ACE Posted November 7, 2011 Share Posted November 7, 2011 The first two weeks will tell us a lot about this season. I have read some stuff about Tenn. State and this could be a very tough game. This is not your typical buy game cupcake. We have to come out and take care of business. Don't let them hang around. No repeat of Austin Peay last year. Then, Methdale is down, but we never play well there. How will this team play on the road? We have to win this one if we expect to do anything this year. I predicted we would win the Washington game. They have a lot of excellent athletes, but I'm going to stick with my prediction. We are going to need a few signature wins if we want to land an at-large bid. This is a big opportunity. Then Boston College in the first game of the tournament. Yes they are an ACC team, but they are down this year. We have to win this one. I would love to be 4-0 heading into a second round game with Villanova the day after Thanksgiving. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wgstl Posted November 7, 2011 Share Posted November 7, 2011 i agree. to have a 4-0 record going to villanova which will make our record 4-1 is not a bad start whats so ever. vill washington and bc all play great teams so they know what they are doing. also the New mexico game might be the hardest behind vill. a win there and i think this team is the real deal. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Billikan Posted November 7, 2011 Share Posted November 7, 2011 The first two weeks will tell us a lot about this season. I have read some stuff about Tenn. State and this could be a very tough game. This is not your typical buy game cupcake. We have to come out and take care of business. Don't let them hang around. No repeat of Austin Peay last year. Then, Methdale is down, but we never play well there. How will this team play on the road? We have to win this one if we expect to do anything this year. I predicted we would win the Washington game. They have a lot of excellent athletes, but I'm going to stick with my prediction. We are going to need a few signature wins if we want to land an at-large bid. This is a big opportunity. Then Boston College in the first game of the tournament. Yes they are an ACC team, but they are down this year. We have to win this one. I would love to be 4-0 heading into a second round game with Villanova the day after Thanksgiving. I know this sounds stupidly simplistic but the bottom line is that if we can shoot the ball at a decent percentage and defend effectively without unnecessary fouling we have a chance to win our fair share of the early games. If we shoot poorly from 3 we will have to be incredibly good on defense to win and I do not yet see this team as incredible defenders. The glass is still half full but I am in a bit of a show me state sort of view right now! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kshoe Posted November 7, 2011 Share Posted November 7, 2011 I know this sounds stupidly simplistic but the bottom line is that if we can shoot the ball at a decent percentage and defend effectively without unnecessary fouling we have a chance to win our fair share of the early games. If we shoot poorly from 3 we will have to be incredibly good on defense to win and I do not yet see this team as incredible defenders. The glass is still half full but I am in a bit of a show me state sort of view right now! Its simplistic, but right. In the first half we shot horribly and that is why we weren't winning by 20+ at half. In the 2nd half we shot poorly AND played crap defense. Against good teams we need to do well at both. Against mediocre teams we sure need to do one or the other. Ace is right about 4-0 being the goal to start. 3-1 isn't the end of the world but anything worse than that and its going to be yet another long season. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ACE Posted November 7, 2011 Author Share Posted November 7, 2011 One thing the first four games offers is variety. A buy game against a solid team, a road game against a regional rival, a home game against a high profile team and a neutral site game against a beatable team. November is a big month. There is no time to ease into the season. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RB2.0 Posted November 7, 2011 Share Posted November 7, 2011 I agree. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slu72 Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 They all scare me until we eliminate those 7-8 minute scoring droughts. I really thought JB and KM would be the answer to this problem. But we've seen it in both exhibition games. A team like TSU won't go away as easy as 2 NAIA teams. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scoop Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 Well KM needs to play 35 minutes. Not 21. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 Well KM needs to play 35 minutes. Not 21. it is my bet that as the non conference schedule plays out, the balanced minutes with everyone playing will cease and ultimately about 6 players will get the majority of the minutes and maybe another 2-3 will see double digits. when that happens, the team will produce and be more in sync. at this time i have no qualms with trying to give minutes to everyone and giving everyone a chance to rise to the occasion. depth is nice, but ultimately most teams primarily play 6-7 players because frankly those 6-7 players are the best. go back and check, our best billikens always played 3/4 of the game or more. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NH Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 it is my bet that as the non conference schedule plays out, the balanced minutes with everyone playing will cease and ultimately about 6 players will get the majority of the minutes and maybe another 2-3 will see double digits. when that happens, the team will produce and be more in sync. at this time i have no qualms with trying to give minutes to everyone and giving everyone a chance to rise to the occasion. depth is nice, but ultimately most teams primarily play 6-7 players because frankly those 6-7 players are the best. go back and check, our best billikens always played 3/4 of the game or more. Agreed for most part. Depth for depth's sake is just dumb. If one guy is better than another, a team benefits from having him on the court. Even if his back-up is a decent player. Only this is, I don't think we know who is better at this point. So everyone will play for a while, I just hope we ride the lineups that work. And I think we'll have moments where it looks tough for a guy like Barnett to get minutes, but then he'll hit a couple threes one game and everyone will be clamoring for him to start. The depth is good. What we need is for a couple guys to rise above that depth and show they need to be in the lineup. I think Evans will do that, Conklin will do that and Mitchell will do that. From there, it's still up in the air. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SShoe Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 it is my bet that as the non conference schedule plays out, the balanced minutes with everyone playing will cease and ultimately about 6 players will get the majority of the minutes and maybe another 2-3 will see double digits. when that happens, the team will produce and be more in sync. at this time i have no qualms with trying to give minutes to everyone and giving everyone a chance to rise to the occasion. depth is nice, but ultimately most teams primarily play 6-7 players because frankly those 6-7 players are the best. go back and check, our best billikens always played 3/4 of the game or more. Agreed. There's nothing wrong with having depth, but how good a team is usually depends on what the top 2 or 3 players do. If I recall correctly, both Butler and UCONN were not deep teams at all last year and pretty much only had 7-man rotations (I think). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Average Joe Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 It will be tough to only play 6 or 7 though if and when our bigs get in foul trouble. I see consistent rotation and minutes for the guards, but you never know who will step in and get clock when RL has 2 fouls before the first tv timeout. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MB73 Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 The concern here has always been of our inside power game, especially "D". Though it is early it seems like everyone is indicating that Manning will be good as he matures but is not going to be a force inside this year. And Glaze is strong and athletic but not ready for prime time. So no new help up front from last yr, other than we have more bodies, more depth, can be more aggressive and have more fouls to take. We will again rely on Loe-Conklin-Remekun-Ellis as "bigs" and Evans is certainly a quality "player" but not a force inside especially on the defensive side. Is that about it? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 it is my belief (and i hope for dwayne's long term sake i am wrong) that evans will end up being our power forward and we will play three other guards. loe, remeken and conklin will play center and ellis will serve single digit minutes unless he is making shots as evans backup. i know this isnt the best situation for evans future as he needs to develop as a sf, but for the teams sake it will likely serve for the most production. i would expect a lot of rickma minutes will be dictated as well by who we are playing and matchups. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SShoe Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 it is my belief (and i hope for dwayne's long term sake i am wrong) that evans will end up being our power forward and we will play three other guards. loe, remeken and conklin will play center and ellis will serve single digit minutes unless he is making shots as evans backup. i know this isnt the best situation for evans future as he needs to develop as a sf, but for the teams sake it will likely serve for the most production. i would expect a lot of rickma minutes will be dictated as well by who we are playing and matchups. I definitely see this happening during crunch time when you want to get your best players on the court, but not necessarily throughout the rest of the game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billiken_roy Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 i agree evans will get wingtime. however unless remeken, loe or ellis evolve, the majority of his minutes seem fated for the lane imo. again, i hope i am wrong. but the switch has definitely not come on for remeken, loe or ellis at this point. luckily it is early and they will get a lot of opportunities in games and practice over the next 6 weeks to change that perception. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MB73 Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 Evans is a stud, but really is a sf. I guess my concern then is still who will stop guards from taking the ball to the hoop, and who will play "D" against big (6'9"+ 250) post up C's and PF's? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Westy03 Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 Evans is a stud, but really is a sf. I guess my concern then is still who will stop guards from taking the ball to the hoop, and who will play "D" against big (6'9"+ 250) post up C's and PF's? Cassity and Mitchell are very good defenders and Jett has the potential to be a very good physical on ball defender. Our interior D is a concern but we wont face many 6'9 250 centers or PFs this year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slu72 fan Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 In simple terms, we have the same team as last year, with 3 additions. Each player SHOULD be better after a year of playing, weightlifting and training. We add KM, GG and JM. Our problem is not defending, but scoring more. Hopefully, KM will help solve that problem. A RM team always defends. Our season will depend on our ability to score. If we can rebound, we'll try to push the pace more. This negates some of our lack of inside strength and plays to our depth at guard. A good read will be RM's willingness to push the pace when we have the scoring droughts that all teams suffer through in a game. It's going to be really interesting to see how this unfolds. I think RM has his kind of team in place and he has a plan that plays to our players' strengths. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jbizzle09 Posted November 8, 2011 Share Posted November 8, 2011 In simple terms, we have the same team as last year, with 3 additions. Each player SHOULD be better after a year of playing, weightlifting and training. We add KM, GG and JM. Our problem is not defending, but scoring more. Hopefully, KM will help solve that problem. A RM team always defends. Our season will depend on our ability to score. If we can rebound, we'll try to push the pace more. This negates some of our lack of inside strength and plays to our depth at guard. A good read will be RM's willingness to push the pace when we have the scoring droughts that all teams suffer through in a game. It's going to be really interesting to see how this unfolds. I think RM has his kind of team in place and he has a plan that plays to our players' strengths. This is a good analysis. However, it is actually 4 additions. You forgot about JB. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slu72 Posted November 9, 2011 Share Posted November 9, 2011 It's not RM's style to overstate a player's ability as he did with JB. Wonder when we're going to see JB fulfill those expectations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scoop Posted November 9, 2011 Share Posted November 9, 2011 It will be tough to only play 6 or 7 though if and when our bigs get in foul trouble. I see consistent rotation and minutes for the guards, but you never know who will step in and get clock when RL has 2 fouls before the first tv timeout. If RL picks up those stupid fouls setting a pick this year, I will pull my hair out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ACE Posted November 11, 2011 Author Share Posted November 11, 2011 it is my belief (and i hope for dwayne's long term sake i am wrong) that evans will end up being our power forward and we will play three other guards. loe, remeken and conklin will play center and ellis will serve single digit minutes unless he is making shots as evans backup. i know this isnt the best situation for evans future as he needs to develop as a sf, but for the teams sake it will likely serve for the most production. i would expect a lot of rickma minutes will be dictated as well by who we are playing and matchups. I agree. I am a big believer in putting your best players on the floor. Temple is going to play three guards and there is some talk that they could even be playing some four guard lineups. Until our bigs provide some consistency, I would like to see three of (KM, MM, KC, JB and JJ) on the floor most of the time. DE will still get some time at both the 3/4, but in crunch time, I want to see DE at the 4 with three guards. DE looks huge this year. I don't remember any Billiken adding more bulk in one offseason. I grew up watching Donnie Dobbs, so unless we run up against a 4 like Lavoy Allen (there aren't a lot of those guys around), I think DE can do fine against more 4s. In fact DE would create a match up problem for a lot of traditional 4s because he is quicker, can handle the ball and drive to the hoop. We'll see a lot of different lineups, but I think the starting 5 who play the first four minutes of the game, may be different than the 5 that plays the last four minutes of a close game. I think our three guard attack could create match up problems for our opponents. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NH Posted November 11, 2011 Share Posted November 11, 2011 It's not RM's style to overstate a player's ability as he did with JB. Wonder when we're going to see JB fulfill those expectations.You can never tell with RM. I take everything he says like the JB comments with a grain of salt. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moytoy12 Posted November 11, 2011 Share Posted November 11, 2011 If RL picks up those stupid fouls setting a pick this year, I will pull my hair out. Argh, the stupid hedge that our big men do. Fires me up every time. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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