Another loss. The only consolation is that each one brings it closer to forcing Mann’s hand to do what is obvious needs to be done.

The thing I will remember more than anything else from the Dane Fischer era is missing layups. His teams made easy things look hard more than anything else.

This game did not make either team's fans happy. You won against the spread, and held Hofstra's two stars to 27 points combined. If you were able to defend German Plotnikov, who shot 6-7 and led Hofstra with 15 points, maybe you would have won. Your 55 points were the fewest by a Division I team against Hofstra since your 46 points against Hofstra in last year's CAA Quarterfinals.

Yeah, just another irritation that this was a win to be had. Hofstra didn’t look good at all. Any halfway decent Tribe team from the pre-Fischer era would have won this game handily.

(01-25-2024 10:55 PM)EvanJ Wrote:  This game did not make either team's fans happy. You won against the spread, and held Hofstra's two stars to 27 points combined.

Yeah I’m sure all those Hofstra fans left the building with their heads hung low, griping about winning but not beating the spread.

Come on, man.

Watching the last 1 1/2 minutes of this game documents the coaching failures

When you are down by 8 or 9 points it does not seem having Moss drive to the basket for a layup 3 consecutive plays and missing 2 of them is a successful strategy to win a game. I am not a BB expert, but execution an offensive scheme to get open 3’s seems better.


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55 points...

On 34% FG ...

Bad.

W&M rpi at 350
11 games left + CAAT
Record v D1 5-13
+ fake wins 7-13
Need to go 9-2 for a winning season
Which would require 4 road wins and win all 5 home games
Conf 2-5
Need 7-4 to go .500
Would require 2 road wins and win all home games

We are only projected to beat Hampton at home in season final
Projected to end 8(6)- 24 and 3-16

The only bright spot that I could find, is that we started in an 8-0 hole (no, not the bright spot..., but fairly typical of this team), the rest of the 38 minutes of play was a 56 - 55 contest.
So we still have no offensive focus (unless you expect Gabe to go off like that every game), but we did play good defense against one of the league's top teams, holding two of the league's best scorers well below their averages.

I am confounded as well about our offense, or lack there of. When we got it to single digits, with 2:00 to play, we proceeded to go 1 for 6 from the field, most of them on drives, instead of running a play to get Gabe, or maybe Haupt, open for a 3 to put some pressure on the Pride.

To their credit, they did go 5 for 5 from the line over the final 2 minutes, but had we made another shot or two, maybe the pressure would have been a little greater.

The problem with our pro style/iso offense is that, at the end of games, our players tend to take it upon themselves to go one on one (usually dribbling into a double or triple team), dribbling away valuable time, instead of running a set play to get an open shot. When the opponent knows, from watching film, that there will be no outlet pass from the drive, they just collapse on the dribbler, usually getting a tough shot and a miss, or a turnover out of the effort. We are just too easy to defend at that point.

Well, on to Boston.

...it kind of needs to go the the way it is projected. There can't be any question that the program rebuild has to start ASAP. And I say that with a heavy heart, I can't actually root against the team or the guys.

Last year we won the freebee new add games and snuck out a few big wins because we had Anders Nelson, full stop. And yet those wins were used as a sad excuse to run it back, even though it was apparent to everyone who watched a game that the reason we lose is named Dane and without Nelson we would default back to 22-23, and sigh, here we are.

This year we can't win even win the throwaway games. I do think we have talented players, but those who think we have more talented players than the Shaver years are wrong. Our guys were highly rated out of high school and mostly fizzled in power conferences and high mid majors. Major, major physical development and maturity occur during ages 18-22. Tarpey, Prewitt, Dixon, Thornton, Milon, Cohn and Pierce were unbelievable gems whose talent exploded after a year of development. Sheldon and Rusthoven stand out as lower ceiling guys who developed into absolutely perfect fits into a scheme. Obviously Knight was Knight, but when we found him he was much heavier and just starting to attract attention. At our level you have to target the Shaver style players from HS knowing you might lose them after a year or two and you have to focus on lower (which is near impossible when we're NET 300+) rated programs who have guys with minutes. It's all about experience when you go into the portal, it doesn't matter how many stars rivals gave them as a 17 year old playing against opponents who 99% of didn't go on to play college, which is what HS bball is.

Fischer's style of play makes it impossible to determine whether our players are any good at all. From watching practices I would say that Fischer's style is what limits us. I can imagine that Case, Dorsey(s), Moss, Karasinski, Williams, and Milkereit would do well in the Shaver system.