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GW game thread - Wed 7pm - NBC Sports App only (not ESPN+ or MASN)

Awesome job by the team to get the win last night and move the streak to 9 games. Sitting at 5-5 in December it would've been hard to convince me it was possible to be where we are now, so big time praise to the team for sticking with it and getting this season back on track with a chance to be a special one. A couple of my quick thoughts from the game:

- Echoing what others have said - Jordan King's ability to take over a game is something to behold. There are few players in the country that can get hot like he can. Should help further cement UR as a landing place for small guards going forward too.

- Dji struggled a bit on offense, but I felt his defense (especially in the first half) on Bishop was one of the keys to the game. When we couldn't buy a basket he helped keep us within striking distance by holding Bishop in check.

- Regarding the offensive lulls - I don't think we will be able to get away with a long dry spell like that against Dayton on Saturday. I think it will be really important to hit the ground running and not get down like we did last night.

- Box score says we had just 7 turnovers, but it felt like more. We made some really weird, untimely, head scratching turnovers at times last night.

- Bigelow - his nose for rebounding the ball continues to be a difference maker. But where he's really elevated his game this year is his 3 point shooting. He's now at 41% on pretty high volume. Having several guys at a time on the court who are a legit threat to make 3's opens things up so much for us.

Looking forward to Saturday!
 
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On the website I could not get the audio only to play. The only thing working was the stat line. I have NBC Sports App on DirectTV Stream but it only let me go 20 minutes of game time before asking me to sign up for Peacock at $5.99 a month.
 
gospidersgo said:
- Echoing what others have said - Jordan King's ability to take over a game is something to behold. There are few players in the country that can get hot like he can. Should help further cement UR as a landing place for small guards going forward too.
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As much as I have been down on Mooney at times over the past 10 years, will say he has shown the ability to adapt with his offseason work in the portal, getting guys that have filled in perfectly and had great chemistry. I was thinking the same thing - not necessarily even just cementing the "small guard" landing place idea, but the fact that Hunt and DLo came in and were able to play huge roles on a team vying for first in the A10- can be used as a big selling point next season. Obviously Bigs too. Will see how the year pans out, but may have to bump up my already generous off season grade :). Of course with Dayton looming I would have loved to have landed that elusive 6'8 and above athlete. Having watched DaRon Holmes a couple times this year, I fear Quinn will have 3 fouls in the first 5 minutes trying to keep up.

That is my biggest fear for the game. I think Quinn needs to be aggressive Quinn on the offensive side too. Some games he is and some games his man lags off 10 feet and he does not look at the basket. When he aggressively hunts his shot I bet he shoots 25% higher. Passive Neal misses those 12 footers and bunnies. We need aggressive Neal against Dayton.
 
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SpiderDad75 said:
I’m biased of course…but Dji played a heck of a defensive game on Bishop. I don’t believe he scored on him. His points came from line and a couple on Neal off a switch. He told me he knew it would be tough and boy did he step up. Should be in the convo for defensive POY imo 🫠🕷️🏀 6-0
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Yes he did, Bishop was 4-18. He will shoot GW in and out of a game.
 
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spider23 said:
As much as I have been down on Mooney at times over the past 10 years, will say he has shown the ability to adapt with his offseason work in the portal, getting guys that have filled in perfectly and had great chemistry. I was thinking the same thing - not necessarily even just cementing the "small guard" landing place idea, but the fact that Hunt and DLo came in and were able to play huge roles on a team vying for first in the A10- can be used as a big selling point next season. Obviously Bigs too. Will see how the year pans out, but may have to bump up my already generous off season grade :). Of course with Dayton looming I would have loved to have landed that elusive 6'8 and above athlete. Having watched DaRon Holmes a couple times this year, I fear Quinn will have 3 fouls in the first 5 minutes trying to keep up.

That is my biggest fear for the game. I think Quinn needs to be aggressive Quinn on the offensive side too. Some games he is and some games his man lags off 10 feet and he does not look at the basket. When he aggressively hunts his shot I bet he shoots 25% higher. Passive Neal misses those 12 footers and bunnies. We need aggressive Neal against Dayton.
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I'd put Bigelow on Holmes.
 
spider23 said:
As much as I have been down on Mooney at times over the past 10 years, will say he has shown the ability to adapt with his offseason work in the portal, getting guys that have filled in perfectly and had great chemistry. I was thinking the same thing - not necessarily even just cementing the "small guard" landing place idea, but the fact that Hunt and DLo came in and were able to play huge roles on a team vying for first in the A10- can be used as a big selling point next season. Obviously Bigs too. Will see how the year pans out, but may have to bump up my already generous off season grade :). Of course with Dayton looming I would have loved to have landed that elusive 6'8 and above athlete. Having watched DaRon Holmes a couple times this year, I fear Quinn will have 3 fouls in the first 5 minutes trying to keep up.

That is my biggest fear for the game. I think Quinn needs to be aggressive Quinn on the offensive side too. Some games he is and some games his man lags off 10 feet and he does not look at the basket. When he aggressively hunts his shot I bet he shoots 25% higher. Passive Neal misses those 12 footers and bunnies. We need aggressive Neal against Dayton.
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I think the portal has caused Chris to simplify his O and it appears David is the focus on D.
 
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CarolinaSpider said:
On the website I could not get the audio only to play. The only thing working was the stat line. I have NBC Sports App on DirectTV Stream but it only let me go 20 minutes of game time before asking me to sign up for Peacock at $5.99 a month.
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The radio part seems like it only works half the time on the website. I have been just going to ESPNRichmond button and picking up the radio broadcast from there.
 
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KE Spider said:
Pleeeze don't go there. He is much better.
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I think Francis is a pretty favorable comparison. both plus defenders. Francis may have forced more (which I assume is your complaint), but he was probably a little better shooter.
 
btw ... I was worried for nothing on the NBCsports app. I started after the game was over, from the beginning. it was great. they even skipped the timeouts and went right back to the action. no commercials.
 
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SpiderDad75 said:
I’m biased of course…but Dji played a heck of a defensive game on Bishop. I don’t believe he scored on him. His points came from line and a couple on Neal off a switch. He told me he knew it would be tough and boy did he step up. Should be in the convo for defensive POY imo 🫠🕷️🏀 6-0
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It'll be Akingbola because voters are lazy and just look at blocks, but you aren't wrong...
 
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Awesome job by the players and coaches last night. A few things to clean up for sure (chief among them, about 5 scream-at-the-screen terrible decisions by D-Lo), but can't fault the effort, energy, or persistence. King is something to behold, and Bigelow is playing outstanding basketball. And I think most importantly, good teams have a rotation where guys have a good sense of their role and what they can do individually to help the team win. It's pretty easy for all of us to pick each guy in the rotation and say "this is his role" and they are all doing it well. It's been fun to watch this team grow.
 
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kneepadmckinney said:
Awesome job by the players and coaches last night. A few things to clean up for sure (chief among them, about 5 scream-at-the-screen terrible decisions by D-Lo), but can't fault the effort, energy, or persistence. King is something to behold, and Bigelow is playing outstanding basketball. And I think most importantly, good teams have a rotation where guys have a good sense of their role and what they can do individually to help the team win. It's pretty easy for all of us to pick each guy in the rotation and say "this is his role" and they are all doing it well. It's been fun to watch this team grow.
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Yes. Couldn’t watch bc of cable provider nonsense issue, but looking at box score, starters went heavy minutes. I think that is good and correct. 1-2 subs at a time with starters, 9 man rotation is way to go IMO, here on out.

Spiderman, I’m jealous. I tried same to watch on delay and was very disappointed to learn you can’t watch the app without a cable provider.
 
urfan1 said:
Dji may have played his finest D game last night. He did a great job on Bishop, but also deflected passes and rbs that will not show up in box score.
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I agree, he's been great all year defensively but last night he ramped it up. He was down on his self a little last night afterwords bc of his offense. Earlier in the day he told me he would be the primary defender on Bishop and thought it would be his toughest test to date...I would say you passed my guy. That effort may have taken the wind out of his sails offensively but I reminded him that was a big 3 that you hit. I'm absolutely pumped for the game Sat. We talked about this last night...this is what we grew up watching together and dreaming about...big time game, big time atmosphere, and on the national stage. Lets seize it and keep this train rolling 🕷️ 🏀
 
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urfan1 said:
Dji may have played his finest D game last night. He did a great job on Bishop, but also deflected passes and rbs that will not show up in box score.
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I think a key play by Dji came when he got offensive rebound and then later found Bigelow for an assist cutting in lane. We were up 8 or 10 at time, but u could tell GW was making a push and we were getting stagnant. Now as it turned out GW still cut into that lead even more after that play, but it gave us some margin we needed at end to prevent it getting super tense imo. I think after DLo tried that long pass when GW pressing which became an And 1 for GW was the most tense. But hey down early took control & did what we had to in not an easy spot given the pending Dayton game.

We've really struggled against Dayton reg season. Of course we got a big one against them in DC in 2022. Hopefully we r due to come up big in one of these reg season spots (we did late in 2010 in a huge home game vs. UD but long time ago). Let's come out fast and energetic.
 
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spiderman said:
btw ... I was worried for nothing on the NBCsports app. I started after the game was over, from the beginning. it was great. they even skipped the timeouts and went right back to the action. no commercials.
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There were no commercials just PSAs. I guess it does not pay Comcast to even try to sell ad time on that app.
 
Nice win last night. I will start with the negative. I was as frustrated as I have been watching us in a long time during the 1st half. We kept shooting bad 2 after bad 2. We missed 11 non layup 2s in the 1st half. You want to know why we were down 31-19? Because at that time, we had missed 10 non layup 2s, and had only taken 5 3s. That is not a recipe for success.

The Quinn floater needs to be out of his game. Yes, he might make some every now and then, but if I am on defense, I give him that shot every time down if he wants it. We need more aggression from him, and the floater screams non aggressive and is also a low percentage shot, and a possession where we are not taking a 3, a layup, or having Quinn set up others with a pass. Neal did rebound well, and had 4 assists and a couple blocks, so he did do a lot of good things out there for us. But, he needs to keep working on finishing at the rim, and a few dunks should be part of his game with the chances he gets down low. If he misses dunks, he will often get fouled, and he went 5-5 at the line last night. The floater will never draw fouls.

Okay, now that the first 17 minutes is out of the way, let's talk positively. King was incredible again, and his final 3 minutes of the 1st half countered the bad 1st 17 minutes we had as a team, and somehow we were only down 1 at the half. Bad 17 minutes, great 3 minutes, only down 1? Wow, I will take it.

The 2nd half we kept it going. The 3s we knocked down were huge, and we might not make that many every game, but we need to shoot them, and keep shooting them even if we miss a few. King and Bigs had it going from 3 and it was fun to watch. When those 2 guys play like that, we are very very tough to beat. The way Bigs rebounds lifts the whole team up. It was such a difference seeing a lot more 3s and way less non layup 2s in the 2nd half. The first half, we were 4-15 on non layup 2s, the 2nd half 4-6, and we should take no more than about 6 of those a half.

Love this team. Love the energy and the chemistry. The starting 5 is really clicking and it makes sense to play each of them 30+ minutes like we saw last night.
 
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brooklyn brownstone said:
Spiderman, I’m jealous. I tried same to watch on delay and was very disappointed to learn you can’t watch the app without a cable provider.
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took me longer than it should have because I'm not technologically competent.
it was trying to connect me with Optimum, which I haven't had for years. I have Hulu.
figured out I needed to connect the App to Hulu on my phone. once done, the tv connected automatically.
 
VT4700 said:
The Quinn floater needs to be out of his game. Yes, he might make some every now and then, but if I am on defense, I give him that shot every time down if he wants it.
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yeah, I don't love floaters from him even though he's sometimes good with them. I'm anti-floater in general since I could never make them! some guys do but it's a tough shot.

the GW big guy gave Quinn a lot of room, begging him to shoot floaters. he was tough on Quinn when Neal got deep inside and tried his spin drop steps. still, I want him eating up that space and getting deep.
 
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GKiller said:
I think a key play by Dji came when he got offensive rebound and then later found Bigelow for an assist cutting in lane. We were up 8 or 10 at time, but u could tell GW was making a push and we were getting stagnant. Now as it turned out GW still cut into that lead even more after that play, but it gave us some margin we needed at end to prevent it getting super tense imo. I think after DLo tried that long pass when GW pressing which became an And 1 for GW was the most tense. But hey down early took control & did what we had to in not an easy spot given the pending Dayton game.

We've really struggled against Dayton reg season. Of course we got a big one against them in DC in 2022. Hopefully we r due to come up big in one of these reg season spots (we did late in 2010 in a huge home game vs. UD but long time ago). Let's come out fast and energetic.
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That was a real good play (plays) there from Dji. The rebound, the drive, and the dish to Bigs.
 
spiderman said:
yeah, I don't love floaters from him even though he's sometimes good with them. I'm anti-floater in general since I could never make them! some guys do but it's a tough shot.

the GW big guy gave Quinn a lot of room, begging him to shoot floaters. he was tough on Quinn when Neal got deep inside and tried his spin drop steps. still, I want him eating up that space and getting deep.
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Yep, go lower and get some fouls on the guy.
 
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VT4700 said:
The Quinn floater needs to be out of his game. Yes, he might make some every now and then, but if I am on defense, I give him that shot every time down if he wants it. We need more aggression from him, and the floater screams non aggressive and is also a low percentage shot, and a possession where we are not taking a 3, a layup, or having Quinn set up others with a pass
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I mostly agree with you here. However, I think it's important for Neal to have some semblance of a mid range game, or he will be too one dimensional on offense and allow defenses to know what's coming. But I'm envisioning more like 2 or 3 of those shots per game - not 6 or 8.

Watching the game highlights it's interesting to see that on all 3 of his made baskets last night he took it hard to the hoop AND used the backboard. Also went 5-5 at the foul line. Hopefully this is emphasized going forward to take full advantage of his strengths and shots with a higher likelihood of success.
 
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VT agree with the shot selection issues. And it’s a reason I think we struggle in endgames sometimes - teams really clamp down on defense late and you don’t get many open 3s. It’s a reason I’d love to see Big/Dji do more driving in endgame scenarios. Go to the rim hard. Try for the layup and sometimes FTs will come too bc other team is desperate they may just hack and hope you miss. I think UR relies a little too much on 3s when trying to kill games (and often have to force a bad look near the shot clock buzzer.)
 
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The floater from close is a high-percentage shot for him that I'm cool with him continuing. But it seems his early season success there boosted his confidence to the point where he now feels like he can also routinely make a 12-foot floater or a 15-foot floater. that's a much worse shot and needs to stop. His moves around the basket are much better than last year, so I agree that he should be using those whenever possible.
 
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Eight Legger said:
The floated from close is a high-percentage shot for him that I'm cool with him continuing. But it seems his early season success there boosted his confidence to the point where he now feels like he can also routinely make a 12-foot floater or a 15-foot floater. that's a much worse shot and needs to stop. His moves around the basket are much better than last year, so I agree that he should be using those whenever possible.
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Totally agree! I hope he is listening. That is a good question to ask on the show Monday!
 
Quinn had some success with the 10-15 foot floater, but not as much now. I think he is not using the back board as much nor is he picking a spot on the rim to focus on, rather just looking in direction of rim. Nowhere near as accurate. I would prefer he attack the rim more often.
 
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A couple of my observations many of which were already noted.

1. Quinn did not have a good game offensively. That floater is not his best shot. I do love that after halftime, Mooney clearly instructed to everyone to feed Neil down low. That is where he should function, he is 7 damn feet tall, really tough to stop a 7 footer in the box unless you double team him.
2. I thought I was going to the one to note the job Dji did on Bishop, apparently everyone noticed. Simply masterful job shutting him down and frustrating him. Now, Dji on offense was a different story. A couple ugly 3's in there and he couldn't get his usual drives to the hoop.
3. Bench: Our starters were so good, the bench didn't really do anything. Walz was really shaky out there in my opinion, terrible 3, ran the wrong direction on one play. Roche played decent. I love how Tynne is not afraid to shoot and his shot looks good, but until he starts making more them, he could be a little more selective in his shot taking.
4. The first half was brutal (up until the last minute). Our offense was one non-stop mistake for the first 19 minutes. That said, you know what wasn't brutal, our defense. Our defense kept us in the game until our offense got on track. Among our starting 5, every single on them is a good defender. Dji is elite, Neil is such a force down though, Bigs, King, and D-Lo are all plus defenders.

Lastly, we were clearly the better team. Even when we were down 12, I felt that once we stopped making really careless decisions on offense that we would take control.
 
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97spiderfan said:
A couple of my observations many of which were already noted.

1. Quinn did not have a good game offensively. That floater is not his best shot. I do love that after halftime, Mooney clearly instructed to everyone to feed Neil down low. That is where he should function, he is 7 damn feet tall, really tough to stop a 7 footer in the box unless you double team him.
2. I thought I was going to the one to note the job Dji did on Bishop, apparently everyone noticed. Simply masterful job shutting him down and frustrating him. Now, Dji on offense was a different story. A couple ugly 3's in there and he couldn't get his usual drives to the hoop.
3. Bench: Our starters were so good, the bench didn't really do anything. Walz was really shaky out there in my opinion, terrible 3, ran the wrong direction on one play. Roche played decent. I love how Tynne is not afraid to shoot and his shot looks good, but until he starts making more them, he could be a little more selective in his shot taking.
4. The first half was brutal (up until the last minute). Our offense was one non-stop mistake for the first 19 minutes. That said, you know what wasn't brutal, our defense. Our defense kept us in the game until our offense got on track. Among our starting 5, every single on them is a good defender. Dji is elite, Neil is such a force down though, Bigs, King, and D-Lo are all plus defenders.

Lastly, we were clearly the better team. Even when we were down 12, I felt that once we stopped making really careless decisions on offense that we would take control.
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Very good observation 97!
 
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