VCU
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jacobkdoyle
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He does need to expand his repitoire.
Don't work on expanding until get quicker with what he already has.
jacobkdoyle
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Ellis had a good game...but anytime he is our leading scorer I think that means everyone else was terrible.
DeBerry Ellis Cobb Mormon Shaq my starting 5
david aka the TYZ
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My sentiments exactly. I said the words "perfect storm" to myself when watching this game. I honestly thought coming in today after a big win and an early game with a young team that we would look flat today. I think the consensus going in today was if VCU is hitting their shots they will be very tough to beat. Well, VCU hit their shots. Part of that is due to bad defense but even the contested shots they were making. Bottom line is VCU came out ready to play today and we didn't. As ugly as it was, and it was ugly, it was one game.
bearcat jeff
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Only going to make a couple comments right now. First of all the team really missed Mick Cronin on the bench today. Adjustments were poor and slow in coming. There was simply a different vibe about the team. Not saying they would have won but neither do I believe for a minute VCU makes 15 threes if Mick were on the sideline.
Secondly, this is the worst shooting basketball team I have ever seen. Countless wide open spots were missed and missed badly. At least 10 wide open threes.
Lastly, play Cobb and Caupain and leave them in together and rotate Morman and let him make his mistakes. Kevin Johnson is playing horribly in every facet and Morman is the only player apart from Ellis and Clark who is aggressive on offense and he will attack the basket and can shoot fts. Johnson has all the tools but can't translate it from practice to a game right now. When a team can't shoot or doesn't pass well you have to be able to generate offense. He is the only one of the guards who is willing to do that right now.
Secondly, this is the worst shooting basketball team I have ever seen. Countless wide open spots were missed and missed badly. At least 10 wide open threes.
Lastly, play Cobb and Caupain and leave them in together and rotate Morman and let him make his mistakes. Kevin Johnson is playing horribly in every facet and Morman is the only player apart from Ellis and Clark who is aggressive on offense and he will attack the basket and can shoot fts. Johnson has all the tools but can't translate it from practice to a game right now. When a team can't shoot or doesn't pass well you have to be able to generate offense. He is the only one of the guards who is willing to do that right now.
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I agree this was a perfect storm. Losing Cronin is by far the story of this game. There is no way the coaching staff or players were prepared for this. The crowd pretty much went flat as soon as word traveled Cronin had an aneurysm.
Cronin will likely miss significant time as this is a serious medical issue. This season is over if Cronin misses significant time. Cronin is a hell of a coach and we need him back ASAP!!!
Couldn't have said it better...
Yeah this team can't shoot the ball whatsoever. The coaching staff has to improve on the recruiting trail. As a coach you can only put the players in the best position to score or make defensive play. It is up to the player to hit their open shots. The staff needs to find guys that can and will knock down open looks. I think Evans is a step in the right direction. Sanders, Shaq, and KJ are playing like complete trash.
david aka the TYZ
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A game like this really exposes your weaknesses. Offensively we are bad, but I still think overall as a team we have more talent offensively than in years past. We need someone to step up as a go-to guy. To me that has to be either Caupain, Ellis or Clark. Problem with Clark and Ellis is they are both undersized. Clark is short, but makes up for it with toughness. Ellis needs to be stronger. Alot stronger. The other problem with those two is you have to get them the ball for them to be effective. This is where Caupain has to get better. Caupain needs to take the reigns and command the floor. He also needs to get stronger. I'd like to see more of DeBerry and would like to see Sanders call for the ball and hit some shots. KJ has to step up his game. I thought he'd be better this year. He needs to realize when he passes the ball that the other team out there plays defense and is allowed to steal the ball. He makes the laziest passes.
Defensively we have a long way to go. Has anyone noticed that when we pressure the ball once it goes past half court we always leave a guy wide open? VCU today left a guy buried in the corner and when they beat the press, the ball went out to him and if he didn't shoot the open jumper then they passed it around as we were continually late recovering and found the open shooter. Not many teams will pass or even space themselves out effectively as they did, but it has been a problem in every game. This team just doesn't recover well. This was not a problem the past four or five years. Also we are missing big-time defenders. I think Ellis and Clark aren't too far behind Rubles and Jackson defensively considering where they're at in their careers so I have confidence they will get better. Where we are missing defensively is at the guard positions. Caupain simply isn't the defender Cash was or that Guyn is. We need Guyn back. KJ and Morman can be good in the press, but again once a press gets past the time-line there usually is an open player somewhere and we aren't good enough to recover as a whole. And once in the half-court we are playing zone because these guys aren't capable of rotating and playing the smothering defense we are accustomed to. Mick needs to get these players up to snuff defensively. At this point we don't even know when Mick will be back.
Today was ugly, but as I said before it was one game. We definitely have some things to work on and improve upon. I really didn't think the drop-off would be this bad this year. I thought that by having better inside play that we could make up for the loss of Kilpatrick. And that really wasn't factoring in Clark as an offensive weapon. I thought defensively that Mick would have them ready. Obviously some early growing pains but I didn't think they would be this bad. I was hoping Sanders and Guyn really asserted themselves this year. Sanders hasn't and Guyn has been hurt. I don't hate Sanders like most on here but he is nothing more than a role player. That was fine in year's past, this year we needed him to step up. This year is not lost but the execution has got to get better on both ends of the floor.
Defensively we have a long way to go. Has anyone noticed that when we pressure the ball once it goes past half court we always leave a guy wide open? VCU today left a guy buried in the corner and when they beat the press, the ball went out to him and if he didn't shoot the open jumper then they passed it around as we were continually late recovering and found the open shooter. Not many teams will pass or even space themselves out effectively as they did, but it has been a problem in every game. This team just doesn't recover well. This was not a problem the past four or five years. Also we are missing big-time defenders. I think Ellis and Clark aren't too far behind Rubles and Jackson defensively considering where they're at in their careers so I have confidence they will get better. Where we are missing defensively is at the guard positions. Caupain simply isn't the defender Cash was or that Guyn is. We need Guyn back. KJ and Morman can be good in the press, but again once a press gets past the time-line there usually is an open player somewhere and we aren't good enough to recover as a whole. And once in the half-court we are playing zone because these guys aren't capable of rotating and playing the smothering defense we are accustomed to. Mick needs to get these players up to snuff defensively. At this point we don't even know when Mick will be back.
Today was ugly, but as I said before it was one game. We definitely have some things to work on and improve upon. I really didn't think the drop-off would be this bad this year. I thought that by having better inside play that we could make up for the loss of Kilpatrick. And that really wasn't factoring in Clark as an offensive weapon. I thought defensively that Mick would have them ready. Obviously some early growing pains but I didn't think they would be this bad. I was hoping Sanders and Guyn really asserted themselves this year. Sanders hasn't and Guyn has been hurt. I don't hate Sanders like most on here but he is nothing more than a role player. That was fine in year's past, this year we needed him to step up. This year is not lost but the execution has got to get better on both ends of the floor.
david aka the TYZ
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I've said this in years past and I'll say it again. I really wonder if all the energy we expend on defense affects our offense. Specifically our legs on jump shots and even maybe we catch our breathe on offense which attributes to why we stand around so much. I get it that everybody was a star in high school and there is an adjustment to college, but it's not like these guys just forget how to score or shoot.
BearcatMick
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We need Mick back. With Mick we win this game easily. All you Cronin haters need to start appreciating what we have in Mick
david aka the TYZ
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Another thing, Mick said at that basketball forum how at the high school level players aren't taught the fundamentals of basketball anymore and when they get to him they have no clue how to run offense. While I whole-heartedly believe there's some truth to that and is probably shown in the overall drop in quality in college basketball everywhere the last several years there are other coaches that seem to run offeses better. The guy we played against today is one of the best coaches in the game. What confuses me is Mick recruits these guys to be quick and athletic so we can press and create turnovers but without fail every year we have to resort to slow half-court suffocating defense basketball because we are weak offensively. He recruits guys to fit our system but maybe he needs to start recruting guys that run effective half-court basketball at the high-school level and teach them defense as opposed to recruiting defensive studs and trying to teach them offense.
david aka the TYZ
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I don't know that we win easily, VCU is a good team and they came to play today. Without Mick, though we weren't ready to play and it was evident. I think with Mick we would've played a tough game rather we won or lost. You are 100% correct that we need Mick back. There are more important things than basketball and he needs to take care of his health first and foremost. I hope he can make a speedy recovery but only time will tell.
Not buying the "missing Cronin" impact. This is the same ugly team and effort that I watched one week ago losing to a team who couldn't beat Incarnate Word......with Cronin on the bench.
It absolutely is the worst shooting team ever, and that says a lot since Mick owns 6 or 7 of the next worst shooting teams ever.
At this point, Kevin Johnson should take a seat near the end of the bench with the walk-ons in my opinion. I can barely count on one hand anything good he has done this season.
Morman is absolutely on a far shorter leash than most of the other players. I too would put up with his ugly shooting to take the other parts of his game which are pretty solid. The team is slow and not that athletic, two things that Morman would help.
I've attended over 1100 home games in my life. I can't remember being dominated at home like that ever. This game and the Nebraska game are as bad as I've ever seen.
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