Cal Postgame

[Scooch]

After watching Starling for 2 3/4ths seasons at Syracuse, I've learned that the best we can hope for is that his positive plays outnumber his negative plays by at least a couple in any given game.

Tonight he accomplished that. Yes, he was a sieve defensively, and OMFG that travel... but he locked down Ames on a critical possession. Yes, he threw up some wild shots... but he hit some daggers down the stretch.

A meaningful issue with this team is that JJ is our #1 or #2 shot taker most nights. That's entirely on Red. But Starling is who he has always been. Tonight that helped us win. Others, not so much.

 

[Dmcnabbrules]

A lot of truth to this. AAU is too many games, too much travel, not enough skills coaching, poor fundamentals, not very much team play.

After being involved for the last five years my biggest complaint isn’t travel or team play, it’s that kids really get used to losing. Every weekend is a tournament so almost all teams lose at least once a tournament. When you only played 16 regular season varsity games every one was taken individually and played with a lot of pride. AAU does not create anywhere near the intensity, until a tournament final possibly.

 

[Newhouser]

His travel was a thing of beauty

Typical starling game. A bunch of bad plays a bunch of good plays

the travel is a play that sums up our current state of basketball. JJ absurdly picks up his dribble after (I believe anyway) Donnie cut the wrong way on the play.

Instinctively every player who has laced up sneakers from Junior High on knows that if a teammate has a dead dribble you have to run to him to help. All 4 of our guys either stayed stationary or ran away from him.

Ending with JJ thinking nobody would notice his multiple changes of pivot foots converging into something like the electric slide.

Nobody knows how to play.

 

[Scooch]

After being involved for the last five years my biggest complaint isn’t travel or team play, it’s that kids really get used to losing. Every weekend is a tournament so almost all teams lose at least once a tournament. When you only played 16 regular season varsity games everyone was taken individually and played with a lot of pride. AAU does not create anywhere near the intensity until a tournament final, possibly.

I suspect that's the nature of all club sports these days. My son played years of club lacrosse, and that meant 4 or 5 tournaments in the summer. There would be some intense games, but by-and-large when the game was over the kid's primary concern was if they played well.

 

[Cusefan0307]

JJ has to have the career record for airballs at Syracuse. At least in the last 30 years. His bad pays are really bad.

 

[Todd23]

I'd say George played a pretty good game.

He had some inexplicable turnovers, including a too-high lob to Souare.

 

[NineOneSeven]

In the end, it was a very memorable game to be at. Double OT, power outage, missed FTs all over. And ultimately a win. Crowd was sparse which worked out for me because you could essentially just pace around the entire row in the waning minutes.

Donnie was non existent too much of the game but credit for stepping up in OT. Minus the FTs. Same with Kingz, but huge buckets. George and JJ have a wide range out outcomes but both had clutch baskets (corner 3 and layup late, respectively).

White, Kyle finished strong inside.

Cal had some nice players. Eventually think they ran out of gas. Their guard (#7) ultimately tried to do too much but he was really tough and their big man was steady. Same with their wing shooter that wasn’t Bell. Bell was.. who he is. Couple big 3s but ultimately minimal else.

The fact Cal had to travel like 3k miles on a Wednesday for this game is stupid.

 

[IthacaMatt]

After watching Starling for 2 3/4ths seasons at Syracuse, I've learned that the best we can hope for is that his positive plays outnumber his negative plays by at least a couple in any given game.

Tonight he accomplished that. Yes, he was a sieve defensively, and OMFG that travel... but he locked down Ames on a critical possession. Yes, he threw up some wild shots... but he hit some daggers down the stretch.

A meaningful issue with this team is that JJ is our #1 or #2 shot taker most nights. That's entirely on Red. But Starling is who he has always been. Tonight that helped us win. Others, not so much.

He was pretty good defensively, sorry, but that's just a lazy take. He locked down that guy at the end of regulation who had been killing us. He stayed in front of a lot of guys on the dribble. Donnie was the terrible defender last night, not JJ.

 

[HyattsCuse]

The fact Cal had to travel like 3k miles on a Wednesday for this game is stupid.

I mean that’s the nature of a west coast team belonging to an east coast conference. They play at BC on Saturday so I assume they’ll stay on the east coast until then. It’s not like they flew out here just for our game.

 

[Scooch]

He was pretty good defensively, sorry, but that's just a lazy take. He locked down that guy at the end of regulation who had been killing us. He stayed in front of a lot of guys on the dribble. Donnie was the terrible defender last night, not JJ.

I only saw the last 10-11 minutes, but in that span Starling got blown by on at least 3 or 4 possessions. A couple of them were immediately following a make by him. He did play very well on Cal's last possession of regulation, for sure.

 

[Cuse12]

We should have prioritized and ran our offense through Kingz all year. Let Will Kyle be the man he is and just let him loose. Donnie should’ve played a lot of pick and pop/roll through Kingz also all year. We severely under prioritized Kingz. He is a really solid 3 level scorer, who else can score at all three levels like him on this team?

 

[AZOrange]

JJ has to have the career record for airballs at Syracuse. At least in the last 30 years. His bad pays are really bad.

It’s so weird because his good ones are really good. Just the disparity between his stroke on the first 3 of the game vs the last FT is crazy. I’m pretty sure he hit his chin with the ball
On the last one

 

[NineOneSeven]

I mean that’s the nature of a west coast team belonging to an east coast conference. They play at BC on Saturday so I assume they’ll stay on the east coast until then. It’s not like they flew out here just for our game.

… yes it is

 

[Cheriehoop]

So I didn’t see him drag his foot and travel late I. The game? I didn’t see him make a pass straight to a Cal player in the back court that immediately led to a dunk? I didn’t see floaters air balled?
Both things can be true. JJ did indeed do a lot of good but he is a senior and I think the teams more consistency from him.

He did guard Ames of Cal and kept him from killing us. Ames stats were way below his averages against us.

 

[AZOrange]

We should have prioritized and ran our offense through Kingz all year. Let Will Kyle be the man he is and just let him loose. Donnie should’ve played a lot of pick and pop/roll through Kingz also all year. We severely under prioritized Kingz. He is a really solid 3 level scorer, who else can score at all three levels like him on this team?

He had some bizarre three pointers too but I agree

 

[Cheriehoop]

Look at his stats for the year. They blow JJ and George out of the water.

Who guarded Ames? Wasn’t it JJ? He did a darn good job I would think holding him to such a poor game vs his stats for the year.

 

[sabach]

Picked up 4 tickets for me and my kids on Vivid yesterday in the 5th row behind the basket. Four bucks each. Good use of 16 dollars. Fun game. Good to see the guys get a win.

 

[Cusefan0307]

We should have prioritized and ran our offense through Kingz all year. Let Will Kyle be the man he is and just let him loose. Donnie should’ve played a lot of pick and pop/roll through Kingz also all year. We severely under prioritized Kingz. He is a really solid 3 level scorer, who else can score at all three levels like him on this team?

To me outside of George not playing to what we thought he was going to be this is the biggest misstep of the season. JJ was priority number 2. Even when Kingz was cooking in early games we would go entire halves without even trying to get him the ball. Red was using him like Chris Bell the first 15 games of the season and the player seemed to be buying into that's how he should be used.

 

[SUalldway]

Bell with 1 more rebound than a dead man.

In 40 minutes.

Plus 0 assists.

Never change, Chris.

Classic Bell setting up stationary in the corner and then playing matador defense the whole game

 

[HyattsCuse]

Who guarded Ames? Wasn’t it JJ? He did a darn good job I would think holding him to such a poor game vs his stats for the year.

This isn’t to discredit JJ, but for the vast majority of the game, Ames got whatever he wanted. It was more of him missing a bunch of open shots than our D locking him down. I commented a couple times in the game day thread how Ames kept us in the game missing so many little 6-10 foot jumpers in the lane, but just kept shooting them.

 

[Newhouser]

I suspect that's the nature of all club sports these days. My son played years of club lacrosse, and that meant 4 or 5 tournaments in the summer. There would be some intense games, but by-and-large when the game was over the kid's primary concern was if they played well.

or if they could get a T-shirt and hit the concession stand (at least in girls softball).

 

[Cuse4Life29]

This isn’t to discredit JJ, but for the vast majority of the game, Ames got whatever he wanted. It was more of him missing a bunch of open shots than our D locking him down. I commented a couple times in the game day thread how Ames kept us in the game missing so many little 6-10 foot jumpers in the lane, but just kept shooting them.

On most of the drives to the basket, Ames constantly hooked whoever was defending him. It was never called...

 

[Cuse4Life29]

We should have prioritized and ran our offense through Kingz all year. Let Will Kyle be the man he is and just let him loose. Donnie should’ve played a lot of pick and pop/roll through Kingz also all year. We severely under prioritized Kingz. He is a really solid 3 level scorer, who else can score at all three levels like him on this team?

Does Kingz have eligibility next year?

 

[charleston]

did you notice whoever Bell was guarding (Kingz, JJ,) drove straight to the basket on him and scored...his defense cost Cal big time

 

[Cheriehoop]

This isn’t to discredit JJ, but for the vast majority of the game, Ames got whatever he wanted. It was more of him missing a bunch of open shots than our D locking him down. I commented a couple times in the game day thread how Ames kept us in the game missing so many little 6-10 foot jumpers in the lane, but just kept shooting them.

He missed 5 threes also, 1 rebound, 2 assists and 5 turnovers too. Not a good game and way below his averages so I would hope that our defense had something to do with it.