godanesgo99

Just now, jimbo said:

This team can’t shoot for Si#$@……bottom line. 

They are better at shooting than playing defense. That's not saying much.

I might be wrong, as I'm now watching for the movement. The set up is there, but I'm not seeing the cuts and rotations, although that could be why it's not working lol. This is really the new school of basketball. I saw a video about St. Joseph's College of Maine from a few years ago that really showed how to make it work.

47 minutes ago, Dane96 said:

This game had every single thing that is wrong with this program on display.  First, I want to acknowledge this is a difficult schedule.  Second, I want to say that Neely's absence hurts but I honest to god don't believe he, alone, would have changed the fortunes of the team.

This team:

-poorly constructed

-filled with athletes but low Basketball IQ

-seemingly has no limitation for shooting- we just take outside shot after outside shot and we are not good at it.

-has players who think they can take on a whole team (looking at you Davis-- kid has not stopped (from exhibition to OOC) taking on 3-4 guys at a time.  That works in D3 (maybe) but not in D1

-has no real ball movement

-has no real offensive sets (at least that I am seeing)

-is undersized

-has no defensive accumen

These fall on the staff.  Why?  Because in the era of the portal, you should be able to build a competitive team if you can recruit.  It doesn't take 5 years anymore.  Look at it this way, if Neely isn't injured...DK must have been betting on big leaps from Little and Reddish (I think he even as quoted as believing that would occur) and figured that Davis and Kellogg were going to contribute heavily, in addition to Beagle.

It is not translating...

I may have argued with some of these points in the past, but I just can't.

I really think I've figured it out though. It really looks like they are trying to run a version of the 5 out Motion offense. This means no real set plays and is designed for creativity. It relies less on ball screens and pick and rolls and is more about spacing and set directions of motion. The problem is that they aren't moving the ball and are using the setup as an excuse to play hero one on one ball. I have seen them run it well on a few possessions against American and FAU, but for the most part it just turns into someone forcing a three or driving into multiple bodies.

If this isn't what they are attempting to do, then they are even worse than I thought lol. You will notice on most plays there is no one in the paint and all offensive players are outside of the three point line (or one guy in the "dunker" spot) This requires strict spacing or turns into turnovers and forced shots... Exactly what's happening. 

Combine that with extremely poor defensive positioning and help rotation and you have a recipe for disaster. Only chance to win is if someone on the team gets hot from outside.

FYI: just an untrained observation. I probably need to go back and watch how they set up to confirm what I think I'm seeing.

Another terrible defensive half. UMass shoots almost 70% from the floor in the half. I guess they only shot 20% for three, but I thought they made more than 1-5.

Definitely hard to watch this team play. I feel like I'm watching 8th grade CYO against the varsity team.

5 hours ago, Eli said:

It doesn't matter if our offense is fine...our defense is non-existent. This will be a bloodbath.

In reality, I agree. Trying to remain positive and hope for a breakout.

I'm gonna go against the grain and call an upset win tonight. While I've been one of the lone mostly positive posters (while being very critical at the same time) and it's not all the surprising for that type of prediction from me based on that, I can see UMass sleeping on how bad the team has been and some of these shots starting to fall. The team is too talented to miss this many easy shots. Hopefully it happens as a team playing as a team and not because someone played hero ball. Winning as a team would bode well for conference play. Winning because one player got hot and took over will signal more of the same. A loss tells us nothing as we aren't supposed to win anyway.

7 hours ago, tnehurley said:

Jamel Horton was last year’s defensive POY, but of course he’s long gone. UA will not win that award this year! 351 out of 363 is awful. ROY with Beagle looks like a good bet, though.

I know he was, it was just a tongue in cheek joke when I realized just how bad the defensive ratings were. I mean comically bad. 

At least last year we knew the defense would keep us in games and even when over matched we could have a shot to pull an upset win over much better teams. Combine strong defense with poor offensive luck from the other team and you can have a terrible team beat a great team. This team right now looks bad offensively AND defensively. 

If Vegas put an over/under on the number of wins this teams gets out of the rest of the schedule at 4 (that is FOUR) I am thinking right now that the under would be a smart bet. I see wins vs. LIU Brooklyn and home games against New Hampshire and NJIT. We are projected to lose every other game. Most by double digits. I am not even really confident in those three. I see a scenario where Presbyterian is the only D1 win of the year. 

If everyone thinks the complaints are harsh now. Wait until the team finishes 6-26 after a first round AE tournament exit. Thats 4-26 against D1 programs. 

I still have on purple and gold glasses on and I am still holding out hope for DK to figure out how to get to this teams potential, but right now the confidence is extraordinarily low. 

Was just looking at Bart Torvik rankings. After this game, UA is now 351 on defense. Out of 363. Didn't we have the league defensive player of the year last season?

On 12/1/2022 at 10:09 AM, Dane96 said:

 

Nm

While he is right, Kaloyeros was a genius and did some great things for the University and was a good leader for that part of the school, bringing him back would be a terrible idea. Not sure the headlines of convicted felon brought back would sit well with all of the other negative UA news in the press lately.

36 minutes ago, Ron said:

They give us no reason to contribute to GDAC yet our seat preference in the updated arena will depend on our contributions.  All the floor seats are empty at HVCC, sold to businesses who don't come to the games.  They should open the floor seats up a few minutes after the game starts.

Or run some form of in game promotion for them. Wait till the under 12 minute media time out for late arrivals, then choose fans from the crowd to come on the floor to shoot free throws for a pair of upgraded seats for the second half during the under 8 or under 4 media timeouts. If there are 30 open court side seats, choose 20 people to come down and have each shoot a free throw. Give the first 10 to make a free throw a pair of seats, leaving 10 seats still open in case someone with courtside seats shows up in the second half.

Kill two birds with one stone. Fill the courtside seats for the important second half and any home court advantage that adds, and create some more fan interaction and fun at the games. Win win.

1 hour ago, UA'08 said:

What I don’t understand is they can potentially have two back to back ROY. I’d say he can recruit, but is completely lost on coaching.  

This is why I have remained positive. His recruiting has brought multiple great athletes/players. His connections in the basketball world bode well for future recruiting and the future of the program.

Last year's class of Neely, Reddish, and Little should be a real solid foundation. Neely was more polished to start, but both Reddish and Little are still projects with the world of potential in their hands. Reddish needs a cooler head and Little needs to improve his defense and team offense.

This year's class of Jackson and Beagle both look great as well. Beagle is obviously the more finished and could be all conference as a freshman, much less rookie team and ROY. Jackson has shown flashes and just needs time to adjust to D1. 

Next year's class of Margoupis, Robinson, and Adnan looks pretty strong as well. This should be a great core for the next few years and give us a contending team in the AE, if not a top team in the AE.

Fill the rest with transfers and the team should be solid. Ketner is a solid AE role player. Edmead is fine as a third PG. He has shown flashes and did well in the NEC. Kellogg isn't ready yet, but seems fine as a practice player, end of the bench guy that could grow into something solid. Amica isn't the same after the injuries, but he can still be good. Hutch is all hustle and always does well in conference play. Drumgoole was a great transfer to get, but is still a little overly aggressive. Davis and Patel are exactly what we want as grad transfers. Players that can step in right away and fill the holes we haven't filled with younglings or to replace someone who graduated or transferred out.

Looking at our roster, it should be good enough to do ok in a tough OOC. Still probably lose more than they win with this schedule, but not get blown out by everyone, then get 9-11 wins in conference and be a threat in the conference tournament. 

Yes losing Neely due to injury hurts and having him and Beagle down low together could cause fits for opponents with both of them being threats outside and in, but injuries happen. I don't think Neely's injury can be blamed for the team performing THIS poorly. In my mind it's all coaching. It's all getting the most out of your players. It's being able to make in game adjustments. It's about teaching how to stay strong and stick to your game plan during adversity. It's about being able to focus the team to stay away from 90% of the hero ball. I say 90% because sometimes you need a player to step up and take over the game.

I don't think WB gets a roster this talented or athletic, but give the team to him and he would have gotten the most out of it. Some of the 1 on 1 isolation play we have seen dominate every game would have landed many of these guys on the bench until they figured it out - even if they were the best on the team. Remember when WB benched Nichols when he went through his isolation crazy circus shot phase? He Sat the entire first half of the SBU game. Brown gave him a shot in the second half and he played calm and collected and led the team to a great comeback. Without putting him on the bench that game to make the attitude adjustment, I'm convinced we never make it to the championship game against UVM that year, and never pull off the "almost" upset.

I said from day 1 we needed to give DK 3 years to develop from a top assistant to a head coach. So while we are only 1.5 years in, we need to recognize that there hasn't been any improvement in his leadership. I know the lawsuit has to be distracting and has to be having an effect on what he does, but it's crunch time for him. Rise above the distractions and become the leader that this team needs or crumble under the pressure and he suffers an even bigger setback to his career. He will get an opportunity as an assistant somewhere again even with the lawsuits due to his connections, but he won't find another HC job anywhere unless it's a D3 or JUCO. 

If he could figure out how to thrive under the pressure despite the distractions and really coach and lead these guys forward to a winning conference record: I'll give him tons of credit. I'll root for him to come back next year and continue to grow. He does that and opportunities at the highest level will open up for him regardless of how the lawsuit ends up. It's really do or die for him. A career defining moment.

He is currently down 5 with a minute and a half left on the clock. Can he perform the comeback? Can he be Hooley at the buzzer or will he be Hartford leaving D1 in disgrace?

As I said, I've been about as positive as can be, and I said we needed to give him 3 years to learn and grow, but I don't think any of us saw us having a team ranked around 340. It's just terrible at this size school, this size market. My patience that was supposed to be three years is starting to look like 1.5 years.

Just rewinded to show my son some replays. How to run an offense and how not to defend. Leaving them soooooo wide open on every play.

Yeah, I'm on record defending this team and sticking with them. My purple and gold glasses keep telling me they will figure it out and be good come conference play. That said, when I went to UA it was ranked the #1 party school in the country. I flunked out and it was off the list. I came back a year later and the schools was back at #1 on the list. (True story)

Soooooooo my purple and gold glasses are more like purple and gold beer goggles. While I can see the faint outline of talent, in reality I'm drunk and they are really, really bad.

Is Reddish still sick? Just tuned into the broadcast and missed the beginning. I don't think I saw him on the bench. 

I know some here have said he hasn't been great yet, but I've seen tons of improvement.

2 hours ago, Eli said:

I'm not a soccer fan, but it's also World Cup time...people are probably busy with that. But yes, the apathy is definitely palpable which is why the AD has asked a few of us to be more supportive online lol. Hard to be supportive when nearly everything is doodoo.

I've watched like 10 minutes of MBB this year. Watched probably 50% of FBB.

What's the World Cup? FIBA isn't until the end of August.

(Yes I am aware you are talking about soccer, but I do not acknowledge that as a sport and do not care about the world cup. It is impossible to care about a game where the clock counts up, no one knows how much time is left and a high scoring game is 2-1. F that noise. Don't care)

You know the apathy has grown when it's 3 hours to tip off and not a single comment on the GameDay thread.

Hoping for a win, as American has lost its last two games (Marist and George Mason) but not too confident in that: as American has beaten Georgetown, William and Mary, and NJIT. The NJIT game was 58-53 so this game could tell a lot about how far towards the bottom we can expect to be come conference time.

EDIT: they have won their last 4, the losses were to start the season. The ESPN app has recent games on the bottom while today's game is on top. It was confusing.

I was under the impression that people that have consistently had season tickets will still be given priority over non season tickets holders, but it is gonna be something like: big donations made this year that are season ticket holders then big donors from this year that aren't previous ticket holders, then small donors this year that are previous season ticket holders, then small donors from this year that weren't ticket holders, then previous season ticket holders that didn't donate this year, then the general public.

I'll be pissed if I can't get the same seats that I have had for the last 7 or 8 years (or extremely close) because someone else takes them before I get my shot at them. Even if I don't donate this year, I do have season tix for the HVCC games and should have priority over anyone that didn't have continuous season tickets before, regardless of how much they donated this season. 

42 minutes ago, UA1882 said:

I know this is cliche but kids can join the Army at 18. Drink at 21. Garbage is not a terrible word at all . I turned 22 and got a job of authority.  I have been called wayyyyy worse than garbage.  

Truth is there is no "talent" on this team.  Now have the freshman (now sophomores) improved .....yes, but they were so bad last year, outside of Neely, there was no way to go but up. 

We are a bad bad team, however I can see them improve in conference, mostly because there are some bad AE teams.  Hoping for a .500 record. 

To each his own. I'm not the police of the board, and everyone is free to post their thoughts. That's what we do as fans. I always wear my purple and gold glasses and root for who we have. They chose to come here. I'll talk about their play on the court, and make criticism where it's due, I just don't like saying "they are garbage" instead I'll say they need to sit because they aren't helping the team or they are playing like garbage. Subtle difference, but still different. They chose to join the purplefam and I'll treat them like my brother or my son. Talk about how they can improve or what they are doing wrong, but I do keep it as positive as possible. 

I'm a Yankee fan, but I don't subscribe to the whole boo Aaron Judge when he sucks in the playoffs. While he is on my team he is family. The argument they are paid millions and deserve to be booed by the home fans holds no water to me. That's your team.

Again, coaches, administrators, and refs are a different story. 

I was different on this board 10 years ago, but then I was at a fraternity party / alumni weekend and spoke with a player over a beer and they talked about several players on the team that couldn't stop reading this board and us fans had gotten in their head. The player I'm referencing will remain nameless, but they are one of the best we ever had. Yup they are adults playing D1 basketball and criticism is part of the deal blah blah blah, but again... Family.

One other thing on the defensive pressure on Drumgoole and Davis... Remember when Jimmy Fatsos had the game plan to stop Steph Curry and held him scoreless, but lost the game by a ton.... LMAO. One of my favorite basketball stories ever. 

https://youtu.be/ZMahowkiFfw

9 minutes ago, nysteve661 said:

3 starters, Drumgoole, Little, and Davis were 1 for 22 from floor combined.  Ain't winning with that performance, Patel at least keep score reasonable.

Drumgoole and Davis were harshly double teamed. The scouting report said that was who to focus on defensively - and they were smothered. That was FAU's game plan. In order to have a shot in this game we needed others to step up. Patel did. Surprisingly Edmead did. Little is still an enigma. Looks incredible one game, can't hit the broad side of a barn the next. I think it's a confidence thing with him. Get the first few to fall and he is fine. Hasn't shown the ability to fight through adversity yet.

This is Hutch's fourth year on the team. He has been fairly terrible in the OOC every season, but plays hard and has always done well come conference play.

Never thought we could win this game without Neely and Reddish playing well, but I put the final score of this game 100% on Killings. Once again he failed to call a time out and settle the team down when FAU went on their run. Gotta find a way to get a stop and a point. 15-0 runs late in the second half will kill any chances. This is another game that was completely different from the final score and erasing a 10 minute stretch changes the way the game looks when it's over. That's on the coaching staff.

17 minutes ago, Clickclack said:

Reddish and Jackson are garbage...who cares! Still weird comment to make 8 games into the season. 

Not a fan of calling any of the players garbage. They are student athletes. Bitch and moan about the coaches, the staff, the administration, and the refs all you want. They are paid to do a job and do it well. Critiquing a players decision or in game actions is fair play IMHO, but calling a kid garbage who chose to wear the purple and gold and compete in the name of the #purplefam is too much for me. These kids work their butt off. Jackson hustles like no kid I've seen before and just really hurt himself while hustling and trying to keep the teams energy up. He was pretty good today and the injury really set the team back when they were clawing back from the first deficit. Reddish is still a project and kind of a head case, but he's still one of, if not the, most gifted athletes we have had on the team. He is much better this year than last year and has been improving leaps and bounds. He just needs to keep a cool head and not let the emotions cause T's and misplaced aggression. I was really looking forward to seeing his junior season as I thought he could be all league. Figured he would transfer after that season. 

Did Killings just say what I think he did in the post game? Unless I misheard, he just said Justin Neely will be back next year but he has to "work on" and isn't sure about Jackson and Reddish? Was Reddish really out sick or is there something else going on?

Only 4 points in the last 8 minutes. From tied to losing by 17.

Ran out of gas. Blah.