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Too bad we didn’t have a pithed frog to bring off the bench late. It would have improved our decision making. Worst case of RCD (Recto Cranial Disorder) I’ve seen in a long time.
Four freshmen, 2 sophomores, a red shirt senior who has never played meaningful minutes, a one trick pony transfer, and a JUCO transfer. If that rotation doesn’t scream mediocrity I don’t know what does. We are not dance worthy. I’ll be shocked at any better than 9-9.
I said pre-season that our season would rest on how well we shot the three and how fast the freshman bigs matured. The bigs have been highly inconsistent but have improved. The shooting has sucked except for BSW in stretches. I was also correct in being cautious about Cat. He plays so much like the classic freshman it isn’t funny.
Six games left. Really need to go 5-1 to make the Big Dance. The games against Klempson, UNCCH, and Pitt should decide our fate. We need to go 2-1 in those to have a shot. We will see how good Gott’s “Dr. Phil” impersonation is tonight.
I think it’s 50/50 whether we go 10-8 or 9-9. Unless we go 11-7 I just don’t think our RPI will be high enough to be in the conversation. We are playing with more consistency from game to game, but we are still subject to long dry stretches on the offensive end.
I will also say that when your rotation includes one Soph. who has played significant minutes prior to this year, four freshmen, a red shirt Sr. who has never been good enough to play before, a JUCO transfer, and a regular transfer, going 11-7 would be very close to their expected ceiling.
“Challenge to all deniers: Find 1 game where questionable call results in PACK win rather than PACK loss against top team.”
Richard Howell set one heck of a moving screen to free up Scott Wood for the game winning in shot at Klempson last year.
The call on TJ wasn’t a no-brainer by any means. If the ref gives continuation I can guarantee you the Syracuse folks would have gone nuts. After watching the replay only, because I was rolling down I-10 during the game, I thought the correct call was made. I don’t have any idea how the rest of the game was officiated. I did see the two TOs on Sports Center and the Lee TO was a just classic case of a guy who isn’t a ball handler getting in a bad spot a screwing up. I haven’t watched the throw away enough to really see what happened. Bottom line is that if we only turn the ball over one in the final 13.7 seconds we win the game. No refs involved. It was there for us to take and we kicked it away.
I wondered if the time change was real when I checked ESPN on the phone just now. I doubt it makes any difference.
This team is about where it should be with the talent we have in terms of record. The margins at Duke and UNCCH and against UVa are what really bother the half empty crowd.
The one thing I think might mean improvement going forward is that with RT playing better it allows Gott to play Lewis more and that reduces the live ball snow bird turnovers that you get from Cat. I’d like to see how the Cat Turner combo functions for extended stretches as well. I don’t think TJ is suddenly a 38% three point shooter. He will regress to the mean. Pitt is the best RPI boost we could reasonably get because it’s on the road. A bad loss before the ACCT wouldn’t shock me either. I don’t think we will make the dance but it wouldn’t take an outrageous scenario to get us in.
High today in Houston today is only going to be 62, but at least its going to warm up a bit for the weekend.
I will enjoy the afternoon of choir concerts on Saturday even more knowing that we are getting whipped by the ‘Cuse.
Washington just got called for the exact foul Wake got away with on their end. This game is going Wake’s way. They will be in the bonus the rest of the half and we’ve already made all of our threes for the next four games.
Wake has already gotten away with two blatant obvious pushes in the back. One on Washington on the lay up and previously on an offensive rebound that we were in position for until getting shoved. Those no calls drive me nuts.
We have not seen improvement from that position, nor from the 5 position in during this 4/5 win streak.
I attribute that to the Anya injury and the Vandy foul trouble/poor play leaving Freeman and Washington on the floor for too many minutes. We have played our best ball when Vandy plays well enough to eat up 27-30 minutes. That leaves 17ish minutes apiece for the three headed freshman monster. Freeman looks “wore out” to me. They all three play hard every minute, but Freeman just doesn’t look as fresh as he did earlier this season.
The injury has really slowed down Anya. Before that you could see progress. Freeman has hit the wall but for a kid who just turned 18 in December he has contributed a lot. He is going to be excellent in this offense if his 15 ft jumper develops. Washington looked to be making a move up on offense but has taken a step back. I think they will all improve because they all bust it full time. Howell just out worked people and I can see both Freeman and Washington being that good. Both are better than Howell was as a freshman.
Two and a half years in I think it’s fair to say that Gott’s teams will:
Play hard
Hang together
Rebound on the offensive end a lot better than the defensive end
Be very good on the break
Be in the bottom 2/3 of the ACC in defense and likely the bottom half
Not shoot 3’s wellIf he ever puts together a group that does shoot threes well they will go a long way
I admire the grit this team shows. They have a lot of flaws and talent gaps but they rarely tuck their tails.
Didn’t even look at the site until the game was over. It’s interesting to read what everyone’s thoughts were after the fact. Simple formula today. Turner bombs carried us in the first half. Warren carried us in the second half. Ugly win. Move on.
I feel for a kid that transfers to the home of the 4 yard crossing route only to have a change that makes your new home a running QB kind of place. I hope he finds a good place to spend his final season. I admire the fact that he didn’t piss and moan and become Mr. Negative. He sucked it up and will probably handle his first poor work situation a whole lot better for having gone through this.
I bet if you did a poll on SFN with the question “Are you a genius?”, you’d end up with a number a lot higher than 33%.
9 or 10 conference wins doesn’t take too much fantasizing to account for. If we go 11-7 in conference we will be bubblicious at worst.
