GDT Davidson

[JettFlight5]

Is this team better now than when the Jim Crews guys were here? Sure.

I bought in to the higher expectations just like many on here did. In terms of "talent", this team is more talented than the one Crews left Ford. It is not even close, however, to being as good a basketball team as the one Rick left for Jim Crews. This team has an identity for the first time in awhile (hard-nosed defense and rebounding), but its lack of execution on the offensive end leaves them where they are now.  

[billikenfan05]

15 minutes ago, cgeldmacher said:

Now that I've had a few days to calm down, here's my take:

The Ford naysayers need to remember what we had before him and what we had  before Majerus.  I think everyone calling for him to go thinks that a new coach we get will procure the same level of talent that Ford brings in, but coach them better.  NOT TRUE.  Another coach that we bring in will not recruit like Ford has to this program.  Who have we had before Ford that recruited better?  Keep this in mind before you call for our coach to be fired after a one point loss that should have been a win.

The offense that we run, which is very similar to the offense run by most top teams, works if you hit shots.  It is much less effective if you don't hit shots.  Of course, this is true of any offense.  We miss layups, we miss mid-range jumpers, we miss threes, we miss free throws.  We get the shots.  We get good shots.  We miss those shots.  If you want to criticize recruiting for not bringing in guys that can shoot, that's fine.  Stop lazily criticizing the offense.  The guys on this board are really starting to sound like everyone Mizzou Tiger fan ever.  The shooters that we had are not here for one reason or another.  Once those shooters left, along with some of our key bigs, we probably should have tempered our expectations for this year.  Not doing so, and then criticizing the offensive scheme reminds me of the callers to KMOX in the day that would suggest that Cardinals should trade four bench players for Mike Schmidt.  It's a lazy narrative pushed by the uninformed when they don't know what else to say.  If our guys could consistently hit shots, we would win most games given the amazing defense that Ford coaches.

We've got shooter(s) coming in next year.  Losing Bess will be big, but all we need is one guy to show as a real threat from outside, and our offense will suddenly look much better.  An (consistent) outside threat will all of the sudden make Goodwin a better player.   It will make French a better player inside.  It will make everyone look better.

I know everyone wants to win now, but this is the team we have.  I think most on this board overestimated what we were.  However, the program is heading in the right direction.  Xavier, Gonzaga, Villanova didn't become successful overnight.  It was a process that involved them sticking behind a coach.  Let's not fall into the trap of not doing so, because you think that switching coaches every three years when some of our fans get frustrated is the proper path. 

Really nice post. I think another thing we are missing and I’ve harped on it a lot is passing and court vision of a true PG. Goodwin is serviceable running the offense but is better at protecting the ball than distributing it. Isabell has the ability to make outstanding passes but lacks the decision making and ball protection of a good PG. Ty Graves as a senior PG with Goodwin running it secondary would have been a huge boost to this team.

[3star_recruit]

11 minutes ago, billikenfan05 said:

Really nice post. I think another thing we are missing and I’ve harped on it a lot is passing and court vision of a true PG. Goodwin is serviceable running the offense but is better at protecting the ball than distributing it. Isabell has the ability to make outstanding passes but lacks the decision making and ball protection of a good PG. Ty Graves as a senior PG with Goodwin running it secondary would have been a huge boost to this team.

Ty Graves wasn't a true point either. He was an athletic shooting guard with a good handle. His assist to turnover ratio at BC was worse than Isabell's at Mizzou or SLU.  His 3pt shooting would have helped us more than anything else.

 

 

[slusam]

52 minutes ago, RiseOfTheBillikens said:

Great post. Some of you supposed fans on this board are really going to far. We had some unfortunate events the past 2 years and it's left us a little short handed. The team is fun to watch and can compete for a conference title. These players seem to love playing for Team Blue and representing our Billikens. Everyone chill out and wait and see where we are at the end of the year. I still think they can come together and the best is yet to be seen. The sky is not falling.

We are 2 freethrows made from being tied for 1st. This team plays hard and are fun to watch

[Pistol]

2 minutes ago, slusam said:

We are 2 freethrows made from being tied for 1st. This team plays hard and are fun to watch

I've found the opposite to be true with this team. Very ugly, frustrating, and hard to watch.

[wgstl]

5 minutes ago, Pistol said:

I've found the opposite to be true with this team. Very ugly, frustrating, and hard to watch.

depends, I find excitement in a good defense.  Just like bess said the other day, something like he gets really hyped whenever the defense does something good. I get hyped too.

 

 

[wgstl]

8 minutes ago, slusam said:

We are 2 freethrows made from being tied for 1st. This team plays hard and are fun to watch

We're just a few FT's away from 18-2 or 17-3.

[TheChosenOne]

49 minutes ago, Pistol said:

I've found the opposite to be true with this team. Very ugly, frustrating, and hard to watch.

Agreed, this team is about as frustrating to watch as I can remember. We play such a slow pace considering our relative athleticism (218th in adjusted tempo per Pomeroy) and are absolutely horrendous offensively (272nd in adjusted offensive efficiency per Pomeroy), not overly enjoyable to watch, but I suppose some enjoy watching teams scratch and claw to 60 points more than I do. I certainly am not calling for a coaching change or anything drastic, but we should probably be realistic with what we have seen all season and that is a fairly highly regarded team coming into the season sitting outside the top 100 in Pomeroy (#109) heading into February which is well below anyone's expectations. Were expectations too high? Maybe they were, but we kind of went all in on this season and next season looks like a bit of a rebuild, so I can understand the angst.

[HoosierPal]

1 hour ago, billikenfan05 said:

Really nice post. I think another thing we are missing and I’ve harped on it a lot is passing and court vision of a true PG. Goodwin is serviceable running the offense but is better at protecting the ball than distributing it. Isabell has the ability to make outstanding passes but lacks the decision making and ball protection of a good PG. Ty Graves as a senior PG with Goodwin running it secondary would have been a huge boost to this team.

 

1 hour ago, 3star_recruit said:

Ty Graves wasn't a true point either. He was an athletic shooting guard with a good handle. His assist to turnover ratio at BC was worse than Isabell's at Mizzou or SLU.  His 3pt shooting would have helped us more than anything else.

 

 

Ty Graves played 11 games for a bad Boston College team.  He scored 53 points, averaging 4.8 ppg, and had 18 assists to 18 turnovers.  He made 12 3's on 36% shooting in his brief career.  He shot 5 FT's while at BC.  He has a total of 10 rebounds in his college career.

To extrapolate these stats into "huge boost" is interesting.

[billikenfan05]

1 hour ago, 3star_recruit said:

Ty Graves wasn't a true point either. He was an athletic shooting guard with a good handle. His assist to turnover ratio at BC was worse than Isabell's at Mizzou or SLU.  His 3pt shooting would have helped us more than anything else.

 

 

My B. I guess I assumed he was a PG. Bishop would have helped for sure though. 

[3star_recruit]

38 minutes ago, wgstl said:

We're just a few FT's away from 18-2 or 17-3.

Many great defensive teams can say this. That's why "hanging your hat on defense" can only take you so far.  Once a defensive identity has been established,  you have to rely on your shooters to take your home. I like the trend in Coach Ford's recruiting. Not only do we have two shooters already onboard in the 2019 class, he's targeting shooters in the 2020 class. Stack those shooters, Coach!

Rammer was just on the radio talking about what his recruiting approach would be, regardless of the program. He would load up on shooters and demand that they play defense. Defense is desire and technique. If they don't like it, they can transfer.

[brianstl]

8 minutes ago, HoosierPal said:

 

Ty Graves played 11 games for a bad Boston College team.  He scored 53 points, averaging 4.8 ppg, and had 18 assists to 18 turnovers.  He made 12 3's on 36% shooting in his brief career.  He shot 5 FT's while at BC.  He has a total of 10 rebounds in his college career.

To extrapolate these stats into "huge boost" is interesting.

Graves will end up being a MEAC POY before he is done at NCCU.  The kid can play.

[wgstl]

6 minutes ago, 3star_recruit said:

Many great defensive teams can say this. That's why "hanging your hat on defense" can only take you so far.  Once a defensive identity has been established,  you have to rely on your shooters to take your home. I like the trend in Coach Ford's recruiting. Not only do we have two shooters already onboard in the 2019 class, he's targeting shooters in the 2020 class. Stack those shooters, Coach!

Rammer was just on the radio talking about what his recruiting approach would be, regardless of the program. He would load up on shooters and demand that they play defense. Defense is desire and technique. If they don't like it, they can transfer.

I got that, but what im saying is this team is really close to telling a completely different story. Its not like we're coming up a few ends short. 

[RiseAndGrind]

Can’t wait to have this conversation next year about “man i wish we had x” still 

[3star_recruit]

Great defense keeps games close.  Against good teams that will often result in the final three minutes turning into a free throw shooting contest, a contest for which we're ill equipped. We're going to lose that contest against good teams most of the time.

The power of shooting is it transforms these nail biters into double digits wins. You're not constantly placing yourself in a pressure cooker in the final three minutes. 

[HoosierPal]

25 minutes ago, brianstl said:

Graves will end up being a MEAC POY before he is done at NCCU.  The kid can play.

You know this because.........

and I am sure you know where the MEAC conference is rated this year.

[TheChosenOne]

49 minutes ago, wgstl said:

I got that, but what im saying is this team is really close to telling a completely different story. Its not like we're coming up a few ends short. 

Couldn't someone just as easily argue the opposite? That we flirted with disaster fairly regularly to this point and these losses aren't surprising considering the number of games we won in unimpressive fashion (at the half we trailed Troy by 6 and NC Central by 5 and led North Alabama by 4, Central Arkansas by 4, and App State by 6). To me, the various rankings and advanced stats have been in line with what we have seen from this team and that is a team that just has struggled to put it all together. We really tested the a win is a win sales pitch. Throughout the season we have seemed to find ways to win (Wiley going for 17 against Seton Hall, Thatch going for 16 against Oregon State, and I am sure we can all point to games that Bess bailed us out of), but eventually that tends to catch up with you. The good news is that I don't think there is any team in the A-10 that can run away from us like Florida State, but on the other side we similarly have not shown to be capable of running away from many teams.

[almaman]

8 minutes ago, HoosierPal said:

You know this because.........

and I am sure you know where the MEAC conference is rated this year.

When is going to do this? He's not on roster this year.

[VeniceMenace]

42 minutes ago, 3star_recruit said:

Many great defensive teams can say this. That's why "hanging your hat on defense" can only take you so far.  Once a defensive identity has been established,  you have to rely on your shooters to take your home. I like the trend in Coach Ford's recruiting. Not only do we have two shooters already onboard in the 2019 class, he's targeting shooters in the 2020 class. Stack those shooters, Coach!

Rammer was just on the radio talking about what his recruiting approach would be, regardless of the program. He would load up on shooters and demand that they play defense. Defense is desire and technique. If they don't like it, they can transfer.

Agreed. What’s needed are the 2019 versions of Highmark (shooter), Clagget (shooter) and Waldman (distributor/shooter).

[cgeldmacher]

2 hours ago, Pistol said:

I've found the opposite to be true with this team. Very ugly, frustrating, and hard to watch.

I think this comes down to perspective.  If you expect them to win every game, and then they don't, that's frustrating and hard to watch.  I'm guessing that there are Duke fans this year that find their team hard to watch when their games are close or they don't win.  It's all relative.  If someone's attitude was NCAA or bust this year, they are probably find any loss frustrating and hard to watch.

If our offense was scoring ten points a game more, with the way our defense plays, we would be a top 10 team.  Is that what this board expects?  It seems to be.  Is that realistic?  I would say no.  This demand that the coaching staff is to blame because we are not a top 25 team, which is what we would be if we had won the games that the board thinks we should have won, is unrealistic.  That was our dream for this season.  It is not reality.

We were 11-21 both of the last two season under Crews.  We were 12-21 the first season under Ford which was a transition year.  We were 17-16 last season.  This season we will end up with 22-24 wins.  Are we unhappy with this progression?  Seriously?

I personally think that this team is enjoyable to watch.   I believe that I enjoy watching them more because I had more realistic expectations than most on the board.  I like watching Bess turn into what I am hoping is an NBA player.  I enjoy watching French do what he does when he's not getting doubled teamed (he's virtually unstoppable one on one).  I like watching Bess and Thatch defend.  I like watching Isabelle drive to the hoop and dish.  I like watching Goodwin grab offensive rebounds left and right and turn them into easy baskets.  There is a lot to like about this team.  I also like the group that is coming in next year.  Let us not ruin the upward path of this team because we demand success earlier than what's normal for a program like ours.  The future is bright.

 

[wgstl]

2 hours ago, TheChosenOne said:

Couldn't someone just as easily argue the opposite? That we flirted with disaster fairly regularly to this point and these losses aren't surprising considering the number of games we won in unimpressive fashion (at the half we trailed Troy by 6 and NC Central by 5 and led North Alabama by 4, Central Arkansas by 4, and App State by 6). To me, the various rankings and advanced stats have been in line with what we have seen from this team and that is a team that just has struggled to put it all together. We really tested the a win is a win sales pitch. Throughout the season we have seemed to find ways to win (Wiley going for 17 against Seton Hall, Thatch going for 16 against Oregon State, and I am sure we can all point to games that Bess bailed us out of), but eventually that tends to catch up with you. The good news is that I don't think there is any team in the A-10 that can run away from us like Florida State, but on the other side we similarly have not shown to be capable of running away from many teams.

Point still stands that what I’m saying is we’re just a few small things away. Some ppl here are now acting like this team is miles away from doing something good.

[Old guy]

The level of frustration exhibited by fans in this blog about the  last game may be related to their belief (which many had before the season started) that we were in the top 10 or top 25 of the nation. Nope, we are not there, not yet anyways. In order to get there we still have a lot to do. However, this group of fans feels betrayed, not because we are much better this year than we were last year, but because they refuse to be forced to abandon their false beliefs that we really were divinely ordained to dominate A10 and go well into the  NCAA competition this year. Those of you that HAVE TO BE RIGHT REGARDLESS, you are wrong. We are not top 10 or top 25 in the nation. We may still win the A10 and make the Dance but at this time I would not be holding my breath about this.

What is really evident in the last game against Davidson is that we played well but lost. That is painful, more painful for the team than for any  of us, I am sure. They deserved to win but did not. The team tried hard and fought up to the very end. As far as I am concerned, the primary reason we lost this game is that we could not stop Gudmunsson. If we had done even marginally better against him we might well have won.

 Being fans means supporting  the team through thick and thin, not adding to their sense of pain for having lost this hard fought game. Oh, and true fans should forget all their dreams about being top 10 or top 25 in the nation. However, we can still win A10 and make the  NCAA although the path to get there is much harder now.

[Bonner89]

Quote

3 hours ago, Old guy said:

Oh, and true fans should forget all their dreams about being top 10 or top 25 in the nation.

 

What the hell is this ? People like you are the reason why this program has been mediocre and the casual fan has considered it a joke for so long .

[Cowboy]

3 hours ago, Old guy said:

The level of frustration exhibited by fans in this blog about the  last game may be related to their belief (which many had before the season started) that we were in the top 10 or top 25 of the nation. Nope, we are not there, not yet anyways. In order to get there we still have a lot to do. However, this group of fans feels betrayed, not because we are much better this year than we were last year, but because they refuse to be forced to abandon their false beliefs that we really were divinely ordained to dominate A10 and go well into the  NCAA competition this year. Those of you that HAVE TO BE RIGHT REGARDLESS, you are wrong. We are not top 10 or top 25 in the nation. We may still win the A10 and make the Dance but at this time I would not be holding my breath about this.

What is really evident in the last game against Davidson is that we played well but lost. That is painful, more painful for the team than for any  of us, I am sure. They deserved to win but did not. The team tried hard and fought up to the very end. As far as I am concerned, the primary reason we lost this game is that we could not stop Gudmunsson. If we had done even marginally better against him we might well have won.

 Being fans means supporting  the team through thick and thin, not adding to their sense of pain for having lost this hard fought game. Oh, and true fans should forget all their dreams about being top 10 or top 25 in the nation. However, we can still win A10 and make the  NCAA although the path to get there is much harder now.

-can you link us to one post where any poster, even the whacked out posters, on this forum predicted we would be top 10 this season? I don't remember any such discussion 

[moytoy12]

6 hours ago, cgeldmacher said:

I think this comes down to perspective.  If you expect them to win every game, and then they don't, that's frustrating and hard to watch.  I'm guessing that there are Duke fans this year that find their team hard to watch when their games are close or they don't win.  It's all relative.  If someone's attitude was NCAA or bust this year, they are probably find any loss frustrating and hard to watch.

If our offense was scoring ten points a game more, with the way our defense plays, we would be a top 10 team.  Is that what this board expects?  It seems to be.  Is that realistic?  I would say no.  This demand that the coaching staff is to blame because we are not a top 25 team, which is what we would be if we had won the games that the board thinks we should have won, is unrealistic.  That was our dream for this season.  It is not reality.

We were 11-21 both of the last two season under Crews.  We were 12-21 the first season under Ford which was a transition year.  We were 17-16 last season.  This season we will end up with 22-24 wins.  Are we unhappy with this progression?  Seriously?

I personally think that this team is enjoyable to watch.   I believe that I enjoy watching them more because I had more realistic expectations than most on the board.  I like watching Bess turn into what I am hoping is an NBA player.  I enjoy watching French do what he does when he's not getting doubled teamed (he's virtually unstoppable one on one).  I like watching Bess and Thatch defend.  I like watching Isabelle drive to the hoop and dish.  I like watching Goodwin grab offensive rebounds left and right and turn them into easy baskets.  There is a lot to like about this team.  I also like the group that is coming in next year.  Let us not ruin the upward path of this team because we demand success earlier than what's normal for a program like ours.  The future is bright.

 

Just a couple of thoughts on your very valid points/posts:

1. I don't recall anyone saying Ford should be gone.  If anyone has said that, then I suspect they are a troll.

2. I think what is frustrating me (and maybe others) is a number of things:  sloppy/lazy passes, ineffectiveness/inability to attack a zone, lack of movement/effectiveness on offense, early season mistakes/unforced errors happening in game #20.

3.  With #2 being said, you (and others) are right that Ford isn't the one missing shots, etc.  The players are making plenty of mistakes that are not on Ford. 

4.  I fell victim to expecting too much in the pre-season and then reality not matching with my expectations as the season progressed.  You do a good job of highlighting the progress we have made under Ford.  

5.  I don't think any reasonable poster was expecting SLU to be a top 10 team.