open looks from 3 from other facilitators.

MAW has been asked to take on a scoring role that he is incapable of handling. MAW is not a natural scorer. He's a game manager PG who can hit the occasional open 3, finish easy looks at the rim, and hit FTs at a high rate. If we're depending on our starting 2 to ideally be a double-digit scorer than we either need to move Dejulius to that spot or start Harvey there and let him find his scoring groove as he did tonight. MAW is not the answer.

Whatever Brannen did to propel Davenport to his current role when people like me definitely wrote him off for this season, kudos to him.

We should be 2-0 in the AAC right now but we're not because Brannen hasn't put the players in the necessary positions to win games against beatable opponents.
 
justinhub2003 said:
The issue is rap at least gets a few boards.

Mikey Saunders outrebounded Tari & Vogt & tied with Rap.


I mean, let’s be real. Tari ain’t the savior either. He’s made a lot of bone headed plays & fouls
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I’m not writing off tari yet. He puts up stats in a hurry when he isn’t in foul trouble. These aren’t top 10 recruits. Takes time.
 
Player development is important.. but at somepoint these guys are what they are.

Keith has been coached by mick and staff and brannen and staff. He is what he is. He's a sheep. Not a wolf. Shows flashes. But will never be the guy.

Vogt has been coached up his entire life. He's unathletic. Has slow footwork. There is only so much you can do with that.

Davenport imo has taken good strides. Shooting much better from three. Just tries to do to much at times.

maw is a bit dissapointing this year. What happened to his great defense?

As much as this is Brannens team. My biggest concern isnt game plan. Isn't style. Isn't teaching.. it's getting these guys to play hard. The lack of effort is simply alarming at times.

This team has no leader. As much as tre scott drove me nuts he was a leader. We simply don't have that and it's brutal.
 
Lawrugby said:
Chill out we haven’t lost yet. Should be leading if not for some stupid mistakes.
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sorry. Not going to "chill out" this loss was easy to call before the game. This team is awful. You have a boneheaded coach that thinks running the offense through an awful 7 foot loaf at the 3 point line is a great way to start the offense. Then he decides yes we must press, even though we have these 7 foot stiffs that cant guard their man. But hey, lets have them pick up a man at half court and see if he can guard him as the only man back on defense. This team is bad. Thats all there is to it. Bad coaching, bad players, bad game plan, bad execution.
 
I like what we were doing toward the end of the game. It was a small ball break neck pace and we didn't pull up in half court...we just kept pushing and we got fouls, layups and kickouts (with some TO's too but). That is what this team needs because we don't look great in half court. Can't even get a damn ball in the post to save our life because our entry passers suck and we can't get position anyway. And we don't have super ball skill players who can make anything they want happen in the half court from the perimeter. We sure as hell are't shooting well.

We have two of the fastest guards in the league. Keith and Tari will throw em down. Davenport etc etc. Let this team run. This team can play man D. We have to switch to zone for the other bigs and slow the pace down for them. Neither are things the coach prefers to do.
 
I don't know if Brannen is ready to switch yet. A couple of feelings would get hurt and it would be hard to send SR's off with very limited roles but at some point here in the near future...he may be forced to do it. It's a tough call to make when you really know the kids well. This team needs to run and we will need to get the underclassmen all the experience they can get

Eason
Davenport
Williams
MAW or Harvey
Dejulius

First subs

MAW or Harvey
Saunders

Situational minutes

Vogt
Rap
Madsen

We can play man D. Run the motion. Press and run break end to end.

If may suck for Vogt and Rap but if they are program guys and want to win they should at least understand.
 
Queens_NYC said:
We should be 2-0 in the AAC right now but we're not because Brannen hasn't put the players in the necessary positions to win games against beatable opponents.
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Great summary. All of our players have some glaring holes in their games. Brannen has so far not been able to come up with a cohesive plan to bring out our strengths and limit our weaknesses.

It's tough to win when you turn the ball over 20 times a game and the other team is in the bonus at the 10 minute mark. I would expect that with a team full of freshmen, but our seniors have been just as much to blame.

We have nine players getting heavy minutes, so everyone has an opportunity. I'd like to see at least a couple break out of their bad habits and string together multiple good games. No one has really done that this year. Davenport is the only player who has been remotely consistent.
 
cincyguy13 said:
I’m not writing off tari yet. He puts up stats in a hurry when he isn’t in foul trouble. These aren’t top 10 recruits. Takes time.
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Im not writing him off.

Just noting that he has a long long way to go before he is the reason we win games.

I hope he progresses in year 2. Its just I haven't seen a whole lot of player growth.

I do wonder why. Is it less skill work this offseason?
 

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