We are NOT going to be ok

hallmatt · Thursday at 9:12 PM

Unfortunately, this is so easy to see and is a pattern of our team over the last few years. We may have somehow managed to play worse offensively.

Jones is not the PG. 4 game sample is high enough.

Parker is unplayable at this point.

Petro managed to play 2 mins is coaching malpractice.

Why does Wilcher have the green light?

Anderson, Fisher, and Copeland have been bright spots.

Huge game Monday, but unfortunately 2-2 appears to be on the horizon.

Piratz · Thursday at 9:21 PM

Pretty bad to watch. Doesn’t look good. We’ll see.

PirateBlue08 · Friday at 4:54 AM

Wilcher and Parker don’t seem to have progressed. Williams and Jones clearly have regressed dramatically. Anderson has obviously improved or was this good already.

Piratz · Friday at 5:16 AM

Strickland is a good coach. Those guys play tough and together. He made Sha and the team look even worse with that zone.; they didn’t have a clue what to do for most of the game.

And Sha was accountable to that.

40% shooting and 16 turnovers. Oy vey.

At this point avoid this dagger losses and move on.

lloyde dobler · Friday at 6:11 AM

Just remember that last year’s team looked underwhelming until they flipped a switch in Hawaii. Still very early.

SHUSource · Friday at 6:46 AM

lloyde dobler said:
Just remember that last year’s team looked underwhelming until they flipped a switch in Hawaii. Still very early.

But overreacting is fun!

sussexcopirate · Friday at 7:29 AM

For the 2 minutes Petrovic played the ball moved well. Parker is a human ball stopper.

hallmatt · Friday at 7:32 AM

Last year’s team also had a point guard and played a much much weaker schedule.

mspaeth · Friday at 7:34 AM

Now I think.....we may NOT be OK...

Sim needs to be the Alpha......not sure it is in him.

With 76 in the dance --- it will at least make the year interesting because we will hover between RPI - 85 to 105.

cernjSHU · Friday at 7:51 AM

This team has a big hole at point guard. Del Jones is clearly not a pg so I am not sure what his role is on this team. I am sure Sha is giving him a chance to play and gain some confidence. But you can see that he does not pass the ball well. I’d put him on the bench. The only player that looks the role is Petrovic. Start him.

I’d like to see the starters play with him and see what he can do. I am sure the offense will flow much better. As far as Wilcher goes, he needs to find his stroke. If you have Anderson and Wilcher shooting lights out, then you need a point guard that can find them.

shu67 · Friday at 7:53 AM

Winning ugly is okay. Way too early to throw in the towel regarding the offensive talent on this team. Sha is still feeling his way on the players and how well they jell.

I was very impressed with 3 of the LIU players and wish they were on our roster!

Piratz · Friday at 7:56 AM

cernjSHU said:
This team has a big hole at point guard. Del Jones is clearly not a pg so I am not sure what his role is on this team. I am sure Sha is giving him a chance to play and gain some confidence. But you can see that he does not pass the ball well. I’d put him on the bench. The only player that looks the role is Petrovic. Start him.

I’d like to see the starters play with him and see what he can do. I am sure the offense will flow much better. As far as Wilcher goes, he needs to find his stroke. If you have Anderson and Wilcher shooting lights out, then you need a point guard that can find them.

Idk what’s going on with the rotation and unfortunately we’re only a week away from the most consequential stretch of the non-conference with 1 game left ahead of it.

It looks bad. I like what I see from what he’s assembled 2-5. There are players there. But 1 is so putrid right now that it’s scary and it’s making 2-5 look messy.

hallmatt · Friday at 8:02 AM

What do you like at the 2 spot? Wilcher was awful the first 2 games

shu67 · Friday at 8:03 AM

hallmatt said:
Unfortunately, this is so easy to see and is a pattern of our team over the last few years. We may have somehow managed to play worse offensively.

Jones is not the PG. 4 game sample is high enough.

Parker is unplayable at this point.

Petro managed to play 2 mins is coaching malpractice.

Why does Wilcher have the green light?

Anderson, Fisher, and Copeland have been bright spots.

Huge game Monday, but unfortunately 2-2 appears to be on the horizon.

Lots of complaints but we are still 2-0.

SPK145 · Friday at 8:12 AM

Wilcher is a decent player especially because of his defense but he’s no better than decent and is not an alpha.

SPK145 · Friday at 8:18 AM

Petrovic played 2 minutes and was -3. You all know why.

sobo1 · Friday at 8:26 AM

SPK145 said:
Wilcher is a decent player especially because of his defense but he’s no better than decent and is not an alpha.

100%. I have been posting this like a broken record all summer on the trove. The expectations being placed on Sim preseason were/are wildly unrealistic. He is a very nice player, but expecting him to be the leading scorer/best player on your team is just not a reasonable expectation.

NYShoreGuy · Friday at 8:27 AM

I mean jahki Howard did not play for liu though his stat line in first game was terrible

PirateBlue08 · Friday at 8:31 AM

SPK145 said:
Petrovic played 2 minutes and was -3. You all know why.

Small sample size, and in that 2 minutes he is 1-1 with a nice offensive rebound outback. But I assume it has something to do with some weird Sha perception related to his defense.

Yet Parker immediately comes in and plays the worst several minutes of basketball we've seen from any individual this year, turning the ball over sloppily multiple times and taking a handful of absolutely boneheaded shots - and he plays the rest of the game.

Sha is a strange bird. Odd hierarchy of values.

This should make everything clear:
In a total of 35 minutes, Del Jones and Tre Parker combined for 0-7, 2 points, 2 rebounds, 4 assists and 4 turnovers.
In a total of 2 minutes, Petrovic was 1-1, 2 points, an offensive rebound, and 0 turnovers.

Hall Is Life · Friday at 8:32 AM

With all the terrible pg play by Jones and Parker, we still had quite a few open looks that didn’t fall other than Anderson and one from Wilcher. I thought Sha brought in shooters? If they’re actually the real deal, those shots should start to fall. Time will tell.

SPK145 · Friday at 8:42 AM

PirateBlue08 said:
Small sample size, and in that 2 minutes he is 1-1 with a nice offensive rebound outback.

So in the rest of his minuscule minutes he was -5. That’s unplayable.

Parker stunk too.

lloyde dobler · Friday at 8:43 AM

hallmatt said:
Last year’s team also had a point guard and played a much much weaker schedule.

This time last year people were speculating that Clark was not performing, was too small and wouldn’t be able to handle moving up to the Big East level. I also remember Hines being unable to get open to do anything underneath against New Haven.

PirateBlue08 · Friday at 8:47 AM

Hall Is Life said:
With all the terrible pg play by Jones and Parker, we still had quite a few open looks that didn’t fall other than Anderson and one from Wilcher. I thought Sha brought in shooters? If they’re actually the real deal, those shots should start to fall. Time will tell.

Thomas clanged a wide open 3 from the corner, and Brown Jr passed up at least one open 3.

Thomas did hit one open 3 and also did a decent job on consecutive possessions driving and making something happen at the end of shot clocks when our offense was anemic and going nowhere.

PirateBlue08 · Friday at 8:49 AM

SPK145 said:
So in the rest of his minuscule minutes he was -5. That’s unplayable.

Parker stunk too.

When Petrovic came in, he had zero turnovers, did not noticeably do anything boneheaded, to me at least (unless I missed it). Yet Parker did multiple boneheaded things and a bunch of turnovers and wild shots, and that was ok?

You think Sha is measuring +/- on the bench minute by minute? No way Petro had a worse 2 minutes than Parker's first 2

I'd be interested to know the +/- of Del Jones and others who played far more and were god-awful

SeanieWard · Friday at 8:57 AM

That was an ugly ugly win. While everyone was worried about our guard play this offseason, i was worried about our bigs. And I must say after 2 games I actually think that's an equal, or if not an even bigger problem, especially when we get to BE play.

I remember posting that Copeland looked on the shorter side after we signed him and people came at me saying 1 or 2 inches doesn't matter but it does. And he doesn't make it better by always bringing the ball down making himself even "smaller", in basketball terms. And he does nothing well besides score in the post. He's not a good rebounder or interior defender even against inferior competition. Easy kid to root for but he's not a starting caliber BE Center right now. Devin Williams is the better to me but he's so thin and will be easily pushed around in the BE. Kabba can't even get real playing time to anyone to evaluate him.

As for Sha, he's a good coach but not without glaring flaws. I think he's a questionable recruiter, even when considering his NIL limitations here. Also, his rotations are baffling to me. He always talks about guys have to earn it and then plays Payday 0 minutes after being one of our best players in the first game. Kareem Thomas comes in and looks like the most aggressive and most prepared to play against the zone,..attacking the zone, making plays, getting to the rim and to the line and he gets benched shortly after providing a spark, never to return. Petrovic gets yanked after scoring a basket because he didn't know what was going on Coach says?? So you don't tell him what's going on and just bench him the rest of the way?? Very odd to me.

Lastly, the good. Anderson and Fisher are clearly our best players right now, by far. Both are good 2 way players and their BE experience shows. I still have hope that Wilcher will get going. He had some good looks that I think will eventually fall. He had some bad turnovers that he must clean up but I think he'll emerge as our 3rd guy on offense sooner than later.

Like others pointed out, we beat a inferior Wagner team by only 7 last year and still went on to be a bubble team so there's certainly hope but I'm really worried about our big men's ability to play at this level.

MichiganStoleTitle · Friday at 9:01 AM

Here was Sha’s purported reason for not playing Petrovic more.

From Jerry’s article:

Asked why Petrovic got just two minutes, Holloway replied: "It was tough because they threw a 3-2 zone on us. We got a few zone plays in, and when we ran them when he was in there, he had no idea what was going on. But he’ll be alright – we’ get him ready for next game."

Anon1776442946 · Friday at 9:06 AM

PirateBlue08 said:
Wilcher and Parker don’t seem to have progressed. Williams and Jones clearly have regressed dramatically. Anderson has obviously improved or was this good already.

Trey sucked as a pg last yr. How do u not start building a team without a BE level pg

Anon1776442946 · Friday at 9:07 AM

SPK145 said:
Wilcher is a decent player especially because of his defense but he’s no better than decent and is not an alpha.

Hes a career 5/6 ppg player. Why would he be any better?

PirateBlue08 · Friday at 9:08 AM

SeanieWard said:
That was an ugly ugly win. While everyone was worried about our guard play this offseason, i was worried about our bigs. And I must say after 2 games I actually think that's an equal, or if not an even bigger problem, especially when we get to BE play.

I remember posting that Copeland looked on the shorter side after we signed him and people came at me saying 1 or 2 inches doesn't matter but it does. And he doesn't make it better by always bringing the ball down making himself even "smaller", in basketball terms. And he does nothing well besides score in the post. He's not a good rebounder or interior defender even against inferior competition. Easy kid to root for but he's not a starting caliber BE Center right now. Devin Williams is the better to me but he's so thin and will be easily pushed around in the BE. Kabba can't even get real playing time to anyone to evaluate him.

Jerry Carino noticed the same thing:

"Holloway’s reluctance to sit Copeland – he even played him some with two fouls in the first half, which is rare – is telling about how problematic the depth is at that spot."

Sha quote on Kabba:

"I wanted to get him in there, I really did, but they started going small a lot and that wasn't fair to him," Holloway said. "The big kid (Xinyi Li), getting Kabba to guard him when he was picking and popping for threes, that's not fair to him. But I've got to get him in the game. We'll see how the next game goes."

Anon1776442946 · Friday at 9:08 AM

MichiganStoleTitle said:
Here was Sha’s purported reason for not playing Petrovic more.

From Jerry’s article:

Asked why Petrovic got just two minutes, Holloway replied: "It was tough because they threw a 3-2 zone on us. We got a few zone plays in, and when we ran them when he was in there, he had no idea what was going on. But he’ll be alright – we’ get him ready for next game."

Pick a pg and let em learn

The Crows Nest · Friday at 9:42 AM

cernjSHU said:
This team has a big hole at point guard. Del Jones is clearly not a pg so I am not sure what his role is on this team. I am sure Sha is giving him a chance to play and gain some confidence. But you can see that he does not pass the ball well. I’d put him on the bench. The only player that looks the role is Petrovic. Start him.

I’d like to see the starters play with him and see what he can do. I am sure the offense will flow much better. As far as Wilcher goes, he needs to find his stroke. If you have Anderson and Wilcher shooting lights out, then you need a point guard that can find them.

Jones thus far the biggest disappointment. If he is truly a "scorer" then why not take advantage of that and put him in a role to succeed, instead of "square pegging" him into a "round hole". The offense is not good at all when he is running the show.

My fear is that Sha will stick with him...for a few games too many....resulting in losses we will lament and wish we had back come March...until he realizes he has to make a change.

We haven't seen enough of Petro to make a determination on his abilities here...but maybe it is time we get to see what he can do.

Early losses are killers come March...

The Crows Nest · Friday at 9:45 AM

PirateBlue08 said:
Small sample size, and in that 2 minutes he is 1-1 with a nice offensive rebound outback. But I assume it has something to do with some weird Sha perception related to his defense.

Yet Parker immediately comes in and plays the worst several minutes of basketball we've seen from any individual this year, turning the ball over sloppily multiple times and taking a handful of absolutely boneheaded shots - and he plays the rest of the game.

Sha is a strange bird. Odd hierarchy of values.

This should make everything clear:
In a total of 35 minutes, Del Jones and Tre Parker combined for 0-7, 2 points, 2 rebounds, 4 assists and 4 turnovers.
In a total of 2 minutes, Petrovic was 1-1, 2 points, an offensive rebound, and 0 turnovers.

Yeah, oddly taking care of the ball doesn't seem to be high on Sha's priority list...at least based on how he doles out PT.

As I said elsewhere, I don't know if Petro is the answer, but we should find out...and continue to look elsewhere because, barring divine intervention, I am not sure Jones will end up being the right guy for this role

dehere23 · Friday at 9:53 AM

lloyde dobler said:
Just remember that last year’s team looked underwhelming until they flipped a switch in Hawaii. Still very early.

Spot on and it tends to happen both ways. When we don't perform well against a low/mid major in particular, you get a lot of immediate negative reaction. And then when we perform well like Maui last year, people start getting insane the other way.

dehere23 · Friday at 9:54 AM

shu67 said:
Winning ugly is okay. Way too early to throw in the towel regarding the offensive talent on this team. Sha is still feeling his way on the players and how well they jell.

I was very impressed with 3 of the LIU players and wish they were on our roster!

Well, you probably would have been more impressed if the guys they had missing were playing. I don't know jack about LIU's roster, but a few times the TV wasn't muted, I kept hearing Spanarkel talk about how it was a good and surprising performance by LIU given the "players" (plural) they were missing. One of which apparently was a guard picked first time all NEC preseason.

dehere23 · Friday at 9:57 AM

sobo1 said:
100%. I have been posting this like a broken record all summer on the trove. The expectations being placed on Sim preseason were/are wildly unrealistic. He is a very nice player, but expecting him to be the leading scorer/best player on your team is just not a reasonable expectation.

I think the hope is that he would step up as a senior. He has talent and has shown plenty of flashes in the past. If someone was a key contributor for a 30 win team 2 years ago in the Big East, the thought is that with 2 additional years of growth and maturation, they can be more than that. At least that was/is my thought.

Unfortunately right now he looks more like the kid who ran from competition at SJU, chased a bag and PT to Texas, only to run into good competition there and regress as a player.

dehere23 · Friday at 10:02 AM

Anon1776442946 said:
Hes a career 5/6 ppg player. Why would he be any better?

He averaged 8 ppg and started 75% of the time two years ago for a 30 win team. Evan Miya had him as a top 50 BE player that season -- now, most of that was driven by his defensive efficiency statistics (for comparison, he was basically considered by those rankings to be on the same level as Dual defensively, which all of us would agree is good). His offensive efficiency statistics were not good, and that probably reflects even more poorly when you consider the talent he had around him on that team and all the opportunities to shoot/score, because he was the 4th or 5th option on the court most of the time for purposes of the other teams focus.

I'm not saying you are wrong, but I'm not jumping ship yet after 2 games.

SeanieWard · Friday at 10:03 AM

Del Jones is far starting PG right now, let alone a backup one. Him having more playing time than Petro and Payday last night is criminal to me. I think we will be okay with Parker and Petro. There's no Budd Clark or Kadary on this team but I think we can compete with those two splitting time at the point. I would lean towards Petro starting and Parker providing a spark off the bench

SeanieWard · Friday at 10:09 AM

PirateBlue08 said:
Jerry Carino noticed the same thing:

"Holloway’s reluctance to sit Copeland – he even played him some with two fouls in the first half, which is rare – is telling about how problematic the depth is at that spot."

Sha quote on Kabba:

"I wanted to get him in there, I really did, but they started going small a lot and that wasn't fair to him," Holloway said. "The big kid (Xinyi Li), getting Kabba to guard him when he was picking and popping for threes, that's not fair to him. But I've got to get him in the game. We'll see how the next game goes."

Yea, Copeland is a huge fall off from what we had last year. I wasn't even biggest Payne fan as I thought he played too many minutes over Hines but he was clearly more equipped to play C than Cope. Like I said, he's is easy to root for..he's a local kid that plays with an edge but I'd like to see more from him

Am I the only one who thinks Dolinsky looked okay in very limited minutes? Against these smaller programs I wouldn't mind seeing him get more playing time to gain experience

sobo1 · Friday at 10:18 AM

Sim is a very nice player. I view him very similarly to how I viewed Myles Cale. Very solid player that everyone would want on their team, but he's not exactly someone you can/should build the team around.

I don't disagree that players improve as they get older, but we've all been diehard college basketball fans for 30+ years. How often do you see a player like Sim (career 5ppg player, 7th man for 11th place bubble team, etc.) turn the corner as a senior and become a star? Can it happen? Sure. Is it a reasonable expectation? I don't think so.

NIL BAD · Friday at 10:20 AM

Board already in mid-season form.

We are NOT going to be ok

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