Not Ready for Prime Time

Basketball
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Two early tests, two early losses.

11 for 32 from deep in the two losses. 34 of 67 in the three wins. On the big stage, our attempt rate is down 1/3rd (22.3 to 16) and our make % is down a third (51% to 34%). Combined, we are making about 6 less three pointers per game on the big stage. Credit the Alabama and Auburn defenses for some of those six, but a couple of them are on us.

This team is uber talented and deep and clearly plays great defense. That combination alone is going to win a lot of games and blow out a lot of lesser foes.

But there’s something missing right now when we play equally talented teams, and I can’t put my finger on it other than maybe leadership or chemistry. Shead left some big shoes to fill.

I have faith in Coach Sampson that he will diagnose the issue correctly and prescribe the right antidote. This team will get better. It has all the ingredients necessary for a national title contender.

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The loss of Shead impacted team leadership more than fans realize. Someone needs to step up.

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Well said. I just think we need Francis and TA at all systems go. They clearly aren’t in these big time games where the competition ramps up. Sampson is being extremely careful with TA.

And Uzan has to learn to stay in the game and not foul himself out.

And hopefully Mercy will continue to get more comfortable as the season goes on. We will need him.

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Both games could have gone either way.

We are a very good team, but we aren’t head and shoulders above other very good teams.

March is 4 months away. It all gets down to who gets better.

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I actually like losing these type of games early.

Just wanted that 1.5 million for our kids.

But this reminds me of the Wisconsin lost that last time we were in Vegas.

That team went to the elite 8 and was one cold shooting night from another final four.

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Uzan only played 12 minutes last night and we had 30 fouls. We were also outrebounded by nine.

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I agree. I hope we win every game BUT winning both of these games would have us ranked #2 (maybe #1) and with a false sense of how good we really are.

We are good, Natty potential good. But there are lots of areas that need to improve.

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That’s your ballgame right there.

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Posted in the game thread but this thread has the folks I wanna be talking to @Joprior23 :eyes:

Yeah our rebounding isn’t what it has been when all 3 of our starting guards don’t really board at a high level.

Sharp has been awesome diving on balls and making toughness plays, but the reality is him and LJ are vertically challenged.

Maybe Uzan can find that dawg in him to help d board for us…

But it was surprising to see Auburn bang with us down there.

And MAN I love Ramon but he looks outmatched at the 4 spot.

Javier needs to stop trying to make a post move… he won’t do that if he plays overseas and he shouldn’t try and show people he’s been working on his game now…

TA and Mercy peaking towards the middle of conference play would be a blessed sight to see.

Am I wrong to think I like Lath at the 5 with Jwan or JoJo at the 4 more than Ramon at the 4?

As much as he scares the shiiii outta me I respect Malik’s idgaf mindset. Would love to see him never running the point tho.

And really the pressure/denying from Bama and Auburn gave us trouble… would love Uzan to be able to settle us and get jwan/cryer the ball in the spots they like. But he’s gotta be on the floor to do that.

I still contend that there is very little difference between Auburn, Kansas, Duke, Alabama, Gonzaga, Iowa St and us.

2 one possession losses against elite elite teams. And I trust CKS more than any coach in the country to have addressed their issues by February/March.

If our Final Four odds went up after this… BUY THE DIP lol

UConn may be fugged tho. At least we didn’t lose to Memphis and CU :rofl:

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Two things turn the tide in our two losses:

  1. Uzan on the floor. Need a better whistle and/or get him defending without fouling.

  2. TA healthy enough to be on the floor in crunch time. He is the only guy on the roster currently who has that Tramon quality of being able to get to a spot on the floor and create a good shot for himself. He’s our closer.

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I see what you did there

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Part of our problem last year and so far this year is that we look lost on offense when our #1 point guard leaves the game. Milos has been in foul trouble in both Auburn and Alabama and both times we had struggled to maintain a rhythm on offense. Heck even go back to that Duke game once Shead rolled his ankle the offense was toast.

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Also about last night. I thought we had an absurd amount of balls that we either blocked or saved from going out of bounds that went straight to a Alabama player who then had a easy uncontested bucket. I don’t know if that was just bad luck or positioning.

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Yep, at least two saves that went to Bama for easy baskets. A few blocks went that way too. Frustrating

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On a positive note, both losses were there for the taking. They just need to learn how to close them out.

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Our two losses sucked but it’s not like we got crushed. They were both very winnable.

We have some stuff to work out but we could have won both games and not been that much better.

I’m confident the staff use these losses to make us better. We clearly aren’t “there” yet but we also aren’t far away.

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I think we’re still having some issues with defensive rotations, especially when Tugler is in the game. We need Tugler’s aggressiveness and shot-blocking, but the other guys are going to have to adjust to cover the space he vacates when he does that, and we’re just not very good at it right now.

It actually seemed like we played better defense around the basket later in the game when people were a little bit tired and also trying not to foul.

On offense, the thing that’s missing is guards forcing the issue one-on-one. Uzan and Sharp can do that when they’re in the game, but foul trouble changes everything. Mylik and TA can also fill that role to some extent. Cryer shouldn’t be the guy to dribble into the lane and engage the defense like that - he just isn’t big enough.

I think we’re really close.

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100% agree. Tugler is still getting beat because of inexperience and JR needs to be there to back him up at the rim and it seems that JR is often out defending the perimeter and nobody is left underneath when Tugler gets beat.

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Yeah, seemed like Bama got easy uncontested baskets on 6 of JoJo’s 8 blocks.

Never seen anything like it.

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Watching the game in person, you can see the offense stagnates when Uzan is not in the game. I though Mercy looked while he was out there. Shead could break down a defense and take a game over. We don’t have that this year. Not ready for prime time? Prime time is in March. We’ve never had ooc games like this, this early in the season. UCONN has lost to Memphis and Colorado. Not in the Auburn/Alabama class. Guess they’re not ready for prime time yet either. There’s still time to workout the kinks.’

Games like last night are why I never bet on basketball. Referees have too great of an impact on the game. Last night’s game they were inconsistent in their calls which had an impact on the game

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