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St J's ThoughtZ™

RichZ

Fort the ead!
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Stayed away from here since the end of the game. I needed to stew with my own thoughts for a while before I put together my ThoughtZ™ tonight.

  1. Early on, when they were playing well, to me, the team seemed subdued. Precious little smiling by our guys, whether on the court o on the sideline. Later in the game, when the lead was slipping away, there was even less.
  2. Adams drive to the hole at just under 8 in the half, I knew beyond a doubt that he was going to get called for the charge as he crossed the 3 point line. It was head down and bull his way in from the get go. That's not the sign of a smart player.
  3. We had 6 dimes on our first 8 buckets, but finished the half with just 7 assists on 12 hoops. What happened? our 2nd half assist to bucket ratio was an identical 7 for 12.
  4. We saw Cole's best game today. He was unfazed by St. John's pressure. 5 assists and a steal in 38 minutes to go with his 4 for 7 from 3 and 18 point total.
  5. Whaley didn't seem to be as offensive minded as usual, but still played within himself and was a positive, though not a dominant presence.
  6. Gaff had the best move of his his season -- maybe of his career -- with about five and a half minutes left in the half. Made the ensuing FT too. (See vid clip below) But those three points were his only contribution of the afternoon.
  7. Tyrese wasn't really on his game, but he played hard, rebounded well, provided a relief outlet when St. John's guards tried to turn up the pressure when we were bringing the ball up and made some big buckets. Missed some big buckets, too. Still dealing with the yips.
  8. Polley's 2 point jumper put us up by 21 with 12 and change left in the half. Six minutes later, our lead was down to three. That's when it struck me that we could be in real danger of losing this game.
  9. Polley seemed hesitant to shoot when when he first got in the game, and when he did start shooting, it wasn't pretty. Seemed to me that once he did start shooting and his three wasn't falling, he went back to being reluctant to shoot. Beyond that actually. He was afraid to shoot. He's not a good defender or ball handler. If he's unwilling to shoot, his value is nil. Sanogo showed both the ability and the willingness to score in this game, and he is a defensive asset in the paint, where St John's did all their damage in the last 8 minutes. Yet Polley played the last 12 minutes of the game while Sanogo rode the pine. I know they were playing 4 guards, but Polley can't guard a guard, and at least Sanogo could have protected the rim. If Polley was Polley today, we win this game handily. But he wasn't. That's going to happen from time to time. But his presence on the floor was detrimental to our cause. I'm as big a DH fan as anyone here, but as far as I'm concerned, leaving Polley out there the way he was playing was a callosal coaching blunder.


 
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JG looked like an All-American with that move. Aggressive, athletic and in control as if he'd done it hundreds of times before. But immediately after he had his head down as he went to shoot the FT and didn't look like a confident player that had just done what he wanted to do and was ready to do it again.
Let's hope DH and the staff play that clip for him about a dozen times a day until the next game.
 
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Gaff is starting to get that hang dog look too. It’s definitely an issue now.
 
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Stayed away from here since the end of the game. I needed to stew with my own thoughts for a while before I put together my ThoughtZ™ tonight.

  1. Early on, when they were playing well, to me, the team seemed subdued. Precious little smiling by our guys, whether on the court o on the sideline. Later in the game, when the lead was slipping away, there was even less.
  2. Adams drive to the hole at just under 8 in the half, I knew beyond a doubt that he was going to get called for the charge as he crossed the 3 point line. It was head down and bull his way in from the get go. That's not the sign of a smart player.
  3. We had 6 dimes on our first 8 buckets, but finished the half with just 7 assists on 12 hoops. What happened? our 2nd half assist to bucket ratio was an identical 7 for 12.
  4. We saw Cole's best game today. He was unfazed by St. John's pressure. 5 assists and a steal in 38 minutes to go with his 4 for 7 from 3 and 18 point total.
  5. Whaley didn't seem to be as offensive minded as usual, but still played within himself and was a positive, though not a dominant presence.
  6. Gaff had the best move of his his season -- maybe of his career -- with about five and a half minutes left in the half. Made the ensuing FT too. (See vid clip below) But those three points were his only contribution of the afternoon.
  7. Tyrese wasn't really on his game, but he played hard, rebounded well, provided a relief outlet when St. John's guards tried to turn up the pressure when we were bringing the ball up and made some big buckets. Missed some big buckets, too. Still dealing with the yips.
  8. Polley's 2 point jumper put us up by 21 with 12 and change left in the half. Six minutes later, our lead was down to three. That's when it struck me that we could be in real danger of losing this game.
  9. Polley seemed hesitant to shoot when when he first got in the game, and when he did start shooting, it wasn't pretty. Seemed to me that once he did start shooting and his three wasn't falling, he went back to being reluctant to shoot. Beyond that actually. He was afraid to shoot. He's not a good defender or ball handler. If he's unwilling to shoot, his value is nil. Sanogo showed both the ability and the willingness to score in this game, and he is a defensive asset in the paint, where St John's did all their damage in the last 8 minutes. Yet Polley played the last 12 minutes of the game while Sanogo rode the pine. I know they were playing 4 guards, but Polley can't guard a guard, and at least Sanogo could have protected the rim. If Polley was Polley today, we win this game handily. But he wasn't. That's going to happen from time to time. But his presence on the floor was detrimental to our cause. I'm as big a DH fan as anyone here, but as far as I'm concerned, leaving Polley out there the way he was playing was a callosal coaching blunder.



I was going to say there was no contact but I did see a reach in. No harm, no foul. Let them play.

In the video you can see the close up of the student section. Dogs. Great stuff.
 
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Seems to me as though DH is trying to run the same offense he has all year, which is to say, an offense built around Bouknight. He's trying to do this with Adams in the Bouknight role. It worked with Bouk, and it scraped by with Adams -- until yesterday. It will work again when Bouk returns. In the meantime, we may lose a game or two because Adams is no Bouk. DH must ask himself, is it worth reconfiguring his offense to work the ball inside, only to change back again when Bouk returns? Or will it screw up the whole season?
 
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I said in another thread that in the 3 games Akok has played we have lost our momentum and juice when he goes in. I am not saying to not play him but lots of times guys off the bench suffer because they play with other back ups. Maybe play him with Whaley or Sanogo instead of Josh. Speaking of Josh, I am starting to think he should not be in thre rotation. What does he bring?
 
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Seems to me as though DH is trying to run the same offense he has all year, which is to say, an offense built around Bouknight. He's trying to do this with Adams in the Bouknight role. It worked with Bouk, and it scraped by with Adams -- until yesterday. It will work again when Bouk returns. In the meantime, we may lose a game or two because Adams is no Bouk. DH must ask himself, is it worth reconfiguring his offense to work the ball inside, only to change back again when Bouk returns? Or will it screw up the whole season?
Again, it is becoming apparent that we are very easy to prepare for.
 
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I believe a big part of Gaff’s confidence has to do with Cole getting the keys to the team after Gaff played so well during our strong finish last year.

Gaff’s issue is in his head and DH needs to fix it. DH’s love with Cole has screwed up Gaff. Cole is a mid major player or a #3 guard first off the bench IMO.
 
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He's not there yet but I get a Taliek Brown, slash Ben Gordon vibe from Gaff. Not so much in how he plays but how he shows these flashes that always leave you wanting more. Benny was the worst at that and only after finally putting it together and he got away from being Gentle Ben, did we win the whole thing.
Gaff is like Taliek Brown right now. A game manager who gives you a taste of great play, takes guff from fans because they want him to play like that all the time, and just sulks along with that hang dog look on his face. Frustrating as hell!
 

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