Mamadou Diarra played three more minutes than David Onuorah this season

[UConnStats]

This is about his inability to grab a 19 year old kid by the balls and say listen son, next time your man nails a three while you’re drifting I’m putting you on a tee and sending you to mars.

And here I was thinking that the only good thing about this season was that our coach wasn’t grabbing 19 year olds by the balls.

 

[August_West]

Both true, but his 1 year timeline and very limited upside means you have to see the big picture and develop players to supplant him.

I think KO made a big mistake with Diarra this year and if you go back to my obesrvations from early this season I was screaming for Diarra to get minutes. He was pretty much our best player in the two back to back early season Overtime victories. Diarra has by far the highest upside of any of our bigs and that includes Carlton. Diarra is an high level athlete who has quick twitch muscle reactions, strong at rim, active and bouncy on the offensive glass, and can catch and finish quickly.

He (like Enoch) is taking a while to grasp team defense concepts. And he sure fouls a lot.

In any case, he should have gotten way more minutes this year.

 

[Fan4ever]

Lots of discussion on this thread about letting MD play and let him "learn" how not to foul. Who is going to teach him to do that? Would it be the same coaches that taught Brimah for 4 years? MD has now completed 2 years in the program. If his intent was to get better, he would have heard all the game advice being given to Brimah last year, all the film review for 2 years, etc. and all of the "coaches" critique for 2 years.

I like the tenacity of the kid, but his approach is to try and swat at everything in sight - rendering him in continuous foul trouble. Where is the coaching, or the intent to learn?

Coaching is very hard work, not many are cut out to be a coach/teacher/administrator/leader/disciplinarian/mentor/communicator...could go on for a bit.

 

[selles]

Kwintin Williams didnt meet the criteria of number 1. And from all accounts was not bringing in practice.

"All accounts" or one quasi sort of implied account? The whole "practice motor" thing reminds me of when Jimy Williams was managing the Sox and would answer every question with "Manager's decision".

Jimy, why are you batting Darren Lewis leadoff even though he can't hit? "Manager's decision"

KO, why can't Kwintin Williams get off the bench even though he was the only guy who showed a glimmer of a pulse last game? "Practice motor"

 

[KodiacKemba]

Foul trouble led him on the bench ... can’t trust him out there .. every time he defended one on one was either a score or he fouled now granted some calls were horrible.. do I like his upside yes , do I trust him not contesting without fouling nope ...! And he got abused by a guy avg 4 points a game ... another game somebody reaches a career high on us...! Only thing I was mad at big O yesterday was him getting his shot blocked by the rim ... man if Whaley has Big O size he would be a monster ... let’s hope we can find that do it all big like a shonn Miller but taller

 

[August_West]

"All accounts" or one quasi sort of implied account? The whole "practice motor" thing reminds me of when Jimy Williams was managing the Sox and would answer every question with "Manager's decision".

Jimy, why are you batting Darren Lewis leadoff even though he can't hit? "Manager's decision"

KO, why can't Kwintin Williams get off the bench even though he was the only guy who showed a glimmer of a pulse last game? "Practice motor"

How many games did you go to this year?

I like the energy Kwintin brought in a couple blow out losses. But did you ever sit in the crowd and strictly focus on Kwintin on the rare times he got in a game that wasnt a blowout? Because a TV wont spot shadow him.

He had absolutely no idea where to be on the floor on both ends. NONE.

If he did play harder than DO it wasnt by much. And their defensive awareness in comparison isnt on the same planet.

Do people really think Kwintin williams not seeing the floor this year was a long term problem? He doesnt really have a future here any more than DO did. So take the "he needs to develop" part out of this equation. THe dude is 24 years old with one year of organized basketball under his belt.

CMON

From a "player needs minutes to develop standpoint"
Diarra not seeing the floor is a problem. Polley not getting enough run....Whaley even. Kwintin Williams? Nope.

 

[Edward Sargent]

In Andersons defense, he played outside of his Initial role on the team. He wasn't suppose to get that many minutes (I hope) but he did due to injury and a decommit. That's not his fault.

I don't know about that. KO sang his praises early in the year about playing at the next level

 

[my2cents]

Our entire front line had issues. Each player showed signs of good things, followed by extended periods of WTF basketball.
Re-arranging the deck chairs on TITANIC makes no sense because the ship was going down.
This season we were clearly going nowhere so the minutes should have been allocated to the freshman more so than 1 year senior
Then Ollie could have done his development magic, the same way he did with Brimah, lol kidding

 

[gtcam]

Our entire front line had issues. Each player showed signs of good things, followed by extended periods of WTF basketball.
Re-arranging the deck chairs on TITANIC makes no sense because the ship was going down.
This season we were clearly going nowhere so the minutes should have been allocated to the freshman more so than 1 year senior
Then Ollie could have done his development magic, the same way he did with Brimah, lol kidding

Agree with the Titanic analogy.
The reason that I have heard from talking with some associated with the team is that DO was the one guy in practice who pushed himself and others, meanwhile Diarra practiced hard but missed some time nursing the knees, and the others just haven't learned/understood that practice makes a difference. Also heard that Cobb started the season as a practice beast but slowly started to trend down as his game time dwindled due to fouls/mistakes and bonehead plays
AB was a different case - at 7' he should have cared enough to work on those aspects of the game he needed but the guy, from reports, was not a hard worker during the off season

 

[Uconn77Duke74]

Onourah's greatest legacy will be that he helped our APR score average for a few years down the road.

 

[my2cents]

Agree with the Titanic analogy.
The reason that I have heard from talking with some associated with the team is that DO was the one guy in practice who pushed himself and others, meanwhile Diarra practiced hard but missed some time nursing the knees, and the others just haven't learned/understood that practice makes a difference. Also heard that Cobb started the season as a practice beast but slowly started to trend down as his game time dwindled due to fouls/mistakes and bonehead plays
AB was a different case - at 7' he should have cared enough to work on those aspects of the game he needed but the guy, from reports, was not a hard worker during the off season

Thanks for the smart reply. I think the great coaches find ways to motivate the "under" motivated players.
This board is always "discussing" the difference between practice and game performance. Lousy at practice/Good-very Good games OR
Great Practice/ Lousy in Games....I would pick the former as its the games that count.

 

[Horatio]

I don't know about that. KO sang his praises early in the year about playing at the next level

What was KO supposed to say, " look kid we're trading you by the deadline for a 3 star pg and a juco to be named later". " make sure your grades are good". I love the Yard.

 

[HuskyHawk]

How many games did you go to this year?

I like the energy Kwintin brought in a couple blow out losses. But did you ever sit in the crowd and strictly focus on Kwintin on the rare times he got in a game that wasnt a blowout? Because a TV wont spot shadow him.

He had absolutely no idea where to be on the floor on both ends. NONE.

If he did play harder than DO it wasnt by much. And their defensive awareness in comparison isnt on the same planet.

Do people really think Kwintin williams not seeing the floor this year was a long term problem? He doesnt really have a future here any more than DO did. So take the "he needs to develop" part out of this equation. THe dude is 24 years old with one year of organized basketball under his belt.

CMON

From a "player needs minutes to develop standpoint"
Diarra not seeing the floor is a problem. Polley not getting enough run....Whaley even. Kwintin Williams? Nope.

I don't think it is fair to say he has no future. He's a good athlete who is clearly learning how to play basketball. I don't know why anyone expected anything from him this year. Give him a couple of years of learning the game, and he might be a nice player.

Diarra is our most talented big and it isn't close. He needs to work on a lot of things as well. That's not unusual for a freshman. But I think he can become a Jeff Adrien type player. Whaley showed me great natural shot blocking ability. That timing can't easily be taught and he has it. Unfortunately, he doesn't have a knack for rebounding or shooting. Again, he's a project. We knew he was a project. On a normal UConn team he never sees the floor.

For the few people who are confused out there, nobody would be saying "play these young, clearly limited players" over Jake, or Freeman, or Travis Knight, or Josh Boone...or any competent big we've ever had. The issue was not playing them to give minutes to a grad transfer who actually provided less quality play than the young guys did. Polley should have played, and his minutes should have come from Anderson...who wasn't a bad player, but who simply took on a role that was bigger than he could fill.

 

[champs99and04]

lmao AA is a terrible basketball player dude

Give Ollie a team of five Anthony Andersons and we’d end up firing every human being associated with UConn basketball right down to the guys who clean the floors at
Gampel.

There’s so much wrong in that post that I don’t know where to start.

We have a basketball coach who is deficient in nearly every aspect of the job. It’s not politics or fear or kids or whatever the hell else, it’s incompetence.

Full stop.

This board is impossible sometimes.

Kevin Ollie has been terrible at his job for four years now. If you want to fire him, go ahead.

But I don't care if you think he's the worst coach in America - he has strengths and weaknesses. Given the fact that he won a championship with a veteran roster and relies heavily on transfers, it seemed logical to suggest that he might be better suited for a role where he has to do less teaching and developing and more gameplanning. And given the fact that he just played a fifth year senior from Cornell whose notable skills include screening and hedging as many minutes as the player who actually has talent, it also seemed logical to conclude that maybe he doesn't know how to reach 19 and 20 year old kids.

I used Antoine Anderson as an example not because he's a great basketball player, but because he had been coached for four years, understood his limitations, and came to the first day of class with his pencil already sharpened. To the extent that he is a limited player in your mind does not preclude him from exceeding expectations.