That wasn't basketball, but better times ahead

[Dream Jobbed 2.0]

The team needs confidence. Some arrogance, "swagger". Adams has shown it but it needs to be collective. They seem scared and don't come out hitting first

What do you mean don't come out hitting? Brimah was punching dudes!

 

[UConnSwag11]

What do you mean don't come out hitting? Brimah was punching dudes!

Yeah, but it wasn't Hess!!

 

[justgoplay]

1) I don't know if the problem is our big men or the stupid offense we run. We run almost all isolations with kick outs for 3's, and penetration always starts 25-30 feet from the basket. Over half the 3's are from passes around the perimeters turning into contested shots. How many times a game do you say "nice cut" with UConn? Me neither. There is a lot of standing around too. Most of the action, if it happens at all, is some form of a pick and roll. 3 guys standing around watching 2 players run a pick and roll is fine if you are the mid 90's Utah Jazz, but a college team has to have more movement. Cincinnati was running a lot of cross action yesterday, which forces the defenders to at least, you know, play defense.

I addition to creating more open shots, a more active offense creates more fouls and make help defense a split second slower, which is often the difference between an open and contested shot. UConn's best teams also ran a lot of the offense through the high post. I am a big fan of that setup.

2) It seems like we foul a lot on defense. I am not just talking about yesterday, but all year. I will not get too worked up about it because we were so young this year, but fouling is not defense.

3) George Blaney was as bad a game coach as I have ever seen on a major college sideline, but he was a wizard with the bigs and we really miss him. The frontcourt of Brimah and Facey should have been a lot better.

4) The officials were bad yesterday and were definitely a factor, but a Cincinnati team that shot 68% from the line during the season shoots 82% in the biggest game of their season. If Cincinnati only hits 2/3's of their free throws, we win that game. Nice work by Cincinnati.

#4) Is spot on.....Before yesterday I was not that impressed with Kevin Ollie, but his game plan yesterday gave you guys the best chance to win. Make Cincinnati beat us at the line. As a Bearcat fan, fortunately we were able to knock them down. I am sure Ollie questioned his players manhood after they kinda' went thru the motions and did not really compete the previous two times they played Cincinnati. Yesterday he got his guys to play like warriors, if we are gonna' get beat we're gonna' go down swinging. I believe Ollie's goal was to muck things up, shorten the game, don't let Cincinnati impose their will on us, and force them to make free throws. He was right where he wanted to be with about three minutes to go. The game had no flow, and was brutal to watch. No way it should take two and one half hours to play a regulation college basketball game. I believe after Clark got the tooth knocked out, the refs biggest fear was a fight. If they have to blow the whistle on every possession they will blow the whistle every possession, but there ain't gonna' be no fights. Our reputation probably contributed to this. Big props to Ollie and your team, they played like warriors yesterday.

 

[mauconnfan]

Durham has so much upside. He reminds me of Vin Baker.

and lets not forget how young Enoch is. He turns 20 in Sept, huge upside there as well but he needs to lose bad weight and get quicker.

Polley looks like a guy who will be able to rebound from day one.

Much to look forward to next year for Basketball and Football.

Just look at this video. I realize it's HS not college d1. But if you don't see what can be then you're nuts. Not sure why as of yet, thinking that he's just not confident enough this year of the new knee and needs to get stronger, but there's some huge upside here as metsfan points out and that's exciting.

 

[EBonz30]

1) Cincinnati is a better basketball team than UConn right now and deserved to win.

2) They also deserve to know that UConn did that with two starters tied behind its back. Make hay while the sun shines, kids, because next year will look a lot different for both programs.

3) For a guy who really hasn't won a blessed thing, Mick Cronin is pretty chippy.

4) Hiring Karl Hess to work a game where the conference finally has a decent slot on national television is something the dopey ass holes in the American offices need to be meeting about on Monday at 8 am.

5) I am agnostic on whether the conference should expand with Wichita State. Houston, Cincy and SMU are obviously on the right path to some extent and Tulsa and Temple are experiencing some short term issues, so I think they'll be okay. UCF is working. Tulane and USF are garbage and will be garbage. Bottom line - conference needs to get better. That starts with scheduling better. Also, the conference needs UConn to be the flagship so perhaps we should start on that next year.

6) Lots of bad happened this year and it's the worst year we've had since the 80's. I'd like to see a change on the staff. We have a relatively inexperienced head coach and a few pure neophytes at the end of the bench. I liked the addition of DK last year and think we are at least one move away from having the staff we need. Player development is not what it should be and this is not a sentimental business.

Kevin Ollie needs to be better during games - we had some off the wall rotations early in the year, but I guess that settled when he lost 40% of his starting lineup. His team needs to be better prepared to start games and halves and he needs to find a way to keep his team engaged. You cannot be successful giving up the number of runs they do. No more fn around.

7) Recruiting simply needs to improve. I think it's heading in the right direction, so I believe it will. We have guards for miles and miles. Adding Alterique next year will move Jalen off the ball and I think that will be like throwing gasoline on a fire - he's going to blow up. Vital was a steal, MAL is a future star, etc. Larrier, Jackson and Polley will be fine. Durham will be much better and he'll be a mismatch at times with his range.

But the rest of them. Enoch just isn't very good at this point and the guys coming in are all questions marks to some degree. I've pinned my hopes on some incremental improvement from Enoch and Carlton being better than advertised. Diarra and Cobb are muscle and hopefully add depth. But...going forward, we need to recruit better bigs. Projects and duct tape are not working all that well.

8) Players. The end of a senior year is like a clean slate. I no longer care about missed layups or rebounds or whatever else. Rodney, Amidah and Kentan always showed up for work, never did a blessed thing to embarrass the school and are about the nicest trio of graduates we've known. They genuinely love the school.

I like what we have coming back. I think next year is going to be a bumpy one if for no other reason than we're adding a ton of new pieces and the team will be very young. Back court is set, wings are set....just need the front court to surprise.

And I hate the American Conference for being so freaking stupid that they hired Karl Hess to officiate a tournament game in one of the few decent national television showcases they've had. Someone needs to be shot.

Agreed on every point, very well stated and done.

Big ups to Mr. Fishy!

 

[upstater]

Absolutely. We have to quit recruiting ghostly, stick figure bigs with zero chance of adding any real bulk to their frames. These guys all get tossed around like rag dolls by any team with one or more wide bodies down low. We need Okafors, or at least some Freeman/Selvie/White/Boone/Adrien/Okwandu types that can bang with the big boys underneath the basket. I'm tired of these 98 pound weaklings getting sand kicked in their faces at the beach, like in the old Charles Atlas cartoon ads.

Half the guys you named showed up as Charles Atlas weaklings not to even mention Thabeet. Adrien was the exception there. I mean, you listed Okwandu.

 

[gtcam]

Fairly good read Fishy but still looking up what the hell an off the wall rotation is and can only come up with home improvement stuff
I wrote an email Aresco but am not holding my breath to hear back
As far as adding a team - would like to see something close to UConn - Dayton, URI - both have young up and coming coaches
One move away from your desired staff - can anyone guess who you want to move and who you want in? Ricky M is a good recruiter.
I love to see how some people place the lulls and runs squarely on KO shoulders - oh well just shaking my head - sometimes 6 kids do lose engagement when they are dead tired - we all saw the difference of JA yesterday after a 1st half rest
Liked your take on the seniors

And yes, George was/is a good game coach
Carmen was in the house Friday and Saturday

 

[gtcam]

#4) Is spot on.....Before yesterday I was not that impressed with Kevin Ollie, but his game plan yesterday gave you guys the best chance to win. Make Cincinnati beat us at the line. As a Bearcat fan, fortunately we were able to knock them down. I am sure Ollie questioned his players manhood after they kinda' went thru the motions and did not really compete the previous two times they played Cincinnati. Yesterday he got his guys to play like warriors, if we are gonna' get beat we're gonna' go down swinging. I believe Ollie's goal was to muck things up, shorten the game, don't let Cincinnati impose their will on us, and force them to make free throws. He was right where he wanted to be with about three minutes to go. The game had no flow, and was brutal to watch. No way it should take two and one half hours to play a regulation college basketball game. I believe after Clark got the tooth knocked out, the refs biggest fear was a fight. If they have to blow the whistle on every possession they will blow the whistle every possession, but there ain't gonna' be no fights. Our reputation probably contributed to this. Big props to Ollie and your team, they played like warriors yesterday.

Is this a joke or did AACRrigns enlist his little brother to sign of on another of his foolish ramblings?

 

[uconnfan68]

Agree, Aresco needs to be questioned by the media on this stupid referee selection move. This should be the last time Hess works an AAC game - period.
Also , the staff needs upgrading with a true Bigs Coach.

Wasn't all Hess, the other 2 were terrible also. Burke even commented on that at one point. Bottom line, they lost control in the first 2 minutes.

 

[junglehusky]

Why not go full derp and play five guards ALL THE DAMN TIME?

 

[selles]

How many times a game do you say "nice cut" with UConn? Me neither.

I agree with this point in general, but this seems like a good spot to note that over the past couple games Vital had several of the nicest hard cuts without the ball I've seen from a UConn player in years. Not sure where it came from, but hope he keeps it up next year.

 

[Glastonhusky]

Durham has so much upside. He reminds me of Vin Baker.

and lets not forget how young Enoch is. He turns 20 in Sept, huge upside there as well but he needs to lose bad weight and get quicker.

Polley looks like a guy who will be able to rebound from day one.

Much to look forward to next year for Basketball and Football.

I noticed the same thing about Enoch's weight. Yes we need his bulk, but he needs to turn some of that bulk into lean muscle. I hope he can work with a trainer this off season to make that happen.

 

[The Funster]

I don't want to add any teams at this point. We need to see if some rivalries can develop (I'm serious). If this is going to be our home we can't keep adding teams to the mix, IMO.

Cincy was the better team and deserved to win. The refs were awful and made bad calls on both teams. Cincy was better at forcing contact and then made their foul shots. Credit to them.

Count me among the few here that actually likes Mick Cronin. He's a classic underdog guy and coaches with a chip on his shoulder and doesn't hide it. He won't ever win an NC but I still like him.

Losing 40% of our starting lineup may have been the best thing that ever happened to Ollie's Huskies. The first two games were an abomination. It looked like another season of swinging the ball around the perimeter until someone was forced to make something happen one on one as the shot clock wound down. After the shock of losing Gibson and Larrier faded a rudimentary offensive philosophy or system began to emerge. Ollie needs to build on it.

Ollie needs to bring someone in from outside to sit next to him on the bench. A new voice is needed. Think George Blaney.

 

[Ts5034]

Just look at this video. I realize it's HS not college d1. But if you don't see what can be then you're nuts. Not sure why as of yet, thinking that he's just not confident enough this year of the new knee and needs to get stronger, but there's some huge upside here as metsfan points out and that's exciting.

Im not saying this as a knock on Durham, I think he can develop into a nice player for us, but I was honestly more impressed with Tony Bradley in that video. I looked up his stats and he averaged 7 points and 5 rebounds a game this year as a Freshman for North Carolina. Keep in mind he is playing in the ACC. Those are the kind of front court players we need to start recruiting, and more importantly developing. I agree that we need bigs that have more size and strength.

 

[Tenspro2002]

And Freeman is not a coach.

How are there still folks who have no clue that a Director of Basketball Operations is not a coach?

I know that Freeman is Director of Basketball Ops and isn't a coach. But do you really think he'd take that position without an expectation of eventually joining the bench?

My point is: UConn alumnus status should not automatically put your resume at the top of the pile. We need more diversity of perspective, not less.

 

[Matrim55]

Im not saying this as a knock on Durham, I think he can develop into a nice player for us, but I was honestly more impressed with Tony Bradley in that video. I looked up his stats and he averaged 7 points and 5 rebounds a game this year as a Freshman for North Carolina. Keep in mind he is playing in the ACC. Those are the kind of front court players we need to start recruiting, and more importantly developing. I agree that we need bigs that have more size and strength.

Yeah, why doesn't Ollie just go out there and beat UNC for more 5-star recruits?

 

[ConnHuskBask]

I guess if we replace a games with USF or Tulane it would be a good thing. Especially for a BPI/SOS standpoint and if the tourney credits almost offset 1 new add, I guess I'd be OK with it..

That being said, why in the world is it Wichita that is the first choice? If it's me I'm talking VCU. I believe they've made the tourney 6 straight seasons, including a Final 4, have had sustained success over multiple coaches and the biggest thing is they aren't in Kansas.

 

[JMick]

Just look at this video. I realize it's HS not college d1. But if you don't see what can be then you're nuts. Not sure why as of yet, thinking that he's just not confident enough this year of the new knee and needs to get stronger, but there's some huge upside here as metsfan points out and that's exciting.

Durham will be good. It's just a matter of when. Hopefully with a full off-season he will gain some more strength and get his confidence back.

 

[aceboon]

I know that Freeman is Director of Basketball Ops and isn't a coach. But do you really think he'd take that position without an expectation of eventually joining the bench?

My point is: UConn alumnus status should not automatically put your resume at the top of the pile. We need more diversity of perspective, not less.

Dude do you not realize that Freeman just got passed up for an assistant opportunity last year with the Killings hiring? If his resume was at the top of the pile due to his alumni status then why is he still the director of basketball ops when there was just an opening last year?

 

[SubbaBub]

There was nothing wrong with the offensive system we saw this past week. The problem was the lack of intelligent execution by the players. Still too many poor decisions in shot selection and too many empty trips. And yesterday, the biggest problem is that Brimah was and absolute no show on both ends. Catch, fake, swarmed by defenders a weak shot attempt, turnover, hand clap. Need a big next year that can catch and either go up strong or kick it out consistently. And everything needs to be crisper. Cincy had time to triple the ball on almost every catch inside the arc.

 

[Doctor Hoop]

Is this a joke or did AACRrigns enlist his little brother to sign of on another of his foolish ramblings?

Definitely a joke. Either that or he "watched" the game by only reading the box score.

 

[intlzncster]

Kevin Ollie needs to be better during games - we had some off the wall rotations early in the year, but I guess that settled when he lost 40% of his starting lineup. His team needs to be better prepared to start games and halves and he needs to find a way to keep his team engaged. You cannot be successful giving up the number of runs they do. No more fn around.

Totally agree on room for improvement. We as fans should give him that room though. People are looking at him as a static from a coaching perspective, and it's mind boggling. The fact that he is so young and inexperience bodes really well for the future in terms of individual development. He's got more 'potential' if you were. I don't know why people expected a finished product coming into his career. We weren't getting a very experience coach, never mind an HOF guy, with KO coming in.

7) Recruiting simply needs to improve. I think it's heading in the right direction, so I believe it will. We have guards for miles and miles. Adding Alterique next year will move Jalen off the ball and I think that will be like throwing gasoline on a fire - he's going to blow up. Vital was a steal, MAL is a future star, etc. Larrier, Jackson and Polley will be fine. Durham will be much better and he'll be a mismatch at times with his range.

Recruiting down low does need to improve. A lot of that was previous sanctions and missing out on top targets. Can't do anything about the first, but the send can be addressed. Maybe starts with identifying targets you can get, and casting a bit wider net with regards to those guys? Leave to top guys aside, and go hard after a wider set of the 2nd tier, instead of settling for 3rd tier, when you've missed out on the first.

Player development is not what it should be and this is not a sentimental business.

This is very much related to recruiting though. If you don't recruit good players with high ceilings, how can you expect them to develop? Garbage in = garbage out--not saying our guys are garbage at all mind you.

Guys are developing: on this team, see Jalen, the two freshman, Facey did at the end. Sometimes it falls on the players themselves.

I like what we have coming back. I think next year is going to be a bumpy one if for no other reason than we're adding a ton of new pieces and the team will be very young. Back court is set, wings are set....just need the front court to surprise.

Gonna be more bumpy than people think, especially at the start, given the front loaded schedule. It's not just incorporating a lot of pieces, but having guys back from a lot of time off basketball because of injuries. One guy languishing in the Juco game. Lot of sophomores and freshman. Few upperclassmen.

Having a stud experienced combo guard is an incredible blessing (see Kemba). Oddly, Durham getting his feet under him this year is an incredible blessing as well. Beginning of the year, I wanted him to redshirt. But now, I want him to hit the ground running, and playing this year was the best way to do that.

 

[Matrim55]

Oddly, Durham getting his feet under him this year is an incredible blessing as well. Beginning of the year, I wanted him to redshirt. But now, I want him to hit the ground running, and playing this year was the best way to do that.

If Durham stays healthy, he's going to be a big gddmn problem for EVERYBODY next year. Cincy couldn't keep him off the offensive glass yesterday, and that's with him playing at about 30% of his potential.

Please Stay Healthy Please Stay Healthy Please Stay Healthy Please Stay Healthy Please Stay Healthy Please Stay Healthy

 

[whaler11]

I guess if we replace a games with USF or Tulane it would be a good thing. Especially for a BPI/SOS standpoint and if the tourney credits almost offset 1 new add, I guess I'd be OK with it..

That being said, why in the world is it Wichita that is the first choice? If it's me I'm talking VCU. I believe they've made the tourney 6 straight seasons, including a Final 4, have had sustained success over multiple coaches and the biggest thing is they aren't in Kansas.

Nobody in their right mind would leave the A-10 for the AAC as a basketball only.

 

[ConnHuskBask]

Nobody in their right mind would leave the A-10 for the AAC as a basketball only.

You don't think so? Still feel like head to toe the AAC is a better hoops league even if it isn't the hoop centric league the A10 is.

In the A10 the games are barely even televised.