Cal Postgame

[Scott11]

Taylor was good in this game. His shot selection was very good and he
only forced one of his threes. Would have been nice if he had stopped fouling late when we were trying to kill the clock,, but overall he was our best player.
To be clear, McLeod doesn’t play because he’s not a very good basketball player. But I will give him credit for the fact that he came in and was very serviceable. I’m sure he’s disappointed with where he is in his career, but he appears to have kept himself ready to play which is commendable.
It was good to see Choppa hit a couple of meaningful shots. Hopefully he can keep building off of that. I wish I saw more improvement in his defense as the season goes along.
The last couple of minutes where we played like we had never seen a press before was disturbing. It was mystifying how we kept throwing the ball to Carlos in the corner. Not a good look for Red as we were neither prepared nor did we use timeouts Effectively to solve the issue.

 

[RyanCuse44]

I mean their coach is the meathead of meatheads

Tom Crean could never figure out how to beat our zone and still can't.

 

[kuethstheman]

Taylor was good in this game. His shot selection was very good and he
only forced one of his threes. Would have been nice if he had stopped fouling late when we were trying to kill the clock,, but overall he was our best player.

Those fouls on Taylor were pretty cheap!

 

[Fly Rodder]

All conference road wins are good. Nice job.

There were possessions with good crisp passing and moving the ball with purpose. More of this please.

 

[Newhouser]

Good win but Red's substitution pattern especially when he pulls a lineup that is doing really well is beyond me.
Also not using a TO to set up the inbounds play after the second turnover is beyond me.
Loved using McCleod I would have played him way more. Thought Carlos was horrible. Not sure why Cuffe and Carlos would ever be on the floor at the same time. It's insane to play them together especially with Petar. 3 guys that can't score and are undersized.
Bell continues to be one dimensional. He is God awful in man D. I'd only have him on the floor if we go zone on D. He simply can't play man.
We can with with more McCleod
Taylor JJ Davis and Choppa.
To me those 5 in Zone are the best team and scheme.
Good win but head scratching substitutions

First half he subs all starters but Eddie. Pete, Bell, Carlos and Cuffe come in at once. Looked like old Grown.

 

[Red2003]

Happy I stayed up to watch. Few big shots to quiet the crowd were big.

Cal is basically our West Coast twin this year. Pretty bad defensively. Terrible shooting when they run into a D that is even playing half decent. Chucking up way too many bad shots.

 

[Dcuse]

I'd rather have Lampkin give McCleod rest. I think we are a better team with him on the floor. Spacing is better on D and he is definitely a better rim protector.

OMG!

 

[Irishsecra1]

as we pull off an upset vs duke with 1800 people in the stands.

I will be one of those fans.

 

[EnviroSciGuy]

What I enjoyed the most was the ball movement and players cutting without the ball on offense. I can tolerate losing if you can see effort and a plan. The rotations were bizarre and the defense is what it is, but zone worked well on kudos to Red and staff seeing an advantage there and ruthlessly exploiting it.

 

[hoopsupstate]

Happy I stayed up to watch. Few big shots to quiet the crowd were big.

Cal is basically our West Coast twin this year. Pretty bad defensively. Terrible shooting when they run into a D that is even playing half decent. Chucking up way too many bad shots.

When we take really good threes we can make them. Taylor’s three last night were wide, open shots. He can make them. Even Carlos can when he gets some clean looks. If Choppa can keep getting those looks last night he will consistently make them. They were all off really good passes. Not many were dribbling near the end of the shot clock. Ball movement last night was really good. You could see the guys enjoying themselves. Excellent passing and getting the ball when you’re open can really help a team to relax on offense. We saw a lot of smiles last night. This team is still fighting. Besides Duke and at SMU, this team can play with most of the teams left on the schedule. It doesn’t mean they will win them all or even half of them, but it shouldn’t be all doom and gloom.

 

[Scooch]

I watched the first minute and last minute of the game. So can someone explain to me if this was a case of SU winning or Cal losing?

I see that Cal shot 29% overall and 6 for 35 from three. That's mind numblingly awful. Did we cause much of that, or were they open looks that they simply missed?

 

[upperdeck]

The bad Cal shooting caused a ton of bad rebounds and 30 FTs and offensive put backs though.

they didnt seem to care how deep the 3s they took were either

 

[wiCuse]

I thought this was the best our offense has looked all season: good shot selection, solid movement off the ball and we ran some good sets. As others have noted, the subbing rotations continue to be perplexing.

You can never discount a conference road win.

 

[nycfan]

We always have top 20 recruiting classes but we never have any good players. This team is unwatchable.

Jaquan carlos is our only good player

Are you a family member?

 

[rocklloyd]

They coulda gotten right back into this thing!!

It never gets old.

 

[Sherman20]

For people who claim we don’t run any offense, look at the first half of the Cal game. Multiple off ball screening actions on most possesstions, brush screens, well executed flare screens, back door and straight line cuts into the lane on many possessions, posting up Lampkin in the lane. Not just endless high ball screens. Now that said, Cal doesn’t have a good defense. But the Syracuse coaches can scheme and the players are capable. I suspect when they meet resistance from better defenses, the players tend to cave and resort to too much isolation instead of continual movement and screening actions. We obviously have a talent disparity with many of the top teams so that’s part of the issue. But the team loses focus on both the offensive and defensive ends way too often, and I think the coaches have been struggling to get the players to maintain their focus and sharpness after they meet stout defensive resistance, instead of continuing to set screens and create off ball movement. I liked the improvement we saw against Cal, though.

As for the defense, the focus and intensity in the first half was very good. And I liked Red switching up defenses (man to zone and back to man) to confuse and disorient. Maybe Red should keep doing the intense pre-game defensive workouts to wake these players up. We could’ve won that Stanford game if not for the 2-25 start.

 

[Sherman20]

Did you hear the announcers today say Red was on the floor practicing with the team just before the game started? They said he really worked them hard. He’s probably tired of them coming out not ready to play. Good for him trying something different. The zone was good tonight except for a few missed rebounds. It really forced Cal to use time trying to get shots. Two biggest shots were Taylor’s late three and Petar’s offensive putback.

Yes. We should keep doing that, if that’s what it takes to wake the team up and play with intensity.

 

[nycfan]

Zone is good. Zone is our friend.

Yes, I can think of one HOF coach who was probably smiling last night.