Game was lost by bazz & lamb

[AfgHusky15]

Bazz because he shot way too much and in bad situations and lamb because he didn't shoot anywhere near enough. The decision making by both can be very frustrating at times. When lamb receives the ball at the perimeter he doesn't even look to attack the rim, there was one time where joseph went for the steal and whiffed at the top of the perimeter and instead of taking advantage of that he just held the ball only to pass it back to napier.

Napier needs to pass the ball when the team gets a steal, everytime when the team gets the steal napier has tunnel vision for the rim. The time where boatright got the steal (or it could have been giffey who then passed it to boat) he led napier and napier was covered by 2 men and he refused to give the ball back to boat!

I dont remember coach calhoun giving so much freedom to a guard in shooting the ball so much without much success as I have seen with napier in many games this season, maybe its because lamb isn't aggressive at all, but bazz needs to look to pass the ball to other players on the team even tho he may not get the assist.

Bazz was 5-17 from the field today with 3 ast and 5 turnovers...look at your other teammates bazz, especially when going 1 v 3 on a fast break...frustrating game. we should have beat them

 

[dogpause]

Napier is still a work in progress. It's rare that we didn't have a PG who drew the wrath of this board in their first year running the show. He's the only player on the team that has both swagger and an outside shot. The kid has been clutch in many games, including some last year. I can live with the mistakes because his judgement will get better with experience.

As for Lamb, yes I find him extremely frustrating at times, but Syracuse' zone has been a tough nut for a lot of teams, and their offensive explosivity is scary. JC took the air out of the ball and it would have worked if we would have hit a few more open shots.

 

[businesslawyer]

The scheme and strategy was sound. We didn't execute.

 

[UConnSwag11]

he played fine, not his fault no one wanted to shoot or move, i thought he did a great job running up the court and setting up the offense and getting the ball inside, it was a team effort

 

[UCweCONN]

This is a 'let's move on' loss for me. Singling out any player or players at this point is pointless. There is plenty of blame to go around from the 34% shooting as a team, shot selection, the fact that we dominated the offensive and overall rebounding but failed to convert on 2nd chances, fatigue, Roscoe shooting 0-6, Olander 2-7, the 4th foul on Oriakhi. This team is what it is.

Some games we win when we do a bad job rebounding but shoot well, others like today we do a good job rebounding but shoot poorly and lose. Other games we lose due to poor free throw shooting, or turnovers or bad decision making at key moments in games etc. This is the schizophrenic nature of this team. The reasons for the losses vary from game to game as do the 'goats' that are to blame. The bottom line is that today, as has happened so many times this season, we failed to execute and let a winnable game get away.

At this point, I'm moving on from today's loss and looking forward to a favorable first round match-up in a soft region and a chance to make some noise. We have clearly demonstrated that we can play with the top teams this season. The question is, will we get a chance in the tournament, and can we put together a full 40 minute effort and beat them? We have little margin for error and need to play nearly perfect.

I hope the coaches stress defense, defense, defense in preparation for the tourney. If they play defense like last year, this could still be a special season.

 

[caw]

I love stats.

This isn't a game to look at individual stats and assign blame. I think Waiters shot well and everyone else was tossing up bricks for both teams. I think they just finished the new arena in Brooklyn. UConn lost by 3. Team effort all around the good and the bad.

 

[Elitehuskies]

It is not Bazz's fault. If you want to fault someone you can fault the team. Players have to want the ball, get open and create. Our team isn't as capable. Lamb has a hard time doing this. Boat and Bazz can, but they are immediately met by the bigs.

Bazz is looking, but nobody is creating enough spacing. In the end, he takes a bad shot. We would not be having this debate if we had a zone breaker in the key. If TO or RS can make those shots regularly, teams would think twice playing the zone against us. When I see AO circling up, I'm pretty sure all of Husky Nation says, "Don't pass the ball to AO!"

But they played great today. They came out with the energy and mentality to not back down. Aside from the result, this is leap yrs ahead of how we were playing 8 games ago. Time to suck it up and take home another trophy.

 

[tzznandrew]

Lamb doesn't run off screens well as it is, but even if he did, that doesn't work well against a well-played zone.

Syracuse paid extra special attention to Lamb this game, and they really made sure UConn couldn't get an entry pass into him at the top of the key. Without that, Lamb really couldn't work himself open. Given his weak handle, he couldn't free himself. That's partially on Lamb, but it's a weakness of ability, not effort; its also not all on Bazz.

 

[Prezidint]

I dont remember coach calhoun giving so much freedom to a guard in shooting the ball so much without much success as I have seen with napier in many games this season

Compare Napier's % this year with Kemba's % last year and get back to me. Your statement is ridiculous.

 

[AfgHusky15]

Compare Napier's % this year with Kemba's % last year and get back to me. Your statement is ridiculous.

Kemba% last year: 42.8%
Bazz% this year: 38.6%
------------------------------
Difference: 4.2%

Yes you can say statically that difference may not be that great but there is a huge difference when your shooting the ball as the primary scorer on the team. All the defenses Kemba played last year focused on him making it much harder to shoot when you are the defenses number one task. Bazz is not the primary scorer or threat on the team, that belongs to lamb who is shooting at 48.1% from the field, hence why I blamed lamb in my original post as well, he needs to shoot more because he still is much more successful at shooting even as the primary scorer. His shooting percentage is nearly 10 percentage points higher than bazz's and yet he had 9 shots compared to bazz's 17!

Kemba realized that too last year when he asked coach if he should defer the ball to lamb bc lamb was on fire during the ncaa tourni last year. kemba realized he had to feed the ball to lamb more down the stretch postseason last year and he made it happened. Kemba sacrificed the game winning shot against ville so lamb could hit the game winning layup.

Take this for thought as well, the difference between the two teams kemba and bazz play for between last year and this:

Drummond>>>Okwandu
Boat>>>Beverly
Frosh lamb>>Soph Lamb

Not saying bazz should produce kemba numbers. Not at all. bazz is a completely different player then kemba and should utilize his passing skills more so as it is a better asset for the team this year. No one can replace kemba, what he did last year was special but what this team can do collectively can match that.

 

[mauconnfan]

Not at all on Bazz......when things went south with the 8 point lead everyone offered a hand in it, even the coaching staff by not continuing to attack until the last TV TO........the referees for missing the HUGE over-the-back on Melo which resulted in AO's 4th on a picky call......and points for them rather than us going down the other end still with an 8 point lead.....our guys all had a hand in bad decisions with the ball too, just needed to take care of the ball better and take open looks rather than run the clock down, the game was theirs to win, they're right there with Cuse!!

 

[Kitaman]

I could have sworn I saw 8 players out there, did the OP watch the game on his phone or something?

Oh and I saw 5 coaches as well.

 

[Kevin Caliendo]

I was at the game andwas fortunate enough to ahve nice seats. Bazz was totally gassed in teh second half. The lack of depth in the backcourt showed up today moeso than any game since Boat was reinstated. The biggest blunder, IMO, was blowing the 3-1 break. A basket there and Cuse is in trouble.

Lamb got one look in the entire second half, when they moved him to 4 and had him flash to where Olander and Roscoe did at the elbow. That was it. They hedged on him, never left him and he had no idea how to get open. Its poor IQ. More troubling was how badly he was beaten on D in the second half. He gave up the baseline twice casuing fouls on AO and Joseph bet him twice 1x1 for easy baskets. Any scout who was at the game would not think twice about who to pick between the two if you wanted production next year.

that brings me to another point about these two teams. In person, it is scary how much bigger and stronger the Syracuse players are compared to the Uconn players. It seemed like at every position, Cuse was 2+ inches taller and at least 10-20lbs heavier. A big part of that is the age discrepancy between the two teams, Cuse is like 2 years older at every spot on the floor. They are a legit great team and probably the only team that can beat KY this year

 

[jorge34]

I was at the game andwas fortunate enough to ahve nice seats. Bazz was totally gassed in teh second half. The lack of depth in the backcourt showed up today moeso than any game since Boat was reinstated. The biggest blunder, IMO, was blowing the 3-1 break. A basket there and Cuse is in trouble.

Lamb got one look in the entire second half, when they moved him to 4 and had him flash to where Olander and Roscoe did at the elbow. That was it. They hedged on him, never left him and he had no idea how to get open. Its poor IQ. More troubling was how badly he was beaten on D in the second half. He gave up the baseline twice casuing fouls on AO and Joseph bet him twice 1x1 for easy baskets. Any scout who was at the game would not think twice about who to pick between the two if you wanted production next year.

that brings me to another point about these two teams. In person, it is scary how much bigger and stronger the Syracuse players are compared to the Uconn players. It seemed like at every position, Cuse was 2+ inches taller and at least 10-20lbs heavier. A big part of that is the age discrepancy between the two teams, Cuse is like 2 years older at every spot on the floor. They are a legit great team and probably the only team that can beat KY this year

I think they are going to have to do a much better job getting a couple of minutes rest for Napier and Lamb the rest of the way.

 

[aceboon]

I think they are going to have to do a much better job getting a couple of minutes rest for Napier and Lamb the rest of the way.

Another benefit of the tourney is longer TV timeouts, but it still wouldn't hurt to try to get Bazz some rest and let Boat man the point alone or try to have Giffey steal some minutes in Lamb's place.

 

[Kevin Caliendo]

One thing about Boat. He was not able to get the offense going at all as he was physically pushed around and away from where he needed to be. and twice he dribbled into traps, once causing a bad TO that turned into a fast break dunk

 

[Dogbreath2U]

One thing about Boat. He was not able to get the offense going at all as he was physically pushed around and away from where he needed to be. and twice he dribbled into traps, once causing a bad TO that turned into a fast break dunk

When playing against the zone, it seemed to me that neither Boat nor Lamb were hardly ever able to make the pass into the player flashing to the foul line, it was almost always Bazz getting the ball in there. Boat needs to be able to make better entry passes...Jeremy just does not seem able to make quick decisions to pass the ball. I would rather see Giffey out there on top against the zone as a passer. With his height, he has better ability to get the passes over the top.

I'm a little concerned about Ryan....he just seems to be pressing, not playing with the confidence that we saw earlier in the year. This team really needs Boat to contribute some points and he has not been doing a lot of scoring.