AG & CV 4-25 from the field

[aburks41]

Gilbert and Bouknight were the only players on the team who could shake their defenders and get a shot off, or draw a foul. When Gilbert went to the bench they couldn’t even get a shot off. It would be nice if Gilbert was taller but some more offensive help to open lanes would be great to. As Bouknight gets experience he will become the go to player but they need a third option to keep the defenses honest. Hopefully Gaffney can eventually fill that roll, but he hasn’t shown any ability to beat a defense yet. Vital needs to be set up for him to be effective and that showed last night.

No one is denying Gilberts ability to create. The problem is that he gets past defenders and then get stuffed at the rim or throws up a wild shot 90% of the time. He would be an extremely effective PG if he would just kick the damn ball out after he draws the defense inside. He thinks he can finish like Jalen Adams when he actually looks like Antoine Anderson

 

[Stinger92860]

The coach needs to coach. Why are AG and CV still on the court if as you say he can't coach them? Don't blame Ollie for that you sound ridiculous even bringing his name up. Dan Hurley needs to figure out how to stop them from bad habits even if it is to keep them on the bench. Simple. He's the boss it's now on him no one else. They have some talented people coach them to victory when up 5 with just over a minute left. Don't allow Vital to take a 3 with lots of time left on the hot clock and certainly do not put the ball in Ags hands to end it.

I agree we need these guys. Just got to figure out a way to get them to stop making the same mistakes over and over at the end of games. I don’t think it was coincidence that we finished strong on Thursday with AG out. That crazy 3 attempt by CV was not appreciated by Hurley, but he also had 2 key steals. We should have beaten number 18.

 

[Jaker]

Everytime AG drives into 3 defenders and throws up a circus shot, Hurley should pull him and get in his grill hard. He is not doing AG or the team any favors by not.

 

[Stinger92860]

No one is denying Gilberts ability to create. The problem is that he gets past defenders and then get stuffed at the rim or throws up a wild shot 90% of the time. He would be an extremely effective PG if he would just kick the damn ball out after he draws the defense inside. He thinks he can finish like Jalen Adams when he actually looks like Antoine Anderson

He hit one runner and I thought he hit a pull up but the box score has a 3. How many of the 11 misses were drives to the basket? Plus at least 2 other times he drove and lost the ball but a teammate picked it up. He is shooting 20% so far for the year. I can’t see his percentage going up if the majority of his shots are forced drives.

 

[Chin Diesel]

Not reading thread but I will be bold and suggest regardless of all other factors UConn will lose every game those two combine to shoot less than 16% from the field.

Capt Obvious out.

 

[superjohn]

Not reading thread but I will be bold and suggest regardless of all other factors UConn will lose every game those two combine to shoot less than 16% from the field.

Capt Obvious out.

And yet we still should have beaten the #18 team in the country.

 

[BigEastLuva]

I agree we need these guys. Just got to figure out a way to get them to stop making the same mistakes over and over at the end of games. I don’t think it was coincidence that we finished strong on Thursday with AG out. That crazy 3 attempt by CV was not appreciated by Hurley, but he also had 2 key steals. We should have beaten number 18.

Quick 3’s (especially with long rebounds that lead to run outs) are turnovers. Negates the steals. CV and AG’s assist:turnover ratio is a big problem. Need to return to the composed style they played against Florida. Lead with composure.

 

[ucp990411]

CV is great at D and he’s a good rebounder. And if he finds his offensive game, he’s got a pretty 3 point shot and it comes in bursts. He hasn’t found that yet. I suspect it’s because we are playing a much slower game with AG running it (we used to have JA running it).

CV is not a great defender

 

[CL82]

Yeah let's keep blaming it on Ollie thats brilliant. Even mentioning the name baffles me at this point let it go let's let our coach Hurley coach them up.

Agree. A lot of our Fanbase developed a bad attitude under Ollie and they’re still looking to grow out of it. Frankly, I blame Ollie. He ruined the generation of fans.

 

[jibsey]

One thing about GIlbert. None of us knows the pain and difficult rehab that he has had to endure multiple times. The kid has always tried to come back even when it looked like his career was over and he still wants to go out there and win for UCONN. He’s desperate to do well for us. At this point a good coach would sit him down and set him straight on what he should do and how. Much of it is obvious, but after that if he doesn’t follow the plan or improve then the pine beckons.

 

[UCSouth]

Could he have packed it up and gone elsewhere? He was injured and had zero impact in his career. Who was going to take him? I’m sure Dan Hurley came in and tried to get him to transfer and tried to get others to take him and there was zero interest. Pitino tried to get Billy Donovan to transfer when he got to Providence because he was 25 lbs overweight and sucked on offense. No one would take him. And Donovan wanted to transfer. When no one would take him, he had the honest convo with him, told him what he needed to do but said he’d work with him personally. Donovan bought in and became one of the keys to his final four run.
I believe he tried to get some of the Ollie guys to go and I’m sure some of them wanted to go. I’m sure some of them had no good options (or the options involved sitting out a year and for AG, that would be a very bad option).
So NO, AG couldn’t pack it up and go elsewhere. He is getting an education and he owed the program his hard work. He can’t decide when he plays or not. Has he been hurt? Yeah. And for that he has all of my sympathy. But he’s gotten a world class education along the way and it’s not like he’s going to leave here empty handed. Maybe he doesn’t make it to the NBA (no one is guaranteed that). Boo hoo.

Great reply....if I had been referring to AG.

 

[browndog319]

Gilbert and Bouknight were the only players on the team who could shake their defenders and get a shot off, or draw a foul. When Gilbert went to the bench they couldn’t even get a shot off. It would be nice if Gilbert was taller but some more offensive help to open lanes would be great to. As Bouknight gets experience he will become the go to player but they need a third option to keep the defenses honest. Hopefully Gaffney can eventually fill that roll, but he hasn’t shown any ability to beat a defense yet. Vital needs to be set up for him to be effective and that showed last night.

That’s not true. We took the lead in the second half when AG wasn’t in the game.

 

[browndog319]

Great reply....if I had been referring to AG.

Who were you talking about? You said “these”. I just used AG as an example but any of them could have left. AG is a particularly extreme example.

 

[BigErnMcCracken]

Could he have packed it up and gone elsewhere? He was injured and had zero impact in his career. Who was going to take him? I’m sure Dan Hurley came in and tried to get him to transfer and tried to get others to take him and there was zero interest.

Sick fans.

This is dumb, by the way. I'm going to go out on a limb and say he could have transferred if he wanted to.

 

[uconnfan68]

With you to a point though some have gotten better. I am simply amazed a good kid, hard working kid like AG just continues to do the same damn unsuccessful stuff gam in game out. I mean I hated getting my shot blocked how happy can he be when he goes to deep it never sees the damn rim? Time for Dan Hurley to pull them like he would a freshman I'm afraid.

He’s not in high school anymore. There isn’t a path to the rim for him. Boatright could do it, but not AG.

 

[BigErnMcCracken]

He’s not in high school anymore. There isn’t a path to the rim for him. Boatright could do it, but not AG.

The problem is not getting past his man, he beats his guy off the dribble routinely. The problem is getting in way too deep. Pull up from 10 feet or force a rotation and get the ball moving.

 

[mauconnfan]

The problem is not getting past his man, he beats his guy off the dribble routinely. The problem is getting in way too deep. Pull up from 10 feet or force a rotation and get the ball moving.

That would be the answer to it all agree. STOP taking it deep period, never please. It would help his game, the teams game and get the naysayers off your back. Scary thing is he’s never done it yet. I mean yesterday 1st half he comes out looking like hes working on it. Dribbling to the FT line passing it to open people running the team like he should. Then around the 8–10 minute mark it was like a drug addict he needed his fix and took 2 awful drives too deep in a row coming up empty.

Need to sit with him and show him all the empty crap and what it does for momentum.

 

[Doctor Hoop]

The only guy on the team right now who can reliably create his own shot with the ball in his hands is Bouknight. That usually means you have to run a more structured offense until through switches you get a mismatch, draw a defender away from a shooter, or until the defense rotations are slow and an opening appears. That’s not Hurleys offense, or at least that’s not what we are seeing.

 

[TRUCONN76]

No one is denying Gilberts ability to create. The problem is that he gets past defenders and then get stuffed at the rim or throws up a wild shot 90% of the time. He would be an extremely effective PG if he would just kick the damn ball out after he draws the defense inside. He thinks he can finish like Jalen Adams when he actually looks like Antoine Anderson

The first half he drove kicked it out and the open shots were missed, the Xavier adjusted their D. If not for Gilbert and Bouknight we would have been destroyed. Vital had one open look all night, when the ball was in his hands he could not get past his defender. Polley worked hard but even the shots he made where not easy to get off. I don’t remember seeing these open great shooters available when he went into the lane, nor do I remember seeing seeing any offense at all when he was out of the game.

 

[Robertelamin]

The problem is not getting past his man, he beats his guy off the dribble routinely. The problem is getting in way too deep. Pull up from 10 feet or force a rotation and get the ball moving.

A runner would do him well.

 

[SixRings]

I’ve never been a CV guy but don’t understand the disdain shown after Xavier. We know what we get from him. He’s streaky and takes bad shots. But when he’s on the hot side of a streak he puts up a lot of points, gets boards and is capable of a few daggers. He had a bad game against Xavier but I don’t see any reason to remove him from starting. AG is a different story. It’s much more than a bad game and he should sit until he shows he can pass first and take and make better shots.

 

[UCSouth]

Who were you talking about? You said “these”. I just used AG as an example but any of them could have left. AG is a particularly extreme example.

I was to a post about Josh being an "Ollie guy"

 

[browndog319]

I was to a post about Josh being an "Ollie guy"

Good point. I don’t know if he could have - but the Billy Donovan example REALLY works for him. He needed to condition more (maybe he put on too much muscle and now can’t move, but who knows). But do you think other D1 programs were looking at that and saying “yeah, I’ll blow a scholly on that!”
Not likely. Even if Josh was begging and offering to pull double duty as ball player AND water boy, I’m not seeing the Upstairs Downstairs School for Boys offering one...

 

[Travelman6]

At the half, 3-8 combined today (1-4 from 3), 5 boards. Let's see how they come out in the second half. They are playing more under control today.

Gilbert has 4 assists to 3 shots, I like that. I want him to pass a lot more as the year goes on! Vital with 0 assists but, between the two, only ONE turnover and one foul. I can.... live with this kind of half from Vital and Gilbert. As far as plays that were "ugh", only 1 three attempt from Vital and Gilberts blocked 3 made me cringe.