Forecast for Georgetown game

[nathanw19]

Golden is so bad defensively, it's absurd. The caveat here is that he may be coached not to draw any contact since we need him on offense, but just watch those highlights and look at him on the defensive end. He rarely even jumps to try to alter shots. At some point when you are not even contesting shots within the paint, it's counterproductive no matter how many points he may score on the other end.

There was one highlight that he was so badly out of position it would’ve been embarrassing in a under 12’s rec league. Maybe he’s gassed, but I don’t buy that as an excuse. If you have the energy to be active on offense (which he always doe), then you have the energy to be active on defense.

Overall, our defense is just a mess. Our rotation is slow and sloppy, and every time we close out they drive past us, even our more athletic defenders. A lot of that is on the coach, but some is on the players. Have some effing pride on defense. So much of defense is effort, desire, and hard work. From the outside, it looks like we’re ok with getting beat to the hoop...

 

[MrTbone]

You have to go back to 2014-15 for the last time our defensive efficiency was top100. Three out of the past four years including early results for this season have us over 200 and last year we were over 300. Ouch.

I think the most plausible explanation is that our defense requires experience which has been deficient for most of these years with a notable exception for the year where TA/DT/TD we’re seniors. It still wasn’t great that year.

Regardless of the reason, it does feel like we might be better off just letting the guys go straight man particularly against opponents who seem to have broke the base defense. I don’t think at that point you’re any worse off than hoping guys go man and let instinct aid them over scheme.

 

[SpiderGuy]

If you can't win a game where you shoot ~60% from 2 and ~45% from 3, you are going to have a tough time winning any games.

Mooney's teams have consistently had decent to good offenses over his tenure, but the defense has been so bad the past 3 seasons it just doesn't matter.

I think last night they showed a visual of our 3 point shooting going into the game season to date. It was really bad. I want to think is was in the lower 1/3 of the country. This is supposed to be Mooney's bread & butter. To reinforce what fan2011 said, we still lost with a really good night of shooting. We know that there will be many nights we don't shoot as well as we did last night (especially from 3 point land). Much of what kept us in the game last night were the 3's. I hope we continue to shoot better.

 

[CarolinaSpider]

The first thing that caught my attention was the guys looked relaxed and played
pretty loose. GT was never able to put us completely away, but on other hand,
by midway point of second half our legs were tired and some open shots were not
falling. Mooney needs to have a few more subbing times. The guys are unselfish and
worked hard for the best open shot.

When Gilyard comes back I would like to see a 3 guard offense with Andre and JW in
providing maybe more pressure on ball handlers and good ball movement. On defense
we got to learn to keep on our toes and not go for the first fake... move our feet. I think Grant is a
better defender but has been warned about fouls. The announcers were really pointing out
defensive mistakes he was making.

 

[Eight Legger]

I do believe it’s one of the key points of emphasis of our defense to not commit fouls. All teams obviously teach it to some extent but we really emphasize it while not emphasizing toughness etc. to the same degree. Combined with our rebounding philosophy, we are soft basically by choice!

The interesting thing here is that Beilein's teams historically – wherever he goes – are among the nation's leaders in fewest fouls and fewest turnovers. And while he's not necessarily known for defense, his teams typically play tough enough defense. So there's a way to teach guys to play D without fouling. But Mooney's way seems to be "Don't foul – and who cares if we give up easy buckets?"

 

[I-M-UR]

I thought the kids played well. Seemed in control, good effort, shot well. Oh and Cayo made some free throws 4 of 5!

We'll see what happens with a quick pressing opponent. How many times did the announcer mention we are one of the worst teams in College Basketball in the offensive rebound category (3 last night)?

 

[keefusb]

I really don't get the "don't foul" aspect of the CM defensive philosophy. It seems to fly in the face of the "don't go for offensive rebounds, get back so we don't give up fast break lay-ups" mentality we have been suffering with since CM came to town. So I reckon giving up easy lay-ups in a half-court defensive set is better than giving up easy lay-ups after a defensive rebound and outlet pass? I just don't get it.

#NoMoreMooneyTruthing

 

[ur2K]

I think Coach has new glasses to look at Euro players now. Just like CoachMcKill already. Was very easy. Keep the fight Andre; and Coach now you have high ball screen clona lopta with entry pass to pivot roll for score. I think we forgot how to do this other times but nice times now because we DO NOW. Keep the fight Andre.

Those were 2 of the best looking plays we've run this year.

A few thoughts on last night:

• Cayo has come a long way since last year, he's playing really well and can get to the rim. If they can fix that 3 point stroke/hitch thing, he's can be a really good player
• Liked the fight from the young guards. Andre is a bit reckless, but in a good way. I hope Mooney doesn't coach the instincts out of him
• Sal is not even close to ready for the college game
• Golden's throw up his hands and grab his head act every time a call doesn't go his way is going to make officials hate him and he's never going to get calls go his way. We see so many of the same officials throughout the season
• Our defense is atrocious. At what point does the coach look at the trend with this defense over the last few years and realize that it needs to just go away?
• In a more normal year, you can see the positives in this game. This is not a normal year, in a year you lose to Longwood and Hampton at home, its just another nail in the coffin

 

[Not-A-Homer]

I honestly don't think that we are going to see a MAJOR team drop off as many predict. Performance was already poor with the regulars. The team is ranked a generous # 230 something.

I don't expect it to be abominably worse going forward. Yes, the team will miss Sherod, he is a good player. BUT, getting Andre significant playing time will prove that he has strong potential. He is young and inexperienced therefore he will make some poor decisions and plays. BUT, he will produce as well. Andre is a better defender already.

Same with Cayo and Sal. Cayo is now forced to consistently step up his scoring role. This will accelerate his development. Again, (and as we have already seen) he will have some good and bad moments. I do not see a catastrophic drop off in the long run. Sal will also be forced to play more, which can only speed his development. Certainly he will have good and bad moments, BUT, WE ARE SEEING THAT ANYWAY from the guys who have been playing ahead of him.

Expectation going forward will be that Wojcik take more offensive initiative. Again, nothing but positives toward his development. He has shown (and will continue to show) some freshman ups and downs, but that is part of nearly every first year player's experience. More responsibility will make him better, faster.

The last piece of this is that Mooney SHOULD rest Gilyard until he is fully ready to return. If you don't let a groin injury heal it can become a season-long problem. I know that Mooney is trying to save his job with wins, but there is no big picture reason to rush Gilyard's return.

Not saying that Spiders will be a BETTER team due to injuries, because that is highly unlikely. But I don't see a 30 points per game drop off either. The team wasn't a well oiled machine before the injuries.

Yes, G-Town won, BUT, this was the best team game of the year in my opinion.

Except for the fact that Sal only played a couple of minutes, we saw all of the things listed above in this game. Though the outcome wasn't really in doubt, the Spiders were competitive throughout.

The team that played last night moved the ball much better than what we had seen. This was due largely to Andre, who in addition to his assists, passed the ball crisply and timely. Better ball movement led to more open shots, which led to more 3-point baskets.

With the exception of Golden (and some poor defensive plays individually by each) overall the defense was a bit better. Not adequate, but better. There were a number of times that Andre' pressure noticeably affected the shooter. Andre' defense and effort made the team performance better on that side of the ball.

As predicted, this team is not going to be abominably worse than "the big three." In some ways. they were an improvement. I honestly don't think that the RESULTS would have been any different with Gilyard and Sherod.

What last night's effort did point out is HOW POORLY Mooney manages his bench. He thinks he has nothing (by the way he treats them and deploys them) and therefore he gets nearly nothing. Yet, when they had a chance to play with different expectations (because Mooney had no choice) they performed fairly well. The results (in both directions) were not an accident. Poor coaching.

The "bench" problem at UR has everything to do with Mooney. As has been stated previously, the problem hasn't been so much about WHO is sitting on the bench. The problem is how they are developed and deployed.

 

[Not-A-Homer]

Those were 2 of the best looking plays we've run this year.

A few thoughts on last night:

• Cayo has come a long way since last year, he's playing really well and can get to the rim. If they can fix that 3 point stroke/hitch thing, he's can be a really good player
• Liked the fight from the young guards. Andre is a bit reckless, but in a good way. I hope Mooney doesn't coach the instincts out of him
• Sal is not even close to ready for the college game
• Golden's throw up his hands and grab his head act every time a call doesn't go his way is going to make officials hate him and he's never going to get calls go his way. We see so many of the same officials throughout the season
• Our defense is atrocious. At what point does the coach look at the trend with this defense over the last few years and realize that it needs to just go away?
• In a more normal year, you can see the positives in this game. This is not a normal year, in a year you lose to Longwood and Hampton at home, its just another nail in the coffin

Golden will be better off if he stops the theatrics.

 

[spiderman]

a lot of this has already been said, but what the heck. stream of consciousness ...

1) we played mostly a straight 2-3, not our usual defense. it made sense with GT being a poor 3 point shooting team. better to protect the lane from their size. but we weren't good in a 2-3 either. I love Grant. I repeat, I love Grant. but he's not a middle of a 2-3 rim protector. he doesn't challenge enough shots. does sometimes and did have 3 blocks, so I don't think it's simply a "don't foul" thing. he's not a leaper but he needs to alter shots more if we're going to play 2-3. and he can't give so much space to a good big man who can shoot.

2) speaking of a good big man ... Govan is terrific. great touch. maybe the best offensive 5 I've seen this year. passes well too. if we contain him even a little we're in it.

3) McClung? meh. super athletic, of course. and he'll get better. but not a very good basketball player right now. he did take over late though.

4) for the most part, we were great offensively. surprisingly solid without Jacob and Nick. Grant was good as expected, but it was the others that impressed me most.
- Woj broke out and got his 20. knew that was coming soon. he's going to make a lot of shots. great form.
- Andre ... still not convinced he can shoot, but his feeds especially on the rolls by Grant were beautiful. very nice game. he's improving.
- congrats to JJ. he gets crapped on a lot. we needed him and he had one of his best games.
- Nathan keeps doing it. every team knows he's driving, and yet nobody can keep him out of the lane. he's my new poster boy for CM's player development when I read that CM never develops anyone. his improvement has been remarkable.

5) I agree with an earlier post that Grant complaining about every call isn't helping him. that's the biggest advice I'd give him. it will never get the call changed, and it will never give him the benefit of the doubt with future calls. I know he's emotional and it's tough when you get a bad call against you, but just move on and play hard.

 

[spiderman]

oh, and as for Ewing ... how the heck does he not press us for 40 minutes last night with Gilyard out and 2 freshman guards???
didn't need to. they won. but still. that's obvious.

 

[SpiderGuy]

What last night's effort did point out is HOW POORLY Mooney manages his bench. He thinks he has nothing (by the way he treats them and deploys them) and therefore he gets nearly nothing. Yet, when they had a chance to play with different expectations (because Mooney had no choice) they performed fairly well. The results (in both directions) were not an accident. Poor coaching.

The "bench" problem at UR has everything to do with Mooney. As has been stated previously, the problem hasn't been so much about WHO is sitting on the bench. The problem is how they are developed and deployed.

This is nothing new. Moon Man's bench management has been lacking for years. However, some of that can be blamed on his inability to recruit better.

 

[SpiderGuy]

oh, and as for Ewing ... how the heck does he not press us for 40 minutes last night with Gilyard out and 2 freshman guards???
didn't need to. they won. but still. that's obvious.

As I pointed out, Georgetown is not an aggressive team - neither on offense nor on defense. If they'd have pressed they probably could have beaten us by 15 to 20 wearing us down much sooner. GT plays well enough to win but not dominate.

We will have much tougher time with aggressive & physical teams that press more & pound the paint.

 

[mr.spider]

This was actually about the best scenario we will have all your year for a respectable win. We shot lights out and Georgetown was not aggressive or all that good. Even just looking at their results tells you that. Squeaking out victories against the Cambells and Central CTs of the world.

We'll steal a couple wins here and there, but this season should definitely finish Mooney.

 

[urmite]

If you can't win a game where you shoot ~60% from 2 and ~45% from 3, you are going to have a tough time winning any games.

Mooney's teams have consistently had decent to good offenses over his tenure, but the defense has been so bad the past 3 seasons it just doesn't matter.

Look at the D rating ANO last 2 years, TJ last 2 years, Golden 2 years.

Not saying at all that they caused it, just defining it by the big guy each year.

 

[SpiderDaMan]

Golden is so bad defensively, it's absurd. The caveat here is that he may be coached not to draw any contact since we need him on offense, but just watch those highlights and look at him on the defensive end. He rarely even jumps to try to alter shots. At some point when you are not even contesting shots within the paint, it's counterproductive no matter how many points he may score on the other end.

No it's not coaching strategy. There is no strategy. He doesn't know how to play D and no one's bothered to teach him how to do it. D is hard work and good coaching. That doesn't exist here.

My guys got embarrassed last night, but they have been playing D that they were starving for the last two years. They played it well while getting beat lasts night. O is much easier than D to fix so I'm not worried. This was coached in and taught carefully and it will stick and the result will be drastically better, but requiring a bit of patience.

Hire any guy that has desire and a history of getting bad teams better and it's way better than Mooney. He's taking decent teams an making them bad. Get a guy that's hungry. I hate to watch it happening. I love this game and I love to see it played well.

 

[SpiderRick]

Rick, i have to disagree. I am not a Mooney apologist, but the team played hard. Georgetown has more talent than we do with two starters out and maybe even if they played. But the kids played hard and had chances to win. Georgetown IS a good team and we made them play. Whether Mooney stays or not, this team has some gonads and we need to support them.

Cup,
I wasn't implying a poor effort, most of the game they played well as a team which was refreshing. I just refuse to lower the bar to the point that I'm happy with ANY loss, I'm not going to accept that premise. We obviously have some good players who are in need of good coaching.

 

[SpiderRick]

I think Coach has new glasses to look at Euro players now. Just like CoachMcKill already. Was very easy. Keep the fight Andre; and Coach now you have high ball screen clona lopta with entry pass to pivot roll for score. I think we forgot how to do this other times but nice times now because we DO NOW. Keep the fight Andre.

I don't know what a clona lopta is but it sounds awesome!
Andre played like he has experience not like a freshman. He might have made a difference if he had played some minutes in the first few games.

 

[RAMS/Spider]

Told you guys a couple days ago that Georgetown wasn't that good this year but also admitted the personnel issues would make it a tough night. I think the take away is that the players have NOT stopped trying to win for Mooney and showed that last night and that Richmond still has enough talent to win games, especially when JG returns I expect a very competitive game verses Wake.

 

[Eight Legger]

I don't think players stop trying to win, period. Whether they looked better because of Mooney or in spite of him is hard to say. I still contend that we could send our best five guys out there and tell them to play it like a pick-up game and we'd probably have better results than we actually have this year (and probably last year, too). They're all so handcuffed trying to make 12 passes before anyone can shoot, trying to figure out when to switch and when not to, etc. It's a mental mess that translates into a physical one.

 

[MolivaManiac]

It was so telling to me at the end of the game. We were in a situation where time was running down and the players were programmed to get into their normal sets and not rush. The color commenter mentioned it twice in the last minute of the game that we needed to speed up.

How do we know the players are playing "for Mooney" as opposed to "for each other" or for "their school"?

 

[SpiderK]

You can just tell Mooney at 6’8” played no defense at Princeton, so he doesn’t know how to teach big men.

 

[MolivaManiac]

Gritty performance by the Liberty Flames to go up to DC and lose by only 10 tonight against the Hoyas. Definitely a result that the Flames can build on.

 

[spider23]

Gritty performance by the Liberty Flames to go up to DC and lose by only 10 tonight against the Hoyas. Definitely a result that the Flames can build on.

I'm guessing they got the moral victory, AND they only gave up 88 points. We are getting there, almost as good as Liberty and only about one light year behind Radford.

#ThanksMooney
#10MoreYears