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RTD Article on Thursday, June 9th

Stork3

Stork3

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Feb 23, 2011
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http://www.richmond.com/sports/coll...cle_e48c9e96-90e2-5684-9b79-2c20e3683f8e.html


"This offseason involves “much more of an urgent motivation for us moving forward,” said Mooney." Holy cow - he is starting to get it. I'm pumped!

"... and Mooney suggested immediately after the season that the matchup resistance to which the Spiders had been dedicated may not continue as their base defense." Oh yes - he is getting it!

An increase in urgency to move forward cannot be a bad thing. And getting more than one defense in our arsenal, especially if these are defenses that our young players can master earlier, is another move in the right direction. It's only June - but "hope springs eternal." Go Spiders.
 
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Stork3 said:
http://www.richmond.com/sports/coll...cle_e48c9e96-90e2-5684-9b79-2c20e3683f8e.html


"This offseason involves “much more of an urgent motivation for us moving forward,” said Mooney." Holy cow - he is starting to get it. I'm pumped!

"... and Mooney suggested immediately after the season that the matchup resistance to which the Spiders had been dedicated may not continue as their base defense." Oh yes - he is getting it!

An increase in urgency to move forward cannot be a bad thing. And getting more than one defense in our arsenal, especially if these are defenses that our young players can master earlier, is another move in the right direction. It's only June - but "hope springs eternal." Go Spiders.
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Stork, nice article. Believe things are being refreshed with our Spiders and the grit lacking last year will be ever present this year. Roll Spide! OSC
 
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Let's hope so. One might ask why that sense of urgency didn't exist last year, or the year before, or the year before, or... I'm withholding judgment until the season starts.
 
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Or is it coach speak, saying what die hard fans want to hear. CM make me
a believer.
 
I don't believe its coach speak. Coaches aren't usually that open and honest in their comments. I admire CM for being so honest about last year.
 
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Stork3 said:
http://www.richmond.com/sports/coll...cle_e48c9e96-90e2-5684-9b79-2c20e3683f8e.html


"This offseason involves “much more of an urgent motivation for us moving forward,” said Mooney." Holy cow - he is starting to get it. I'm pumped!

"... and Mooney suggested immediately after the season that the matchup resistance to which the Spiders had been dedicated may not continue as their base defense." Oh yes - he is getting it!

An increase in urgency to move forward cannot be a bad thing. And getting more than one defense in our arsenal, especially if these are defenses that our young players can master earlier, is another move in the right direction. It's only June - but "hope springs eternal." Go Spiders.
Click to expand...

I am not sure how JOC came to this conclusion based on the quotes he included in the article. Here is the quote JOC used to support his claim that we may be changing base defenses:

“We’re looking to diversify a little bit and maybe overhaul what we’ve done with the matchup,” said Mooney, who is in his 12th year at UR. “(We’re) just looking very closely at the things that were effective for us for most of 10 years and then were ineffective for us last year. How can we fix some of those things?”
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To me it sounds like Mooney has no intention of leaving the matchup-zone, just tweaking it. He never mentions anything about even trying another defense, just making changes to our matchup-zone. Since our defense has been largely successful over the past 10 years (excluding last year) it seems that Mooney intends to keep using it, but change a few pieces that were not working last year.
 
a lot of our probs are not scheme, they are execution. coaches like comfort, they do not like to get outside their box. as they say in mizzou, "show me"
 
to me i have the list of meaningless Fezz words 1/ the swagger 2/ icanthsootorreboundbutiplayanyaway 3/ magic defense spots 4/ he just needs more confidence 5/ now the Grit now i must nap i hope Coach will diversify by playing all the shooters more Ha I have seen enough of the magic defense players with no offense bnut i am very jealous for sure of big money for coaches now. they work hard and have to stay krasny for TV !
 
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MolivaManiac said:
+1
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Agree. Coach is very smart and is going to make changes necessary to win. This team will have a somewhat different look and will likely feature some underclassmen before the season is over. Moreover, think more players will be used in order to gain experience necessary in case someone is injured. OSC
 
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Ulla1 said:
Agree. Coach is very smart and is going to make changes necessary to win. This team will have a somewhat different look and will likely feature some underclassmen before the season is over. Moreover, think more players will be used in order to gain experience necessay in case someone is injured. OSC
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Hopefully the response means he is getting substantial pressure to change. As for the smart part, it certainly took him awhile to get here, and that's assuming he can actually change.
 
This makes me cautiously optimistic. Whether he leaves the matchup or not, I think you can fairly interpret the comments as directional evidence that he is trying to adapt to address weaknesses. I think that is good.
 
I think he'll look for ways to adjust the matchup.
Every defense is attackable. He's taught this defense for a long time with really great success. I can' imagine he's say "doesn't work anymore", and go to a straight zone or man. There should be adjustments to make it work again. But there should have been in season adjustments last year that would help too. I really think it was the players, not the scheme.
 
spiderman said:
I think he'll look for ways to adjust the matchup.
Every defense is attackable. He's taught this defense for a long time with really great success. I can' imagine he's say "doesn't work anymore", and go to a straight zone or man. There should be adjustments to make it work again. But there should have been in season adjustments last year that would help too. I really think it was the players, not the scheme.
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spiderman, totally agree that the problem was more the players than the strategy. The new recruits appear to be overall quicker and stronger than team members last year. Coach has stated his ideal would be five 6' 6" athletic and skilled players who move well enough to cover anyone on the other team. Looks like we are approaching this ideal. Let's see how things go down this year, the Ulla for one is very optimistic. One last comment: heard John Calipari talking this morning about a strategy nearly identical to the one espoused by Coach Mooney. Coach Cal said that this will be the winning strategy of the future. For those if you still wishing for a big center, their usefulness has gone the way of the dinosaurs. OSC
 
Ulla, hope you are right that the big centers are dinosaurs, because we don't seem to be able to recruit them. Don't know that we need, 5. 6'6" players, either. Kwhan Fore looks every bit as good as a taller guard. VOSC
 
TBSpyder said:
Ulla, hope you are right that the big centers are dinosaurs, because we don't seem to be able to recruit them. Don't know that we need, 5. 6'6" players, either. Kwhan Fore looks every bit as good as a taller guard. VOSC
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TB, Khwan is only 6', but, and this is a big but, Khwan is an uber athlete with a 45" vertical leap making him functionally about 6' 6". OSC
 
Big men are dinosaurs in today's game until an apposing team has one or two of them that destroy us. History has not been kind to the Spiders in regards to opposing bigs having career games against us.
 
keefusb said:
Big men are dinosaurs in today's game until an apposing team has one or two of them that destroy us. History has not been kind to the Spiders in regards to opposing bigs having career games against us.
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kee, you said correctly: "History". That was in the past. OSC
 
I would take a good big man any day. We only have to go back in the annals of history to last year to see how the loss of ANO impacted our defense considerably. Not the only reason our defense stunk, but not having a big rim protector certainly was a large factor.
 
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old school, slow footed, no handle, poor passing, no outside shot big men are dinosaurs. today's big men are 6'8"+, strong, athletic, can run and pass and shoot. those will never go out of style.
 
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Yes, Sandman killed us, as he did a couple teams in the NCAA. I was at the game vs. St. Mary's. They had 4 shooters on the floor that all shot 40%+ from 3 if I recall, making it very difficult to double down on him. He was big and good. In the lineup before the game it looked like he was trash talking Darius Garrett, and then proceeded to beat him up on the court too. Tough game.
 
spider23 said:
Yes, Sandman killed us, as he did a couple teams in the NCAA. I was at the game vs. St. Mary's. They had 4 shooters on the floor that all shot 40%+ from 3 if I recall, making it very difficult to double down on him. He was big and good. In the lineup before the game it looked like he was trash talking Darius Garrett, and then proceeded to beat him up on the court too. Tough game.
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Dellavedova was on that St. Mary's team too, though he didn't have a good game against us.
 
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