Tuesday's Departure Thread

[two3zone]

How do we know this? Chance has played 11 games in his college career shooting 31% from the field.

Would welcome both back but wouldn’t have a starting spot waiting for them. They’d be backup plan A and B to whomever we brought in. Take it or leave it.

 

[two3zone]

the things I want added for next year:

1- A leader
2- A rebounder
3- A distributor
4- A rim protector

Shooter

 

[jordoo]

the things I want added for next year:

1- A leader
2- A rebounder
3- A distributor
4- A rim protector

Yes Please, and hopefully we can get 1/3 from one guy and 2/4 from another guy. If those two play PG and Center then we have a lot of latitude on the 3rd guy we would bring in.

 

[djcon57]

In anticipation to today's departures, I'd like to get the following on the books...

Those that are departing tried hard. Also, they are good kids and gave all they could.

Unless there are "reasons" otherwise, they are they troublemakers and bad teammates.

 

[Sherman20]

I thought Cuffe was looking elsewhere?

And Hima med dq?

Carey moving on

Mintz moving on


So out:
Williams, Taylor, Copeland, Carey, Cuffe, Mintz, Hima

Staying:
Brown, Starling, Patterson

Leaning stay:
Bell

Also Chance Westry is staying.

 

[teamco]

From a coaches point of view college basketball with the transfer portal must be like trying to build a team inside a washing machine set to max spin cycle. It was a tough enough task when you had your best couple of players joining a program with it understood their intentions' were one and done, but everyone else was pretty much assured of staying put. Now its like three quarters of the team turns-over annually.

No real sense of continuity anymore from year to year.

While I remain a die-hard Cuse fan, I am not a fan of where the game is these days.

Maybe I've just turned into an old geezer. Hey you kids, get off my lawn. Hurumph!

 

[Owens guy]

Bell just turned 21 years old. We all agree Bell needs to drastically improve his defense and rebounding to become a worthy starter on a good team. I'm sure he has been told to improve these things his whole life but he still hasn't done it.

We have seen flashes of good defense, rebounding and incredible blocks so we know he is capable of doing it. Bell needs constant effort. That is what is holding him back.

I'm sure it's exhausting for Red & the coaches to feel like they constantly need to light a match under Bell's butt to get him to play hard.

I want Bell back but we can't place next season's success on Bell's effort level improving. Several posters say Westry provides the insurance if Bell doesn't click but that means relying on a guy coming off injury that hasn't played in 2 years. I'm worried but trust Red.

 

[SUFan44]

PG/Westry
JJ/Cuffe/Moore
Bell/Westry/Portal Wing
Freeman/Brown
Brown/Portal Center/Freeman/Patterson


Looks like we need 3 portal players, but 2 will be role players.

This isn't a good enough lineup.

PG - Portal
SG - JJ Starling
SF - Freeman
PF - Brown
C - Portal

Bench
Guard - Westry, Moore
Forward - Bell, Portal
Center - McLeod, Patterson

Fill in the last 2 roster spots with best available developmental piece or add a couple transfers who are good to accept lesser roles.

McLeod or Brown at starting center is simply not giving us the best chance to succeed at a high level. Brown is a good enough player, but we were outrebounded way too often this past year in part due to his being more suited to play the PF position, IMO.

 

[Sherman20]

I think we want JJ, Bell and Brown as the core coming back. Add Cuffe, Patterson, Westry, Naheem and the two frosh. We look to add a PG, a wing and a center. Depending on the quality of those three adds, we just might have something.

Totally. And don’t you think Red wants a deeper team, to be able to legitimately go 9 or 10 deep like the UConn title team did last year? None of the players on that team played more than 30 mpg. You have to have depth to play fast. That’s why i don’t understand some of the handwringing yesterday about the front court and how playing time concerns for Maliq and Freeman might hinder us in being able to land a quality center. I hope Red is telling these guys that there will be more talent on the roster and everyone will play less minutes and be refreshed and be able to play uptempo. If a big bodied portal center plays 25mpg, Maliq can still get 15 mpg at center and 15 at PF. Freeman then plays 25mpg at PF and maybe 5 at SF.

 

[Orangezoo]

This isn't a good enough lineup.

PG - Portal
SG - JJ Starling
SF - Freeman
PF - Brown
C - Portal

Bench
Guard - Westry, Moore
Forward - Bell, Portal
Center - McLeod, Patterson

Fill in the last 2 roster spots with best available developmental piece or add a couple transfers who are good to accept lesser roles.

McLeod or Brown at starting center is simply not giving us the best chance to succeed at a high level. Brown is a good enough player, but we were outrebounded way too often this past year in part due to his being more suited to play the PF position, IMO.

No way Bell stays if he is coming off the bench.

 

[SUFan44]

No way Bell stays if he is coming off the bench.

Then our team is fatally flawed from the jump and isn't giving us the best chance to win.

Brown needs to start as a forward.

Freeman, presumably, will be too good not to start.

If it's Bell & Brown with Freeman the 6th man off the bench, I'm fine with that too. I just don't get how that works, when Bell is so extremely one dimensional.

 

[Cuse_NYC]

No way Bell stays if he is coming off the bench.

Then our team is fatally flawed from the jump and isn't giving us the best chance to win.

Brown needs to start as a forward.

Freeman, presumably, will be too good not to start.

If it's Bell & Brown with Freeman the 6th man off the bench, I'm fine with that too. I just don't get how that works, when Bell is so extremely one dimensional.

Wish Bell would come off the bench as well, but he won’t.

 

[General20]

He played 7 more minutes a game than he did as a freshman (20 to 27). He nearly doubled his scoring (6.6 to 12 ppg) and his shooting percentage from 3 went from 34.5% to 42% and field goal percentage went from 40.2 to 43.4%, on much higher volume for both. Both his scoring and efficiency approved a significant amount. Also went from 8 to 22 blocks, only 7 less than Maliq Brown on the season. Rebounding is the only area we did not see a significant increase. His defense and rebounding will continue to be problems, but factually incorrect to say his averages did not improve significantly.

This is a really good post. I just want to add some context to his D.

From my perspective Bell improved a lot defensively from Freshman to Sophomore year.

Because we had to play the year mostly without a real power forward, Bell guarded power forwards a lot, and he's not built to do that. When he was guarding smaller guys he did a pretty okay job.

I found it interesting that when Brown played center and got pushed around, most fans noticed he was out of position and wanted to get a center on the team to help, but when Bell was playing power forward and got pushed around, nobody complained about him being out of position, they just complained about him being a terrible defender.

I think Bell will be stronger next year and a better defender, but I also think having Freeman and Brown at power forward, allowing Bell to guard wings as he should be doing will make a big difference. I predict there won't be any defensive problems with Bell next year.

 

[Orangezoo]

Then our team is fatally flawed from the jump and isn't giving us the best chance to win.

Brown needs to start as a forward.

Freeman, presumably, will be too good not to start.

If it's Bell & Brown with Freeman the 6th man off the bench, I'm fine with that too. I just don't get how that works, when Bell is so extremely one dimensional.

It seems pretty clear from what’s been shared that Red knows what needs to be done and what he needs to get from anyone returning. My hope is that the personalities that needed to move on and are with the frosh and then solid portal adds bring an energy locked in to what Red wants to do and it rubs off such that we get the level of all around play we need. We all have our opinions but only the staff knows what they are capable of and all we can do is speculate. Time will tell.

 

[JarHeadJim]

I would love to land J.P. Estrella at Center!

 

[jordoo]

This is a really good post. I just want to add some context to his D.

From my perspective Bell improved a lot defensively from Freshman to Sophomore year.

Because we had to play the year mostly without a real power forward, Bell guarded power forwards a lot, and he's not built to do that. When he was guarding smaller guys he did a pretty okay job.

I found it interesting that when Brown played center and got pushed around, most fans noticed he was out of position and wanted to get a center on the team to help, but when Bell was playing power forward and got pushed around, nobody complained about him being out of position, they just complained about him being a terrible defender.

I think Bell will be stronger next year and a better defender, but I also think having Freeman and Brown at power forward, allowing Bell to guard wings as he should be doing will make a big difference. I predict there won't be any defensive problems with Bell next year.

I predict that Bell will also be our leading scorer next year.

 

[jdubs30]

It’s hard to imagine a situation where Bell, Brown, Freeman are all here and we still go after a stud big. If those 3 are here next year all 3 are starting and none of them can play guard sooooo

 

[Ragman2000]

It’s hard to imagine a situation where Bell, Brown, Freeman are all here and we still go after a stud big. If those 3 are here next year all 3 are starting and none of them can play guard sooooo

Exactly this. Not sure how others don't see it. And exactly why we won't get a star Center either.

 

[Trueblue25]

The more I think, the more clear it is how devastating the Westry injury must have been to Red and staff.

 

[Sherman20]

It’s hard to imagine a situation where Bell, Brown, Freeman are all here and we still go after a stud big. If those 3 are here next year all 3 are starting and none of them can play guard sooooo

See my post above.

 

[General20]

It’s hard to imagine a situation where Bell, Brown, Freeman are all here and we still go after a stud big. If those 3 are here next year all 3 are starting and none of them can play guard sooooo

Yep. People have been pining for a stud bug who can rebound, defend, and score in the post. Its a wonderful dream, but there are only a small handful of these guys out there and every team wants one. They come with high price tags and a ton of competition. I don't think we can rely on that, especially when we have other positions that need filling and probably can't just assign a million dollars to one guy.

I've been thinking about our center position more like a committee. Brown does a lot of things well but he can't guard the post. McLeod is one dimensional but he is elite and guarding the post. That's a good start. I think a guy like Hima (pre injury) would do wonders for us. Someone who can defend vut is a little more mobile than McLeod l, and has a nasty streak on the boards. That's the kind of guy I think we will go after.

 

[jordoo]

It’s hard to imagine a situation where Bell, Brown, Freeman are all here and we still go after a stud big. If those 3 are here next year all 3 are starting and none of them can play guard sooooo

I find imagining things to be quite easy. That doesn't mean my imagination always tracks logically. That said there are ways that this can work out that do track. All we can do is wait and see but I am optimistic.

Your brain is hallucinating your perceived reality right now. Its basing it off of a flow of stimulus through your five senses, previous experience and recall of previous hallucinations it has made. This is why dreams can seem so real, they don't depend on the flow of stimulus from the senses although they can be interrupted by stimulus.

 

[orangefog]

Red and Co. have to go after better players. If they are better than the one we currently have, isn't that a good thing. If somebody has to come off the bench, and that makes that player leave, who cares, didn't we just upgrade? All I want Red to do is increase the talent on this roster. The rest will work itself out. I am not going to try to think about starting lineups until roster building is complete.

 

[Bulldog04]

Then our team is fatally flawed from the jump and isn't giving us the best chance to win.

Brown needs to start as a forward.

Freeman, presumably, will be too good not to start.

If it's Bell & Brown with Freeman the 6th man off the bench, I'm fine with that too. I just don't get how that works, when Bell is so extremely one dimensional.

Gotta remember and this isn’t to knock Taylor but we played 4 on 5 on every offensive possession because he didn’t want to shoot outside shots anymore. This definitely affected the offense and Bells open shots. Add in that Judah wanted to shoot it 20 times. Add freeman into the mix and Bell is going to skyrocket. He will develop his dribble and mid range this offseason. You started to see some of that later in year. But he will be even better next year. And so will the offense especially when Brown works on his top of the key 3 all year

 

[007]

This is a really good post. I just want to add some context to his D.

From my perspective Bell improved a lot defensively from Freshman to Sophomore year.

Because we had to play the year mostly without a real power forward, Bell guarded power forwards a lot, and he's not built to do that. When he was guarding smaller guys he did a pretty okay job.

I found it interesting that when Brown played center and got pushed around, most fans noticed he was out of position and wanted to get a center on the team to help, but when Bell was playing power forward and got pushed around, nobody complained about him being out of position, they just complained about him being a terrible defender.

I think Bell will be stronger next year and a better defender, but I also think having Freeman and Brown at power forward, allowing Bell to guard wings as he should be doing will make a big difference. I predict there won't be any defensive problems with Bell next year.

To me, it looked like Bell was consistently targeted by ACC teams. Teams would isolate his man and take him off the dribble. That seemed to be more of an issue, IMO, than getting pushed around by bigger players. Taylor was that target.

For Bell "not to have any defensive problems next season" he is going to have to get WAY better at moving his feet and staying in front of people. Not saying he can't.