Jump to content

cgeldmacher

Billikens.com Donor
  • Posts

    3,075
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    24

Posts posted by cgeldmacher

  1. Will Gladson (Chaminade, 2016) tore his ACL this summer. Big blow for my Red Devils, who would have had a sophomore front court of Gladson and Tyler Cook. Both 6-7, Gladson is the more comfortable of the two in his frame and projects as a PF; Cook is raw and expected to grow more, projecting as a C.

    Tatum plays any position but brought up the ball a lot last season despite his height. Chaminade will also have a high-level 2017 recruit in Reggie Crawford, who has been on the national radar for a few years already.

    Anyway, Gladson's ACL tear is a setback for sure. He'll likely miss the whole coming season but still have two full years.

    Kansas offered the duo; I can't confirm an official offer for Gladson from SLU but they've been recruiting them together. Illinois, Purdue, and UNC have also been in contact (the two were behind Illinois' bench for the last Braggin' Rights game). The question is: with this injury, will other schools keep looking at them as a pair? Will Kansas and others back off Gladson, leaving SLU as the local team willing to recruit that whole class? I've heard SLU is also looking at Cook, making them the only one interested in all three as a package recruiting class at this point.

    Does Chaminade have a message board where its supporters obsess over their recruiting just like we do here?

  2. What does that make the A10?

    On that note, it was interesting looking at the final rankings from last year. We were 16. The only new BE team ahead of us was Marquette who was 11.

    Behind us, but still in the top 25 were Georgetown and Creighton (new BE) and VCU and LaSalle (A-10). Each league had three teams finish in the top 25 and all six were from 11 to 25. I'm not arguing that the bottom of the A-10 is as good as the bottom of the new BE, but the top of each sure finished rather evenly last year.

  3. The term will be irrelevant to SLU if we join the Beast. Been awfully quiet on that front, by the way.

    Weren't we supposed to send formal notice to the A-10 in June or July this year to be able to opt out of the A-10 and get hit with less of an exit fee. Does anyone recall that date? I'm quite concerned that we haven't heard anything about this recently.

  4. Pushing the tempo to get easy baskets works if your team has two qualities: athleticism and the intelligence to know when to pull back if it's not there. I think that this team has both in sufficient quantities to try running a little bit more. The purpose of the motion offense is to create the maximum number of opportunities in a possession to get a good look. The motion offense creates opportunities for shots, but doesn't force anything. IMO, teams that run a disciplined motion offense (i.e. the Billikens) would be naturally better at trying to break out off a defensive rebound, because they're more accustomed to turning down bad looks than other teams (they do it multiple times in a possession in the motion offense). The purpose of running off of a missed basket is the same, to create a quality look, which can compliment the motion offense. I think this group is athletic enough and smart enough to add this to their repertoire and would love to see it incorporated more often.

  5. Surely, you and Aron jest! The thought of Glaze playing important minutes at the end of a game is NEVER going to happen. Either one of you, please let me know what you have seen in any game GG has played that would support your opinion that he is capable of contributing anything to this team other than as a cheerleader. Have you seen him shoot? Have you seen him shoot FTs? Have you seen him defend. control the boards....? What in the name of Billiken basketball have you ever seen him do that could possibily make you think he will be a contributor to this team other than when a couple of bigs are in early foul trouble?

    I like Glaze, not because he is going to a reliable ton of minutes guy, but because he probably shames the rest of the players into playing harder. I would guess at practice, the coaches say to some of the guys when they are slacking "This is why Grandy is starting and not you," trying to get more effort out of them.

    I think that best thing that Grandy could do in the offseason is to shoot free throws until his fingers bleed. If he can get his FT average up to, let's say, 65%, he could be effective as a guy whose hustle draws fouls against valuable players on the other team.

  6. I liked what Taj said. Rather than look at who might be starting, I prefer to look at who can replace or improve on what we had. If we assume our returning guys all improve their games even slightly, which is a reasonable expectation each year in the college game, then we should be better if we can simply replace what we lost. If we improve on what we lost, we could be that much better.

    Loss #1 - CR - I am confident that RA, or extra minutes from an improved GG or JM, will cover what CR gave us. This replacement has the greatest chance of actually being an improvement to the team.

    Loss #2 - CE - This is much tougher. I loved CE's game, but when his shot wasn't there, his presence on the court was almost a detriment rather than a positive on the offensive end. On defense, he was an average defender whose ability to put himself in position and flop properly helped us grab a lot of charge calls. The best case scenario is that TL can give us some of what CE gave us. I just wouldn't count on the occasional game where CE would go off from behind the 3. Plus, keep in mind that CE's minutes can be effectively replaced by someone who doesn't have his exact game. This is where RA, GG, & JM can help. Basically, the best case is that two of the four (JM, GG, RA, TL) step up and give us what we need to replace CR & CE, or give us better.

    Loss #3 - KM - IMO, KM gave us less last year than he had previously. Still, his minutes will be hard to replace. If we can get close to that caliber of play from a combination of AM and MC, along with improvements from MM, JJ, and JB, we'll be back to even from our guard play.

    All in all, the great thing about the guys we have coming in is that the coaching staff has depth to choose from to find replacement minutes this season. We don't have to rely on one particular guy stepping up. At each position, we have at least two guys to look to come in and play well and we could be better than last year. Thank you coaches.

  7. Question: If MM or JJ has an injury that puts them out for part of the season, who runs the point when the other one is getting a rest, or in foul trouble?

    I am very happy with this recruiting class. Crews and the coaching staff came through on the primary concern that many of us had. However, the above questions still bothers me. Am I forgetting someone? Can MC handle the ball at point? Are we confident enought in JB to take this responsibility?

  8. Jack Mihoff and Mike Hunt are supposed to be coming in for a tandem visit this weekend. Rumblings of an asian player, Phuc Ahl coming in, too. Other than that, I haven't heard anything. Getting pretty slim out there...

    Does it really make sense to try to get both. I mean if we can get Hunt, there would be no need for Mihoff. I would got the route of making a real strong sales pitch to Hunt, but if we can't close the deal, after a nice dinner out a Pappy's and maybe a movie, we might have to settle for Mihoff.

  9. Look, I know there's something to be said for making the players around you better. But when the best compliment you can give a guy is that he played with other good players, that's a warning sign to me. If Strawberry were good enough to play for SLU, he would be committed here. The staff watched him play with the team, brought him in for a visit and clearly needed a point guard. If they STILL passed then i'm going to trust them.

    I'm not about saving scholarships. Given roster turnover injuries, I think it's too risky a practice. But I'm certainly NOT for taking players who are not good enough to play at this level. That will only turn out poorly.

    I understand the worry about the 2013 class, I really do. We only filled 3/5 scholarships and missed on some promising transfers. But I sincerely believe that the 2013 recruiting has gone fine and the true class we need to worry about is 2014. We have our name in that hat for LOTS of good players and we have 7 open scholarships. That is the class that will make or break the immediate future of SLU bball and Jim Crews.

    I think we might agree, even though we made our comments in different ways. I said that I trust the staff if they think that Strawberry can play. You said that if the staff passed on him, you trust them. The problem is that we don't know how they view Strawberry. I think you would agree that if they thought he was a fit, but wanted to explore other options, it doesn't mean that he still may not be a fit. I would agree that if they are passing, I trust them.

    It seems to me like Strawberry is the type of player we have recruited in the past, but that we have our sites set a little higher right now. However, if we need a point guard and he is our Plan B, let's not set our standard so high that we're not filling out recruiting classes or leaving holes in our line up. The difference between him and others on our wish list may not be that great. I'm going to leave up to Crews to decide. All teams have their Plan A and Plan B and Plan C. That's how it works. I would hazard a guess that there have been times that teams end up very happy, years later, that their Plan A didn't work out and that they got their Plan B or C guy. I've mentioned this many times, but MM, JJ, and DE weren't highly recruited out of high school and I'm pretty sure we're all happy we have them as seniors for this upcoming season.

  10. Let's assume for the sake of argument Strawberry isn't quite to the level of an A-10 guard (i.e. he's more like an SIU-E level player), would you take him if he was out only option for a 4th guard?

    I have not seen Strawberry play in any form, but I have liked what I have heard. You can't be a point guard on a team full of top recruits without having some skills and the ability to distribute the ball. I also have to give him a sliver of a positive in his column for being the son of a professional athlete. Kids of pro athletes typically have seen the level of commitment that is required to succeed at the highest level. This is why so many fall into the "coachable" category.

    If the staff sees something in him, I will trust their evaluation given the two facts mentioned above.

    What I can't figure out, though, is his height. I just looked it up and Darryl is 6'5". How is his son only 6'1", if that's accurate (I thought I saw somewhere that he was 6'0" or under). Maybe Darryl's "shorty" at the time was a literal term.

  11. The ACC is trying to move in on Madison Square Garden or the Barclay's Center for its conference tournament. They will get a lot of resistance if trying to push the new Big East out of MSG, but I imagine the A-10 may get treated like Jared Drew if the ACC decides it wants the Barclay's Center.

    http://espn.go.com/new-york/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/9278832/acc-investigating-playing-conference-tournament-madison-square-garden-sources-say

  12. That's a little misguided. Chicago is an actual major city, and specifically the Depaul area has been very nice for a long time. You can't buy up space in Lincoln Park like you can in a ###### Midtown area of STL. I love St. Louis and I understand the inferiority complex it has with Chicago, but you gotta open your eyes. I would've said the same thing as you a year ago before I moved here, so that's not a personal attack.

    Also: Biondi stepped down..come to grips, dude. He made great improvements to SLU and STL, but that's a specific example in a specific city where his vision worked.

    One more thing, who has the inferiority complex? You used the phrase "Chicago is an actual major city," when defending it against an imagined attack.

  13. That's a little misguided. Chicago is an actual major city, and specifically the Depaul area has been very nice for a long time. You can't buy up space in Lincoln Park like you can in a ###### Midtown area of STL. I love St. Louis and I understand the inferiority complex it has with Chicago, but you gotta open your eyes. I would've said the same thing as you a year ago before I moved here, so that's not a personal attack.

    Also: Biondi stepped down..come to grips, dude. He made great improvements to SLU and STL, but that's a specific example in a specific city where his vision worked.

    My comment was not intended to be a comparison between STL and Chicago. It was intended to be a commentary on the fact that Father Biondi got run off after years brilliant forthought and planning that has resulted in an ugly, dangerous campus being turned into a much larger beautiful campus in neighborhood that is turning around in large part due to his efforts. I'm actually not sure how you interpretted that as a slight on Chicago, which I think is a great town.

  14. Boston, Cleveland, and probably Detroit....maybe Dallas.

    Cleveland??????? They have a first place baseball team that is in the bottom three in attendance. To be a top five sports city you at least have to have fair weather fans that show up when times are good. At least the Rams sell out when they are doing well.

    Detroit - also doesn't sell out their football and baseball stadiums when they are doing well.

    Dallas - Rangers, Mavericks and Stars don't light up the attendance numbers.

    Boston - agreed, should be in top five.

  15. I don't know where you people are getting your maps and information about Chicago.

    Allstate Arena: 16.4 miles from DePaul's student center.

    United Center: 4.1 miles from DePaul's student center.

    And no, McCormick Place is at the southern edge of the South Loop neighborhood, on the lake. It doesn't really feel like it's "by" anywhere. It's about a mile south of Soldier Field. United Center is not by Soldier Field.

    DePaul has a super nice practice gym that seats a couple thousand and that the women use for home games. The men play an exhibition game there each year, usually. There is no room for a Big East-worthy arena near DePaul's campus. They're landlocked way more so than SLU ever was and - more importantly - the surrounding neighborhood is too nice to force people out for gentrification or the University's purposes.

    Thank God that Biondi acquired all that land over all those years before he mysteriously and abruptly became inept and a tyrant.

  16. I see Mike as a high-floor player. Worst case scenario, he is a glue guy at the swingman position and a rotation player for his last two years. Best case, he is a mismatch at the 2/3, can stroke it from downtown and is a 3-4 year rotation player and 1-2 year starter.

    He will have a tough time breaking into the rotation this year, as will be the case for all of our frosh. We will have talent from top-to-bottom at every position, and the only place we might need help will be at the 4/5.

    Mike is another guy who I am excited to see develop over the next four years.

    If Carter was getting minutes last year as a freshman, and we haven't added another guard, yet, why wouldn't MC get minutes next year. I think that if he does well, he could get 15-20 a game. Of course, that all could depend on our other signees, but they probably would be freshmen also.

  17. Let's flash back to the opening of the Fetz...who did we play? Was it UMSL? Yeah, I think it was. Pretty lame for the opening of a multi-million dollar facility. Wasn't our next home game against Kent State? Then Boston College? Why not have a marquee name like BC open up the arena?

    Flash forward now to the 2013-2014 opener. Probably against Quincy (Bay Area Billiken courtside for this one) or SEMO or Harris-Stowe. Do we raise the conference championship, regular season championship and NCAA appearance banners then or do we wait for the A-10 opener against (hypothetically) VCU or LaSalle or any other worthy adversary that isn't a Division II or lower tier Ohio Valley school? Or do we wait for the first big non-conference game?

    We want to do this when there's a chance for a sell-out, not the opener against Rockhurst or Chicago State, etc. Let's face it, SLU's opening game isn't like the Cardinals.

    I say have three separate banner raising games. The first game of the year against whoever we play to raise the NCAA Tournament banner, the first conference game to raise the A-10 Regular Season Champ banner, and then the best conference opponent on the schedule for the A10 Tournament Champs banner. Get a few of our regular sponsors to pay for give-away replica banners of each for each of those games.

  18. I also had to look it up. It appears to be located at Lafayette and Compton: http://www.slcacougars.org/default.html - which is odd, because I lived in Shaw and rode my bike by there a lot and never noticed a ton of activity. Certainly not enough to indicate a K-12 school was inhabiting those buildings. "Est. 1952." Something's not right.

    Looks like they push the international program; must be how they got Ike: http://www.slcacougars.org/International-Program.html

    That's practically on campus.

×
×
  • Create New...