Blue Man wrote: ↑10 months ago
I'm ready to talk about it.
If I'm being honest I didn't expect it to go this way - I thought we'd beat NW and lose to Miss State going in. I said this weekend would be a measuring stick, and we were certainly measured.
Overall - I think most people had us at 8-4 OOC. I was leaning more 9-3, figuring we'd get NW. I don't think the W/L results this weekend changed anything about our season. I think we have talent, I think they need to improve, I think they will, and I think the A10 sucks. That's still a recipe for us to make some tweaks, finish the OOC strong, and have a very good showing during conference play. Maybe this weekend will serve as a shakeup.
The good:
Zek Montgomery. Holy hell do we have a player. The only one to consistently show up this weekend. When we needed a bucket, he was there. Great defensive plays. All over the place. He was ready for the challenge, he is going to be the dependable guy it looks like. May not always be the leading scorer but he's clearly our most important player at this point.
Cam Estevez. Tom Ryan back up the NIL brinks truck please. Baller. Period. He was who Washington State was making changes against. They killed us with a 2-3 zone and Estevez shot them out of it. Both games he was the sparkplug. Absolute playmaker who's definitely the first guy off the bench. Can create, can shoot. Not there yet defensively, but you need that kid on the court in a scoring drought.
Kortright. Not his best game against NW and Boo, but man oh man did he turn it around against some big physical guards yesterday. Guy did everything from everywhere from the 3 point line to under the hoop. The most productive lineup on the floor had Louie, Zek, and Cam out there.
The bad:
House. WTF man. You can't come out and talk about how you're not scared of any competition and then straight up disappear. Incredibly disappointing. He was trying way too hard and forcing things that he couldn't get. He couldn't contend with WSU's length and he was just trying to jam a square peg in a round hole all day. Reminded me a lot of the bad part of Fatts - just head down and trying to do something when the right play was to kick it out. -17.1 against NW.
Arch. I'm an Arch guy, he's the right guy, we're on track with him, he'll lead us to the promised land and I think the end of this season is going to finish a lot better than we've started. That said he got out-coached yesterday. Estevez was the key on offense and he didn't see enough burn. WSU was going to a zone when Estevez was out and we never made the adjustment to keep him on the floor. Down the stretch it should've been Luis/Cam/Zek and more Foumena. And I'd love to know why it's OK for Fuchs to shoot 3's but not Foumena. I'd also love to know why Fuchs leash was so long and Fou's was so short. Fuchs playing too long and Cam not playing enough was the difference yesterday.
Ways. Tough weekend. Worst +/- on the team against NW. -19.4. Didn't really get anything going. 1:3 A:TO ain't gonna do it.
The ugly:
Fuchs. Immediate Onyekaba alert. Dominated the lesser teams and just flat didn't show up when it mattered. My issue is rarely talent, but lack of effort goes right up my ass. This kid couldn't be bothered to rebound or run up the court. He got torched. For some reason he would hold the ball for 5-10 seconds at the top of the key and try to run the offense. He got dominated up and down the court. He couldn't be bothered to jump for a rebound. He was responsible for at least 5 TO's himself, and he contributed to another 1 or 2. He singlehandedly lost this game. Do you know how hard it is to play 16 minutes and record a -25.1. MINUS TWENTY FIVE. That was against WSU. He was an electric -13.8 against NW. Dear God can we get Bilau/Green in here because if I never saw that kid play again I'd be fine.
All in all, W/L keeps us right at most people's expectations. 9-3/8-4 still in tact. Certainly not how we wanted to play all weekend. If I'm trying to put a positive spin on it, we played 55/80 minutes of really good basketball. Unfortunately those other 15 minutes were absolute diarrhea and cost us 2 games.
I think there's enough in here to say we can still compete in the A10. Honestly there was enough in there to beat NW and keep it very close/beat WSU if the lineups were managed better in game 2, and if we just showed up the first 9 mins of game 1.
Onward and upward. Go Rhody.