Why is everyone freaking out this season? | Page 3 | The Boneyard

Why is everyone freaking out this season?

I'm a glass half full kinda guy. I generally stay away from the negative stuff.
I'll leave the coaching to the man who as 11 championships, a 1,000+ victories, and all kinds of ridiculous streaks!
I like to think he knows what he's doing. :)
When the team is clicking (which is most of the time) they are really, really, REALLY
fun to watch! Go Huskies!!

P.S.: We ARE spoiled. ;)
 
Execution, execution, execution.

In a recent interview, Geno said (I paraphrase): "while winning is the obvious end result one hopes for--that's why we play this game--at UCONN we win a lot, so it's no big deal to win a game; the most important thing is, when you're walking out the door after a game, you don't want to say 'yes, we won, but I played lousy.'"

While for most coaches winning is the ultimate and only objective, for UCONN and Geno they have entered into the rarefied realm that winning has become simply a BY-PRODUCT of striving for perfect execution--for each player in her individual role, and for the team as a unit.

I think it is in the execution where much of the angst lies this season, compared to the last. For some reason I am not getting the vibe that the current team as a whole is executing as well as the last team, despite having played a less tough OOC scehdule. Much of this could be a teething problem when Geno has to integrate as talented a player as Z into the machinery, thus perhaps causing a temporary disruption to the dynamics of the whole team. Hopefully such a teething problem would be smoothed out come tournament time.
 
My opinion is that not "everyone" is freaking out. Perhaps more are than usual, but hyperbole often makes a bad situation worse. I, for one, am very content enjoying this year's team, even during the tense moments of the Texas game I was loving this team. At the same time, I saw some things that they will need to work on in order to make it 12 NCs. That's OK, in my opinion.
 
I know that we are undefeated. That is not the point. What bothers me most that half the team (now that AEH has departed) sits on the bench midway thru the season. What is the plan B if the top half fails? I did not enjoy at all when UConn trailed most opponents in 4th quarter scoring.

There was a post on McGraw's bench that said the Geno has built UConn from scratch developing players in the mid 80s and early 90s. Now he does not have to. He gets the cream of the crop of his own choosing and he builds a juggernaut. All that crash-landed today. I would like to know if he would have put in a concerted effort to develop the bench by the end of January without today's game.
 
trb123 said:
All that crash-landed today.
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I'm sorry but that is just way over the top hyperbolic. First you create a strawman (well actually take a strawman created by some unknown poster on an opponent's board that needs to justify their situation is just not their fault) and then you use a well fought win as a justification for that strawman?

I can't come close to agreeing with that.
 
tomcat said:
Well, now, this post is calling out something entirely different. If the issue is not what people are saying but how they are saying it, I could not agree more. I've noticed a certain level of snark on the board that we al could do without. But I did not think that was what Nan was referring to.
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The following was the post that Nan wrote that I responded to: I responded to the highlighted bold parts.

Because the angst is pervasive and it’s affecting the overall mood of the board to the point where people either don’t want to post or they’re afraid to. We know certain posters’ feelings about problems they may perceive yet these posters say it over and over again. There’s one poster with a favorite complaint and if I see it for the 150th time -this season!- I may put my fist through my monitor. And I think the count currently stands at 149.

Beyond that, some folks that are fretting feel the need to impose their angst. Let’s say someone posts something like, “I though Player X was great tonight. She scored 15 points and had 7 rebounds. I love to see her play” someone has to, has to like it’s a compulsion, point out that Player X only shot 4-12 and had 3 turnovers and they may preface their post with “you don’t know much about basketball”. The OP, who may not be particularly basketball savvy, may feel embarrassed and could potentially avoid posting so as not to be shown up again.

This is a real scenario. I’ve gotten emails and PMs and folks tell me theses stories when I meet them at games. And just look at this thread. It started out on one topic but posters felt the urgency of repeating the same complaints we’ve been reading since November.

I don’t care if people want to have threads for fretting over players and games. But why rain on everyone’s parade? If you think someone missed the turnovers and 33% field goal percentage, it’s not always necessary to ruin the game for them.
 
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HuskyNan said:
I don't remember ever seeing so much angst over an undefeated, #1 ranked team that's put on so many dominating performances in my life. I really do not get why some see disaster in every missed shot, impending doom in every turnover, and the team's imminent fall from the pinnacle with every narrow 30 point win. It's confounding.

Did these folks watch the games on tv this past week? How many of those other top 10 teams played a perfect game every single time? That's a rhetorical question because none of them did. The UConn team, and all of the teams, are made up of human beings who have good days and bad, just like you and me and every other person on this earth. If we expect them to be perfect every time, well, that's just unreasonable. Yet, invariably UConn fans will freak out if someone makes a mistake. It's stunning to me that we would expect 18-22 year old kids to be more perfect than we are ourselves.

I just don't get it.
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Because many on the forum went overboard with unrealistic expectations about this team being untouchable. Last year there were a couple basic weaknesses that the coaches had to really work around that are still there. And when good coaches with some talent to work with expose them somewhat, the natives get restless and need someone to blame.
 
1-- Other teams have scholarship players too.

2-- Too many posters believe that just because UCONN recruits you and you put on the jersey as a frosh that you are entitled to minutes and will easily get better and make the team better just by giving the player more minutes.

3-- Too many posters overrate freshmen. I can't believe how many people thought this class was super elite. Meg Walker is disappointing - but last year so was Danger. Because posters overrate freshmen. Relax. Meg will be fine in time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

4-- Impatient fans. Nervous fans.
 
eebmg said:
I think alot of us have our nerves on edge after last year's loss. Makes sense that every warning sign is discussed and assurances given. The fact that MSU looks better than last year is also on my mind at least.
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Last year's team was 36-1. It was a phenom season. Nobody expected that team to be like that. Well maybe tony etc. I can remember CD giving the story of the guy at the banquet saying "Nice season coach." I think many heard that recently on TV. What did CD say to the guy? "No! It wasn't a nice season. A nice season is 23-10. We were 36-1." I just don't get the feeling that most (not all) posters on here that are so worried about the bench and future years really agree with CD that last year was a terrific season. Then some of us get labelled as some type of homer.

We just beat a very good team tonight and there is angst about the bench instead of more celebration that we're undefeated and have played 1st or 2nd best schedule. It's really weird. Even this talk about Miss State? Who are they? Every year is different. We're supposed to be worried about them in January? UCONN is undefeated. But I do enjoy the dialogue.
 
CocoHusky said:
Low basketball IQ.
Unrealistic expectations.
Anonymity of cyber space.

The best reasoned differences of opinion on this board are about basketball because the game has so many different ways it can be played, enjoyed and strategized.

Some of the worst spite on this board are those that are based on the fallacy of UCONN WBB players being errorless basketball players, in reality no such player exists at UCONN or elsewhere.

If many of us were forced to verbalize (face to face) our opinions the tone of many post, at a minimum, would be far different.
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As concise and astute an assessment as I have ever seen.

Edit to add: I find that the maelstrom of the game threads is where most of the negative posting is concentrated. In the heat of the competitive moment, people spew out all sorts of frustration and exasperation. I personally don't enjoy partaking in that as a shared experience, and so it generally works better for me to stay clear. The other threads seem to be a bit more level-headed and equanimous. But of course, each poster's mileage may vary.
 
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We are Spoiled. We are used to winning every game by double digits and no competition. This team is number 1 in the country and many fans expect us to continue to win by double digits every game. Well we dont have Stewie anymore. She is the reason why we won 4 NCs and every game by double digits . Shes the difference between this years team last years team and every team for the next few years. With that said we are not like every other team...we are better only difference is we arent going to win every game by double digits or 30+ points especially against top teams. We may but lets not count on it. Leave that to me LOL .
 
We used to have a mechanism for dealing with all the negative nellies.
 
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dont mind me.jpg
 
I went to the game last night and I can't believe what I'm reading here this morning. Tons of threads with titles like, "UConn's Achilles Heel," "Why didn't UConn have a bench tonight?", "We've got some work to do", "So far... this looks a lot like last year (trouble)", etc. Not that each of those topics doesn't merit some discussion - this is not an attack on the OPs. But the reaction to last night's game just seems to be generally negative.

What I saw last night was a great college sports environment with a huge home court advantage for Texas, two great teams with great players who made great plays, a game that went down to the wire with the visiting #1 team making the plays necessary to win the game. Fantastic effort by Texas, but it wasn't quite enough. UConn prevailed, we are still undefeated and will undoubtedly still be ranked #1. I guess I would have enjoyed a blowout win, but that's not why I came. Put it this way - I ain't flying back to Texas for the SMU game. This was a great game and a great win - just don't know what all the worry and complaining is about. ??
 
j66kicker said:
I went to the game last night and I can't believe what I'm reading here this morning. Tons of threads with titles like, "UConn's Achilles Heel," "Why didn't UConn have a bench tonight?", "We've got some work to do", "So far... this looks a lot like last year (trouble)", etc. Not that each of those topics doesn't merit some discussion - this is not an attack on the OPs. But the reaction to last night's game just seems to be generally negative.

What I saw last night was a great college sports environment with a huge home court advantage for Texas, two great teams with great players who made great plays, a game that went down to the wire with the visiting #1 team making the plays necessary to win the game. Fantastic effort by Texas, but it wasn't quite enough. UConn prevailed, we are still undefeated and will undoubtedly still be ranked #1. I guess I would have enjoyed a blowout win, but that's not why I came. Put it this way - I ain't flying back to Texas for the SMU game. This was a great game and a great win - just don't know what all the worry and complaining is about. ??
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You make fair points BUT, the expectations were so high this year. People (from Stewie to Rebecca to Kara to other hoops experts)were quoted (numerous times in different ways) that "you better get UCONN this year (2016-2017) because next year they will be unbeatable".

Fans as well bought into the hype. Heck, we were a hair-width away from making the NC game without Azura, and any of the improvements from the players. Fast forward to this year - we got down big to both ND and Texas. I don't know if any reasonable fan expected that we'd "struggle" they way we apparently have this season. I expect us to handle SC, but L'ville looks like it will be a huge test for us. I honestly never thought we'd struggle the way we did to beat ND and Texas.

And I totally agree - it was a tremendous environment. But the team is simply not living up to the expectations most of us had for them this year. Perhaps it's due to the steps back Gabby and Napheesa seem to have taken. Perhaps our expectations were just too high. But this really was a season UCONN fans expected the team to roll thru the entire schedule. Perhaps Geno did not, but most fans did. Now we are seeing that the reality is different from what was expected, and the reactions are a result of that... :)
 
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EricLA said:
But the team is simply not living up to the expectations most of us had for them this year. Perhaps it's due to the steps back Gabby and Napheesa seem to have taken. Perhaps our expectations were just too high. But this really was a season UCONN fans expected the team to roll thru the entire schedule. Perhaps Geno did not, but most fans did. Now we are seeing that the reality is different from what was expected, and the reactions are a result of that... :)
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"Perhaps"
 
EricLA said:
You make fair points BUT, the expectations were so high this year. People (from Stewie to Rebecca to Kara to other hoops experts)were quoted (numerous times in different ways) that "you better get UCONN this year (2016-2017) because next year they will be unbeatable".

Fans as well bought into the hype. Heck, we were a hair-width away from making the NC game without Azura, and any of the improvements from the players. Fast forward to this year - we got down big to both ND and Texas. I don't know if any reasonable fan expected that we'd "struggle" they way we apparently have this season. I expect us to handle SC, but L'ville looks like it will be a huge test for us. I honestly never thought we'd struggle the way we did to beat ND and Texas.

And I totally agree - it was a tremendous environment. But the team is simply not living up to the expectations most of us had for them this year. Perhaps it's due to the steps back Gabby and Napheesa seem to have taken. Perhaps our expectations were just too high. But this really was a season UCONN fans expected the team to roll thru the entire schedule. Perhaps Geno did not, but most fans did. Now we are seeing that the reality is different from what was expected, and the reactions are a result of that... :)
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'Expectation is premeditated resentment. ' It is so true. I bought the hype, couldn't wait to see it happen and now I'm a little disappointed.
 
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Puppy Love said:
'Expectation is premeditated resentment. ' It is so true. I bought the hype, couldn't wait to see it happen and now I'm a little disappointed.
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Same here, although I did say after the big three left that we'd never see that kind of dominance again.
 
My expectation was that at this point in the season we'd be 16-0 and ranked #1. That's at least a fairly high expectation. In fact unrealistically high for everyone but us. And guess what - we're 16-0 and ranked #1. So we struggled against a couple top 10 teams - that's not allowed? (We did actually win both those games.) (And all our other games.) Hand wringing and complaining when we "struggled" against ECU and won by only 36?

I dunno. Texas played great last night - I was happy with the win.
 
j66kicker said:
My expectation was that at this point in the season we'd be 16-0 and ranked #1. That's at least a fairly high expectation. In fact unrealistically high for everyone but us. And guess what - we're 16-0 and ranked #1. So we struggled against a couple top 10 teams - that's not allowed? (We did actually win both those games.) (And all our other games.) Hand wringing and complaining when we "struggled" against ECU and won by only 36?

I dunno. Texas played great last night - I was happy with the win.
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Hear hear. I also think that much of the angst is because Texas hasn't played particularly well all year. Their performance against Tennessee was so dismal, I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it with my own eyes. And most of their other play has been lackluster and disjointed.

Let's imagine that Texas had beaten Tennessee and TCU (as most expected they would) and entered last night's game undefeated. The expectations would have leaned more toward a close and hard-fought encounter, much like what we got. And while there would've surely been plenty of teeth-gnashing to go around, perhaps it would have had less of a bitter edge.

Expectations. They're a funny, and dangerous, thing.
 
RockyMTblue2 said:
My working hypothesis: the oxymoron: social media. It is impersonal, anonymous and increasingly snarky. We are a stressed out and polarized society in which we react before we think as often as not.
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Astute hypothesis, Rocky (as usual). The “ready, fire, aim” mentality triumphs over rational consideration. What are the consequences of blurting out whatever bubbles to the surface? Just deny you said it or point out something said that was worse.
 
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