East Texas Post Game Thread

[Sibeerian]

He’s setting up guys off of dribble penetration. Still seems to be struggling to find guys coming off of cuts on the perimeter, which is why some people are saying he dribbles too much. I’m far less critical. He’s still learning the offense and managing to find guys and disrupt the defense.

I like how he can get anywhere with his handle. He's fearless about dribbling and out of the lane. It's a change up from Silas's game and gives us a different look.

 

[TheShot1990]

Feel free to call this major league nitpicking, but is Demary having trouble adjusting to the officiating? Through 9 games, he has 22 personal fouls (3 last night), which is tied with AK and 1 behind Stewart.

Nitpicking and constructive criticisms are OK in my book. It’s literally what the boneyard is for.

Overly harsh criticisms and attempts to crush or dismiss a player, not so much.

 

[Scottobot]

Don't look now, but Karaban 4 for his last 20 from three.

He still is at 41% for the season, and probably higher than where he will end up on the season. He has always been a streaky shooter. I expect he will end up somewhere between 35 to 40 % for the year which is decent.

 

[imno1]

Well he is averaging 5 points the last 2 games specifically. Also note the word “much” I used. He has kinda just been running the offense, which is fine, but we have had some significant lulls recently, and that’s when you want your guys to go to the hole. He’s also just not really gettng to the line much at all, which is indicative of lack of driving.

I’m not seeing what you are seeing with Malachi at all.

Really? I feel they’ve been getting good shots at the rim through driving or passing. They’ve missed a bunch of bunnies though. What surprises me is we are not great from 3 yet. That is coming

 

[Husky Alien]

I hope Hurley schedules just two cupcake games next year, 3 at the absolute MAX. They are so boring, useless, not to fun to watch, and nothing good can come of them after a few tune ups.

As I was going through the likes I came across a long time boneyarder that I have not seen in few years and always liked the majority of his posts. Happy to see @8893, hope all is well.

 

[cp176]

Once again, the play from each of our point guards has been outstanding. They penetrate, they kick it, they are team first guys. I also think that Demary is going to get progressively better as we go along. Smith is just a kid that was made to be a Husky. Millender has more to give than we have seen. As for comments about Mullins, it is obvious that the kid is good. I think that he is still going through a process like Demary of learning the offense. It might look like he gets knocked around a bit when playing against bigger and stronger. When he matures physically, he may become one of the best ever.

 

[DW1361]

He also through a hook pass i

My biggest takeaway was Stewart's improving footwork on defense. This is the first time I can recall where he did an outstanding job of consistently keeping smaller, quicker players in front of him.

Mullins' court vision also stood out. He made a couple of cross court passes on fast breaks that were dead on accurate.

He also threw a hook pass in to the stands . Just nitpicking though.

 

[Excalibur]

Because his steered away from that with a 1 assist and 2 assist game. There's a few plays I've noticed where he dribbles the ball way too long without giving it up and then just forces his way to the rim.

He needs to go back to being that 9 assist player and looking like one of the best passers in the country like he did in the preseason.

He was dribbling just as much when he got the assists.

 

[gtcam]

IMO, UConn's PGs are not consistently doing the things that UConn needs to be successful in the long run.
Are they capable? I think so, but both Silas and Smith do not look at all like T Newt etc. They don't have the tempo and the decision making (at this point in time) that we envisioned nor what I think Dan Hurley is expecting. Just watching his reactions to their play tells the story. Things need to be amended and soon.
Reibe has improved and will continue but playing without Read is unfortunate. Don't believe for a minute that NIL has anything to do with his situation, nor did I expect him to play last night. However, the longer that he sits, the less he will be in game condition and with the NBE schedule starting around the corner, UConn needs their #1 big guy on the floor.
A win is a win and beating that pesky team by more than 20 points is OK with me. Florida will be a huge test,

 

[REB1094]

IMO, UConn's PGs are not consistently doing the things that UConn needs to be successful in the long run.
Are they capable? I think so, but both Silas and Smith do not look at all like T Newt etc. They don't have the tempo and the decision making (at this point in time) that we envisioned nor what I think Dan Hurley is expecting. Just watching his reactions to their play tells the story. Things need to be amended and soon.

Newton's first 9 games as a Husky: 11.4 PPG, 4.2 APG, 4.6 RPG, 2.4 turnovers shooting 37.5% from the field, 37.8% from three, 79.6% FT
Silas' first 9 games as a Husky: 10.4 PPG, 5.6 APG, 4.7 RPG, 1.8 turnovers shooting 51.5% from the field, 25.0% from three, 76.7% FT

Against real competition, Newton averaged 12/4.5/3.5/2.8 turnovers on 44% (Oregon/Alabama/Iowa St/OSU)
Against real competition, Silas is averaging 11/4/3.5/2 turnovers on 50% (BYU/Arizona/Illinois/Kansas)

We need to stop comparing 9-games-in Silas to 2-seasons-in Newton

 

[HooperScooper]

Newton's first 9 games as a Husky: 11.4 PPG, 4.2 APG, 4.6 RPG, 2.4 turnovers shooting 37.5% from the field, 37.8% from three, 79.6% FT
Silas' first 9 games as a Husky: 10.4 PPG, 5.6 APG, 4.7 RPG, 1.8 turnovers shooting 51.5% from the field, 25.0% from three, 76.7% FT

Against real competition, Newton averaged 12/4.5/3.5/2.8 turnovers on 44% (Oregon/Alabama/Iowa St/OSU)
Against real competition, Silas is averaging 11/4/3.5/2 turnovers on 50% (BYU/Arizona/Illinois/Kansas)

We need to stop comparing 9-games-in Silas to 2-seasons-in Newton

Thank you! As I was reading gtcam's post I was thinking the same thing. Everyone seems to have already forgotten Newton's first few months at UConn. He wasn't the Tristen Newton 2nd year here that some people seem to only remember.

I have faith in Demary. He's talented but he needs more experience in the UConn system. He's coming from Georgia where he was asked to be more of a scorer most of the season because their team kind of sucked. He averaged 19.3 points over the final 10 games. He's learning to be something different at UConn. He will get there. I'm confident.

 

[UCan3]

IMO, UConn's PGs are not consistently doing the things that UConn needs to be successful in the long run.
Are they capable? I think so, but both Silas and Smith do not look at all like T Newt etc. They don't have the tempo and the decision making (at this point in time) that we envisioned nor what I think Dan Hurley is expecting. Just watching his reactions to their play tells the story. Things need to be amended and soon.
Reibe has improved and will continue but playing without Read is unfortunate. Don't believe for a minute that NIL has anything to do with his situation, nor did I expect him to play last night. However, the longer that he sits, the less he will be in game condition and with the NBE schedule starting around the corner, UConn needs their #1 big guy on the floor.
A win is a win and beating that pesky team by more than 20 points is OK with me. Florida will be a huge test,

Well, I think it’s far too early to start making comparisons to what Tristan Newton look like when he graduated to what Silas and Smith look like right now.

Is it just me or are we like 8-1 or whatever it is with just one loss when we were down a couple players? Likely with most difficult schedule we’ve ever started this season with.

Reibe has proven to be so impactful down low that yes playing without reid is unfortunate, but we can’t dwell too much on that as we’ve done phenomenally well so far the season. The Reibe surprise is what we should be focused on - progressing well ahead of schedule.

When Taris comes back, we’ll be all that much better.

I don’t know what I saw last night was one 1/2 where they were kind of lackluster, but we were still winning by double digits at half against the team that was playing quite well.

Second half a lot of teamwork and unselfishness.

Nothing but positive as far as I’m concerned.

When we start losing games and teams start imposing their will, I’ll get it more concerned, but for right now I’m perfectly fine with how the seasons progressed in. I’m certainly not down on any player in particular.

Let’s go!

 

[Malamute]

Is Mullins still hurting? At the game he appeared to be limping a couple times. I never said anything and I heard someone behind me say the same.

I sit close to the court and watched Mullins closely during the game and he was very much limping and had a pained look on his face. Each time he came out of the game he would go down the tunnel which I assume was to ride a bike. The first time he did it he was dragging his leg so bad I mentioned to my son that he was likely hurt again and out. Then, he just kept coming back to the bench when it was his time. Looks to me like it will be a bit before he is truly healthy. Hurley sort of mentioned that in his presser.

 

[Palatine]

Remember all the "we don't have a point guard" posts, well into the 2022-23 season? Then when I posted that Newton was the PG, people argued with me.

 

[BigErnMcCracken]

IMO, UConn's PGs are not consistently doing the things that UConn needs to be successful in the long run.
Are they capable? I think so, but both Silas and Smith do not look at all like T Newt etc. They don't have the tempo and the decision making (at this point in time) that we envisioned nor what I think Dan Hurley is expecting. Just watching his reactions to their play tells the story. Things need to be amended and soon.

There is a 100% certainty that you were saying the same thing about Newton in December '22. It's the circle of life on the Boneyard. They will both be fine.

In the meantime we have wins over BYU, Kansas and Illinois and lost by 4 points to Arizona without 40% of the eventual starting lineup. And we're ranked fifth in the country. If there was ever a team with some margin for error while they work out the kinks it's this one.

 

[Chief00]

You're underestimating how much work it takes to change a jumpshot at this level.

I agree that’s the conventional wisdom, but looking at the data and the eye test of the shot vs fundamentals - is it working?

 

[cp176]

All 3 of our point guards are just fine. I loved Newton but not a classic point guard by any stretch of the imagination. Every game our guys get better at general things that point guards do.

 

[DogMania]

You're underestimating how much work it takes to change a jumpshot at this level.

Great point. Being in his final season, it's unlikely there will be any tweeting to his shot.

He has NBA range, which can be used to his advantage when he's got space and it's not early in the shot clock, but I'd like to see him shoot it more often from just beyond the 3 Pt arc. Hopefully he starts shooting it better.