Sometimes you say, "If they had only done..." I'm not sure what they could have done differently.

[DogMania]

Being the glutton for punishment type that I am, I keep on playing the game over and over again in my head.

For the most part, I think their game plan was sound and they created a lot of good looks throughout the game, but simply missed far too many of them. Granted there was some standing around at times, some "trying to do too much plays" and some windshield wiper passing back-and-forth above the top of the key. But after watching the game a second time, I'm convinced that the Cuse gave up many more good looks to UConn than UConn allowed them.

If there was one thing I thing they could have done differently, was I would have liked to see Bazz and Boat split the zone with our shooters moving into open gaps with their feet set and ready to catch and shoot. What we saw was a lot of standing around watching those two take the shots themselves or turn it over in traffic in those situations.

I liked it when they were able to pass the ball to the foul line, but unfortunately the players who got the ball there either missed it, turned it over driving into traffic or kicked it right back out with no advantage gained. Sometimes they need to hold it a tad longer to let the D collapse, but when doing that, their teammates must move into passing lanes and be ready to catch and shoot or catch and drive.

You have to give SU some credit for how well they play their zone, collapse around the player who does catch it in the middle and close off passing lanes. If that player passes it out too quickly, no advantage is gained. If they hold it too long they get swallowed up and often forced into making a mistake.

Getting back on point, I thought they executed well enough to win that game. But as I pointed out in the past few games, that their inability to finish would cost them against better teams, and that's exactly what happened.

 

[UCHuskies08]

They missed a large number of wide open, make-able baskets, especially in the beginning of the game when we started 1-10(?). Olander missed another one toward the end of the game, I don't remember exactly what the scenario was.

 

[orangehomer]

if you were going to change anything it should be shot distribution. early in the game when napier made a couple of deep threes in some ways i thought that might be good for cuse, because every time napier shoots it means that lamb isn't and when he makes a couple he gets trigger happy. as an opponent if you gave me a choice going in to a game between napier versus lamb on who takes 17 shots and who takes 9 i would take my chances with napier every time. napier and boatright combined for 20 points on 7-26 shooting, as opposed to your 2 lottery picks who combined for 24 points on 11-19 shooting. why in the hell does napier shoot so much? he is much scarier as a distributor than a scorer.

 

[Gurleyman]

Olander's shot would have cut it to two. Boat had a nice clean look from 10 feet in the paint after splitting the defense late that he tried to bank and it didn't go, as well as the wide open 3 off the kickout that he missed when we were up four. He also had a stepback three down by 6 that was uncontested. Lamb's last shot was wide open in the corner off a nice screen by Drummond that he missed. I thought the little fadeaway Bazz had on the baseline (we might have been down four) was a clean, if somewhat difficult look, but it was frankly easier than some of the shots Cuse made late (Joseph's running bank, and the drifting 3 by Southerland).

We might have had a couple truly bad "normal" possessions in the last seven minutes - Napier was caught in the air for one turnover trying to force it on the drive, there was the Olander turnover on the bounce pass to Drummond's ankles, and we caught a break with Drummond catching the airball for the dunk. The last 45 seconds was bad, since we killed too much clock doing nothing, and ended up with either Napier forcing a long three or killing 10 seconds to get Drummond a lay-up. But I'm not considering those normal possessions - that was desperation time.

 

[nelsonmuntz]

I would have changed the lineup on the court. UConn NEEDS Smith or Oriakhi on the court at all times. The defense sucks if they aren't there, and there is no rebounding either. I think Boat gets too many minutes.

 

[VAHuskyFan]

I have no problem with Boat's minutes. He is the quickest guy we have distributing the basketball and he actually attacks the D. When Napier is the sole PG, he is too often content to toss the ball around the perimeter for 30 seconds and settle for a low probability last-second shot. Boatright forces the defense to react to him -- he's the spark this team needs on offense. The kid also gives 110% all the time. He pulled down more boards per minute of playing time than AO did today.

 

[Stinger92860]

I would have liked Niels on the floor for more minutes. He made a difference in his short time onthe floor. Hit a 3, rebound and D. BUT his TO's caused Coach to keep him on the bench.

 

[willie99]

I would have changed the lineup on the court. UConn NEEDS Smith or Oriakhi on the court at all times. The defense sucks if they aren't there, and there is no rebounding either. I think Boat gets too many minutes.

I concur with RS & AO. Not so much with RB

 

[mauconnfan]

I concur with RS & AO. Not so much with RB

Which Rosce? I agree on AO, the 4 fouls should have been disregarded at the 5 minute mark and let him play his way out. But as far as Roscoe WVU he had zero rebounds in 19 minutes, count em. Yesterday was as bad and a couple early bricks seemed to take him out of the game.......then having him and Andre on the court when a team will give up fouls? Not a good move.....Giffey deserved Rocsoes minutes yesterday from what I saw and should have been in....Boat needed to make that 8 foot floater and the game would've been different.

This is our biggest flaw....different guys just not showing up to play form the frontcourt, no consistency and noone to lean on every game!!

 

[August_West]

This was a tough one in that we had it. That game was ours. We needed a couple breaks and didn't get them.

Perfect storm of shots not falling (lambs 3, boats 3, boats bank shot), any one of those stems the tide, bad decisions( napier not giving the ball up on the break) , bad luck (Napier losing the ball out of bounds on a semi break, the bounce of the ball that gave southerland an open 3 after a great stop).... And bad passing into the foul line after good passes the first 36 minutes. Get just one or 2 of all the above items to change and we win that game.

Problem is that we lost that game exactly the same way we won the WV game. The mojo gods giveth and taketh away.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Drumguy]

Usually you're spot on DM, this time I disagree.

The slowdown was a calculated risk once Alex went to the bench. We were having our way with them and we told our guys to hesitate and hold off - wrong message. Then we didn't put Alex back in with 5 to go.

Too much one on one - there was a point with a minute or half a minute left where Jeremy just stood there and didn't try to get open.

So add to it - we needed a sense of urgency with 2 minutes left which did not happen. Too much time wasted.

 

[jibsey]

Being the glutton for punishment type that I am, I keep on playing the game over and over again in my head.

For the most part, I think their game plan was sound and they created a lot of good looks throughout the game, but simply missed far too many of them. Granted there was some standing around at times, some "trying to do too much plays" and some windshield wiper passing back-and-forth above the top of the key. But after watching the game a second time, I'm convinced that the Cuse gave up many more good looks to UConn than UConn allowed them.

If there was one thing I thing they could have done differently, was I would have liked to see Bazz and Boat split the zone with our shooters moving into open gaps with their feet set and ready to catch and shoot. What we saw was a lot of standing around watching those two take the shots themselves or turn it over in traffic in those situations.

I liked it when they were able to pass the ball to the foul line, but unfortunately the players who got the ball there either missed it, turned it over driving into traffic or kicked it right back out with no advantage gained. Sometimes they need to hold it a tad longer to let the D collapse, but when doing that, their teammates must move into passing lanes and be ready to catch and shoot or catch and drive.

You have to give SU some credit for how well they play their zone, collapse around the player who does catch it in the middle and close off passing lanes. If that player passes it out too quickly, no advantage is gained. If they hold it too long they get swallowed up and often forced into making a mistake.

Getting back on point, I thought they executed well enough to win that game. But as I pointed out in the past few games, that their inability to finish would cost them against better teams, and that's exactly what happened.

We saw a lot of windshield wiper in the last 10 minutes. If Bazz and Boat wait until the shot clock is down to 10 and then try to penetrate, it's a disadvantage, even though they were trying to slow SU down. Penetrating that zone off the dribble is going to cause turnovers but you can't stop that, and Lamb should have been moving more to make himself available to shoot. Tired?Lazy? I don't know.

 

[businesslawyer]

We needed to make more plays and make more shots. They were there. The only thing I would have done differently is get AO back on the floor with 5 minutes left, when we were down as little as one. And I firmly believe that might have made a difference.

 

[DogMania]

We needed to make more plays and make more shots. They were there. The only thing I would have done differently is get AO back on the floor with 5 minutes left, when we were down as little as one. And I firmly believe that might have made a difference.

Perception verses reality. What's real interesting is that I along with many seem to think that Alex had a big game when he was in there but to my surprise here's what his line was for the game:

​

Alex Oriakhi 17 min, 1-5 1 ORB 3 RBs 4 Blks 3 Pts

That one spin-a-rama left such a lasting image in our mind, we all think, if only Alex was on the floor more we would have won.

Now maybe he actually did more that didn't show up in the box score. I found it strange that JC gave Tyler so many minutes. I think it was because he has been capable of knocking down that foul line J, but he didn't seem to do enough of that. But look at his box:

Tyler Olander 26 min 2-7 FG 4 ORBs 8 RBs 4 Asst 4 pts

Although some of Tyler's 5 misses were wide open looks and huge misses, he did a really nice job on the boards on both ends and 4 assists in just 26 minutes from your 4 is pretty good. Some of these numbers seem to point to JC giving TO some well earned minutes.

Roscoe had turned things around the past couple weeks, returning to his post season form of last season, but he had a forgetful 13 minutes, mostly from the first half.

Roscoe Smith 13 Min 0-6 FGs 0-3 3ptFGs 1-4 FTS 2 RBs 1 Pt

The more I watch this team, the more I'm convinced that they need Alex and/or Roscoe to play like they did last post-season for them to beat top tier teams. Neither did much in the the WVU game, though Alex did have 6 pts and 4 blocks. As much as it's hard for JC to keep putting one or both out there when they're struggling, he needs to keep on doing it and find a way to convince them that they can and will help this team. I'm not saying don't give Tyler or Giffey a few minutes here and there, but IMO, those two don't have the game changing ceiling that Alex and Tyler can bring to the game. I don't know who it was but someone posted the other day that JC should stick to a 6 man rotation (AD, Alex, Scoe, Lamb, Bazz, Boatright) and giving Giffey a few minutes here and there. I wonder if this team should live or die with those six. It's hard to do that when a player goes 0-6 and 1-4 in his first 13 minutes though.

 

[Edward Sargent]

if you were going to change anything it should be shot distribution. early in the game when napier made a couple of deep threes in some ways i thought that might be good for cuse, because every time napier shoots it means that lamb isn't and when he makes a couple he gets trigger happy. as an opponent if you gave me a choice going in to a game between napier versus lamb on who takes 17 shots and who takes 9 i would take my chances with napier every time. napier and boatright combined for 20 points on 7-26 shooting, as opposed to your 2 lottery picks who combined for 24 points on 11-19 shooting. why in the hell does napier shoot so much? he is much scarier as a distributor than a scorer.

You are correct