Bison137
Professor
Posts: 16147
Reg: 01-23-06
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01-06-20 02:12 PM - Post#296156
In response to Old Bison
OBSERVATIONS:
3. Poor John Griffin (i.e., how does SJ lose to LC by 20?)
5. If Rice can go north-south (as opposed to east-
west)he will be much more effective. Doesn't
need to finish, just needs to go really hard
UNDER control and kick to the perimeter
6. Offense in the last two second halves seemed
better with Bruce off the floor...coincidence?
7. Its clear ND does not want to put Spear in the
position of defending the 5. Comparative
performance does not illustrate to me that AT
is a better option or even close to it.
9. Sorry Rhoades was pulled so fast as he is the
type of big defensive body we're gonna need. If hit that mid-range jumper he would have stayed longer (don't see him pulling Ellis like that)
3. St. Joes is a real mess. In addition to that LC loss, they have a 16-point loss to St. Francis, a 39 point loss to Temple, and a 32 point loss to Richmond. Pomeroy ranks them behind eight Patriot League teams. What is amazing is how SJ beat Bradley and UConn at the start of the year.
5. Agree that Rice needs to penetrate more. But right now when he does drive, he makes it too obvious that he has no intention of shooting. Doesn't even look at the rim. Even if a lane opened up the width of the Grand Canyon, I think he would still kick it out.
6. Might not be coincidence. Bruce recently hadn't been scoring much in the lane and his outside shot has totally abandoned him. Like a golfer with the yips. On threes, he is 1-25 this year, after being doing reasonably well on threes the past two years. Also his defensive rebounding has been very weak this year. His defensive rebounding rate is half that of Sotos and Funk, and also way behind Toomer. Even way behind Ellis.
7. Part of Spear's usage may have been dictated by Lafayette having a 7-0 center who showed some surprising ability to back into the lane and score. Spear did play center for a couple of minutes vs Army. But yes, ND clearly prefers him at PF. Now that he is showing an OK stationary three point shot, if he could only develop a couple of moves to the basket, he could be useful on offense.
AS for AT, he does show some talent, but he is just too slow laterally to guard any center with a quick spin or drop step. That problem would be at least partly solved if he went back to his HS playing weight.
8. At some point Rhodes may get more minutes, but right now his offense is non-existent. Missing that mid-range shot was about a 90% probability. If you surrounded him with Funk, Sotos, Toomer, and Ellis, his lack of offense wouldn't be a big deal - but playing him with a few other subs really makes it difficult to score.
As for Ellis, ND has trimmed his minutes significantly. He is averaging 7 mpg over the past nine games, and only played 5 mpg in each of the last two. Right now, he won't put the ball to the floor with any purpose, has no inside or mid-range game and is not good defensively. He needs to show a fair amount of improvement in these areas. At least he has hit an OK percentage of his threes this year.
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