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Post by keithfromxenia on Jan 21, 2023 20:34:48 GMT -5
I think we are slow, unathletic and not particularly good. But we do not quit and we never feel like we are out of the game. They deserve credit for that. Coach does too.
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Post by guyinstandswithbeer on Jan 21, 2023 20:40:35 GMT -5
This season has been so hard to watch knowing how good this team could have been if Tanner and Grant didn't transfer out. So tired of folks whining about “what could’ve been”. Let it go. So tired of guys telling others what they can and can't talk about on a message board. |
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Post by Ukraine Train on Jan 21, 2023 20:41:17 GMT -5
Raiders down 74-68 with 4:28 remaining
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Post by Legend on Jan 21, 2023 20:55:23 GMT -5
Our real problem is we have a few athletic guards that play lazy defense and several unathletic guards that can't defend anyone with the slightest bit of athletic ability. What scares me is that next year all we have is those unathletic guards coming back. Next year is going to be even worse than this year if we don't add a few impact players this off season. Exactly. I said that a few weeks ago. Someone pointed all the great freshman guards that are coming in. I'm sure they will be good but that's a lot of expectations on unknown players. I think we are in some real trouble. Really hope I'm wrong but this is not looking good. Hurts to say but we just have lot of people that shouldn't be on this roster. And a handful of transfers that just haven't worked out. I think most of our current issues stem from our coaching changes that happened 2 years ago. Brian Cooley was Coach Nagy's right hand man. He was our associate head coach and recruiting coordinator. He ran our practices and made sure our guys were all on the same page when it came to our defense. I don't think it is a coincident that our defense has gone to shit in the last 2 years since he left. |
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Post by Raidermania on Jan 21, 2023 20:58:51 GMT -5
You aren't going to win many games when you don't play defense and have close to 20 TOs.
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Post by Ukraine Train on Jan 21, 2023 21:00:03 GMT -5
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Post by wsuraider09 on Jan 21, 2023 21:16:05 GMT -5
We've now lost 5 of our 6 home conference games. I really miss the home court Raiders that wouldn't lose more than a game or two at home. Being decent in this league has to start at home. After last weekend, I thought maybe we turned the page, but last weekend was clearly a case of a blind squirrel finding a nut.
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Post by Raider3G on Jan 21, 2023 21:39:18 GMT -5
Exactly. I said that a few weeks ago. Someone pointed all the great freshman guards that are coming in. I'm sure they will be good but that's a lot of expectations on unknown players. I think we are in some real trouble. Really hope I'm wrong but this is not looking good. Hurts to say but we just have lot of people that shouldn't be on this roster. And a handful of transfers that just haven't worked out. I think most of our current issues stem from our coaching changes that happened 2 years ago. Brian Cooley was Coach Nagy's right hand man. He was our associate head coach and recruiting coordinator. He ran our practices and made sure our guys were all on the same page when it came to our defense. I don't think it is a coincident that our defense has gone to shit in the last 2 years since he left. So replacing him with a insurance agent wasn't a good move? |
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Post by refrigeratorraider on Jan 21, 2023 23:29:49 GMT -5
This season has been so hard to watch knowing how good this team could have been if Tanner and Grant didn't transfer out. So tired of folks whining about “what could’ve been”. Let it go. Agreed. Everyone enjoyed last season for how it ended, but don't forget the Raiders finished 4th in the Horizon League standings and were fortunate to even make it to Indianapolis as Oakland led by 14 points with 14 minutes left in the quarterfinals. Even if everyone had stayed, I'm not convinced the Raiders would have dominated like some believe. I don't want to look too much ahead to next year yet, but I have some optimism for next year -- so long as Nagy doesn't automatically try to redshirt all the true freshman. The three signed guards look athletic and talented. I'm also excited to see all the redshirt freshman that are currently on the bench. |
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Post by Big D on Jan 22, 2023 1:09:12 GMT -5
[Agreed. Everyone enjoyed last season for how it ended, but don't forget the Raiders finished 4th in the Horizon League standings and were fortunate to even make it to Indianapolis as Oakland led by 14 points with 14 minutes left in the quarterfinals. Even if everyone had stayed, I'm not convinced the Raiders would have dominated like some believe.; LMFAO. Yeah, I’m sure we would have sucked this year with the extra 40 points and 15 rebounds a game Tanner and Grant would have added. Not to mention the 4 years of experience in Nagy’s system that they would have provided. We ended up in fourth place last year because we had no depth. Hell, we lost one of our HL games at YSU because we only had 5 scholarship players available for the game and we still almost won. If Grant and Tanner were still here we would be a legit 10 deep team with 4 All HL players in our starting lineup: Tanner, Grant, Trey, and Noel. There isn’t a team in this shit conference that would have stood a chance trying to defend against that lineup. |
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Post by Raidermania on Jan 22, 2023 7:54:44 GMT -5
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Post by wsuwillie on Jan 22, 2023 9:41:50 GMT -5
When your team lacks athleticism (and doubles down by insisting on playing smaller lineups) and also insists on playing man-to-man defense you are going to give up a ton of layups and wide-open looks. Nagy is willing to die on the vine with this ridiculous notion that these guys are suddenly going to be able - and/or willing - to be effective in that sieve of a defense.
Why not ever try a zone? If the answer is that we don't practice a zone, why don't we practice a zone? Whenever an opponent finds themselves guarded by Norris, they go to the basket for a layup or pull up for a uncontested, short jumper. He cannot guard well. He appears to be busting his tail...but he just isn't athletic-enough or big/strong-enough. Why do we keep putting him in a position to fail?
How many times does Finke have to get beaten for a dunk or layup by a guy 4" taller and 40 lbs heavier? He is not a PF/4...not in any D1 game we will play this year. 39 minutes last night...that's just stubbornness by the coaches. At least he didn't chuck up 12-16 shots last night to get his 2-3 makes.
This insistence on a 4-guard lineup is ridiculous. Do not any one of the coaches notice this? We have ONE truly athletic G...and we play FOUR at a time with regularity...and man-to-man at that!
Play zone...always have (2) of Noel, Braun and Sisley in the game. Play Norris only when Calvin needs a break...and/or make one of our non-PGs bring the ball up at times. Cycle Davis, Finke, Welage and Hube through the 2-3 spots and 80 minutes of PT.
IMO we are far from putting these guys in position to succeed...at a minimum, what we keep doing doesn't work with enough consistency to be a good strategy.
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Post by keithfromxenia on Jan 22, 2023 16:54:47 GMT -5
I think I agree with fridge and I think , big d, that you oversimplified by saying our season was solely a result of a lack of depth. I think it is way more complex than that. I looked at a couple of things. I looked at our losses last year.I figured if depth causing fatigue played a huge role our performance in the second half would reflect that. Playing a good first half then getting clobbered in the second half would suggest that fatigue was playing a large part. But I saw no pattern that we were playing well in the first half and playing poorly in the second. No pattern of that at all.
Secondly, we played 7 players double digit minutes most games. The ysu game you cited I assume 4 or more players were sidelined with Covid or something and most teams could not deal with that. If you do not include that ysu game we got , on average , about 35-40 minutes per game from our bench. I recall a couple of mid majors making a run in the dance with 7 man rotations. It can be done.
Third, we must strengthen our team with transfers, not bring in transfers who produce little or nothing. A transfer who gives us nothing for two years is way worse for us than a freshman who gives us little or nothing for two years but then Plays a significant role for two years. We get nothing from the former but two productive years from the latter. But we have a very small margin of error with our hs recruits as well. Obvious question is why did our recruiting leave us feeling like we needed to go only seven deep??
Lastly, I know there is a lot of angst over the loss of basile and Holden. News Flash!!!! That is our life now. The combo of NIL and the transfer portal means there is a good chance that any time we luck into a recruit who develops beyond expectation the big boys will start sniffing around and if they think he can help the, start throwing money at him . If trey has any eligibility left due to Covid he will probably get an offer from someone. Just the way it is going to be from now on.
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Post by Big D on Jan 22, 2023 17:58:10 GMT -5
Keith, I think you are oversimplifying my statement that we had a lack of depth last year by comparing the first half of the year to the second half. Our lack of depth affected us in multiple ways all season long.
1. In almost every game our boys played more fatigued than our opponents. Doesn’t matter if it was at the beginning of the year or the end of the year. We only played 6-7 guys it’s most games and 6 of those guys got the majority of the minutes. It is hard to play good man to man defense when your guys are gassed from playing 35-40 minutes a game when your opponents are playing 2-3 extra players every game and are fresher the entire game. Playing zone would’ve helped with that but we all know Nagy is going to live and die with man to man defense.
2. We had guys playing injured or sick in almost every game of the season because we didn’t have any depth.
3. We had to have some of our players play soft defense when they got into foul trouble because we didn’t have anyone to put in for them.
4. Our lack of depth also included a lack of talent coming off the bench. We could have played 10-12 guys a game if we wanted to play everyone including walk ons but it would have been a huge drop in talent on the court.
5. For everyone that watched all of our games last year, could you imagine that team with Noel on it. I think we would have only lost a handful of games at most with him in our rotation. Go back and look at look at our schedule and scores. Most of our losses were close losses that could have easily been won if we had 1 more talented guy coach would have trusted to come off the bench. It is honestly one of the things seeing Noel play at such a high level this year that drives me nuts. Nagy decided to red-shirt Noel and didn’t play AJ Braun the first several games of the season planning on red-shirting him too. We all saw that AJ was able to be a solid player in our rotation last year. After watching Noel this year, you cannot get me to believe that he would not have been able to help us last season. I hate that Nagy wants to red-shirt everyone. It doesn’t make sense anymore in the age of NIL and immediate transfer eligibility. We are just wasting time developing our players for another team instead of utilizing them earlier in their careers here. It’s something he is going to have to adapt to or the game is going to pass him by.
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Post by wsuairstrike on Jan 22, 2023 18:42:28 GMT -5
5. For everyone that watched all of our games last year, could you imagine that team with Noel on it. I think we would have only lost a handful of games at most with him in our rotation. Go back and look at look at our schedule and scores. Most of our losses were close losses that could have easily been won if we had 1 more talented guy coach would have trusted to come off the bench. It is honestly one of the things seeing Noel play at such a high level this year that drives me nuts. Nagy decided to red-shirt Noel and didn’t play AJ Braun the first several games of the season planning on red-shirting him too. We all saw that AJ was able to be a solid player in our rotation last year. After watching Noel this year, you cannot get me to believe that he would not have been able to help us last season. I hate that Nagy wants to red-shirt everyone. It doesn’t make sense anymore in the age of NIL and immediate transfer eligibility. We are just wasting time developing our players for another team instead of utilizing them earlier in their careers here. It’s something he is going to have to adapt to or the game is going to pass him by. This also sums it up. There is no point in red shifting players. Could our two scholarship freshmen players contributed this year? Not sure but I would assume they would be an upgrade over Alex and Kenton and couldn't play worse defense than Davis and Calvin. A lot of issues catching up with this team. Unless we get an impact transfer I'm not sure it gets any better. Sure Noel is good, but who's going to create for him? Who can create their own shot after Trey leaves? The goal should be do anything it takes to keep Noel, Andrew and the freshmen. |
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