2022-2023 Season

[wgstl]

8 minutes ago, slu72 said:

Here we go again with high expectations. They scare the hell out of me. Every year we get them we seem to get slammed by the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. I'm not going to get too excited until we find out the quality of the guys who fill in the roster holes. Today we just have too many question marks; Perkins recovery, Parker's adjustment to D1, just one big and one PG. Granted this team has talent, but it lacks quantity. 

Quantity will be filled regardless, its how good is the question.  I'll be honest, no matter who we get for the remaining four spots, not finishing top 3 in the A10 is an absolute failure or a season(injury aside).  Who we get to fill the final spots will only help us determine if we're a 3 seed or 9 seed. Yuri - Fred - GJ - an 80% Perkins and Okoro is way too good otherwise. 

[3star_recruit]

It's unnecessary to downplay Dayton's talent level in order to build ourselves up.  They beat Kansas last year with a bunch of freshmen.  If they make the normal freshman to sophomore improvement, Lord knows what they're capable of accomplishing this year.

[wgstl]

9 minutes ago, 3star_recruit said:

It's unnecessary to downplay Dayton's talent level in order to build ourselves up.  They beat Kansas last year with a bunch of freshmen.  If they make the normal freshman to sophomore improvement, Lord knows what they're capable of accomplishing this year.

Problem is, it cancels out with those losses. Beating Kansas was awesome for them and our conference, but you and I know they lose that 9/10 times.

 Also they only had 2 freshman(first year players). Everyone else had at least one full season under their belt going into 21/22

 

Also not trying to downplay ud, I think they are very deserving of #1 A10 votes and a tourney team.

 

[HoosierPal]

18 minutes ago, wgstl said:

Quantity will be filled regardless, its how good is the question.  I'll be honest, no matter who we get for the remaining four spots, not finishing top 3 in the A10 is an absolute failure or a season(injury aside).  Who we get to fill the final spots will only help us determine if we're a 3 seed or 9 seed. Yuri - Fred - GJ - an 80% Perkins and Okoro is way too good otherwise. 

Did someone recently leave?  I thought we had 10 on scholarship. [Perkins, Pickett, Okoro, Thatch, Hargrove, Collins, Jimerson, Parker, Kramer and Thames.]

[wgstl]

Just now, HoosierPal said:

Did someone recently leave?  I thought we had 10 on scholarship. [Perkins, Pickett, Okoro, Thatch, Hargrove, Collins, Jimerson, Parker, Kramer and Thames.]

sorry, 3 spots. 

[Old guy]

57 minutes ago, slu72 said:

Here we go again with high expectations. They scare the hell out of me. Every year we get them we seem to get slammed by the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. I'm not going to get too excited until we find out the quality of the guys who fill in the roster holes. Today we just have too many question marks; Perkins recovery, Parker's adjustment to D1, just one big and one PG. Granted this team has talent, but it lacks quantity. 

What you say is like the new year's resolutions, the thinking and logical reasoning is there, but after all is said and done, you (plural you, I include myself in this plurality) do exactly as you (plural you) did last year. You (plural you) cannot help it, a wave of optimism and blue koolaid will wash over it all.

[slu72]

26 minutes ago, Old guy said:

What you say is like the new year's resolutions, the thinking and logical reasoning is there, but after all is said and done, you (plural you, I include myself in this plurality) do exactly as you (plural you) did last year. You (plural you) cannot help it, a wave of optimism and blue koolaid will wash over it all.

Ford has coached 6 seasons at SLU. I think that in 5 of those years pre season predictions had us dancing, but only happened once. Sit 2 wrecked the 17-18 season. 18-19 we made it. 19-20 tourney was cancelled. 20-21 team gets slammed by Covid and loses momentum.  21-22 Stuen dies and Perkins goes on IR for whole season. My point was in  in 4 of the 5 seasons where we were expected to be dance worthy we got hit by some misfortune totally beyond our control. Bad luck or cursed? Take your pick, but the bottom line is it’s hard being a Billiken fan. 

[3star_recruit]

5 minutes ago, slu72 said:

Ford has coached 6 seasons at SLU. I think that in 5 of those years pre season predictions had us dancing, but only happened once. Sit 2 wrecked the 17-18 season. 18-19 we made it. 19-20 tourney was cancelled. 20-21 team gets slammed by Covid and loses momentum.  21-22 Stuen dies and Perkins goes on IR for whole season. My point was in  in 4 of the 5 seasons where we were expected to be dance worthy we got hit by some misfortune totally beyond our control. Bad luck or cursed? Take your pick, but the bottom line is it’s hard being a Billiken fan. 

We were not picked to dance in year 1 (taking over the Crews trainwreck), year 2 (even before Situation 2, we were expected to be an NIT team at best), or year 4 (lose Bess and Isabell to graduation and bring in a bunch of first-year players).  

[Old guy]

39 minutes ago, slu72 said:

 Bad luck or cursed? Take your pick, but the bottom line is it’s hard being a Billiken fan. 

I do not believe we are cursed simply because I do not believe there are witches or warlocks that can cast a real curse. However chance and risk are always present and, as you say, we have absolutely no control over either, bad issues just happen. Yes have had issues in the past, and the likelihood is that this year we will also have encounters with unfortunate issues. We will see how we do, and keep on hoping for the best. I really see no other solution.

[AnkielBreakers]

55 minutes ago, Old guy said:

I do not believe we are cursed simply because I do not believe there are witches or warlocks that can cast a real curse. However chance and risk are always present and, as you say, we have absolutely no control over either, bad issues just happen. Yes have had issues in the past, and the likelihood is that this year we will also have encounters with unfortunate issues. We will see how we do, and keep on hoping for the best. I really see no other solution.

Just one change:

“I do not believe we are cursed simply because I do not believe there are any witches or warlocks that can cast a real curse, except for the spiritual entity known as the Billiken, which can and does curse our opponents.”

[Brighton]

6 hours ago, Bills By 40 said:

 

 

He's got Dayton as a 6-seed winning the A10 tournament and playing Memphis in Greensboro. Seems like we're one commitment away from leapfrogging them. 

Would love to see a metro area 2nd round game in this scenario.

[Matty Light]

5 hours ago, slu72 said:

I'm not going to get too excited until we find out the quality of the guys who fill in the roster holes. Today we just have too many question marks; Perkins recovery,

You can stop right there and I would completely agree with you. The rest of the issues don't concern me much.

If Perkins comes back as good as he was before injury, I think we are undervalued. If he is still trying to work his way back to that level, we may have problems. He is a man playing against a lot of guys who finished puberty in the recent past. If Perkins is fully healthy he will be A10 POY. If he has a Kobe like recovery he might be looking at All American.

[billikenfan05]

Nobody here is complaining about undeserving of preseason predictions here. But since we're talking about expectations ahead of the season, the above thread seems relevant.

There are two very distinct points of view that can lead to the "Billikens have under performed under Ford's tenure". The first is the "SLU Hater" POV. This includes conference mates that don't like it when we get preseason love from national personalities. This one is pretty easy to understand and you don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to reach the root cause of it. Then there's the "Rabid Billiken Fan" POV. My theory on this one is very much under the banner of die hards being hypercritical. We see all the warts because we analyze every dribble, pass and shot. It's why people outside of fanbases, including national media members, can point out how valuable a player is to a team all while that fanbase will complain about all the mistakes that player has made in his career.

[ACE]

11 minutes ago, billikenfan05 said:

Nobody here is complaining about undeserving of preseason predictions here. But since we're talking about expectations ahead of the season, the above thread seems relevant.

There are two very distinct points of view that can lead to the "Billikens have under performed under Ford's tenure". The first is the "SLU Hater" POV. This includes conference mates that don't like it when we get preseason love from national personalities. This one is pretty easy to understand and you don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to reach the root cause of it. Then there's the "Rabid Billiken Fan" POV. My theory on this one is very much under the banner of die hards being hypercritical. We see all the warts because we analyze every dribble, pass and shot. It's why people outside of fanbases, including national media members, can point out how valuable a player is to a team all while that fanbase will complain about all the mistakes that player has made in his career.

This last point is spot on. On the NIT selection show - I don't recall who the analyst was - but when SLU was announced he matter of factly said that with a healthy Perkins SLU would have been a NCAA Tourney team. I'm not sure what some people on this board were expecting after Perkins went down, but I think a strong case could be made that under the circumstances Ford at least met and probably even exceeded reasonable expectations for this team. 

[billikenfan05]

8 minutes ago, ACE said:

This last point is spot on. On the NIT selection show - I don't recall who the analyst was - but when SLU was announced he matter of factly said that with a healthy Perkins SLU would have been a NCAA Tourney team. I'm not sure what some people on this board were expecting after Perkins went down, but I think a strong case could be made that under the circumstances Ford at least met and probably even exceeded reasonable expectations for this team. 

To kind of expand on my point and zero in specifically on the disappointment of last season. I know I've at least seen one post that either outright stated or alluded to their disappointment over not making the NCAA Tournament being linked to games like Auburn, the home Dayton game or the Boise State game. Those games were probably very much exceptions to the standard this season. We really were the team that couldn't hang on to leads or close out games that we led the majority of. And to answer why, I would say on word: Perkins.

With Perkins, we were the team that could slit a teams throat up 5 in that last 2-3 minutes of the game and win by 10. Asking for someone to step up as a closer in his absence was probably too much to ask.

[Young Charles]

10 minutes ago, billikenfan05 said:

like Auburn, the home Dayton game or the Boise State game.

Beat Dayton at home, beat Boise on the road in OT... The loses to Belmont at home and UAB on the road were the brutal L's in my opinion. 

[billikenfan05]

2 minutes ago, Young Charles said:

Beat Dayton at home, beat Boise on the road in OT... The loses to Belmont at home and UAB on the road were the brutal L's in my opinion. 

I was highlighting those games as reason for expectations leading to the let down of not making the tournament. This team looked like it belonged in the NCAA Tourney at times without Perkins. It was smoke and mirrors or exceeding our ceiling. We didn't actually belong.

[Old guy]

54 minutes ago, billikenfan05 said:

I was highlighting those games as reason for expectations leading to the let down of not making the tournament. This team looked like it belonged in the NCAA Tourney at times without Perkins. It was smoke and mirrors or exceeding our ceiling. We didn't actually belong.

The truth about the matter is that we did not make it last year. As far as I am concerned, the question remains in the air, could we have made it? Who knows if we could have made it? What we know for sure is that we didn't.

 

[slu72]

7 hours ago, 3star_recruit said:

We were not picked to dance in year 1 (taking over the Crews trainwreck), year 2 (even before Situation 2, we were expected to be an NIT team at best), or year 4 (lose Bess and Isabell to graduation and bring in a bunch of first-year players).  

I didn’t say we were expected to dance his 1st year. I do think we were picked to be a bubble team prior to SIT 2. 

[slu72]

4 hours ago, billikenfan05 said:

Nobody here is complaining about undeserving of preseason predictions here. But since we're talking about expectations ahead of the season, the above thread seems relevant.

There are two very distinct points of view that can lead to the "Billikens have under performed under Ford's tenure". The first is the "SLU Hater" POV. This includes conference mates that don't like it when we get preseason love from national personalities. This one is pretty easy to understand and you don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to reach the root cause of it. Then there's the "Rabid Billiken Fan" POV. My theory on this one is very much under the banner of die hards being hypercritical. We see all the warts because we analyze every dribble, pass and shot. It's why people outside of fanbases, including national media members, can point out how valuable a player is to a team all while that fanbase will complain about all the mistakes that player has made in his career.

I wasn’t knocking Ford. Rather I was saying we’ve suffered unexpected misfortune that has derailed our dance invites. We fans have always been excited about the teams Travis is putting on the floor. But events have happened to trash these expectations. Let me summarize: 6 years 

year 1 no expectations 

year 2 some expectations due to transfers - then sit 2 kills the whole season

year 3 we meet them and dance

year 4 we have a good shot but dance is cancelled

year 5 ok now we’re cooking until a 30 day pause and all momentum is lost due to the Covid

Year 6 looking good until we lose our A10 POY candidate and a really good AC (sad) 

I attributed the disappointments to bad luck/bad timing/curse not the HC. 

U have to admit, we’ve had more than our fair share of some really bad shite. 

[billikenfan05]

22 minutes ago, slu72 said:

I wasn’t knocking Ford. Rather I was saying we’ve suffered unexpected misfortune that has derailed our dance invites. We fans have always been excited about the teams Travis is putting on the floor. But events have happened to trash these expectations. Let me summarize: 6 years 

year 1 no expectations 

year 2 some expectations due to transfers - then sit 2 kills the whole season

year 3 we meet them and dance

year 4 we have a good shot but dance is cancelled

year 5 ok now we’re cooking until a 30 day pause and all momentum is lost due to the Covid

Year 6 looking good until we lose our A10 POY candidate and a really good AC (sad) 

I attributed the disappointments to bad luck/bad timing/curse not the HC. 

U have to admit, we’ve had more than our fair share of some really bad shite. 

I was not knocking ford.

I was not ignoring bad luck. 

My post is the opposite. In fact defending Ford and outlining results that I believe indicate outperformance and in game and off season coaching which helped us outperform. Jimerson’s transformation was remarkable and as hard of a worker as he is, there’s no chance he got to where he is without guidance from the staff. 

I am strictly speaking on expectations in the polls and numbers on paper vs results. There’s a Kenpom screen cap from West Pine Bills about how we’ve almost always exceeded expectations. I’m too lazy at 7:45 in the evening to go look for it. 

[Billiken Rich]

4 minutes ago, billikenfan05 said:

I was not knocking ford.

I was not ignoring bad luck. 

My post is the opposite. In fact defending Ford and outlining results that I believe indicate outperformance and good coaching ability.

I am strictly speaking on expectations in the polls and numbers on paper vs results. There’s a Kenpom screen cap from West Pine Bills about how we’ve almost always exceeded expectations. I’m too lazy at 7:45 in the evening to go look for it. 

Wah! Get your head in the game!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[billikenfan05]

16 minutes ago, Billiken Rich said:

Wah! Get your head in the game!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I've made 3 posts today with more than one "paragraph", playoff hockey is on. I'm good.

[AnkielBreakers]

49 minutes ago, slu72 said:

I wasn’t knocking Ford. Rather I was saying we’ve suffered unexpected misfortune that has derailed our dance invites. We fans have always been excited about the teams Travis is putting on the floor. But events have happened to trash these expectations. Let me summarize: 6 years 

year 1 no expectations 

year 2 some expectations due to transfers - then sit 2 kills the whole season

year 3 we meet them and dance

year 4 we have a good shot but dance is cancelled

year 5 ok now we’re cooking until a 30 day pause and all momentum is lost due to the Covid

Year 6 looking good until we lose our A10 POY candidate and a really good AC (sad) 

I attributed the disappointments to bad luck/bad timing/curse not the HC. 

U have to admit, we’ve had more than our fair share of some really bad shite. 

I don’t see why we are apologizing to anyone in the A10. We get the accolades because we are a premier program in the A10. Everyone else can eat it.

[Bills By 40]

17 hours ago, Young Charles said:

Beat Dayton at home, beat Boise on the road in OT... The loses to Belmont at home and UAB on the road were the brutal L's in my opinion. 

Nitpicking here but UAB was at home, and on my f***ing birthday. Both of which make the L a little harder to chew