Maliq at center doesn’t work | Page 2 | Syracusefan.com

Maliq at center doesn’t work

It's still early to make any concrete judgments. Red is still tinkering with rotations and getting players back and players are figuring things out and getting used to each other and Red's new expectations. Things are going to go in spurts of awesome and ugly through November.
 
Basketball is and always will be a chess game. If you have a banging physical center McLeod should be the best option at center for as long as he can play. We will def need him in ACC play.

Yesterday McLeod couldn’t guard their 6’6” sharpshooter though so they were forced to bring in Maliq and Cary. When Benny is back hopefully he will help.

I think it’s great we have multiple options. And we will create a few mismatches of our own.
 
HakAttack said:
Maliq made some really head-scratching plays tonight. His foul on the three point shooter chief among them.
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That was out of the zone, Devo commented you have to know the rotations. Bad foul, but he was trying to do his assignment. So there's your answer to the question, will Red ask a center to cover the corner 3?
 
Cuse_NYC said:
Yeah idn about Red’s in game decisions thus far
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Remember that the next time you start a new job.

It's becoming easy to spot all the ones who wanted Pitino as a rental...
 
Orangezoo said:
He's fine. He's not 100 pct at all.
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I don't think that's totally it. Even 100% healthy, he's not the answer at the 5, ESPECIALLY in the zone. I suppose if you need to go small in man to man, he's an ok option, but I don't think he's a plus defender in man to man either. Slow-ish lateral movement and poor defensive stance/positioning were especially noticeable Monday night. That being said, I'm not sure anyone on this team, outside of Copeland and JJ, is a very good defender, zone or man.
 
shandeezy7 said:
I don't think that's totally it. Even 100% healthy, he's not the answer at the 5, ESPECIALLY in the zone. I suppose if you need to go small in man to man, he's an ok option, but I don't think he's a plus defender in man to man either. Slow-ish lateral movement and poor defensive stance/positioning were especially noticeable Monday night. That being said, I'm not sure anyone on this team, outside of Copeland and JJ, is a very good defender, zone or man.
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With Maliq I'd wager its mostly to do with injury. Also I'm not sure why so many think we need 7-4 out there most nights in mtm or even 6-11 for that matter. Maliq is definitely stronger this year for sure.

We face about 6 or 7 teams this year that have more traditional size at the 5. Everyone else is running with more small ball/ versatile lineups like those that have wrecked us in the recent rough stretch.

There is a lot of work on both sides of the ball to build chemistry and guys to trust one another. On defense especially guys aren't being quick enough to recognize where they need to help or switch in certain situations which then puts their teammate in a bad spot.
 
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McLeod needs to be able to maintain positioning on defense and not get pushed around and shy away from engaging with opposing bigs.

I know I need to let bygones be bygones but it's a big reason why I wish we'd have landed Udeh.
 
M2MPrinciples said:
McLeod needs to be able to maintain positioning on defense and not get pushed around and shy away from engaging with opposing bigs.

I know I need to let bygones be bygones but it's a big reason why I wish we'd have landed Udeh.
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Udeh played 13 minutes with 0 pts 2 rebs and 3 blocks in TCUs opener just FYI.
 
Orangezoo said:
Remember that the next time you start a new job.

It's becoming easy to spot all the ones who wanted Pitino as a rental...
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Oh I’m more than admitting I wanted Pitino.
 
Orangezoo said:
Right so throw objectivity on the coaching comments out the window.
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Why can’t we question Red wanting to play small? He said it AGAIN at Carrabba’s. Teams will score at will against us with Maliq at center. I will stand by this.
 
Cuse_NYC said:
Why can’t we question Red wanting to play small? He said it AGAIN at Carrabba’s. Teams will score at will against us with Maliq at center. I will stand by this.
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It's modern basketball. We scored against Miami too and lost again and again. He's not throwing away McLeod. Look at our recruiting targets as well. He's not putting together a lineup of midgets.

What's so great about going with a bigger lineup? Looked at the advanced box score 0307 posted with Maliq not at 100 pct. The numbers don't back up your argument.

Also right now our bigger issues are to sort things out on offense and rebound better.
 
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shandeezy7 said:
I don't think that's totally it. Even 100% healthy, he's not the answer at the 5, ESPECIALLY in the zone. I suppose if you need to go small in man to man, he's an ok option, but I don't think he's a plus defender in man to man either. Slow-ish lateral movement and poor defensive stance/positioning were especially noticeable Monday night. That being said, I'm not sure anyone on this team, outside of Copeland and JJ, is a very good defender, zone or man.
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Copeland might be the worst defender on the team. Getting steals doesn’t equate to being a good defender. Watch him try to defend in the post area. Comical!
 
shandeezy7 said:
I don't think that's totally it. Even 100% healthy, he's not the answer at the 5, ESPECIALLY in the zone. I suppose if you need to go small in man to man, he's an ok option, but I don't think he's a plus defender in man to man either. Slow-ish lateral movement and poor defensive stance/positioning were especially noticeable Monday night. That being said, I'm not sure anyone on this team, outside of Copeland and JJ, is a very good defender, zone or man.
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According to the stats Maliq was our best defender the other night. JJ was actually one of our worst.
 
I always find it ironic that McCloud has bad matchups on defense. Shouldn’t it work in his favor on offense? We never seem to punish smaller players with our size. McCloud scored on a nice low post move to start the game and never touched the ball again in the post. Taylor made two bad entry passes from the top instead of giving the wing the ball to feed McCloud. He needs touches. JJ and Mintz in transition need to find the shooters and set them up. JJ did this in our first exhibition game, but they didn’t look for anyone against NH.
 
hoopsupstate said:
I always find it ironic that McCloud has bad matchups on defense. Shouldn’t it work in his favor on offense? We never seem to punish smaller players with our size. McCloud scored on a nice low post move to start the game and never touched the ball again in the post. Taylor made two bad entry passes from the top instead of giving the wing the ball to feed McCloud. He needs touches. JJ and Mintz in transition need to find the shooters and set them up. JJ did this in our first exhibition game, but they didn’t look for anyone against NH.
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Taylor tried to throw it to him in the post a few times. They were successful once. Three other times it lead to a turnover. Taylor got credit for each turnover, but I’m not sure McLeod sealed his man that well either.
 
M2MPrinciples said:
McLeod needs to be able to maintain positioning on defense and not get pushed around and shy away from engaging with opposing bigs.

I know I need to let bygones be bygones but it's a big reason why I wish we'd have landed Udeh.
Expand...

McLeod also needs to do a better job vs attacking guards. Couple times during the exhibitions and UNH game guards could drive at him and he couldn’t alter or block the shot.
 
Cusefan0307 said:
Taylor tried to throw it to him in the post a few times. They were successful once. Three other times it lead to a turnover. Taylor got credit for each turnover, but I’m not sure McLeod sealed his man that well either.
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Well, one of those passes was WAAAAY over Highlander's head.
Even MP joked that it was pretty hard to overthrow a dude who is 7'4", but Taylor managed to do so.
So yeah - that crap pass was totally on JT.

I do appreciate that Taylor was looking to feed the big guy, but his passes weren't great.
 
shandeezy7 said:
I don't think that's totally it. Even 100% healthy, he's not the answer at the 5, ESPECIALLY in the zone. I suppose if you need to go small in man to man, he's an ok option, but I don't think he's a plus defender in man to man either. Slow-ish lateral movement and poor defensive stance/positioning were especially noticeable Monday night. That being said, I'm not sure anyone on this team, outside of Copeland and JJ, is a very good defender, zone or man.
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This is an utterly absurd comment at this point. Maliq, JJ and Copeland are all really athletic and can move laterally really well and are extremely hard workers. They have the potential to be very good defenders. But it’s going to take them all some time to learn how to play high-level man to man defense and understand all the minute details of what they need to do on that end in terms of help defense, stopping dribble penetration and trying to keep guys out of the lane. It’s gonna take some time. It’s up to Red and the staff to teach them.
 
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