Kansas Can, SU Couldn't Postgame Thread

[phsyra]

We are not beating Tennessee...so we could be headed for the NIT...Our team is definitely better than last year but the late game coaching is really bad...Hard to imagine we ever compete for titles with this type of offense

 

[nocohalo]

Tennessee is going to absolutely destroy this team

 

[McCuse]

Tennessee is going to absolutely destroy this team

They looked awfully good. And big, and deep!

 

[djorange1989]

Guessing maryland or baylor as possibilities

Yeah or maybe Oregon

 

[Dcuse]

We got much better movement and screening actions in the first few games but we were still too stagnant. Granted, Houston has the #1 defense and Kansas is top 10 so we were gonna be challenged on that side of the court. Autry puts so much emphasis on defense, and we’re looking a lot better there, but he clearly doesn’t spend enough time on teaching and emphasizing ball movement and off ball screening actions. We run plays at times but it’s never consistent. He’s not going to succeed as a coach if he can’t do better there. He either needs to change concepts, teach the players better, or hire an offensive coordinator if he can’t do it himself. He’s following JB’s lack of creativity and iso ball reliance and that’s gonna cost him his job if he can’t figure it out. Hopefully getting Donnie back helps.

Disagree. Our offense created a ton of open shots. We turned the ball over twice. The coach can’t shoot threes or foul shots for you. Stop protecting the players.

 

[Four7Oh3]

Tenn goes 23/29 from the line including 10 for 10 down the stretch. PG went 9/9 and barely touched the rim. Cuse 12/29 last night. What could’ve been….

 

[ScriptCuse]

I fear that this has made me laugh out loud

 

[Cusefan0307]

.
They’re not getting get enough 3-point shots in the flow of the offense. We need way more motion in the offense and cutters flying through the lane and moving along the baseline. That’s why the shots aren’t going down. To quote Seth Greenberg, you need to shoot 3s when you have room and rhythm. And the guys need to be ready to catch the ball as soon as the pass comes. Jay Wright always emphasized that with his Nova teams.

The offensive design is putrid. Some of these guys are performing worse here than their former schools because of it.

 

[nocohalo]

Bad shot selection is also bad coaching. Always has, always will. In fact, shot selection is practically the #1 indicator of how well a team is coached. This has been true since the game was invented. Yet I still saw comments trying to gatekeep coaching observations based on whether or not they thought you ever played "meaningful basketball". We're in for a rough ride.

 

[McCuse]

It’s a really weird team. Lots of athleticism, very little shooting. It’s 100% opposite of the Boeheim Bunch teams.

FT shooting is really a concern. This team has two key players that cannot be guaranteed to hit the rim. That’s a ginormous flaw. Donnie has to play the 5 at end of games.

For all the defense, we don’t turn stops into transition baskets. And then we get into 1/2 court offense and it stalls.

I don’t know what to think of Kingz. Pretty shot, just doesn’t fall. He’s been more effective attacking the glass.

Kiyan- ugh. Very concerned here. He’s not doing anything in the flow of the offense. He was a complete ball stopper today. Trying to operate clear outs against plus athletes who knew he was not giving it up. He battled hard to get a couple buckets, but that is not winning basketball.

Agree with those who are confused by what George is doing- he’s not making his teammates better. I’m not sure if he’s not confident in his teammates or what.

We missed a ton of inside shots too. Didn’t finish through contract for the most part. Very disappointing.

As far as Red goes, I think my biggest issue that I have with him is that he doesn’t use the bench as a teaching tool. I know people hated watching JB pull kids, but ffs it sends a message. Watching players take bad shots and “play through it”….sends a message that it’s okay. There’s a happy medium.

This team’s defense is good enough. No doubt. We just struggle to score and we essentially lose 5-10 pts against good teams because we can’t shoot fts.

Good observations. I think they have the capability to shoot much better( aside from the foul line). We'll see how they respond. Getting really difficult to be a die hard SU basketball fan. Because lately, it feels like that.

 

[McCuse]

We’re not beating the Vols. They’ve totally clamped down on Houston. Shut them out for over seven minutes. The Vols have ball movers. Our bigs are the only ball movers we have.

Tennessee is big, and deep!

 

[hungrychuck]

Certainly a different vibe from last night.

Still, this looks like Red’s best team and I think it will be.

Good chance they make the Dance.

 

[kcsu]

Kiyan had an awful game no doubt, but he’s a freshman. Those games are gonna happen. However, all of the other players who are older and much more experienced (JJ), there’s no excuse.

He didn't need to play as much.

 

[Sherman20]

Bad shot selection is also bad coaching. Always has, always will. In fact, shot selection is practically the #1 indicator of how well a team is coached. This has been true since the game was invented. Yet I still saw comments trying to gatekeep coaching observations based on whether or not they thought you ever played "meaningful basketball". We're in for a rough ride.

True. But honestly, a lot of teams and coaches look like Syracuse on offense, even some good ones. We don’t need a John Beilein or Matt Painter offensive guru to win (though I wish we had one). We just need some well designed plays and actions that we run regularly and run with a crispness and precision. Even the off ball screens we do set aren’t executed all that well. I get that Red wanted to emphasize defense and toughness in the offseason (and I appreciate that we’re a lot better on D), but you can’t ignore the offense. You have to work just as hard on it, and lot of it is mental and practicing it over and over.

 

[CardiacCuse]

It’s a really weird team. Lots of athleticism, very little shooting. It’s 100% opposite of the Boeheim Bunch teams.

FT shooting is really a concern. This team has two key players that cannot be guaranteed to hit the rim. That’s a ginormous flaw. Donnie has to play the 5 at end of games.

For all the defense, we don’t turn stops into transition baskets. And then we get into 1/2 court offense and it stalls.

I don’t know what to think of Kingz. Pretty shot, just doesn’t fall. He’s been more effective attacking the glass.

Kiyan- ugh. Very concerned here. He’s not doing anything in the flow of the offense. He was a complete ball stopper today. Trying to operate clear outs against plus athletes who knew he was not giving it up. He battled hard to get a couple buckets, but that is not winning basketball.

Agree with those who are confused by what George is doing- he’s not making his teammates better. I’m not sure if he’s not confident in his teammates or what.

We missed a ton of inside shots too. Didn’t finish through contract for the most part. Very disappointing.

As far as Red goes, I think my biggest issue that I have with him is that he doesn’t use the bench as a teaching tool. I know people hated watching JB pull kids, but ffs it sends a message. Watching players take bad shots and “play through it”….sends a message that it’s okay. There’s a happy medium.

This team’s defense is good enough. No doubt. We just struggle to score and we essentially lose 5-10 pts against good teams because we can’t shoot fts.

what gets me most is the team does not play smart basketball. i just wanna see a team that plays cleverly, in a fsahion that maximizes winning chances, like so many other top programs do. for me, this is THE difference separating the Cuse from the top of the sport right now.

i dont think its a talent issue like it has been. i think a lot of the teams that beat SU lately do not actually have more talented rosters...but they use what they have SO much better than the Orange.

SU has played with pretty low bball IQ for a long time now, sadly. the teams they will beat are the ones with lower bball iq.

prtty sur red is feeling a lot of heat at the moment...he knows hes on a hot seat and the mental issues we are seeing with the team are likely related.

 

[Sherman20]

Disagree. Our offense created a ton of open shots. We turned the ball over twice. The coach can’t shoot threes or foul shots for you. Stop protecting the players.

I do agree that the players need to step up and make shots and they did have some open looks. But coaches also have to design and teach an offense to put the players in position. Did you listen to the broadcast? Robbie Hummel was calling out our team multiple times for lack of movement and screening action. He was like (I’m paraphrasing), “you can’t just run all high ball screens and iso ball. You have to have some movement and off-ball screen and variety on offense.” That said, we did that more in the first three games against inferior competition.

 

[swish7]

The offensive design is putrid. Some of these guys are performing worse here than their former schools because of it.

There is no design besides the 2nd or 3rd person to touch the ball is gonna shoot it, regardless

 

[Sherman20]

There is no design besides the 2nd or 3rd person to touch the ball is gonna shoot it, regardless

I don’t think hyperbole and glibness is helpful here. But, yes, we barely got any ball movement and not enough off ball screening actions. When we did they were poorly executed. Autry and the staff need to do a better job at working on the offense and getting the players to execute. He can’t just rely on high ball screens or revert to iso ball when that doesn’t work.

 

[phil77]

There is no design besides the 2nd or 3rd person to touch the ball is gonna shoot it, regardless

"extra pass" isn't in the playbook

 

[OrlandoCuse]

Gassed? Really? That’s the excuse?

Both Cuse and Kansas played back to back days. These are athletes in the prime condition and we brought a strength and conditioning coach in who worked them hard all offseason (or so we think based on the marketing they put on social media).

We lost because the consistent effort and shooting wasn’t there tonight, we didn’t rebound well, we have zero offensive identity yet again, and we cant hit FTs. Watch this Houston Tennessee game and imagine Cuse is Tennessee at the end. We easily blow it due to FT shooting. Thats the difference between being a tourney team or an NIT team for Cuse

I saw a fresh team that played well against a top 5 team yesterday and despite a ton of errors (bad free throw shooting) they still almost pulled out a win.

I saw a team that didn’t bring the same energy level today. They played worse and lost, even though they had a chance to take the lead with under 5 minutes to go. Other than limiting turnovers, there wasn’t a lot of good play from the team. Bad shooting, bad rebounding.

Additionally, we didn’t have our best player.

I see a team that hasn’t played its best game. A team that hasn’t had its full complement of players. I see a team with lots of potential. Significantly more than the last several seasons of Syracuse basketball.

I think the problem is Syracuse fans have been stuck in the doldrums having watched bad basketball for nearly a decade they are desperate for a great team again. Desperate for wins against top teams. I get it. I want the same. I think this team finds a way to fix or hide their flaws and puts together a competitive season making the NCAAT.

 

[capeorange]

i see j.j. going full kamikaze to the rim and hoping for a whistle like his old sidekick mintz .

Big difference is that Mintz could make his free throws

 

[nocohalo]

I saw a fresh team that played well against a top 5 team yesterday and despite a ton of errors (bad free throw shooting) they still almost pulled out a win.

I saw a team that didn’t bring the same energy level today. They played worse and lost, even though they had a chance to take the lead with under 5 minutes to go. Other than limiting turnovers, there wasn’t a lot of good play from the team. Bad shooting, bad rebounding.

Additionally, we didn’t have our best player.

I see a team that hasn’t played its best game. A team that hasn’t had its full complement of players. I see a team with lots of potential. Significantly more than the last several seasons of Syracuse basketball.

I think the problem is Syracuse fans have been stuck in the doldrums having watched bad basketball for nearly a decade they are desperate for a great team again. Desperate for wins against top teams. I get it. I want the same. I think this team finds a way to fix or hide their flaws and puts together a competitive season making the NCAAT.

The problem is that we hear this at this time every season. I remember last year everyone thought we were going to do something because we hung around at Tennessee for 3/4 of the game without Starling, and hung around with Texas and Texas Tech.

 

[RedtheGOB]

On reflection I think I’m just real pissed. Watching Donnie sit the bench nursing his leg just pisses me off this week. Even having him available changes these game. for all we care he can nap through all December for the that next run of cupcakes.

 

[CuseBlood44]

I saw a fresh team that played well against a top 5 team yesterday and despite a ton of errors (bad free throw shooting) they still almost pulled out a win.

I saw a team that didn’t bring the same energy level today. They played worse and lost, even though they had a chance to take the lead with under 5 minutes to go. Other than limiting turnovers, there wasn’t a lot of good play from the team. Bad shooting, bad rebounding.

Additionally, we didn’t have our best player.

I see a team that hasn’t played its best game. A team that hasn’t had its full complement of players. I see a team with lots of potential. Significantly more than the last several seasons of Syracuse basketball.

I think the problem is Syracuse fans have been stuck in the doldrums having watched bad basketball for nearly a decade they are desperate for a great team again. Desperate for wins against top teams. I get it. I want the same. I think this team finds a way to fix or hide their flaws and puts together a competitive season making the NCAAT.

Fair, but with the portal you can turn over a team easily in a year. We were told this was the roster to do it, and now it appears FTs are going to be kryptonite all year. Can’t close out games if you can’t hit them

 

[CuseBlood44]

On reflection I think I’m just real pissed. Watching Donnie sit the bench nursing his leg just pisses me off this week. Even having him available changes these game. for all we care he can nap through all December for the that next run of cupcakes.

He and JJ the big money guys are the ones causing issues. Go figure