Billinikens
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Posts posted by Billinikens
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I'm not sure how confident we are or ever were that Tyus is considering SLU, but I just saw this thread on the Illiniboard that discusses Illinois and some other major schools on his list. Doesn't look good for SLU on this one.....
http://mb16.scout.com/fillinoisinsiderfrm1...cID=62341.topic
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VTIME, curious how you see Powell fitting in. Is he a legitimate PF option or more of a swingman? Forgive my ignorance, I had to leave the Shootout early so I haven't seen him play in person.
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The 4 spot is killing us no matter which one you start, JJ or VN. I wonder if putting Bryce on the other block might attract one of the other teams bigs and free up Ian to go up against a smaller defender. He's struggled a bit getting shots the last few times out, just a thought....would be worth experimenting with once or twice.
Taking up some extra space on the defensive glass could make it tougher to get shots and offensive rebounds for opponenets as well. Just a thought...
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>Do you go to SLU?
I think I speak for all graduates when I say I hope not. Msfan's grammar is so bad I can barely discern what he's trying to say. It probably doesn't help that they're completely illogical.
I'm curious Msfan, if you think we're all too critical, what exactly do you propose we talk about on this board? I have been visiting this site for over a year and have generally found the discussion of recruiting and game strategies informative although not always flattering of the Billikens. I started posting because I wanted to help contribute to those discussions. Don't you think it would get boring coming here every day just to post how great everybody is? When the team is at .500 coming off a dismantling defeat at the hands of a team many thought was beatable, doesn't such uber-optimism seem ridiculous?
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>Practice please I have attended more than enough! So you are
>telling me that TL and KL earns their right to play in
>practice. Well if that is the case DP is often worked or
>beat by PJ the walk on and this has been said by the coach
>himself but my question is if it works like this in practice
>and that is where the pt is determined why isn't he (PJ)
>given the oppurtunity to play as well.
Certainly this wasn't a serious post....
also notice you had nothing to say about a serious conversation regarding the relative abilities of DB and LM....
With the scatterbrained arguments you've made I don't even know what to say anymore.
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I'm not sure who is worse, BB Scout or Msfan. Listening to you guys talk about our players I'm left wondering how we possibly could lose to Duke, let alone Mississippi.
Reality check you two:
All the posters you disagree with are doing is acknowledging the shortcomings of our players. If you really think Danny Brown is the answer on the wing, good for you. Not many others do. His shot is average as evidenced by the fact he never even takes it unless he's wide open. And when he goes to the hole, he charges at least as often as he finishes. He's simply an okay player.
Luke Meyer has flashes of brilliance, I'll admit it. However, he takes longer than it took me to type this post to get his shot off and he hasn't shown any of the slashing ability we saw last year. Just a wild guess that he's been getting outplayed in practice by some of the other guys for time at the 3 and he just isn't big enough to guard at the 4.
Finally, as I alluded to in the above paragraph, there is such a thing as practice. Brad conducts these a couple times a week and uses them to evaluate who gives the team the best chance to win. I'm betting if you went to one, you'd see Liddell and Lisch consistently outplaying every other guard but Drejaj (and maybe him too).
Keep in mind, by the way, that Tommie and Kevin have had 8 games to prove themselves. Danny, Dwayne, Luke, and whoever the other All-Americans are that you two think we have, have played in close to 40 college games. At this point, I think it would be best if we gave our heralded freshman some time to prove themselves. I've seen enough of the others by now to know that they're roll players.
With all that said, I love the Billikens. I just don't have foolish notions of their ability.
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This is perhaps the worst post I've seen on any board. So what you're saying is all we need to do is increase everyone's playing time and we're fine, huh? To hell with the whole a game is 40 minutes long crap! Brilliant analysis!
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"Billikens Billikens Billikens....please."
????
Is this directed my way?
I would hope that my posting on this site would make obvious that I know the proper spelling of "Billikens".
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My mistake. I misread the paper. He actually hit 5 three's for the game, three in the first quarter.
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I was one of the one's that was critical of DM's play in the shootout (which was atrocious). Looks like he found his stroke last night against Belleville West, though, as he went 3 for 5 from behind the arc and finished with 17. Didn't see the game, so I'm not sure about defense and rebounding. Nice to see him shooting it well......
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I saw DM yesterday and agree with Trich's assessment. Stewart is clearly the leader on that team, and DM fit nowhere in the offense. As the biggest body on Edwardsville, he plays on the inside both offensively and defensively. On offense, though, he often leaks out to the perimeter looking for a 3 ball and leaves no one in the paint. Edwardsville's guards seem good enough to beat good MetroEast teams with this, I doubt they'll go far in the state playoffs that way, though. His defense and rebounding were also suspect given that he was the biggest body on the court most of the time. He was not physical at all, and he never had the opportunity to display anything that would give me confidence in him having the quickness to defend a D1 guard. It sure didn't seem like he was very quick......
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Interesting analysis, kshoe. I'm curious, what lineup do you propose so that we match up better on defense? I suppose JJ is the more true 4 so he would be the natural choice. Do you like his defense enough for him to be trusted as a defensive upgrade? How do you see his offensive/rebounding skills fitting in? He seems to turn the ball over a lot and I've never felt he played very strong inside....
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How many of these threads do we have to go through? I've been reading this message board for a year or two now, and about once a week we have to have a discussion about how one particular poster knows absolutely nothing and whose opinion brings no value to the board. And of course the attacks on the particular poster are based on such empirical evidence as....THE OTHER PERSON'S OPINION! Get a life people, we're all just giving our opinion. If you don't agree, post why you don't, not some half-cocked personal attack on the poster you disagree with.
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I think that's an interesting perspective on what happened to Tommie in the second half. I just posed the question on a different thread asking what happened to his aggressiveness in the second half. Banging inside all game when he's not used to doing so is a viable answer.
As for the three's, another poster in that thread questioned whether DB should continue to start. Since we acknowledge that the shots are there but just not falling, maybe giving KL more of DB's minutes would see him getting more of those open looks. Most on here agree he's the best shooter, maybe getting more looks can get him into a rhythm. Then, hopefully shooting is contagious....
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I think DB has the game to contribute for this team and I'm not sure what has happened to him since the first couple of preseason games. He doesn't seem anywhere near as aggressive to me on the offensive end as he did early on, and even when he does make an aggressive move, he's out of control (i.e., last night's charge).
Not certain on BS working the refs. He certainly didn't get many calls to go our way last night, though......that was atrocious.
As for DP taking the three, you can hardly say that it is killing us when he misses two wide open threes. For one, he didn't take that many. Two, you don't get better looks than that very often in the half-court offense. Someone is going to need to start making some of those if we're to keep the defense honest on Ian. Passing up open three's is not the way to do that.
The real question about last night's game to me is:
We played very, very well when Ian went out in the first half with foul trouble, which was quite surprising. Specifically, Tommie asserted himself and was the best player on the floor. What happned in the second half? It seems he stopped being aggressive until the very end. Anyone else think that we need to find a way to continue to let IV have his touches, but not at the expense of Tommie's being aggressive as well? Tommie slashing to the hole with effectiveness or getting IV in position on the block seem to be our best offensive scenarios and could open up three's for KL, DP, LM.......(and maybe they'll start hitting).
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Couldn't disagree more with your opinion of Ramsey. He comes across as the ultimate fan on the radio as far as I'm concerned. However, he isn't a total homer and freely acknowledges the shortcomings of the Billiken program. I think we should all be able to make such admissions.
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I think you can make a few assumptions based on what we've seen, some positive other negative:
Negatives-
--IV getting into a foul trouble is our biggest weakness (due to the lack of a 4) and he has done nothing to calm anyone on this issue.
--Our shooting percentages over the two games have been at both ends of the spectrum and we can expect such inconsistency this year due to our youth.
--Defense on the perimeter has not been strong, likely due to our need to crash the boards, which leads me too....
--Rebounding is going to be a group effort, and if we don't grab them, we'll see some made perimeter shots by the opponent.
Positives-
--The starting lineup seems to really work well together and has a definite rhythm that does not translate to some of our other lineup combos at this point.
--We have definitely committed to running, which is good, because this is where our talent is best utilized at the guard position.
--Ian has looked good from the stripe. A big man that can make 75% from the line, especially one that will carry the load for a team like he will ours, goes a long way.
At this point, negatives outweight positives because of our youth, but the view from the cheap seats is a heck of a lot better than last year.
Final point: The second half was very ragged due to a blowout score and a refereeing mindsight to be judicious with what they should call. I think the raggedness really affected the way we looked on offense and how miserable the shooting percentages ended up. There just wasn't much rhythm.
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I think that's really what I'm afraid of happening with so many early contests on the road. I understand it may be necessary at this point to get good teams later, I just wanted to shine some light on the fact that early road games for a team that historically struggles on the road and features a heavy reliance on underclassmen could end up tempering some of the enthusiasm generated this offseason. The fickle nature of the students is particularly at risk. Here's hoping we get an early steal at Hawaii and my concerns are blown away right off the bat!
Thanks for your insights kshoe.
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kshoe,
I wasn't looking for an apologist for the adminsitration or athletic department. What I was looking for was the opinion of posters as to how they thought the schedule could/would affect attendance, particularly student attendance. Other than SIUC there are no intriguing matchups for the students to attend until late January (St. Joseph's). With our recent history on the road as well as this team's reliance on freshman and relatively unproven sophomores, we could easily have let the season get away from us by that time. It would be a shame to see the optimism and support generated this offseason (thanks to events like Billiken Madness) fade away because we are ten games below .500 before the students even have a good chance to support the team. Having a date with a major conference foe while the students are around to create a buzz about the team on campus could go a long way toward keeping students interested throughout the year. Just a thought....
In response to the parting shot, I don't think anyone's vision of this program's future involves the meager attendance students give at this point. However, to build excitement among the students you need a tradition of success (at least recent success) or an intriguing foe. Since we don't have the former unfortunately, it would be nice to have the latter.
Anyone else have a thought?
P.S. I just verified by doing so that you can rate yourself as a poster...seems like a conflict of interest there, huh?
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In reviewing the schedule for this season, it occurs to me that an extremely successful non-conference performance is of utmost importance this year. Here's why:
Nov. 22 game - Residence Halls close that evening and most students will head home for Thanksgiving.
Dec. 3 game - Should have solid attendance.
Dec. 17 game - During final exams vs. a very vanilla foe (Kennesaw St.)
Those are the only games during the fall semester at home for students to attend. I think most of us on this board think student support needs a dramatic improvement and believe we finally have the athletes to draw their interest. A slow start by young kids playing mostly only the road could be a strong formula for continued apathy.
As a member of Blue Crew last year I seem to recall only two games at home not over a break (just like this year) in the fall semester. By the time the conference schedule started, no one cared. I'd really hate to see the optimism wane due to a poor job of scheduling that puts us on the road throughout the fall. Anyone else worried at all by this? Any insight as to why we seem to be road warriors in the non-conference?
Thought it was worth a mention before we get ahead of ourselves......
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I have emailed "The Bottom Line" since Rammer does that show and is voice of the Billikens. To get the turnout we are hoping for and for it to cause the stir I think we are all hoping to get, I think it is crucial for the public outside of campus and this message board to become aware of the event. As the Athletic Department is not promoting it themselves, I'm trying to do the legwork for them. I figure Rammer is as likely to help us get some publicity as anyone and I encourage everyone else to email [email protected] as well. Maybe if we send a barrage they'll take note. I may try to call in tomorrow and see if I can get on that way as well, but it'll depend on the Cardinals coverage. If all the talk is about them, maybe I'll wait until Monday and hope there isn't a Game 5 to worry about. Any other thoughts on how to get the word out....?
Alex Tyus Discussion by Illini Fans
in Billikens.com Main Board
Posted
At the bottom the thread does discuss his skills pretty well. He sounds like the exact sort of thing that the Billikens need. I guess we'll have to battle some of the big boys ('Zona and Kansas) to get him. I wonder if Brad's even going to try that?