Providence Scouting Report

[AntG168]

The fact that you’re asking that question tells me everything I need to know. The guy just averaged 20+ the last 3 games and had 5 blocks and 4 steals in the last one. I don’t watch much outside of the Big East, but I do record all the Big East games and spun through the DePaul and Butler ones last night to see what we’re up against - he was scary. You my friend are the classic homer, can’t appreciate the talent on other teams.

Homer? Lmao. We prioritized Newton over Carter in the portal. And he damn sure ain’t playing over Hawkins or Jackson. He’s a good player but we’re loaded. I see you ignored your ridiculous Croswell take. My point has been proven. PC is a plucky team, it’s their DNA. They’re never an “easy” win. We have the 2nd highest odds to win the national championship. We are on a different level and should win and need to win this game. Implying anything else is a defeatist attitude. PC should not beat us, especially with us coming off of a loss.

 

[CheshireCat]

One way would be if we watched Freemantle and freaking Hunter humiliate Karaban. Sean Miller's biggest mistake on Saturday was not going to Freemantle more after Freemantle had 11 in the first 10 minutes. Freemantle would have scored 30 if I had been coaching Xavier because I would have isolated him on Karaban until Karaban was a human puddle on the court. There was no reason for Xavier to go to anyone else on Saturday.

Sanogo's defensive effort comes and goes, but he can defend a 4 like Freemantle when he wants to, and he forces Freemantle to play on both ends. I like Karaban's shooting and effort, but he does not have nearly the 1-on-1 offensive game that Sanogo has.

Amazing that X gave Miller the job instead of you. I don’t know what they were thinking, but I’m sure it was a tough call.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

Amazing that X gave Miller the job instead of you. I don’t know what they were thinking, but I’m sure it was a tough call.

Sarcasm is a bad look when you have been as brutally wrong in this thread as you have been.

Either come up with something to add or sit this thread out.

 

[superjohn]

It just boggles my mind after seeing Sanogo these past two games against bigs with any semblance of outside game, how anyone can still be stumping for Sanogo at the four.

You realize Freemantle abused our 4's right?

The problem is the defense Hurley has him playing and not playing Clingan nearly enough.

 

[WhereistheDove?]

One way would be if we watched Freemantle and freaking Hunter humiliate Karaban. Sean Miller's biggest mistake on Saturday was not going to Freemantle more after Freemantle had 11 in the first 10 minutes. Freemantle would have scored 30 if I had been coaching Xavier because I would have isolated him on Karaban until Karaban was a human puddle on the court. There was no reason for Xavier to go to anyone else on Saturday.

Sanogo's defensive effort comes and goes, but he can defend a 4 like Freemantle when he wants to, and he forces Freemantle to play on both ends. I like Karaban's shooting and effort, but he does not have nearly the 1-on-1 offensive game that Sanogo has.

The issue with the logic is that it assumes if Sanogo was at the four, Freemantle would still be posting up down low. He did that BECAUSE there was a major advantage against Karaban in the post. If Sanogo and Clingan are in, they’d have just let Freemantle go to work on the perimeter, where he has a mismatch against Sanogo.

 

[CheshireCat]

Homer? Lmao. We prioritized Newton over Carter in the portal. And he damn sure ain’t playing over Hawkins or Jackson. He’s a good player but we’re loaded. I see you ignored your ridiculous Croswell take. My point has been proven. PC is a plucky team, it’s their DNA. They’re never an “easy” win. We have the 2nd highest odds to win the national championship. We are on a different level and should win and need to win this game. Implying anything else is a defeatist attitude. PC should not beat us, especially with us coming off of a loss.

Homer? Lmao. We prioritized Newton over Carter in the portal. And he damn sure ain’t playing over Hawkins or Jackson. He’s a good player but we’re loaded. I see you ignored your ridiculous Croswell take. My point has been proven. PC is a plucky team, it’s their DNA. They’re never an “easy” win. We have the 2nd highest odds to win the national championship. We are on a different level and should win and need to win this game. Implying anything else is a defeatist attitude. PC should not beat us, especially with us coming off of a loss.

Plucky. You’re a plucky poster. So you basically just backed down and said Carter is better than Newton and Karaban - which is true. At least you’re starting to come to your senses. Your point was that nobody other than Hopkins could start for UCONN. Now, you’re just digressing to the game itself vs the players that were called into question. I didn’t say Croswell would start for UCONN, I just commented on his rebounding. You should try politics - just speak to whatever fits your narrative.

 

[superjohn]

The issue with the logic is that it assumes if Sanogo was at the four, Freemantle would still be posting up down low. He did that BECAUSE there was a major advantage against Karaban in the post. If Sanogo and Clingan are in, they’d have just let Freemantle go to work on the perimeter, where he has a mismatch against Sanogo.

You clearly don't watch Xavier play.

Xavier got and 1's and layups all game because we don't keep our big man near the basket. Sanogo was running out on the perimeter all game and not getting back down low in time. We let Miller and Xavier dictate how we play.

We need a big to protect the rim.

 

[AntG168]

Plucky. You’re a plucky poster. So you basically just backed down and said Carter is better than Newton and Karaban - which is true. At least you’re starting to come to your senses. Your point was that nobody other than Hopkins could start for UCONN. Now, you’re just digressing to the game itself vs the players that were called into question. I didn’t say Croswell would start for UCONN, I just commented on his rebounding. You should try politics - just speak to whatever fits your narrative.

No I didn’t…….

Also why is Karaban in this discussion? Carter can’t play the 4. Newton is by far the better fit next to Hawkins and Jackson. Carter wouldn’t start. I said Croswell wouldn’t play not start lmaoo. My point is still very much in tact. No one outside of Hopkins would start on this UConn team.

 

[NotADime89]

Plucky. You’re a plucky poster. So you basically just backed down and said Carter is better than Newton and Karaban - which is true. At least you’re starting to come to your senses. Your point was that nobody other than Hopkins could start for UCONN. Now, you’re just digressing to the game itself vs the players that were called into question. I didn’t say Croswell would start for UCONN, I just commented on his rebounding. You should try politics - just speak to whatever fits your narrative.

 

[WhereistheDove?]

You clearly don't watch Xavier play.

Xavier got and 1's and layups all game because we don't keep our big man near the basket. Sanogo was running out on the perimeter all game and not getting back down low in time. We let Miller and Xavier dictate how we play.

We need a big to protect the rim.

I'm not denying we should have played Clingan more and should have stopped running Sanogo out to the three point line when they continued to abuse him almost every play. I'm just saying the solution to that is not putting Clingan and Sanogo on the floor together. Miller exploited the mismatch. If you think he wouldn't have just exploited the different mismatch with the two of them in the game instead of playing into the strength of UConn's lineup, then you don't have nearly a high enough opinion of Miller's coaching.

 

[UConnSwag11]

Jackson HAS to be confident in driving to the rim. He has to put pressure on the defense. It will open up his game and greatly help our offense. He should be as confident if not more confident in driving to the rim than he is taking threes

 

[WhereistheDove?]

Jackson HAS to be confident in driving to the rim. He has to put pressure on the defense. It will open up his game and greatly help our offense. He should be as confident if not more confident in driving to the rim than he is taking threes

I would love nothing more, but if you're expecting to see that from him this year, I think you're setting yourself up for disappointment. It's just not part of his game unfortunately.

 

[UConnSwag11]

I would love nothing more, but if you're expecting to see that from him this year, I think you're setting yourself up for disappointment. It's just not part of his game unfortunately.

Agreed. Even if it's not attacking the rim, drive to the lane and lob it to Clingan, get Sanogo in a better position to score, or keep the dribble alive like Nash. Our players do a fairly good job of moving without the ball, we should capitalize on that.

 

[CardiacAndre7]

Wouldn’t even start on UConn. Croswell wouldn’t play. Hopkins is the ONE guy who would start on our team. They’re a plucky team. They’ll be at home so it won’t be easy. But make no mistake about it, this would be a disappointing loss

Lmao never once did I say they would start, I said they were good players. Croswell has been very productive and Bynum is a good distributer who is smart with the ball. They aren’t “mediocre” and neither is Carter actually.

 

[AntG168]

Lmao never once did I say they would start, I said they were good players. Croswell has been very productive and Bynum is a good distributer who is smart with the ball. They aren’t “mediocre” and neither is Carter actually.

I don’t think I’ve ever once claimed you said that. We agree that they’re good players. Just not the level of our players currently

 

[superjohn]

I'm not denying we should have played Clingan more and should have stopped running Sanogo out to the three point line when they continued to abuse him almost every play. I'm just saying the solution to that is not putting Clingan and Sanogo on the floor together. Miller exploited the mismatch. If you think he wouldn't have just exploited the different mismatch with the two of them in the game instead of playing into the strength of UConn's lineup, then you don't have nearly a high enough opinion of Miller's coaching.

Xavier's bigs combined for 1 made three, Xavier got 41 points off of layups. Maybe don't send your center out to the perimeter constantly and leave your 7'2 rim protector on the bench.

It was a game where the opposing coach dictated things against us, we saw this in previous years. We're now the best team in the conference and I was hoping we wouldn't see this. Let Nunge and Freemantle beat us shooting threes like Miller let Jackson beat us shooting threes. We're too big and athletic to let a not overly athletic Xavier team get rim runs all game. Again, Nunge and Freemantle combined for 1 made three and Xavier got 41 points off of layups.

My biggest thing is Clingan needs to be on the court more, Hurley seems hellbent on not taking Sanogo out of the game in Big East play and not playing him down low defensively which is one of the reasons I'm advocating for playing them together for 4-5 minutes. Clingan wasn't getting enough minutes when he was at 15 minutes per game IMO and now he's a tick below 10 in Big East play.

Now that everyone has seen us play a bunch, good coaches are going to exploit what we're doing. Hurley clearly didn't impose our advantages on them and didn't make the counters last game, let's make the other coach make the counters. Let's see how we respond against Cooley and the Friars.

 

[CardiacAndre7]

I don’t think I’ve ever once claimed you said that. We agree that they’re good players. Just not the level of our players currently

I said they are good players. Your first sentence response was “Wouldn’t even start at UConn” as if that was what I was opining.

 

[Tenspro2002]

Strong offensive rebounding team that doesn't shoot a lot of 3s and is powered by undersized bigs, and a decent but not aggressive defense, actually seems like a decent matchup for us.

 

[AntG168]

I said they are good players. Your first sentence response was “Wouldn’t even start at UConn” as if that was what I was opining.

Just to put into perspective what type of “good” were talking about. We often times use that term to pump opposing teams up so that we won’t be as disappointed with a loss. We are the far and away better team. Their main “good” players would be role players over here. A loss here is not acceptable for this group

 

[ucp990411]

One way would be if we watched Freemantle and freaking Hunter humiliate Karaban. Sean Miller's biggest mistake on Saturday was not going to Freemantle more after Freemantle had 11 in the first 10 minutes. Freemantle would have scored 30 if I had been coaching Xavier because I would have isolated him on Karaban until Karaban was a human puddle on the court. There was no reason for Xavier to go to anyone else on Saturday.

Sanogo's defensive effort comes and goes, but he can defend a 4 like Freemantle when he wants to, and he forces Freemantle to play on both ends. I like Karaban's shooting and effort, but he does not have nearly the 1-on-1 offensive game that Sanogo has.

Fremantle stopped scoring when we put Andre on him because we went small and turned them over and we went our run in the last 10 minutes of the first half. Why we abandoned this in the 2nd half is a question for Dan Hurley that should be asked

 

[gtcam]

PC is not a team to be looked past. I don't care if they have all 5* or all walk-ons. They are always prepared to play UConn and no matter who is coaching them they seem to find a way to beat UConn.
I saw performances of some players on UConn at times this season that would have them sitting on the PC bench and performances by a few PC players at times this season that would have them competing for starter minutes at UConn.
Just win
Stop all this our guys are better than your guys crap. I felt that UConn was better on paper than Xavier but that was not the case on that particular day.

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

Oh, but he used the pronoun "we" a few times at the thread's beginning...

 

[gsmooth]

Strong offensive rebounding team that doesn't shoot a lot of 3s and is powered by undersized bigs, and a decent but not aggressive defense, actually seems like a decent matchup for us.

Croswell is a tough and grabs boards, but he and Clifton Moore really can't shoot outside of 7 ft from the basket. Sanogo and Clingan should be more comfortable in this matchup. Sanogo and Clingan have not outplayed their counterparts since the Butler game. I would like to see that change versus Providence.

 

[CardiacAndre7]

PC is not a team to be looked past. I don't care if they have all 5* or all walk-ons. They are always prepared to play UConn and no matter who is coaching them they seem to find a way to beat UConn.
I saw performances of some players on UConn at times this season that would have them sitting on the PC bench and performances by a few PC players at times this season that would have them competing for starter minutes at UConn.
Just win
Stop all this our guys are better than your guys crap. I felt that UConn was better on paper than Xavier but that was not the case on that particular day.

I don’t think Xavier is a better team overall than us, but they match up extremely well and are extremely well coached

 

[Tenspro2002]

So we’re not going deep in March if we don’t beat Providence on January 4th?! So, so clueless. Going deep in March has nothing to do with winning games you’re supposed to “win on paper” in early January. It has to do with peaking at that time, matchups, being healthy and often a bounce or two going your way. This game isn’t a layup and we’ve been getting by teams like Butler and Georgetown that Providence and Butler just blew out respectively. You could argue that’s because we have a target on our back. I would argue that your take is clueless.

"Peaking at the right time" is something that should concern us the way the team has looked over the last 3 games, given that it seems like we peaked late November/early December.

Yes, this game won't be easy, and yes, there is plenty of time to peak again later in the year, but this is a game that a #1 seed-type team should be able to control start to finish.