Looking ahead to Buffalo

[auror]

Problem is you mentioned Sid. He's not good at guarding anyone right now hence why he doesn't play. He wanders looking to block a shot and hasn't done that well either. For now, at least for me no matter what, Polley would be my guy ahead of him even guarding a 6'5" guy because at least he can score.

I'm envisioning Akok in that spot as the 6'5" guy plays the 4 for Buffalo. I did concede I'd play Polley as a backup 4 if I were Hurley (10-12 minutes). I'm sure I'd play him 5-10 minutes at the 3 as well (more if Buffalo goes zone at all), but also a few minutes each of Sid and Adams (Adams would get more minutes as the backup 2), and then the other 20-25 of the minutes at the 3 to Bouknight. Sid can hit the offensive glass from the 3 at least, which is taking advantage of the opponent's mismatch (he's been our 2nd best offensive rebounder to this point). But still, I'd only give him 5-10 minutes total unless there's foul trouble.

And again, that's just for this particular matchup.

 

[HuskyHawk]

I don't like the suggestions here that we need to match up with them. They need to match up with us. If you are a Buffalo fan, your thread on this matchup is saying, how the hell can we match their size? They start 6'10". 6'10" and 6'9" across the front. How do we stop that?

So I say, hammer them. Good luck to them stopping us inside without fouling. Playing small is not playing to our strengths. I'm fine with playing a big guard/wing at the 3 (Bouk, Adams). But we shouldn't try to beat them at their game.

 

[Bonk]

Said before the season the Buffalo game will be a litmus test to see if we are good or not this year. Tough but an opponent we need to beat if we have postseason aspirations.
If we are a bubble team come spring a loss to tough the Buffalo/Iona teams would hurt our odds, assuming the Florida win negates the St joes loss.

 

[ctchamps]

Sounds like a game plan for a line up of Gilbert, Vital, Bouknight, Polley and Akok on occasion. Smaller, quicker some length.

Would love to play some half court and shove the ball down their throats if smaller with carlton. But dam he hasn't looked the same. That guy last year had quicker feet, wasn't glued completely to the ground like the guy I'm seeing right now. Never seen him lose balance so much, I am concerned he worked too hard to get strong and lost some athleticism.

Should change as season goes by. On the positive side neither Blackshear or Gorjok Gak manhandled him. I even wonder if the balance issue was because he bodied back Blackshear easier than he anticipated. We never needed to double their bigs. Where as they doubled and triple teamed Josh all game. If he can react quicker and improve his passing he's going to be special.

He corrected the problem second half, managed eight rebounds and thirteen points. Kerry managed two more points and similar rebounding numbers. And two of his shots were circus shots that managed to go in. Whaley and Carlton gave better overall numbers than the Fla. bigs and it's been a long time since we could say that against a good team.