Gopher Basketball is Painful to Watch

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Honyocker

Gophers-In Good or Bad Times
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This team is going nowhere fast if this level of play continues. Nolen will help, but the issues go way beyond the point guard challenges.

1) This team does a poor job of taking care of the ball. Sloppy passes. Dribbling too much into traffic. Poor decisions that result in turnovers.

2) The perimeter defense is very weak. We simply cannot shut down the tre' against weak teams. What will happen when we get into the conference schedule?

3) This is a horrible free throw shooting team. And it is not getting better. When the pressure of the B10 schedule begins, the pressure will only make it worst.

4) The half court offense is listless and out of synch much of the time. Is it all Tubby's substitution methodology? I think it is more than that. The team is tight, painfully out of flow and very sloppy much of the time. I they trying to run a system to perfection to the point that they can't play the game?

5) Our "bigs" do not dominate the paint against smaller, less talented teams. Rebounding and interior scoring can be painfully weak against smaller teams.

These and other issues have the potential to make this a very disappointing season in the Big Ten Conference. You cannot have all these obvious flaws and be a winner in the conference.

What say you, my fellow Gopher fans?
 

Wait and see. Don't panic and don't get too excited. Fans made the latter mistake after Puerto Rico and are making the former mistake now. This is not to say these things aren't problems that need work, though I question issue #5 - the game turned around when the Gophers turned to inside play, if my memory of the game is correct (which it might not be).

Keep an even keel and wait for the actual games to be played. Also keep in mind that this team hasn't played a single game with its full roster yet. I predicted fourth place when the season started. I was thinking fourth place after Puerto Rico. I still predict fourth place now. I am not changing that prediction until conference play is underway.
 

I agree with your first 3 points. For #4, I think the half court offense is still a work on progress and will start flowing better as the season goes on - if you've watched many of the other BT teams so far, you see the same thing.

But, I think you're way off on #5, my friend. I'm not going to look up the stats for every game, but in general we have been by far the most dominant and aggressive team in the paint. I expect that to continue.

Finally, I don't think watching Gopher BB is painful at all. Broken ribs are painful.
 

The primary reason that the half court offense doesn't flow is that Devoe doesn't move the ball. As someone said a while ago, the FT's will likely cost them 3-4 winnable games in the B10.

I think they have the potential to be a great team. I'm not concerned about them playing to the level of their competition in the preseason because December will be long forgotten by mid Feb. I am very concerned about the free throw line.
 

painful to watch

W/O Nolen, this team is AT BEST a top 35 team. Surprisingly, the defense is what jumps out at you as being a weakness--both team defense and individual defense. Joseph is a step and a half behind his man virtually every play. I don't know what happened to the team we saw in Puerto Rico. I'm simply going to stop watching.
 


Wait for big ten time...Tubby will shorten his rotation to 8 or 9 depending on health and schedule. Chip & Ahanmisi will not see a lot of time and we will see a rotation that will play more consistently.

I think you saw some of this tonight as we say Colt with RSIII early in the first half and some of Trev with big Mo...I think we will see the bigs start to play with each other more and then our gaurd rotation to be 5...Al, Hoff, RW with a good dose of Devoe and 10 minutes of Hollins. This will help our half court offense from a consistency stand point...and once Devoe stopped dribbling and started passing and running O...we got better in the second half...hopefully he learns from this and plays better within the system...getting Al back will help.
 


GopherinPhilly said:
Wait for big ten time...Tubby will shorten his rotation to 8 or 9 depending on health and schedule. Chip & Ahanmisi will not see a lot of time and we will see a rotation that will play more consistently.
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Couldn't agree more. The experience the young guys are getting in the game is for the future, not so much for this season. They have all proven at one time or another they can play at this level....now. The bench will get shorter once the B10 season begins.
 

Honyocker said:
5) Our "bigs" do not dominate the paint against smaller, less talented teams. Rebounding and interior scoring can be painfully weak against smaller teams.
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I disagree with this statement. Did you watch the game last night? We scored like 45 points in the paint. That is over 2/3 of our total points last night. We average 41 rebounds a game. I think everyone of our opponents coaches have said that our big men have dominated them. Especially Roy W. and Bob H.
 



While I agree with the general thoughts here, I wouldn't call a 10-1 team "painful" to watch.

If they win 24-25 games, that's very a good season. With 19 games left in the regular season they need to go 14-5 or 15-4 the rest of the way to that. They have 7 games against ranked teams left on the schedule and I think they could go 3-4 or 4-3 against them.

However, I think Wisconsin is better than they are given credit for and Indiana,Michigan,NW and Penn St. are not going to be pushovers.

If they don't turn it around soon, they might not win 20 games much less 25. They have enough talent to be top 3 in the big ten, they just need to start playing like it.
 

Its about defense.

The Gophers dont win many games pretty. Tubby Smith believes in defense and depth. His goal is to make you play hard, wear you down, and in the end his team will be better. Its not always pretty or lead to 35 point blowouts but overall it has been effective. We will see as this season goes along how the team goes against better competition but the ugly wins now against non conference teams become pretty 4-12 point wins against the likes of Purdue, Wiscy, and MSU.
 

The fact of the matter is this team plays to its opponents level. We're in for a lot of close games... No, we haven't been playing well, but the addition of Nolen back in the rotation and starting big ten play will be enough motivation for these guys to step up their play. While Nolen doesn't completely solve #1-4, he will definitely be a help in improving those areas.
 

Funny that Nolen fixes or greatly improves issues 1-4, and 5 isn't even an issue.
 



Honyocker said:
1) This team does a poor job of taking care of the ball. Sloppy passes. Dribbling too much into traffic. Poor decisions that result in turnovers.?
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We are missing our starting PG. One of the (if not the) best PG's in the Big Ten. Who is in charge of taking care of the ball, and decision making? The PG.

I am a big Devoe fan, and believed he could play the point. He has done an Okay job of it, but he is not the "true" PG that we as fans are used to. Devoe is a scorer, and with the way this team is set up, he is better served for the 2.


Honyocker said:
2) The perimeter defense is very weak. We simply cannot shut down the tre' against weak teams. What will happen when we get into the conference schedule?
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Al Nolen is a great defender. His defense on the ball makes it harder for them to move it quickly. How do you stop a great passer? Pressure them so they can't see the floor as well and can't get the ball out as quickly. That's what Al does and it solves a lot of problems.


Honyocker said:
3) This is a horrible free throw shooting team. And it is not getting better. When the pressure of the B10 schedule begins, the pressure will only make it worst.
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The biggest pressure moment this team faced was the closing minutes against UNC. Lots of pressure. How did they d on FT's to close the game? I think 8 of 9? Seems like they handle the pressure FT's just fine. Same thing with the WVU game. Check the numbers.

Honyocker said:
4) The half court offense is listless and out of synch much of the time. Is it all Tubby's substitution methodology? I think it is more than that. The team is tight, painfully out of flow and very sloppy much of the time. I they trying to run a system to perfection to the point that they can't play the game?
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When Al was playing, people commented how great the half court offense looked this season. He is gone now and now we have these comments. What would you venture to guess happens when he returns?

Honyocker said:
5) Our "bigs" do not dominate the paint against smaller, less talented teams. Rebounding and interior scoring can be painfully weak against smaller teams.
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Have you actually watched any of the games? Every team we have played, the bigs dominated (especially smaller teams) In case Akron is the only game you watched, they have a 7-0, 6-8, and 6-10 player ... Gophers still dominated.
 

Must win every game by 30 to appease sports message boards!
 

So do the people who think Gopher basketball is "painful" to watch have any tickets? I would be happy to relieve your pain and take them off your hands!
 

gopherfan3 said:
The fact of the matter is this team plays to its opponents level. We're in for a lot of close games... No, we haven't been playing well, but the addition of Nolen back in the rotation and starting big ten play will be enough motivation for these guys to step up their play. While Nolen doesn't completely solve #1-4, he will definitely be a help in improving those areas.
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I think this is a great point. We want to beat a team like Wisky by 40 but Wisky is good and we can't, but we don't really have the same drive to kill Akron. Valid?
 

I think a lot of the problem is that we are a poor shooting team. Other than dunks and lay-ups last night, I can barely remember many mid range shots going in, and ony 25% on 3's. We need to shoot better to be a top big ten team.
 

I'll admit that they haven't been their best the last couple of weeks...but they've still been fun to watch. Rodney's and Trevor's dunks are enough for me to tune in at least. I think the team has been bored with the last couple opponents, and they will turn it on when the Big 10 season starts...oh, and when they have their full team suited up which still hasn't happened yet this year. People try to ignore that fact.
 

Relax. Coach Smith gets teams up for big games and he plays a short bench when he needs to. Against good teams in Puerto Rico, Mav and Chip averaged 3.1 and 9.3 minutes respectively while they have averaged 9.3 and 10.7 minutes respectively in the first 11 games. Even with a full team and coaching intensity, we will not win every game. But we'll win between 10 and 12 conference games. Not a conference title team but a solid 6 or 7 NCAA seed and only trolls find that painful to watch.
 

W/o Nolen

Without Nolen the gophers remind me of Michigan teams that had plenty of high flying dunkers and "athletes" but had trouble with turnovers and ft's, etc... I really think Nolen will make at least a 10 point improvement for out team with defense and pt. guard penetration! He will make the other players better!
 


This forum has always been bipolar, but I think more people are aggravated lately because our expectations have gone up. Beginning of the year, the consensus seemed to be around 5th. Now a lot of us dream of contending. I tend to go with the we're pretty damn good view and sort of play to our opponent's level. Last two games had me muttering and cursing some in the first halves, but they came out after half time in both games and just took control. Whether Tubby got their attention or we just wore them down, I'm not sure but there wasn't much doubt about either game.

Not down on Devoe as much as many. At first, last night he was trying to involve others. It's just the passes were so terrible. I just think he's trying to do too much. Needs to watch Blake who doesn't force things generally. More ticked at Colton's play. He really seems out of it at times again this year. It's all speculation at this point, but Al's return, Big 10 play, and Tubby's coaching are going to ease some of this angst.
 

doctor j
painful to watch
W/O Nolen, this team is AT BEST a top 35 team. Surprisingly, the defense is what jumps out at you as being a weakness--both team defense and individual defense. Joseph is a step and a half behind his man virtually every play. I don't know what happened to the team we saw in Puerto Rico. I'm simply going to stop watching.
So this is your last post ever? Why didn't you say so? I mean, kind of hard to post if you don' t watch games. I suppose you could comment on the box score the next day.

Nolen being gone is a big problem, he was impressive so far this year. But the gophers are far more talented and athletic this year. It's fun to even see them not win. Well, not really, but awful powerful athleticism in any event. Williams last nite was amazing. He doesn't get to the NBA without a more rounded game, but those dunks were NBA dunks.
 

macgopher said:
doctor j
painful to watch
W/O Nolen, this team is AT BEST a top 35 team. Surprisingly, the defense is what jumps out at you as being a weakness--both team defense and individual defense. Joseph is a step and a half behind his man virtually every play. I don't know what happened to the team we saw in Puerto Rico. I'm simply going to stop watching.

So this is your last post ever? Why didn't you say so? I mean, kind of hard to post if you don' t watch games. I suppose you could comment on the box score the next day.

Nolen being gone is a big problem, he was impressive so far this year. But the gophers are far more talented and athletic this year. It's fun to even see them not win. Well, not really, but awful powerful athleticism in any event. Williams last nite was amazing. He doesn't get to the NBA without a more rounded game, but those dunks were NBA dunks.
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Whats an NBA dunk?
 

While the fact that they haven't blown out anyone is disturbing, there is way too much unecessary panic. The only complete bottom-feeder we've played is EKU and that game was probably a bit surreal with the small crowd, etc. They dominated the second half of that game about how you would have expected.
 

is this the dunkiest team ever? seems like ever other possession Rodney or mbakwe are throwing down the hammer
 

The offense has been tough to watch during Tubby's tenure, not just this year. Nonetheless, watching an ugly win is better than an ugly loss. I'm sure FOT will come up with some brilliant statistics about Tubby's offenses, but could it be that Tubby just isn't a very good offensive practitioner? Some of it just seems so basic. No cuts. No pump fakes. Poorly executed screens. Lots of standing around.
 

Swede said:
The offense has been tough to watch during Tubby's tenure, not just this year. Nonetheless, watching an ugly win is better than an ugly loss. I'm sure FOT will come up with some brilliant statistics about Tubby's offenses, but could it be that Tubby just isn't a very good offensive practitioner? Some of it just seems so basic. No cuts. No pump fakes. Poorly executed screens. Lots of standing around.
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Tubby's most brilliant offensive statistic is that he W far more than he L games.

He used up his eligibility in 1973 so it's not HIS offense. Some of his teams were very good offensively, others not. He's coached for 20 years (not just the past few).

Most folks know that he is more noted for defense than offense. His teams have averaged about 75 ppg over 20 years, rarely over 80 or under 70.
 

Swede said:
The offense has been tough to watch during Tubby's tenure, not just this year. Nonetheless, watching an ugly win is better than an ugly loss. I'm sure FOT will come up with some brilliant statistics about Tubby's offenses, but could it be that Tubby just isn't a very good offensive practitioner? Some of it just seems so basic. No cuts. No pump fakes. Poorly executed screens. Lots of standing around.
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+1.

People thinking Al Nolen returning solves many, or most, of the offensive issues are have pretty short memories, IMO.

The halfcourt offense has been an on again, off again problem no matter the personnel. Personally, I think part of the problem is the offense never seems to vary...how tough can the Gopher offense be to scout? And part of the problem is, Tubby has been unable to recruit a talented point guard his entire time in MN, and the Gopher backcourt players in general haven't been the most athletic of groups. Nolen is at least quick, so that helps a bit, but he's limited offensively and seems to have no feel for running an offense.
 

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