Gooooooooooooooood evening AU Eagles fans! I hope you're all well-rested and ready to go for another fun time here with the GOOD, the BAD, and the UGLY. This game certainly had elements of all three. I have to come clean, I was working my way through a plate of kung pao chicken with my dad and sister while the game was going on, but I tried to do my homework and get a picture of exactly what happened against the Florida Gators. I'd like a little help with this one (though admittedly, I've already had some). If you feel I missed something or got something wrong, please let me have it in the comments. Sometimes I need a little help from my friends, or at least anonymous blog community members who post insightful things that I don't think of but then agree with. Anyway: box score, recap, and off we go!
THE GOOD
Contributor Vidulicious - With me spending quality time with the family, and the squirrels that run Josh's hometown Internet company apparently dead, dying, or missing, we were about to be SOL on having the liveblog tonight. Luckily, Vidulicious came through and administrated the liveblog in a way that makes him Rookie of the Week here at the Hoops Blog. Thanks, Joe, you're a lifesaver!
Nick Hendra - A team-high 15 points. A game- and career-high 13 rebounds. A second career double-double. No player on this team has benefited more from the arrival of Vlad the Impaler than Nick Hendra, who in the last four games (since Vlad came on) has averaged 14 points and 7 rebounds. He's been a force. Now, tonight he did have 5 turnovers, but he also gave us 37 minutes. I'm willing to overlook that in light of his other contributions tonight. Great work, Nick!
Vlad the Impaler - 14 points and 4 assists in 20 minutes on 5-9 shooting and 4-6 from behind the arc? Very solid. What's not solid? The 4 fouls he picked up that limited him to 20 minutes. More on that later.
Joe Hill - Maybe JJ reads the blog or something? Joe Hill got some minutes tonight, and he apparently had the green light to shoot from behind the arc. He went 2-5 from the field (all five shots from behind the arc), but he also picked up 3 personal fouls. Not sure exactly what was up with them, maybe I can get some help in the comments from those who saw the game.
Shooting in the second half - 15/29 from the field and 8/16 from behind the arc? Very nice! We actually outscored the Gators in the second half and kept the score respectable. Nice work!
The beginning of the second half - We actually came out and didn't slump. In fact, we came out and played them evenly at the beginning of the second half. Nice work, JJ!
THE BAD
Stephen Lumpkins - As was so deftly pointed out in the liveblog, "I think what has been lost in Vlad's addition to the team is Lumpkin's presence on the court." Very astute. Lumpkins has not been scoring very much since Vlad came into the picture, and tonight was no different. Just 5 points tonight on 1-5 shooting with 5 rebounds in 26 minutes. He's really become more of a periphery player instead of the inside force he was at the beginning of the season. He didn't even start tonight. Maybe Coach wants to see him improve his finishing in practice before he gets the start again. You know we love you, Lumpkins, but tonight was not your best.
Vlad the Impaler's Propensity for Fouling - In the four games he's played, Vlad has 14 total fouls. 2 games with 4 fouls (tonight included) and 2 with 3. Vlad is averaging almost 18 points a game but only 25 minutes a game. He might be averaging 26-27 points a game if he could actually stay on the court for a longer period of time. I mean, in 1-2 games, fine, maybe I'm inclined to say "the refs called too tight a game." But this is a pattern now. Not isolated incidents. Whatever you're doing to get these ticky-tack fouls, Vlad, stop. You're too valuable for us to have to keep you on the bench.
Jeff Jones's Not Playing Mike Bersch - Here's your little piece of Speculation Tuesday: "Why isn't Mike Bersch playing?" My personal guess is that Jeff Jones thinks he doesn't know the sets. I saw/heard Mike get yelled at more than a few times for not being where he was supposed to be on set plays. Hence the drastic reduction in his play time since the Howard game. Still, he was an outside menace, and I really think we could use him. I'd like to see him back. Does this deserve to be in the BAD column? Well, I'm writing it, and I think so. Get your own column where you arbitrarily put people in categories, I guess.
THE UGLY
Shooting in the first half - Really? 4-20? That is ABHORRENT. If we had shot even halfway decent in the first half, the run we made in the second half might've actually made Florida sweat. Instead, the closest we ever got was 9? 10? And against a team like Florida, that's really not that much. Still, I'm happy to have only lost by 16, they could've easily hung a 35 point loss on us, I think.
Another Buzzer Beater Before Halftime - This is like the 56th one this season. PLAY DEFENSE EVERY SINGLE SECOND.
The turnovers - 18 brings us back to our old ways. Some old habits die hard, but this is one I wish would get stabbed in the chest with a wooden stake.
I look forward to your comments. Bring them on!
I wouldn't necessarily put Lump in the bad category tonight. I checked the box score and couldn't believe that his stats were as pitiful as they were - in this case, they didn't fully reflect what he did out on the court. He's transformed from the low post beast that we saw at the beginning of the season into a purely defensive guy, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. He had a few great blocks tonight and played a solid game on the defensive end of the court (not to mention he actually hit some free throws, which he's failed to do a lot this season). He wasn't great, but he wasn't bad either.
ReplyDeleteOtherwise, another accurate good, bad, and ugly despite your sidetrack with the kung pao chicken! Well done.
Great analysis, Vlad needs to play better D without fouling, Lumpkins needs to improve his finishing which has been bad versus the better teams and I agree Bersch needs to play more or at all. He was scoring in those bleak November games and was most of the offense in the Manhattan game and provides more offense than JH, MW,SM, DF.
ReplyDeleteI don't think theres any reason to give Bersch more playing time considering we have Vlad now. Bersch played earlier in the year because we had absolutely no outside threats. Bersch contributes very little right now outside of his shooting and the shooting is not as much of a neccessity with Vlad. I think going forward he's going to be a key member of the team, but he needs to work on the rest of his game first.
ReplyDeleteThe effort was just all around sloppy. We look like a high school team, firing up anything that resembled an open look in the first half. Blake and Daniel are unable to create their own shot, and turn the ball over far too much. Riley should never be taking any shot beyond a 15 foot jumper. He also likes to step out and handle the ball beyond the arc at the top, which makes no sense. No one really seemed to be able to create a shot besides Hendra and Vlad - We would hold the ball for a few minutes at a time if there was no shot clock. Also a poor job handling the trap - the guards were afraid to try and break it, while the forwards caught the ball and immediately looked to pass the ball backward instead of forward, and no one flashed up beyond half court to try and serve as an outlet. The defensive zone just wasnt working.. They gave up too many open shots and three's because they couldn't keep up with Florida's ball movement. The good things I saw were Lumpkin's shot blocking ability and playing with his hands straight up. Also, Vlad played great on defense but made stupid fouls and picked up three fouls before the 12 minute mark in the first half. Hopefully this fairly challenging game will serve as a learning experience and allow for more growth from this team.
ReplyDeleteThat's the worst analysis I have heard yet. Look at the stats and watch video and get your facts straight about turnovers and handling the press.
ReplyDeleteAgreed... I am very pleased with our progress thus far. Our freshmen pt guards have come a long way and JJ apparently have confidence in them. Both of those kids can create for themselves. Did you see the Albany game when Blake asserted himself and scored at will to bring us back. Creating shots for these kids is not the issue. They need to sacrifice their strengths this year to improve their flaws. We don't need them to score much we need them to run the team. We need to improve our defense and rebounding. We do not have a problem breaking a press. Our team has made tremendous strides since the beginning of the season. We have a chance to do well in league play and that has been JJ's focus all year.
ReplyDeleteThat was a bad analysis. I don't understand how it can be implied that Munoz is one of the 2 main guys that turns it over to much(just looked at most recent stats) when he's 4th on the team in that catagory with 27 ( 2 a game avg. 23.8 min per game)and with an almost 1/1 assist/to ratio. Agree with the above analysis that the main thing JJ would want from his PG this year is to run the team and not turn it over especially with the addition of Vlad who can handle much of the scoring load. That being said I think a pick and pop/roll could be used with Lump to get him more invovled, by him setting the screen up top for the PG then popping/roll and allowing the pg to feed him or create. Could use it with Vlad also. There are never any ball screens set which forces our guards and small forwards to try and create 1 on 1 and against teams like PSU and UF its not going to happen. Those teams are just too athletic, long, and talented.
ReplyDeleteFirst, I applaud the effort in the second half. Florida tried just as hard to get us off our game as in the first half, but we did learn a few things from the first half, so good effort on that score.
ReplyDeleteWe had no productivity from the center position and Vlad in foul trouble.
Turnovers to be sure, but at least not so much in the backcourt with the full court press. We had a strategy against the press and it worked for the most part. Good work.
I'm not a fan of burying Lumpkins underneath. Our first score was when Lumpkins flashed at the foul line and slipped the ball to Grafft. Did he even touch the bowl on the high post after that?
Do we have a zone-breaking offense? I'd like to see a 1-4 used sometimes. With 4 guys on the baseline, the 3-2 has to collapse.
When we get to the point when Vlad is isolated against a big man from Florida, our defense is already blown at that point. The only good defense is to either deny or double down, and that is a team failure. But when the defense does break down, Vlad has to realize that his only defense is to impede forward progress. That's it. If he does that, then his work is done. It will be up to the opponent to make or miss the shot. He can't move into the player with his body. He did that twice. Against Florida, Vlad is a small forward, not a power forward or center.
Overall, another game against a very good opponent where we didn't have quite enough offense or quite enough defense to get the job done, so lots of things for them to work on. At least they won't be bored at practice.