My Take | Page 2 | Syracusefan.com

My Take

They don’t have the size of UNC but they play like them.
They crash the boards and get a ton of second chance points.
They only have one great shooter in Grimes.
The rest of the team plays tough defense and give effort on offensive glass.

The best team they played all year was Texas Tech early on who they beat. They should have lost vs RU but RU showed as a team who hasn't been to a tourney in a long time choking away a game they should have won by double digits.

If we can prevent the game from being a chaotic scrum like we managed to do the past two games I really like our chances. UH is also a team that struggles vs a press. Tape should show that trapping them and sneaking in some pressure could be really effective.
 
AG looks like he’s overthinking on the defensive end and it’s impacting his confidence on the offensive end. Early in the year, AG was dribbling the ball into space. It looks like now if he doesn’t have an open shot at the catch, he’s not quite sure what to do with the ball.
I think you make a good observation here. Quincy does seem to still be doing a lot of thinking still. He picks it up gradually and has become a major contributor as time goes by. Like JB says, if Quincy continues to develop as he thinks he can, he could be an all-American.

Can you imagine Quincy moving around fluidly because he's confident in what he's doing? Knows what he can and can't do when driving into the paint?

(As JB says, some guys you show them once and they get it; others you have to show them a dozen times before they finally get it.)
 
He may not be "ready" but he did some good things. Our rebounding was better in the game, and when MD slides to wing and Griffin goes out the defense is so different.
Defense Defense Defense. Jesse does so much with his size and wingspan by just being there. He really lets the other positions play their spots.
 
He was pushed around but they also looked to really crowd him when he got the ball to force a turnover. He did ok in limited minutes minus the missed rebound and the turnover. As a developmental big he is going to show the ups and downs , especially against a team like WVU that has their hands all over you daring the refs to call it.
He must immediately stop swinging like a ninja when he’s contesting shots. Easy call for a ref.
 
Nantz was struggling differentiating between Q and AG.
I think all of these play-by-play guys are missing a "spotter" (b/c of Covid) who typically sits next to them and feeds them info regarding who made what play.

But I think Nantz also said "Glen Falls" as Joe's hometown 3 different times in the first half before correcting himself and properly saying "Glens Falls" in the 2nd half. That's 100% on Nantz - he either did his research poorly, or couldn't read his own writing on his little cheat sheet.
 
Great stuff. My favorite part of this tourney is that Buddy came into the tourney really having carried us offensively at the end of the regular season. He then kept us alive the first 10 minutes of the SDSU game. Then all of the sudden he gets two fouls. Since that time his teammates have gone on a 13-0 run vs SDST and put a 6 pt halftime lead on WVU. These are the kind of contributions and depth of contribution that is seen with 1-4 seeds not an 11 seed.

WVU was a damn good team. They have their own game breakers on offense and yet we went deeper. The late game panic was hard to swallow but what I saw more importantly was a team that took a hell of a counter punch and then reset, took control and pushed the lead to 9 with a minute to play. Gotta finish better after that but to get to that point was impressive on many levels.

On to Houston- they rely on their big 3 perimeter guys to hit big shots. Sasser in the lane, Grimes from 3 and Jerreau off the bounce and from deep. It tends to be a lot of hero ball which resembles Sampson's Oklahoma teams that were tough , physical and had 3 guards who did most of the damage. Rebounding is the concern but I don't see a team that is designed for beating a zone.


We'll soon find out whether Sampson has gotten any better at attacking our 2-3 zone than he did for Oklahoma in 2003! LOL
 
We'll soon find out whether Sampson has gotten any better at attacking our 2-3 zone than he did for Oklahoma in 2003! LOL

Hopefully he doesn't have any preordained goons this time either.
 
Do they have the multi-dimensional guy who can flash to the key and turn to pass, shoot, or drive? WVU’s big guy struggled in that role early in the first. Dolejaz was great at stepping up or dropping back, and the guy didn’t know what to do.

One of the keys to attacking a 2-3 zone is entering the ball to the foul line. When that happens the two wing defenders must 'dive' to the low block areas. This weekend, I saw this team do that better than any I've seen in a long time. They must have had five steals that way against WV. And SD kept trying to do it but kept throwing the ball out of bounds, trying to throw passes they were not used to doing. And whenever either team got the ball down to the block, there were 2 and often three sets of arms around the ball. This team really hustles on D.
 
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I think you make a good observation here. Quincy does seem to still be doing a lot of thinking still. He picks it up gradually and has become a major contributor as time goes by. Like JB says, if Quincy continues to develop as he thinks he can, he could be an all-American.

Can you imagine Quincy moving around fluidly because he's confident in what he's doing? Knows what he can and can't do when driving into the paint?

(As JB says, some guys you show them once and they get it; others you have to show them a dozen times before they finally get it.)

He struggles with teams that play tight m2m with quick hands... he doesn't have the dribbling skill to deal with it and is rightfully concerned about turning the ball over when lanes are tight and battling quick-handed m2m defenders on him or teams that hand check... opposing teams have also figured this out about him.

It's also clear he's battling through a knee injury that is clearly affecting his play.
 
We need Jesse more this game than any of the first 2.
Houston plays like North Carolina.

They crash the offensive boards hard. Jesse, Marek, Quincy will need to crash the boards.
Houston is a tough team that has only a few shooters.
The big difference between the offensive rebounding of Houston and North Carolina is that Carolina has 4 guys that are 6'10" and 260 lbs. Houston does it with guards crashing.

I think Jesse's long arms will really help as he won't be getting tossed around by big guys.
 
He must immediately stop swinging like a ninja when he’s contesting shots. Easy call for a ref.
He did that a lot too which was surprising. I haven’t really seen that from him at all recently in this good stretch he’s been on. He was in good position he just needs to go straight up and make them shoot over him rather than trying to block everything n foul. That play where he like blocked the guy with his face was a bit weird as well.
 
We'll soon find out whether Sampson has gotten any better at attacking our 2-3 zone than he did for Oklahoma in 2003! LOL
One thing someone pointed out this weekend that was a great point is that it's really hard to get your team ready the first time they're going to see it because you can't accurately replicate it in practice. You can tell them what's going to happen, but good luck getting them ready to handle the real thing at game speed.

I have a feeling the current iteration of the zone is also quite a bit different from 2003. Boeheim has adjusted over the years as the three point shot has become a bigger part of the game and analytics have shown how important it is.
 
houston is the opp of UNC.. they rebound with athletes not big bodies.. much like WVU does.. if we rebound well we will be fine.
BUT WHAT IF WE DON’T????? WHAT THEN???
 
I hope he finds some confidence early next game. He can be incredibly impactful when he’s playing his A game. But you’re right, he seems to be down a bit.

An early dagger 3 and a big block/steal would be a great start for him
JB screams at him for every mistake and gives him the hook. Nobody can play like that.
 
He did that a lot too which was surprising. I haven’t really seen that from him at all recently in this good stretch he’s been on. He was in good position he just needs to go straight up and make them shoot over him rather than trying to block everything n foul. That play where he like blocked the guy with his face was a bit weird as well.
Looked like the old GI Joe with the kung fu grip on that play..
 
AG looks like he’s overthinking on the defensive end and it’s impacting his confidence on the offensive end. Early in the year, AG was dribbling the ball into space. It looks like now if he doesn’t have an open shot at the catch, he’s not quite sure what to do with the ball.
To me, AG looks like he is trying to get his. He gets himself into tough spots, takes bad shots, then gets pulled.
 
JB screams at him for every mistake and gives him the hook. Nobody can play like that.
Yeah, he’s earned an early hook, especially with the emergence of Bras.

To say JB screams at him for every mistake though, I’m not seeing that. He definitely gets on him.
 

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