Thoughts from the couch, as a TV spectator -

First 20ish minutes felt concerning, like here we go again we'll be 1-8 and lose to another D1 basement team. More negativity, we suck, rock bottom, etc... Then to start the second half I finally saw glimpses of that fast tempo transition offense Drew wants and when it finally happens within the flow of the game. CMU had no response back. That was the game.

Offense and whatever was being ran in first half still looked God awful.

Rubin brought nice fire and played angry. He and Chuck are the only real leaders of this team when they want to be, still. Too much individualism otherwise, with nobody else playing for one another. I did see when Chuck got pummeled on his 3-and1 and Rubin was the only guy coming to his aid.

Great energy Ola Joseph...... and Richardson ???!!!!

Karli Bell was outstanding calling this game on TV. Give her more TV assignments.



So..... Despite beating CMU, I am still worried and lacking in confidence with upcoming games with Princeton, Chicago State, and the San Fran and Santa Clara games. Each of the next 4 are very winnable, but also very losable too.

Well, they did not flat out run a lot in the second half. It was more selective when they had a clear advantage. When they did run, they took it to the hoop more then just spotting up and launching 3s. Again we got a steal by Tavares that lead to a breakout and our rebounding was better which also helped us get a couple of times. Drew was also encouraging them run when we had an advantage and was slowing them down when we did not. Ideally, you want the team to understand when to go and when not to.

I agree with your assessment of the first half. My fear at halftime was whether we were going to fall into the kicked dog syndrome where the team would be like a dog that has been kicked too much and fall into the negative mindset of "here we go again". However, they came out and played hard with energy in the second half and looked much better. Again, to change your philosophy on tempo and offense 8 games into a season is difficult. Let's see how they look against Princeton who is not a run and gun team. Ball security and TOs will be important as it does figure to be a high possession type of game.

Richardson did some nice things yesterday. I think if we play some bigger, less mobile centers he will give us some decent minutes. It is obvious that Miles needs to stay on the floor and avoid the silly fouls. He got another foul on a moving screen and he needs to STOP this. The staff needs to drill into him that its not his job to seek the contact on the screen. Its the guards job to run his defender into the screen and cut off of Miles' hip. This has been partly Miles' fault, partly the guards' fault, and mostly the staff's fault for not demanding more precision. Attention to detail! If Miles can stay out of foul trouble, Richardson can provide much shorter minutes giving Miles a blow around media timeouts and his short comings can be minimized.

Interesting fact: We only have one player who is not underwater in +/- who has logged significant minutes. It might surprise you who it is.

Tavares is +2 on the season! Everyone else is a negative.

Of course when you start 1-7 and get blown up as much as we have it's not surprising.

We need to play only two guards at a time, plus a combo of Housinou, Ola-Joseph, Love III, (Amos when he can play) and Rubin. We were getting killed on the boards, and having 6'7" Housinou, 6'7" Ola-Joseph, and 6'10" Rubin on the court at the same time helps with the boards. You could see the difference in the second half when those three were on the court.

The group of Housinou, Ola-Joseph, and Love can handle the ball well, pass well, and have good speed. Taller guys can help close out on the three better and intimidate attempts. You don't lose much in speed or defense when H-O-L are on the court instead of a third guard like Harris, Dotson, or Tavarez. In fact, Housinou can become a point-forward in some situations and allow Moore to be a shooting guard.

The starting lineup should be Moore, Dotson, Love, Housinou, Rubin. Late in the game, you can do offensive-defensive subs to put in three guards on offense (Tavarez, especially) and switch back to two guards (Moore and Dotson are the best) on defense. But really, having the best players on the court for the offensive/defensive switches is the best bet, and the best players besides Rubin and Moore are Housinou, Love, Ola-Joseph, Tavarez, and Dotson in that order. Would also like to see Anderson put in that mix. I would rank Anderson higher than Harris or Glazkov on both offense and defense, and I want him to stay here for next year (Harris will be done).

We don't have any lock-down defensive guards/forwards this year like we've had in the recent past (Norris, Williamson, Mwamba, Quinn, Watson, DeLoach, etc.) That hurts a lot. If we did have a guard like that, we could start three guards. But we don't, so we have to take advantage of the versatility of Housinou, Love and Ola-Joseph to use their ball-handling and rebounding skills to create mis-matches with opponents on offense and shore up rebounding.

I love pressure in the backcourt, but I'm glad the token pressure on every inbound experiment is over. It needs to be used as a surprise or to change up rhythm, not as an expected tactic every time. And we do not have the defensive chops this year to make it effective.

Just my thoughts so far. The second half of the CMU game was relevatory for me.

Excellent analysis here, a lot of good points. I pretty much agree, although I'd try to give Moore, Dotson, and Tavarez and even share of ~27 minutes each instead of Moore getting "starter" minutes vs. the other two -- I think the pre-season hysteria around Moore as a potential all-conference play maybe did more harm than good, especially off the knee injury. He's still a very useful piece, but he can't be "the guy" if we want to win.

In terms of lacking a lockdown defensive guard, definitely agree. There is some room to dream on Love's defense, given his length, but it's been pretty bad so far. But you can chalk that up to inexperience.

Sharp observations, JCT. The small, three guard lineups have definitely hurt us. It was fun to see Kymany and JOJ finally able to get space and use their size and athleticism.

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Some more great points. Check out the picture below regarding our best +/- and Net Rating lineups.

There are 6 guys that when they play together have positive +/- and Net Ratings. These lineups need to get more run.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1QeS2EvcJUDNWnnjQoB4S6ZapLHaZZC0T/view?usp=drivesdk

I would hope Drew and staff would be cognitive of this data. Now it doesn't mean depending on certain matchups other lineups may not perform well but it does confirm some of what people maybe thinking.

The two best lineups with these 6 guys Tavarez, Moore, Love, Houinsou, Ola-Jospeh, and Rubin, share couple of traits. First they have only two "small guards". They both have 3 taller, longer, stronger/athletic players. I would think Amos, when he gets back might fit in well with this group of 6 as well. I think Dotson might do well subbing in for Moore or Taveras, but he needs to get better at keeping his man from penetrating as he got beat off the dribble a couple of times in CM game. Getting beat off the dribble will lead to defensive issues and worse stats as far as +/- and Net Rating are concerned.

These 6 guys got extended run in second half of CM game and results were good. Drew plays with combinations and lineups a lot in pre-con and eventually pares down rotations when we get closer to the conference season. Hopefully, Drew and the staff are seeing these numbers as well.

These stats are from CBB Analytics.