Taj79 Posted November 18, 2016 Share Posted November 18, 2016 ... an entertaining game to say the least. While the EIUers were more talented than other EIUers we have seen recently, they are not an A10 team. I expected a win and frankly, Wiz' line scared me. I thought we could lose ... given an injury, shooting slump or foul trouble. When Welmer got his second in under four minutes, I thought unfortunately that I had nailed it. But we prevailed. Overall, the runs were maddening. At one point, Fox was showing five different shut out spurts ... 11 for EIU, 10 for us, 7 more for EIU, 11 more and then 15 for us. The fact that we could do it was heartening but again, always shadowed by the caveat "look at who we are playing." Vegas will be interesting to say the least. I am wondering if Jay has his best team in years .... picked second in the OVC West ... and we have one of our worst .... so that may have been in play. But despite that, we won and wins will get harder to come by as we move forward. I had this as a win so three-for-three right now on the 2 and 1 record. Positives .... Roby, Welmer and Agebko. This is obviously Roby's team. I like the interaction between he and Ford when he leaves the court or even during breaks. He carried the team early and was a steady influence throughout. His defense and his offense are picking up and he looks like he is really enjoying himself right now. Gonna need to squirrel some of that nutrition for the long winter coming. Roby will be fun to watch and also informative -- I always thought he wore his emotions on his sleeve in the Crewsplatt dark years and I hope that doesn't affect him going forward. But we'll worry about that later. Welmer had another yeoman-like game. He appears to be our best three-point shooter right now and I'm okay with that. It Is obvious that his interior game is not his strength but it is adequate right now given the competition. I want to watch that as we move into conference play and/or encounter better and bigger front lines. But he is a nice keeper so far .... more a stretch-four, Cody Ellis type if you ask me. Agbeko did very well. I was hoping he'd get his third double-double but I'll settle for 18 and 7. Who wouldn't. Here's hoping the early OOC season lets him find a comfort zone that continues through the year. It will get tougher. He still will occasionally have boards for hands, miss bunnies and commit dumb (fifth) fouls but as Hmark said, he's really all we have on the low blocks. Neutrals .... Johnson, Crawford and Bishop. Under other circumstances, I'd give Johnson a positive given his offensive put-backs and supplying some point sin a "give-rest" role. Plus he's a freshman. But he does appear lost at times in the offense and out of position far too many times on defense. But I expect he will get better and better. Hmark said he can play and guard the 2, 3 and 4 positions (okay, we shall see) so he will be a valuable place in reconstructing what's left of our house going forward. Crawford is hurt, plain and simple and I hope he makes it through the year. But it is obvious he doesn't have the legs right now. Yes, I saw the dunk and that was nice on the breakaway but overall, his touch is off and shooting starts and ends with the legs. Just no there yet. He only got three shots (not counting the dunk) and made none so that is concerning going forward. Bishop's best positive was 8 assists. He's still negative on his shooting and shot selection but my greater fear is exhaustion. I thought at the end, when he was fouled and missed with 36 seconds to go, we might be in trouble. But he made the next two at the 4 second mark. Great, but the fact that we have no second ball handler is getting quite obvious going forward. Negatives: Gillmann, Neufeld, Hines and Moore. Both Gillmann and Neufeld seem to be mirror images of each other.... neither is strong enough to play the traditional big role and when opposing teams play small ball as EIU did yesterday they can't keep up. Gillmann at least has an outside jumper but its frequency and his consistency are not good. Hine sis a walk-on and just not equipped. But his wildness, shot selection and general hyper-speed existence make him useless even when we desperately need to rest Bishop. Moore didn't do much and was quickly yanked on a poor shot selection. The best thing about him is as a freshman, he has much more time on his hands to get better and show us. Why I laud calling an intentional foul there are many more blatant call sconstantly overlooked then the on ewe got. Dama was going to foul but everyone knows that in th eclosing seconds in every game so his was no more extreme to warrant the call. And given our ineptness shooting free throws, it was the right move. EIU let Spoon down by not fouling sooner IMHO. I also thought possession to EIU after the made three was the right call as well. Some will likely ask why we didn't;' recruit some of these kids especially Johnston but that's on talent scout Jiminy Crewsplatt. But even though this is likely Spoon's best EIU team, I don't see them being godsends and saviors on Crewsplatt's part. Johnston had 14 at half and ended with 18. Plus seven assists. Nice work and worth a look for us but is our lack of a true PG amplifying our weakness there and making Johnston more desirable than he really is? He can't make the court on a roster of Mitchell, McCall, Jett and Carter, can he? Another issue to me was I thought (and I could be wrong here) that Bishop had Johnston for most of t e first half. Did Roby get him more in the second? The concern is not so much Bishop's defense (which ain't too good to begin with) but another thing "to do" to exhaust him as our ball handler. Dribble, shoot, pass, score, and now cover the best guard on the opposition? I don't think so. Jermaine logged 35 minutes last night as well. It was refreshing to go from 91 free throw attempts to 24. Game ended 30 minutes sooner than Monday's game did. I enjoyed it. It was a nice win. And we are still where I thought we'd be with answers to questions still developing. Hey, we came back from down 11 at half. I'll take the win and slink off to Vegas, bay-bee. I think it's going to be a rough road trip. Projecting a pair of losses. Surprise me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Old guy Posted November 18, 2016 Share Posted November 18, 2016 Nice summary Taj, enjoyed it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Taj79 Posted November 19, 2016 Author Share Posted November 19, 2016 I stand corrected .......I read the Mid-Major report from last night's game and read where Bishop deserves the credit for shutting down Johnston in the second half. Per Ford. Good for Jermaine. To credit him with suspect defense is probably true to this point but the fact Johnston was shut down in the second half last night is obvious. I thought it was Roby. I was wrong. So huge positive there for JB. Having said that, it still doesn't alleviate my fears for the poor kid ...... only ball handler, needs to break presses, needs to score, needs to assist and needs to play defense. All night, every night. With only Hines to count on for minor blows, this kid will be exhausted come mid-January. Build stamina young fella, build stamina. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
3star_recruit Posted November 19, 2016 Share Posted November 19, 2016 13 hours ago, Taj79 said: Having said that, it still doesn't alleviate my fears for the poor kid ...... only ball handler, needs to break presses, needs to score, needs to assist and needs to play defense. All night, every night. With only Hines to count on for minor blows, this kid will be exhausted come mid-January. Build stamina young fella, build stamina. I'll be shocked if Zeke isn't helping with the ball handling responsibilities by December. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Basketbill Posted November 20, 2016 Share Posted November 20, 2016 Bishop was guarding Johnston in the second half. Ford apparently talked about what was not being done, and Roby commented that Bishop took it to heart and went to work in the second half. Johnston clearly seemed quicker than Bishop, but I thought he did a decent job on him in the second half. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Soderball Posted November 21, 2016 Share Posted November 21, 2016 On 11/19/2016 at 10:40 PM, Basketbill said: Bishop was guarding Johnston in the second half. Ford apparently talked about what was not being done, and Roby commented that Bishop took it to heart and went to work in the second half. Johnston clearly seemed quicker than Bishop, but I thought he did a decent job on him in the second half. he didnt get much done in the second half. lit up the Bills in the first. if he lit it up like he did in the first 20 the Billikens would have lost badly. to win: 1. Defend 2. Rebound. important lesson for Jermaine. great job. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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