2024-2025 Season

[willie]

I sort of understand where you are coming from but Canyon has built a pretty decent program. 

[BrettJollyComedyHour]

34 minutes ago, willie said:

I sort of understand where you are coming from but Canyon has built a pretty decent program. 

Yeah didn't they make the NCAA a couple times in the last few years? 

[Lord Elrond]

1 hour ago, BrettJollyComedyHour said:

Yeah didn't they make the NCAA a couple times in the last few years? 

They made the NCAA tournament in 2021, 2023, and 2024. Last year, 2024, they advanced to the round of 32

[billikenfan05]

Kellen out of practice all week due to a hip injury. Very cool, very normal.

https://x.com/studurando/status/1867643607932616999

[BrettJollyComedyHour]

17 hours ago, billikenfan05 said:

Kellen out of practice all week due to a hip injury. Very cool, very normal.

https://x.com/studurando/status/1867643607932616999

Say the...nah don't say it.

[Aquinas]

This year is our seniors (Swope, Jimerson and Johnson) last chance to make the tournament. I belive Avila is also focused on that goal. 

We have 3 good starters in Avila,  Swope and Jimerson. Avila is just now getting back up to speed. Anya is exceeding my expectations, though his FT shooting is French like. The last starting position is still up in the air. Injuries knocked out Dotzler and have hindered Johnson  and Thames. 

That last spot would ideally be a ball handler that can also shoot. Especially  since Anya has limmited range. At the beginning of the season, most on the board thought our freshman wouldn't be needed, but now the door us open for them, with the injuries and Hughes exit. McCottry has the greatest potential, though he makes poor decisions, that have resulted in too many turnovers. We need him to turn the corner. We also need to see what Johnson can do healthy. 

Casey hasn't done anything with his injuries, and maybe won't do anything this year. We really get small when Avila is on the bench. It looks like Pikaar is going to get a shot and has nosed ahead of Brockoff. 

I think we still have a shot at the tournament, but it probably means taking the A10 title. No easy feat. We need health and stability in our lineup, so these guys can come together as a team and reach their potential. An at large bid isn't totally out of the question this early in the season, but things would have to start cooking soon for that to happen.

[billiken_roy]

i think you have to include Anya in your "good starters" grouping.   the guy has so much hustle, is a double double machine.  i wish he shot better free throws, but with Avila outcourt the majority of the offensive possesions, we need someone to go after misses.  what we need is a third good guard.   in Schertz offense a by the book point guard isnt necessarily a need as long as at least a couple of them have ball handling skills.   

want we dont need from the guards is any sort of hero mentality.   we had enough of that with yuri.   yuri would have been all time great had he just played point guard, but he was more occupied being hero.  i dont really blame him as ford allowed it to continue which tells me ford told him to be hero.  i fear swope is becoming yuri.   

 

[slu72]

Anya has been a pleasant surprise, but face it, due to injuries and now LH departure we are one injury away from  hitting the berg and scrambling for the life boats. It doesn’t seem Casey will be back any time soon, if at all, and will have a period of scraping off the rust. Again, I only had us dancing if we win it all in DC. That’s beginning to look like the impossible dream. 

[HoosierPal]

For anyone keeping track, this upcoming game's Game Notes attainable through the MBB website, lists walk-on Nick Patton as Redshirting.  Interesting.

[The Wiz]

For those that would like to see the 3P report card of Hughes....It shows his overall career average is a B grade. This year's 3P grade is C+.

[billikenbill]

Games today - 12-14:

- Santa Clara improves to 6-5 with an 84-74 home win over Bradley, which drops to 8-2.

- 5-4 LMU defeats a weak Prairie View team (1-9) 76-75. That’ll put a dent in your NET ranking.

- 8-2 DePaul smokes Wichita State 91-72. Surprising both that DePaul might  be good and WSU got punked like that. More hurt on the NET.

- 8-4 UMass-Lowell takes down 4-6 Dartmouth 92-83. Dartmouth isn’t good but they did beat BC earlier so they don’t seem to be terrible. 

- Upcoming opponent Grand Canyon fell to Georgia 73-68. That will be a tough one to get.

 Raises a key question: What does it all mean?

Answer: Bills need to win the next one, the next one, the next one… and so on.

[757billiken]

On 12/6/2024 at 2:19 PM, cgeldmacher said:

Someone help talk me off the ledge with regard to what is happening this season and what the future holds.  I know we have injuries, but teams need to overcome them and recruit depth to avoid having the problems we are having.  I keep hearing that we live and die by the three, but "yes" that happens, and Schertz has a system reliant on threes, and we are not getting good attempts and not hitting them.  Right now, we are losing to teams that we should beat and being told "but that's a really good team."  We used to be competitive with the Butlers, Marquettes, Memphises of the world, and now we are making excuses for losses or close games with the likes of San Francisco and 0-9 Jackson State (they lost they're most recent game to Arkansas State).

Jimerson and Swope are gone after this season.  The way the season is going, I cannot see Avila sticking around for his last year.  Given this, where is our team going to be at the beginning of next season?  With Jimerson, Swope and Avila gone, are we just starting over and counting on Schertz's system to win out with a new bunch.  All I can see is bleakness.

Does anyone have a reasonable argument that there is a silver lining?

No. No silver lining. We suck. It's embarrasing. Anyone who actually knows bball knows that Schertz is over his head. Arguably got his best two ISU players to come. Have our all-time leading scorer and we still suck. Avila is fat and slow. Putting up 28 points against a mid-tier MVC team is his ceiling. Too slow to defend. Too unathletic to move on offense. Total Knollmeyer vibes athletic ability. No way he can dunk. I guess we're back to recruiting Soderberg era athleticism. At least Sodie's teams hustled and played their asses off. 

People say Pikaar will play more but CJS will only play his starting 5 like at ISU. That means Pikaar won't grow and progress. Anya was Brown's starting forward. Brown sucks and so does he. He can rebound but that's because other teams shoot and miss so much because of our pace, rebounds will exist. Kobe was a sort of role player at an okay WVU team. Hampton got the better WVU transfer. Swope is too small for the big games IMO. He'll show up for the MVC level games and will soon disappear in the A10. Thames is solid. LHJ was solid but for some reason this message board apparently secretly hated him. Solid role player in my book. It seems Ford's holdovers (GJ, Thames, and LHJ) were the only guys who didn't turn the ball over every other trip down the court. Maybe he actually taught players something afterall.

I'm depressed. No way we get better this year or next. He can't recruit better players. How will he recruit better players after being in the bottom 4 of the A10? How will we improve players when he doesn't play more than the starters? Looking back through the Hire Schertz thread is enlightening. This was so predictable but many MBMs convinced themselves otherwise. ISU was a fluke last year. 

Long story short. No hope for this year or the future. We used to have an identity. "Bully Ball." No we just run a gimmick offsense. We're too effing SOFT. No toughness. Our toughest player is Jimerson and that says all you need to know about the state of the program. I've been a fan for over 25 years and this is the most apathetic I have felt. Even during Sodie's and Crews' years, I could find hope. I have none now. 

Cue the effing dolphin. 

[Aquinas]

Is there an update on Thames?

Its hard to believe he had severe cramps in 10 minutes of play. 

[3star_recruit]

On 12/6/2024 at 1:19 PM, cgeldmacher said:

Someone help talk me off the ledge with regard to what is happening this season and what the future holds.  I know we have injuries, but teams need to overcome them and recruit depth to avoid having the problems we are having.  I keep hearing that we live and die by the three, but "yes" that happens, and Schertz has a system reliant on threes, and we are not getting good attempts and not hitting them.  Right now, we are losing to teams that we should beat and being told "but that's a really good team."  We used to be competitive with the Butlers, Marquettes, Memphises of the world, and now we are making excuses for losses or close games with the likes of San Francisco and 0-9 Jackson State (they lost they're most recent game to Arkansas State).

Jimerson and Swope are gone after this season.  The way the season is going, I cannot see Avila sticking around for his last year.  Given this, where is our team going to be at the beginning of next season?  With Jimerson, Swope and Avila gone, are we just starting over and counting on Schertz's system to win out with a new bunch.  All I can see is bleakness.

Does anyone have a reasonable argument that there is a silver lining?

If Coach Schertz could turn Indiana State into a winner in 3 years, there's a good chance he can accomplish the same thing here.  He didn't suddenly forget how to coach. 

Message boards thrive on emotional extremes.  Everything is awesome or the sky is falling.  There is no in between.

[cgeldmacher]

I got two responses to my ten day old text asking for something positive to think about when looking at our program (from 757 and 3 Star).  The responses I got were basically polar opposites of each other and, somehow, I agree with both of them.

[crymdg2]

C'mon man...

[billikenfan05]

51 minutes ago, crymdg2 said:

C'mon man...

Totally normal amount of injuries for a team to have. Totally cool, everything is fine. 

[Lord Elrond]

29 minutes ago, billikenfan05 said:

Totally normal amount of injuries for a team to have. Totally cool, everything is fine. 

 

[WUH]

Is there a consensus definition or dividing line between mid-major and low-major?

Massey has a computer ranking for all college basketball and has Williams Woods significantly below Rockhurst and Maryville, but with the injury report...

[ACE]

Remember prior to the season there were a few people on here who seemed to be concerned that we had "too much depth"? You can never have too much depth. 

[The Wiz]

28 minutes ago, WUH said:

Is there a consensus definition or dividing line between mid-major and low-major?

Massey has a computer ranking for all college basketball and has Williams Woods significantly below Rockhurst and Maryville, but with the injury report...

Rockhurst and Maryville are both D2 schools. Rockhurst is a high D2...Rockhurst could compete against Chi St. a low D1 school in a close game. And in fact, SLU beat both schools by 20+ pts in similar scoring games.  Maryville is a low D2.  They could not beat any of the schools listed above.  WW is high NAIA similar to D3.  They could have a close game with Maryville.  Neither William Woods or Maryville  could compete with SLU... even in our weakened condition.

Bottom line...W2 is a good NAIA team that is not yet ready for Div 1.  Their motto will be take the money and run. There will not be a 3rd mid town surprise....says Mortarmer McPestle.  He says ...grind them up. (see W4 spread thread)

[WUH]

Right, I am well aware that Rockhurst and Maryville are Division II schools.

My point was that one computer has William Woods rated lower than the D2 opponents on the schedule.

I was mostly curious about the notion of low-major schools.

Is Wofford a low-major school?

[MusicCityBilliken]

5 minutes ago, WUH said:

Is Wofford a low-major school?

Two years ago they beat Texas A&M which ended up being a 7th seed.  Beat a strong Drake that year also.

They play in the SoConn, watched a lot SoConn basketball when I lived in Eastern Tenn. Pomeroy rates them 15th, so middle of the pack. They always had a nice year end tourney in Asheville.

[slu92]

Who is pumped for tomorrow?

Holiday Party.

Cash bar.

William Woods.

Special holiday party. Special cash bar. Special NAIA opponent that is 12-2 right now. 

 

[HoosierPal]

5 hours ago, crymdg2 said:

C'mon man...

Swope suffered from both a torn meniscus and loose cartilage in his knee last season at ISU.  As we all know, he had surgery to 'repair' these issues this summer.  This repair does not put the knee back to 100% of what it was before the injuries.  He will have problems with his knee for the rest of his basketball life.  Some, or hopefully even most, of the issues such as constant aching, can be dealt with, but the swelling limits mobility. 

Rest them all.  This game means nothing.  We are not an At-Large team.  If we win, it doesn't count on our NET.  If we lose, it doesn't count on our NET.  (Yes, we would get 24-48 hours of national ridicule with a loss, but so what.  We already lost one buy game.)  The conference games are the only thing left that counts.