8legs1dream said:

Not like there are any games in the past 20 years that we could have benefitted from an extra offensive possession or two right?? You seriously make me laugh man, keep toeing that company line. I sincerely hope you are compensated well for it.

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The real question is how does Tony Bennett and UVA do with offensive rebounding

8legs1dream said:

There is a whole lot of hours available to work between March 19th and today and the coaching staff just didn't get it done. Yeah it's hard, whatever the excuses are, but if we consider ourselves one of the top programs in the nation, hat tip to GKiller, we can't let this happen again. Whatever needs to be done, make it happen.

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All of this. Tired of the excuses as to why it didn't get done. Losers make excuses, winners/top performers just get the job done.

Gallipoli said:

One doesn't realize how vulnerable this country would be if one or both candidates were assassinated at the end of the campaign.

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Or if a sitting vice-president were hanged, or if a sitting Speaker of the House would have been murdered.

But they were only tourists, right?

VT4700 said:

Unleash Bigs and Tyler more? Cmon, man. Geez, Tyler averaged over 7 boards a game and Bigs over 6 for us. At 6'7, Tyler finished 6th in the A-10 in rebounding 3 straight years, and Bigs, also at 6'7, finished 8th last year. Instead of mentioning how impressive that is, you say "we should have unleashed them more"?

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Tyler and Bigs were very impressive rebounders on the defensive ends. I would have loved to see guys with an aptitude, desire, and athletic ability like Tyler or Bigelow being given the green light to go after offensive boards versus the main approach we took during out time of running back on defense after a missed shot.

SFspidur said:

There are still ~70 teams yet to release their OOC schedules. Even if pretty much everyone has an MTE lined up, there appear to still be dozens that aren’t completely firmed up otherwise and may have a spot or two available.

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Let's hope they get a 6th team and thinking with the lineup so far, possibly might get tickets for only $5. 😉

32counter said:

At least a 4.5 hour bus ride on Friday up I-95 should be fun.GPS should help
decide route 495E beltway to I-95 or take I-50 over Chesapeake Bay bridge.Decisions,decisions…

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Apparently we're walking.

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No new info, but a Dayton paper article on him visiting there and mentioning his other recent visits to Harvard, Davidson, and UR.

brooklyn brownstone said:

We should just play the entire Ivy League OOC each year. If we sweep them, we can claim we are Ivy League champs. Last year we would have been double conf. champs - unprecedented and a lock for a bid. /s

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I know you are joking but..that is not a bad idea at all

brooklyn brownstone said:

We should just play the entire Ivy League OOC each year. If we sweep them, we can claim we are Ivy League champs. Last year we would have been double conf. champs - unprecedented and a lock for a bid. /s

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the entire Ivy League, a really good 3 game MTE, and 2 Auburn-level high majors is a schedule I could get excited about.

VT4700 said:

I wouldn't worry too much about the bottom 10 of stats when the sample size is so small. We have usually averaged only about 2 offensive rebounds less than teams that are in the middle of the pack. And, the interesting thing is last year, when we were about 3.5 offensive rebounds from the middle, we went 15-3 IC and won the A-10 regular season. In 2020, we went 24-7 and finished 326 in offensive rebounding. In 2022, we finished 325, and won the A-10 title and beat Iowa in the dance. So it's just not accurate to say this strategy doesn't work and is not productive.

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Not like there are any games in the past 20 years that we could have benefitted from an extra offensive possession or two right?? You seriously make me laugh man, keep toeing that company line. I sincerely hope you are compensated well for it.

I feel like Tyne is a sneaky offensive rebounder. Haven't looked at data at all, but just a sense I got from watching last year. Could be I'm making this up in my head.

We should just play the entire Ivy League OOC each year. If we sweep them, we can claim we are Ivy League champs. Last year we would have been double conf. champs - unprecedented and a lock for a bid. /s

mr.spider said:

But if we can't find enough teams with games left to schedule for the tourny, how are we going to find teams to play outside the tourny? I know part of it is availablity for the tourny dates, but most teams have a full or nearly full schedule by now, don't they?

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There are still ~70 teams yet to release their OOC schedules. Even if pretty much everyone has an MTE lined up, there appear to still be dozens that aren’t completely firmed up otherwise and may have a spot or two available.

GKiller said:

Are you sure Lunardi doesn't have Mooney's agent too and he's on a lifetime consultancy gig? a scheduling cartoon circle between Mooney, Looney, and the Gazelles.

Or maybe we canned him after he didn't give us the PR we expected for it during 19-20'. That was the real reason we hired him anyway. But when u come out with this schedule and show you have no serious interest in at large bids no reason to go down that well again.

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LOL G but no way want him back just like I thought it was silly even paying him previously for any role. Could this be the worst OOC ever assembled under Mooney?

97spiderfan said:

Good point on Quinn/Golden but those teams had other really good rebounders (Burton/Bigelow) on the court that we could have unleashed more to go after offensive rebounds.

This is the first I have heard Mooney ever articulate though that this strategy was done for personnel reasons. Mooney has repeatedly said it was to prevent transition points, that was the strategy and he employed it regardless of who was at the center position in the past. I'm just glad he has see needs for an adjustment, whatever he chalks it up to. Anytime you finish in the bottom 10 of statistically category in all of the college basketball, it should cause you to re-evaluate your strategy around said issue.

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I wouldn't worry too much about the bottom 10 of stats when the sample size is so small. We have usually averaged only about 2 offensive rebounds less than teams that are in the middle of the pack. And, the interesting thing is last year, when we were about 3.5 offensive rebounds from the middle, we went 15-3 IC and won the A-10 regular season. In 2020, we went 24-7 and finished 326 in offensive rebounding. In 2022, we finished 325, and won the A-10 title and beat Iowa in the dance. So it's just not accurate to say this strategy doesn't work and is not productive.

Unleash Bigs and Tyler more? Cmon, man. Geez, Tyler averaged over 7 boards a game and Bigs over 6 for us. At 6'7, Tyler finished 6th in the A-10 in rebounding 3 straight years, and Bigs, also at 6'7, finished 8th last year. Instead of mentioning how impressive that is, you say "we should have unleashed them more"?

It's seems rather obvious why Mooney said what he said. We have guys like Walz and Beagle instead of TJ, Grant, and Quinn. I don't think we will see a dramatic change other than those guys getting more boards for us. I doubt we see guards crashing and us giving up easier buckets at the other end at the result.

SouthJerseySpiderFan said:

And I thought it was a waste of money paying Lunardi. Possibly get him back for next season. 😆

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Are you sure Lunardi doesn't have Mooney's agent too and he's on a lifetime consultancy gig? a scheduling cartoon circle between Mooney, Looney, and the Gazelles.

Or maybe we canned him after he didn't give us the PR we expected for it during 19-20'. That was the real reason we hired him anyway. But when u come out with this schedule and show you have no serious interest in at large bids no reason to go down that well again.

teams love to hit the offensive glass against us, why are we not burning them with fast break points as a result?

I understand controlling pace - & there are a number of ways to do it - #1 avoiding live ball TO's which we do a good job. I'm not convinced getting everyone back on D has a very big impact on that though. It can help control pace but its down the list imo.

Personnel will always play a role in strategy but as 97 noted we are not regularly sending our most athletic guys to O rebound either. We've all seen a shot go up and everyone turns & runs the other direction. There's a time & place but to me there's no doubt we do it to an extreme and that's a coaching directive. I'd like to see a better balance.

SFspidur said:

If the MTE doesn’t happen at all, we can only add one more game for 29 total.

If it drops to a 2-game MTE somehow, we could also add an additional non-MTE game to still hit 31.

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But if we can't find enough teams with games left to schedule for the tourny, how are we going to find teams to play outside the tourny? I know part of it is availablity for the tourny dates, but most teams have a full or nearly full schedule by now, don't they?

And I thought it was a waste of money paying Lunardi. Possibly get him back for next season. 😆

97spiderfan said:

Mooney has repeatedly said it was to prevent transition points ...

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yes, because Quinn/Golden wouldn't always be able to get down the floor if they went to the offensive glass.
I assume he feels Beagle/Walz can get back faster.

SFspidur said:

If the MTE doesn’t happen at all, we can only add one more game for 29 total.

If it drops to a 2-game MTE somehow, we could also add an additional non-MTE game to still hit 31.

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Add both and make the D3 game an exhibition.

spiderman said:

our "strategy" of not going after offensive rebounds as much as other teams do is strictly related to personnel in my opinion. we recruit highly skilled big men. the ones who we get typically aren't great run/jump athletes. Quinn and Golden for example ... you can send them to the offensive glass all night but they'll only get 1 or 2. and they'll have a hard time getting back.

we haven't had a Beagle type of rebounding big man. it makes sense to ask him to do that more than Quinn or Golden.

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Good point on Quinn/Golden but those teams had other really good rebounders (Burton/Bigelow) on the court that we could have unleashed more to go after offensive rebounds.

This is the first I have heard Mooney ever articulate though that this strategy was done for personnel reasons. Mooney has repeatedly said it was to prevent transition points, that was the strategy and he employed it regardless of who was at the center position in the past. I'm just glad he has see needs for an adjustment, whatever he chalks it up to. Anytime you finish in the bottom 10 of statistically category in all of the college basketball, it should cause you to re-evaluate your strategy around said issue.

our "strategy" of not going after offensive rebounds as much as other teams do is strictly related to personnel in my opinion. we recruit highly skilled big men. the ones who we get typically aren't great run/jump athletes. Quinn and Golden for example ... you can send them to the offensive glass all night but they'll only get 1 or 2. and they'll have a hard time getting back.

we haven't had a Beagle type of rebounding big man. it makes sense to ask him to do that more than Quinn or Golden.

VT4700 said:

I know our lack of offensive rebounding can be frustrating to many out there, but I really do get the strategy. And, its just not nearly as dramatic as many of you think. Usually, it is a difference of only a couple offensive rebounds a game. Sure, we may be near the bottom in OR, but teams in the middle are only 2 ORs a game better. 4 of the last 5 seasons, we have been outrebounded on the offensive end by 2.5 rebounds or less a game. Last year was the one time over this and we went 15-3 IC and won the A-10 regular season. I think Mooney feels it makes more sense to prevent as many easy buckets as possible on the other end instead of going harder at the boards and maybe getting 2 more offensive rebounds a game. I don't see a problem with his thinking, especially when we have had TJ, Grant, and Quinn at C about the last 10 years.

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The issue I have with this strategy is that in my opinion it bleeds passivity into our play. We are just giving up on an aspect of the game that brings energy into the game. Offensive rebounding wears down other teams on defense, energize the crowd and your team when you get one and it is demoralizing to the other team when you give them up.

And again, I don't see this mutually exclusive decision that you either go after offensive rebounds or get torched in transition. Lots of teams can do both successfully, as should we.

I do get having a player like Quinn out there causes you to tweak things because he was not the most swift footed of players, but this strategy was employed long before Quinn was on the roster. Maybe Mooney sees something different with Walz/Beagle this year and if so I would welcome that. It would be a major change of his tactical approach to the game though.

the only reason we are forced to have this discussion is because some people here worship the hardwood that Mooney walks on and everything he has done or will ever do is flawless.