I'll try to explain this again

[two3zone]

loyola is just slightly better than lemoyne. the Orange wont be 15 win bad, but 18-20 is where they headed. mccollough is clearly the only finisher. christmas needs to learn to finish...and in his 4th year in the program, well... and the only guy trustable with the 3 is cooney. gonna be a wild ride ladies...

Lol. Raks at 52% shooting. I think he can get a free pass here.

 

[moqui]

offense in college basketball stinks; when you take that into context, SU's struggles are not so bad relatively speaking.

at its essence, basketball is a simple game: you try to take high percentage shots & make your opponent take lower percentage shots. You do that and you are going to win most of the time.

So far, SU is taking over 40% of its shots at the rim & hitting over 65% of them and at the same time forcing our opponents to take over 40% of their shots from beyond the arc where they are hitting only 28%. Keep up with that general breakdown & the team will be fine; improve a little bit on offense as I expect and they will be better than fine.

All this 19 win, NIT talk seems silly to me

 

[Cusefan0307]

offense in college basketball stinks; when you take that into context, SU's struggles are not so bad relatively speaking.

at its essence, basketball is a simple game: you try to take high percentage shots & make your opponent take lower percentage shots. You do that and you are going to win most of the time.

So far, SU is taking over 40% of its shots at the rim & hitting over 65% of them and at the same time forcing our opponents to take over 40% of their shots from beyond the arc where they are hitting only 28%. Keep that general breakdown up & the team will be fine; improve a little bit on offense as I expect and they will be better than fine.

All this 19 win, NIT talk seems silly to me

You aren't kidding. I've watched Michigan/nova, unc/butler, and now UCLA/Oklahoma. I've still yet to find a team that's good on offense.

 

[SoBeCuse]

We lost to Lemoyne before with a better team.

There's 8 ranked teams on our schedule. If we lose them all, we'd still have to lose 5 more games to win 18.

You're down on Roc after last night? He had 18 on 7-11 shooting against an NCAA tournament team on Friday.

Watch someone besides Syracuse. There are worse teams than us on offense. cough pittsburgh cough.

We play Michigan next week. The Final score may be 40 -35. They can't shoot straight either.

Agree except for the last part. Villanova is a bad matchup for Michigan. Syracuse is a good matchup for Michigan. Villanova had multiple physical guards who could defend Michigan's very good trio of LeVert/Irvin/Walton. Still, Michigan made a nice comeback and almost won. We saw how LeVert is comfortable handling the ball now and he made some tough shots in the paint. If he is open then pretty much book a 3. Michigan will score points on Dec 2. Can we?

 

[SBU72]

If i had to guess, i would say 19 wins. And if anyone is trying to take anything from the game last night, they must not have watched. i thought it was actually the worst game we played all year. it was tough to watch in person. Loyola is one of, if not the worst team i have ever seen in the Dome. Horrible shooters, horrible passing... uggh. They wont go .500 in whatever league they are in.

we need to get alot better, and fast. If we make the Big Dance, this is a huge bonus.

Agreed. If that was a fair representation of how good the team is then they should not only be dropped from top 25 but maybe the top 100!

 

[Cusefan0307]

Agree except for the last part. Villanova is a bad matchup for Michigan. Syracuse is a good matchup for Michigan. Villanova had multiple physical guards who could defend Michigan's very good trio of LeVert/Irvin/Walton. Still, Michigan made a nice comeback and almost won. We saw how LeVert is comfortable handling the ball now and he made some tough shots in the paint. If he is open then pretty much book a 3. Michigan will score points on Dec 2. Can we?

6-21 from three doesn't scare me. They have nothing inside. They are going to shoot long contested threes that will be low percentage looks. As long as we rebound, and we should, I expect roc and cmac to combine for 35 and 18. Trevor will get at least ten, and our defense will keep this game in the 50's.

 

[Macky44]

If i had to guess, i would say 19 wins. And if anyone is trying to take anything from the game last night, they must not have watched. i thought it was actually the worst game we played all year. it was tough to watch in person. Loyola is one of, if not the worst team i have ever seen in the Dome. Horrible shooters, horrible passing... uggh. They wont go .500 in whatever league they are in.

we need to get alot better, and fast. If we make the Big Dance, this is a huge bonus.

" the sky is falling!"

Boeheim doesn't NOT get to 20 wins. Only happened twice in his career...with MUCH worse teams. Everyone just shut up until end of December.

 

[SoBeCuse]

6-21 from three doesn't scare me. They have nothing inside. They are going to shoot long contested threes that will be low percentage looks. As long as we rebound, and we should, I expect roc and cmac to combine for 35 and 18. Trevor will get at least ten, and our defense will keep this game in the 50's.

Again, lot of that is Villanova's perimeter D. Want to make a bet about Michigan in the 50s? Maybe in Syracuse or neutral but not in Crisler. They will move the ball well and get plenty of open looks. Joseph and Cooney aren't a lockdown duo on top of the zone, lol. Corner threes have been available this year as well against us.

 

[Cusefan0307]

Again, lot of that is Villanova's perimeter D. Want to make a bet about Michigan in the 50s? Maybe in Syracuse or neutral but not in Crisler. They will move the ball well and get plenty of open looks. Joseph and Cooney aren't a lockdown duo on top of the zone, lol. Corner threes have been available this year as well against us.

I watched the game against nova last night. Our ("crappy") two guard scored 25 against those same defenders last year. Who's going to play the high post for them? You asked for my opinion. We aren't going to Lexington.

 

[SoBeCuse]

I watched the game against nova last night. Our ("crappy") two guard scored 25 against those same defenders last year. Who's going to play the high post for them? You asked for my opinion. We aren't going to Lexington.

I won't post anymore about this but Beilein knows how to attack a zone. They were pretty good still without McGary last year so not having a big post presence never bothers them too much, imo. Villanova was a much younger team last year and that was before teams figured us out. Now Cooney is getting lots of attention.

 

[Cusefan0307]

I won't post anymore about this but Beilein knows how to attack a zone. They were pretty good still without McGary last year so not having a big post presence never bothers them too much, imo. Villanova was a much younger team last year and that was before teams figured us out. Now Cooney is getting lots of attention.

A. John Beilein with one career win against Jim Boeheim.
B. Glenn Robinson.

 

[reedny]

You aren't kidding. I've watched Michigan/nova, unc/butler, and now UCLA/Oklahoma. I've still yet to find a team that's good on offense.

We all knew there would be some growing pains -- replacing 60% of the offense from a team that averaged a 50 year low was never going to be easy. But I love our front line and I think KJ and CM are going to be a great players for us. CM's already getting lottery notice. Enjoy watching him play while he's here.

I'm optimistic about this team because of our inside nucleus. Five games in, we're averaging 30 points between Rock and Cm. If this continues, they can pack it in all they want ... our bigs will be able to score, rebound and defend with the top teams in the league. You win games from the inside out. And we finally have the inside talent to do that ... conceding that depth and foul-shooting might become issues.

Where I'm less optimistic is the backcourt and SF positions - 1 through 3. Up top, we're small and we look raw. MG brings in some size and defense, but his scoring has been limited to transition points so far. Similarly, at SF we don't have the experience or scoring talent we've had in the past. Outside shooting could improve somewhat as our younger players at the 1 and 3 get used to playing at this level. We may also get better looks as teams start concentrating on our inside scorers. But I don't think we're going to light it up from outside this year. And it's not just TC's fault. It's a problem with all the guards, SF's and rotation guys. These guys are going to have to find a shooting rhythm in order for us to beat any of the top tier teams in the ACC.

I don't buy into the excuse that we won't need to shoot well because other top teams suck from the outside right now . Even if that's true, and I don't think it is, that's unlikely to be the case come January and February. For just one example, the Cal guards (Mathews and Bird) ate our lunch. They used simple high screens and splashed shots from all over the court. And we couldn't stop them. Those two guys alone went off for 38 points. Kavesh also hurt us a little from the foul line area. But poor guard play lost us that game.

This isn't really a massive surprise, because our team is young. We've already improved our baseline defense since Cal. As Joseph, TC and Roberson/BJ get used to playing with each other and running the zone, the holes and passing lanes will start disappearing. We have great size and shot-blocking ability inside. If we improve our perimeter defense and make even marginal improvements in outside shooting and feeding the post, I think we can have a good season.

Note: Cal averages better than 40% from outside. So do Michigan, Miami, Duke, V-Tech and ND -- all teams we play. So our perimeter D has to get better and I think it will have to if we are to survive and be successful.

 

[longtimefan]

agree, 007. I wouldn't mind seeing G move into the starting lineup and then have Roberson & BJ fight it out to see who the sixth man is going to be

I think G remains 6th man, as his versatility helps JB adjust substitutions to the flow of the game.

 

[Cowtown]

We lost to Lemoyne before with a better team.

There's 8 ranked teams on our schedule. If we lose them all, we'd still have to lose 5 more games to win 18.

You're down on Roc after last night? He had 18 on 7-11 shooting against an NCAA tournament team on Friday.

Watch someone besides Syracuse. There are worse teams than us on offense. cough pittsburgh cough.

We play Michigan next week. The Final score may be 40 -35. They can't shoot straight either.

Yeah, I watched Pitt get handled by SDSU. Pitt seemed baffled when they had the ball.