Quite frankly, when some posters a few weeks ago were advocating a high national ranking, Chief exercised caution. Without Bouknight, offense comes really hard for this group. Our defense and rebounding is good but Creighton had matchups where they could take us off the dribble. That really hurt and got us in foul trouble.
Chief thinks this Tyler scoring off the bench concept is overdone - we can’t afford a scoring drought to open up the game against a good team and wait 6 minutes before we have an outside threat. Too many bad habits form. The game is too ugly by then and the flow is bad. Today he was Artic cold coming off the bench.
Whaley looks really bad offensively, he’s rushing everything and not exhibiting good hands or judgement. I think Gaffney is the guy who we can get more offense from and he’s got to start being assertive.
Agree with Donny, our Bigs have trouble enough scoring in the post, why do we give them the ball so far away from the hoop? Ends in disaster too often.
While our defense was good too often our center is doubling a guard over 20 feet away from the hoop that leads to a mad scramble, which leads to a foul or a mismatch drive. This is why teams think they can beat us playing small. Bigs fouls caused by bad scheme given personnel. In the second half Creighton was brilliant exploiting mismatches.
Sanogo is the only Big who has any moves in the post with the hands, strength and touch to finish. Our offense needs to work through him. He needs to be confident he will get that pass and that means he’s got to be willing to give it up if nothing is there. Great offensive rebounding but Josh and Whaley finishing with bad hands and lack of power today.
Tough to win when you shoot 35% FG and 20% from 4. Cole, Martin and Sanogo were the only ones who played well offensively and Adama had around 5 turnovers.
Agree with most Chief but not Tyler and starting. The "droughts to start" have been few and far between minus yesterday actually a change with this team finding ways to get out to leads. I mean 19-7 lead against the Johnnies before Tyler saw a second of play can't ask for better than that.
Whaley wow, so much to like about him but if you dig hard right now he killed us yesterday. I mean missed bunnies galore, in one sequence missed a bunny tip in which right after he got the rebound and missed a wide open freebie. 4-5 easy ones at least yesterday have to finish those. Also off the ball defense has been lackluster as he's been caught worrying about making plays off the ball rather than tending to his own guy. Jefferson torched him twice on baseline as he was making up for space he had left by rushing out without control and was burnt by 23 getting to the hoop. Have you noticed the opponents trying to NOT screen as much with the man he defends because they know the impact he has on the screen and role? We rarely see him making those plays anymore because coaches aren't setting their players up in that situation. He needs to guard his man better because he can, help off the ball only when needed or in his area and box people out. He's smart and tough enough for all of that, need him to concentrate on doing his job rather than everyones.
Agree on way too many bigs getting the ball too high and no one around. Sanogo, Whaley and Carlton all with it too many times on top and way too many bad things can happen in that situation. There's no Jake V or Travis K who you can pretty much guarantee you can throw it to and they will make a play or at least the right decision. Needs to be tempered for sure.
Mahoney and Jefferson killed us, that's the match up that will hurt us all the time. The 6'4-6'5 guy who can take it to the hole, make a 3 or pull up for a jumper. Adams is ok against it but gets beat, Cole and Gaff no shot, Polley has not regained any quickness in his lateral movement and is getting torched on that end. Bouk was improved on D as well, his length gave some of these guys fits I don't think we realize just how much we miss him. We have no answers for some match ups at this point, all the more reason to occasionally mix in a zone with this crew.
Cole played fine, I mean he seems to be getting better game by game and hopefully will be even more of an impact with Bouk back, hope it means something at that point. Gaffney actually mad a couple nice plays finally going to the basket then got hurt. Still can't guard anyone but at least he came off screens 2 times in a matter of minutes and didn't just go east-west but instead tried to make a play, good sign? (Pretty strange it was the same situation almost as Bueckers the other night, great pass then an awkward ankle turn)
We (I) put a lot of blame on Dan H for the Johnnies but let's be sure to take all of that off for this one. Our kids had their chances, he put them in the best position to win this one but the constant missed bunnies, the inability to get good shots off unless early in the clock and just some very bad D lost this one. They played hard, made a couple runs but don't have enough offense to finish a run.
The fence will be a welcome place when Bouk returns because if we're not on it that means there were too many games like yesterday. Go Huskies, big week need to be 2-1...
