THIS Year (2014-15)

rhodylaw · Unread post by **rhodylaw** » 10 years ago

Officially pumped - looks like a legit NCAA team for the first time in years.

Iggy1979 · Unread post by **Iggy1979** » 10 years ago

I thought it was great seeing Hare out there, too. And while these were just drills and scrimmages, lots of shots going in.

Billyboy78 · Unread post by **Billyboy78** » 10 years ago

Was Terrell in that video? I didn't see him.

Ram1019 · Unread post by **Ram1019** » 10 years ago

That might have been him shooting a 3 at the 3:19 mark.

adam914 · Unread post by **adam914** » 10 years ago

Billyboy78 wrote:Was Terrell in that video? I didn't see him.

I caught him a couple times. Dont remember any specific plays but I remember seeing him standing in the huddle a couple times.

Billyboy78 · Unread post by **Billyboy78** » 10 years ago

adam914 wrote:
Billyboy78 wrote:Was Terrell in that video? I didn't see him.
I caught him a couple times. Dont remember any specific plays but I remember seeing him standing in the huddle a couple times.

Yeah, watching it back again, he was in that huddle right at the beginning.

bigappleram · Unread post by **bigappleram** » 10 years ago

he has a dunk or two in there on break outs, and i believe a jumper as well. #32

Keaney.Blue · Unread post by **Keaney.Blue** » 10 years ago

I'm still not sure if we should be talking about an NCAA tourney berth. I'm expecting a 20 win season, but NCAA's are a stretch. Don't get me wrong I'm hoping they exceed expectations, but you remember what happened to our high hopes last year

adam914 · Unread post by **adam914** » 10 years ago

Keaney.Blue wrote:I'm still not sure if we should be talking about an NCAA tourney berth. I'm expecting a 20 win season, but NCAA's are a stretch. Don't get me wrong I'm hoping they exceed expectations, but you remember what happened to our high hopes last year

I tend to agree. I am looking for a major step forward this year, but next year is where I have my hopes on a tourney. With EC and Hassan as juniors and Terrell and Garrett as Sophomores.

RAM67 · Unread post by **RAM67** » 10 years ago

I tend to agree, but I bet the players don't.

Seawrightspostgame · Unread post by **Seawrightspostgame** » 10 years ago

I've been hoping for a tourney birth for many years and that won't change.

Expectations? The team to play hard basketball and DH to shine a little more for on the court stuff.

Dan is a Master of the offseason. That video is awesome.

adam914 · Unread post by **adam914** » 10 years ago

RAM67 wrote:I tend to agree, but I bet the players don't.

Well thats good though, tourney should always be the goal for the players/coaches.

Unread post by **SGreenwell** » 10 years ago

Keaney.Blue wrote:I'm still not sure if we should be talking about an NCAA tourney berth. I'm expecting a 20 win season, but NCAA's are a stretch. Don't get me wrong I'm hoping they exceed expectations, but you remember what happened to our high hopes last year

Agree - It would require roughly 10 wins of improvement to get on the bubble. I imagine another bit of improvement of this year, like around 6 wins to get to 20, and then another step forward in 2015-16. With all of the younger players on the roster now, I think that would be a good mark to shoot for, and if you wildly exceed expectations, even better.

Billyboy78 · Unread post by **Billyboy78** » 10 years ago

I did some math on some of the losses last year. If we had shot 75% from the line in the games we lost, we would have won 4 more games. Free throw shooting cost us last year. That has to improve greatly. So, that would have given us 18 wins. I don't think 23-24 wins this year is out of the question. Get on that free throw line in practice, especially when the legs are tired!

Rhody74 · Unread post by **Rhody74** » 10 years ago

I think the NIT is within reach, though.

Blue Man · Unread post by **Blue Man** » 10 years ago

I honestly expect PC like results next year. An NIT team that could be good enough to pull together and win the conference tourney and auto bid to the dance.

At least close to the bubble next year. There's really no excuse.

bigappleram · Unread post by **bigappleram** » 10 years ago

except PC had an AA senior guard, and the core of their team (Henton, Batts, Council) with loads of experience. We have a team where our 5-6 best players have 1 year or less of college ball.

Unread post by **TruePoint** » 10 years ago

Billyboy78 wrote:I did some math on some of the losses last year. If we had shot 75% from the line in the games we lost, we would have won 4 more games. Free throw shooting cost us last year. That has to improve greatly. So, that would have given us 18 wins. I don't think 23-24 wins this year is out of the question. Get on that free throw line in practice, especially when the legs are tired!

I know what you're saying, but only 20 teams in all of D1 shot 75% from the line. Also can't assume that all of those games would have played out exactly the same way had we made a couple more free throws. In general, though, I agree with your points that we weren't that far off from a few more wins last year and we need to be a better free throw shooting team.

Blue Man · Unread post by **Blue Man** » 10 years ago

bigappleram wrote:except PC had an AA senior guard, and the core of their team (Henton, Batts, Council) with loads of experience. We have a team where our 5-6 best players have 1 year or less of college ball.

I will give you that. I'm going on what the 2 players that were here last year were able to do by the end of the year. I'm expecting a huge jump in their game, and honestly even a minor jump for either of them would make them in the top few at their position in our conference.

I also think that with the depth we have, we won't "have" to play certain players.

A lot of this hinges on how good Jared Terrell is, and I would argue that as a freshman he'll be a better player than X was as a senior. At least I expect him to not hog the ball like X did and shoot 30%. At 220 lbs he doesn't strike me as the player who has to shoot, and will have the body to go inside and finish if there's no shot to take.

I honestly believe that losing X will benefit this team simply because he won't be there to take and miss so many shots.

It certainly is a far fetched thought, but PC wasn't all that talented and relied solely on Cotton. We certainly don't have a player of his caliber on the roster this year, but I think overall this is a better team than PC was last year.

bigappleram · Unread post by **bigappleram** » 10 years ago

The areas of JTs game that need the most work are his shooting and ball handling, and his game is nothing like X's. Regardless of his FG% X was a much more polished offensive player than JT is currently, you just cant compare a SR to a FR. JTs immediate contribution will be felt on defense and in transition, he could struggle early on in the half court. You may be putting a bit too much stock in him singularly, for example, I would not expect him to have even close to the impact on the offensive end that EC had last year. Realistic for JT is 8ppg, 4 rebs, 2 steals and you should be happy with that. Great numbers for a FR, but nothing that will drastically alter our success on the court when taken in isolation. Overall our team is heading straight up, and in time this cast of players should certainly be better than last year's PC team, they got by largely due to the out-of-the-world play of Bryce Cotton. We will be a much more balanced and athletic team, but young teams have growing pains and I expect some more for next year especially in the early going. We have 3 important pieces - Terrell, Garrett and Hare - that didn't play a minute of Div 1 basketball last season. That cant be ignored or overlooked.

adam914 · Unread post by **adam914** » 10 years ago

bigappleram wrote:We have 3 important pieces - Terrell, Garrett and Hare - that didn't play a minute of Div 1 basketball last season. That cant be ignored or overlooked.

Yeah this is a very important point I think. Lets not fall back into the same traps as past years of expecting too much from guys who haven't seen the court yet.

Unread post by **SGreenwell** » 10 years ago

TruePoint wrote:
Billyboy78 wrote:I did some math on some of the losses last year. If we had shot 75% from the line in the games we lost, we would have won 4 more games. Free throw shooting cost us last year. That has to improve greatly. So, that would have given us 18 wins. I don't think 23-24 wins this year is out of the question. Get on that free throw line in practice, especially when the legs are tired!
I know what you're saying, but only 20 teams in all of D1 shot 75% from the line. Also can't assume that all of those games would have played out exactly the same way had we made a couple more free throws. In general, though, I agree with your points that we weren't that far off from a few more wins last year and we need to be a better free throw shooting team.

I would also add that you can do this sort of thing every year. It's a bit of a misnomer that good teams win close games - More often, good teams win games big, that way a couple bad breaks (some careless turnovers, free throws missed, etc.) don't swing the outcome of the game.

Billyboy78 · Unread post by **Billyboy78** » 10 years ago

Good points, but I didn't even have to look at numbers to know that free throws cost us a few games last year. Missed front ends of one and ones, missed free throws in critical situations. Many of us commented here after games about how free throws were a big reason we lost. Guys like Hare and Iffy will never be good free throw shooters. But they have to go from being terrible to being at least OK. And all the rest of the guys have to get better. Without looking at numbers, I'd bet that EC was the only one who shot them at a good percentage. There were many reasons that we lost 18 games last year, but free throws were one of the big ones.

rambone 78 · Unread post by **rambone 78** » 10 years ago

This team should be at least a solid NIT club by the end of the season, and if things break right, could make the NCAA tournament.

That's my take on the subject. If we end up winning less than 20 games, it will be a disappointment imo. Stay healthy and eligible, and we should get there.

Ram1019 · Unread post by **Ram1019** » 10 years ago

http://www.coxhub.com/articles/moment-o ... ce=twitter

RF1 · Unread post by **RF1** » 10 years ago

Friar fans will not like that article. How long will it take before one of them posts here to dispute it?

Billyboy78 · Unread post by **Billyboy78** » 10 years ago

Can't wait to see reaction from PC fans to that article. It all sounds good, but until we beat them, it means nothing.

BFC · Unread post by **BFC** » 10 years ago

Oooooh, the top spot in Rhode Island basketball for a year. Now there's a lofty goal.

SmartyBarrett · Unread post by **SmartyBarrett** » 10 years ago

I believe the author of this piece is "The Warrior Friar", so hopefully PC fans will flip out on their board and not here.

Stop! Rammer Time · Unread post by **Stop! Rammer Time** » 10 years ago

He mentions "URI won’t go quietly into the night on December 6". Does this mean that the URI-PC game is on December 6th this year? A Saturday instead of a Thursday?

Ram1019 · Unread post by **Ram1019** » 10 years ago

I think it's December 10th. (per Jon Rothstein of CBS Sports)

bigappleram · Unread post by **bigappleram** » 10 years ago

Hilarious that one NCAA berth and all of a sudden PC are this insurmountable foe we are finally able to take down. Hubris and ignorance, a lethal cocktail.

Unread post by **ATPTourFan** » 10 years ago

The story's PC-URI date is incorrect and there are plenty of other errors in this piece that should have been caught before it went public.

I just laugh at these kind of articles. Just baiting a reaction. Honestly, URI has nothing to say to PC right now -- they need to earn it on the floor both head to head and with NCAA berths.

PC has the head to head winning streak.
PC has been in the Dance twice since we have
PC owns the majority mindshare in RI

URI has lots of work to do. It starts this year but I don't want to hear any smack until we earn something.

rodfromcranston · Unread post by **rodfromcranston** » 10 years ago

Exactly! We haven't had a winning season in years, let alone a tournament.
Let's worry about our own program's development.
There are miles to go, before we can start any chest pounding.
The article seems to have been ignored, so far, on Scout.
It makes some points, but it's a long way until December.

ace · Unread post by **ace** » 10 years ago

I don't care enough about Providence to only view URI in relationship to them. But, every positive he mentioned about Rhody was spot on, and I can't wait to watch this backcourt develop.

CT Rhody · Unread post by **CT Rhody** » 10 years ago

I agree, beating PC is nothing compared to the goals that we have for this team. It's like step one, coming out top 4 in conference will be much more difficult then beating PC on the road.

Billyboy78 · Unread post by **Billyboy78** » 10 years ago

Beating PC will always be goal #1 for me. Of course there are much higher goals. That's just a personal one for me.

Ram1019 · Unread post by **Ram1019** » 10 years ago

CT Rhody wrote:I agree, beating PC is nothing compared to the goals that we have for this team. It's like step one, coming out top 4 in conference will be much more difficult then beating PC on the road.

I agree. I wouldn't say this game is my top priority. Sure I'd like to win it. I'd like us to win every game. But I'd be much happier to see our team top 4 in this very underrated conference. I do like how the author is trying to revitalize this rivalry. There is nothing wrong with getting people excited as it is good for basketball in this state as a whole.

seanmc94 · Unread post by **seanmc94** » 10 years ago

A PC vs URI rivalry with real stakes is a good thing. Looking forward to the day when this game is a signature win for an NCAA bound team; ala the 90s

rambone 78 · Unread post by **rambone 78** » 10 years ago

That day is almost upon us, if not this year then next. URI is a big man and maybe a wing away from a deep run NCAA team.

rhodylaw · Unread post by **rhodylaw** » 10 years ago

I think we have the pieces now. By the end of last year we were very competitive in every game but with Biggie hurt and Powell out we did not have the players to rotate through the guard spots. X leaving will hurt some but I think his D will be replaced immediately by Terrell. TJ will be better playing closer to 20 mins a game than 25 to 30. We had no PG for most of the year last season. I know things change quickly but this should be a very successful season

bigappleram · Unread post by **bigappleram** » 10 years ago

I don't think we are this player or that player away from a tourney team, I think we are X months/year away from that and the only reason is youth and inexperience. An experienced group of EC, Hassy, JT and Garrett plus the other parts is an NCAA team IMO. They just need to mature and gel, who knows how quickly that happens.

Billyboy78 · Unread post by **Billyboy78** » 10 years ago

Tom Penders @TomPenders · 14h
I've been to some #RhodeIsland summer practices . Danny @dhurley15 can really teach and coach . The M&M boys, Matthews and Martin can play!

ace · Unread post by **ace** » 10 years ago

Good thing Chris Martin's a really great guy because he could probably kill you with his bare hands.

Billyboy78 · Unread post by **Billyboy78** » 10 years ago

Where's Gil?

bigappleram · Unread post by **bigappleram** » 10 years ago

The M&M boys are gonna lead us to the promised land...and play their way into the NBA in the process. Both have NBA bodies, once their skill sets catch up sky is the limit. EC certainly further along but Hassan may have a higher ceiling. Exciting times ahead for Rhody hoops!!!!

rhodylaw · Unread post by **rhodylaw** » 10 years ago

I am less hopeful of Hassan's NBA potential. Should be an awesome college player though.

Micheal_Phelps_22 · Unread post by **Micheal_Phelps_22** » 10 years ago

rhodylaw wrote:I am less hopeful of Hassan's NBA potential. Should be an awesome college player though.

If he can develop a consistent outside shot then I think he has even more potential then EC. He has elite level athleticism and defensive instincts, especially when it comes to shot blocking. If his offensive game catches up at all, lookout.

I can see both if them being potential 1st round picks though. EC just needs to keep working on his right hand. Good defenders are going to start to force him right and I thought he had a little trouble with that towards the end of last season.

Keaney.Blue · Unread post by **Keaney.Blue** » 10 years ago

Let's cool the 1st round NBA talk for now and just hope for productive sophmore season from both of them. They have a long way to go until they're popping up on draft boards, including propelling their college team to the postseason.

rodfromcranston · Unread post by **rodfromcranston** » 10 years ago

Agree with KB.
Both kids have to develop their games to even think about
the NBA.
Let's worry about how they do on the court and how much they improve year to year.
We're lucky to have them both, but let's not put the cart before the horse.