(EXHIBITION) Michigan (MSG), Sat., Oct. 25, 7p, Big Ten+

I liked the way darling battled. Seems like a good kid

I just echo the sentiment some others have mentioned, perfect energy guy off the bench, but the minutes he was asked to play tonight? It’s far too much. Will be interesting to see how the backcourt minutes get handled this season, it’s the big question mark we have. Because the front court is locked and loaded with Zuby, Hopkins, Mitchell and Prey.
 
kranmars said:
Maybe Pitino wanted to practice the press in a game situation, and used tonight to do it.
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Perhaps but when you encourage a large crowd to attend a game as coach did, and you witness your team getting shellacked time and time again you should call it off as that clearly contributed to the loss. Again, did Rick play to play or play to win?

I think there may have been mixed messages given ?
 
Jack Williams said:
I liked the way darling battled. Seems like a good kid

I just echo the sentiment some others have mentioned, perfect energy guy off the bench, but the minutes he was asked to play tonight? It’s far too much. Will be interesting to see how the backcourt minutes get handled this season, it’s the big question mark we have. Because the front court is locked and loaded with Zuby, Hopkins, Mitchell and Prey.
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If you lead with seems like a good kid 😂

We were + 3 in the far too many minutes. Maybe he should have played more
 
Silly Donovan said:
Perhaps but when you encourage a large crowd to attend a game as coach did, and you witness your team getting shellacked time and time again you should call it off as that clearly contributed to the loss. Again, did Rick play to play or play to win?

I think there may have been mixed messages given ?
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Well, you obviously watched the game. They were beaten easily at least three times for open layups or dunks. That, basically, was the game.
How do none of the 6 coaches not notice a guy 7'3 wide open down court?😜
 
Just checked the archives and years ago the marathon oil preseason game thread hit 1 page of posts

Eric dropped the ball not predicting how many pages this thread would go to 😀
 
How did Rick let Lendeborg go? It’s criminal. I think he was just too excited to clear house when he got here. Kid is a monster. Imagine he and Zuby together? Unstoppable.

This year our frontcourt will lead and our backcourt will have to catch up.
 
Larry Wright said:
Not watching the game but I do find it funny that people killing our biggest recruit in an exhibition game, even asking “why is he in there?”
So criticizing coach is terrible killing 20 year old kids is ok?
Now will probably get banned for this but not sure Pitino mind games is 100% successful.
Not all kids respond the same way.
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Because Stevie Wonder can see he’s played horrible in both games and there are a lot of rumblings from folks that it’s been this way for weeks.

He was anointed the PG and funny how that was squashed early.
 
Amaseinyourface said:
If you lead with seems like a good kid 😂

We were + 3 in the far too many minutes. Maybe he should have played more
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that’s great he was a +3. I don’t think it really has anything to do with what I’m trying to say.

He’s a tough player. And a Pitino type player which will earn him a lot of minutes. I liked his game tonight. I’m happy he’s on the team.

But I think it’s fair to say that if (and I understand it might be a big if, as there was foul trouble tonight) darling has to be a 30+ mpg guy for this team, all due respect to him, it means something went wrong with this group of guards we assembled, and perhaps we assembled the roster a little more clumsily than I originally thought
 
Michigan is an extremely unique team and we may not see a 3 big lineup like that again all season, and certainly not any that are close to that good. Yaxel is a legit All American that dominated the game at times.

Darling was good, not great. He looked much more comfortable today and found the right balance of trying to playmake and when to try to score himself. Seems that him knowing his role on this roster is going to be an issue. Defensively I thought he was ok though I think this was a good matchup for him on that end. Cadeau is shifty which caused Darling some problems but he's not much bigger and isn't much of a shooter so Darling had another step or two of space to try and stay in front. I don't know how he'll fare against bigger guards that can drive and shoot like the Alabama guys. Maybe he'll surprise.

Lefty is going to get minutes. He was part of our best lineup in the 1st half and obviously got us back in the game in OT. He battles on D and got 6 rebounds which is especially notable considering Rick said our biggest weakness is lack of rebounding from our guards in the post game presser.

Rick gave both Odih and Pohto mins in the first half. Odih will be a good player in time but we can table the "he's going to be hard to keep out of the rotation" takes at least for now. Pohto isn't terrible but he's clearly the worst player on the floor in games like this.

2 weeks to fix what needs to be fixed before the Bama game, a team that is going to run everything through their elite guards and will crash the offensive glass like Michigan.
 
What a great game! Pitino has done amazing job with upgrading the program. Gone are the days where the preseason had games against the likes of Manhatten/Fordham/Sacred Heart and a DII program. Thank you CRP.
 
I can't even remember the name of the kid who came in at the same time as Darling to be worked out by Pitino, but we probably should have signed him too. I can't remember the last time a team so highly ranked in the preseason had such a lack of depth at PG.

Praying it doesn't bite us in the ass over and over. It's going to be hard not noticing Acaden Lewis' stats if we do get bit. Or Malachi Smith's. Or . . .
 
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