Minnesota, Fri. Nov. 18, 9pm, BTN/570AM

For me, the thing to watch is our defense. I want to see a win - but I think a good gauge of this team's development will be playing better D. Moving their feet, not leaving their feet on ball fakes, preventing easy baskets in the lane etc.

Im not worried about the blocks or the help defense. That's there already.
But look to see our guys staying disciplined and locking down their man.
 
For me, the thing to watch is our defense. I want to see a win - but I think a good gauge of this team's development will be playing better D. Moving their feet, not leaving their feet on ball fakes, preventing easy baskets in the lane etc.

Im not worried about the blocks or the help defense. That's there already.
But look to see our guys staying disciplined and locking down their man.
Click to expand...

See I have a different take on our defense. I don't mind the gambling because we have 2 quick guards another in Ellison with good length and 3 legit shot blockers. I think the gambling will help get us some easy baskets which since we don't have a low post scorer we will sorely need.

Everyone seems content with the offense and having 2 exciting guards does help but I predict once we play better teams we will struggle to score.As great as they seem, way too much pressure to carry the offense is going to fall on two guys who have played 2 college games.
 
For me, the thing to watch is our defense. I want to see a win - but I think a good gauge of this team's development will be playing better D. Moving their feet, not leaving their feet on ball fakes, preventing easy baskets in the lane etc.

Im not worried about the blocks or the help defense. That's there already.
But look to see our guys staying disciplined and locking down their man.
Click to expand...

See I have a different take on our defense. I don't mind the gambling because we have 2 quick guards another in Ellison with good length and 3 legit shot blockers. I think the gambling will help get us some easy baskets which since we don't have a low post scorer we will sorely need.

Everyone seems content with the offense and having 2 exciting guards does help but I predict once we play better teams we will struggle to score.As great as they seem, way too much pressure to carry the offense is going to fall on two guys who have played 2 college games.
Click to expand...

Obviously you can't expect Ponds & LoVett to continue to generate 60% of the offense, which they did most of the last game if I recall correctly. Ahmed was brought here to score & they will get him going. I did expect Yakwe to be more active offensively, but it is a small sample, as Logen noted on another thread. Perhaps a fair phase one evaluation is after the Bahamas tourney.

Desco's point above on defense makes sense to me as well.
 
For me, the thing to watch is our defense. I want to see a win - but I think a good gauge of this team's development will be playing better D. Moving their feet, not leaving their feet on ball fakes, preventing easy baskets in the lane etc.

Im not worried about the blocks or the help defense. That's there already.
But look to see our guys staying disciplined and locking down their man.
Click to expand...

See I have a different take on our defense. I don't mind the gambling because we have 2 quick guards another in Ellison with good length and 3 legit shot blockers. I think the gambling will help get us some easy baskets which since we don't have a low post scorer we will sorely need.

Everyone seems content with the offense and having 2 exciting guards does help but I predict once we play better teams we will struggle to score.As great as they seem, way too much pressure to carry the offense is going to fall on two guys who have played 2 college games.
Click to expand...

Obviously you can't expect Ponds & LoVett to continue to generate 60% of the offense, which they did most of the last game if I recall correctly. Ahmed was brought here to score & they will get him going. I did expect Yakwe to be more active offensively, but it is a small sample, as Logen noted on another thread. Perhaps a fair phase one evaluation is after the Bahamas tourney.

Desco's point above on defense makes sense to me as well.
Click to expand...

I get that this year is all about development of the younger guys, but honestly I think we might be a little better than I thought and have outside shot at an NIT. I know it is spilt milk but again Jones would have certainly made us better this year. I think people are crazy saying he wouldn't have played.
Question if you need a basket down low would you rather have the ball in Jones hands or any of the bigs on the current roster?
 
I'm expecting us to be around 5 point underdogs. Also expecting to drop the points and take us at a healthy 2-1 moneyline!! Wouldn't be surprised if we are getting even more points than 5 but we'll see.
 
Agree about gambling to some extent on defense and creating turnovers. Minnesota turns the ball over quite a bit too. I think they turned it over 16 times last game.

That being said, defense is still a big weakness in terms of not recovering from double-teams and not moving well with ball reversal. The deficiency was exclusive from the gambling by our guards for the most part.

We can gamble but need to get rid of many of those easy shots and baskets. We can gamble like we did on those teams who D-lo and Pointer, but we still have to be able to move our feet and cover the ball.
 
I may be missing something from the first 2 games but I didn't think the D was that bad. IMO the most important thing when it comes to defense is effort. It's evident this squad gives plenty of effort, in part because there is a nice amount of depth and you'll be replaced if the effort isn't there. I'm not a tactician (obvious) and I'm sure this team has plenty of room for improvement on both ends, but I like what I see.
 
For me, the thing to watch is our defense. I want to see a win - but I think a good gauge of this team's development will be playing better D. Moving their feet, not leaving their feet on ball fakes, preventing easy baskets in the lane etc.

Im not worried about the blocks or the help defense. That's there already.
But look to see our guys staying disciplined and locking down their man.
Click to expand...

See I have a different take on our defense. I don't mind the gambling because we have 2 quick guards another in Ellison with good length and 3 legit shot blockers. I think the gambling will help get us some easy baskets which since we don't have a low post scorer we will sorely need.

Everyone seems content with the offense and having 2 exciting guards does help but I predict once we play better teams we will struggle to score.As great as they seem, way too much pressure to carry the offense is going to fall on two guys who have played 2 college games.
Click to expand...

Obviously you can't expect Ponds & LoVett to continue to generate 60% of the offense, which they did most of the last game if I recall correctly. Ahmed was brought here to score & they will get him going. I did expect Yakwe to be more active offensively, but it is a small sample, as Logen noted on another thread. Perhaps a fair phase one evaluation is after the Bahamas tourney.

Desco's point above on defense makes sense to me as well.
Click to expand...

I get that this year is all about development of the younger guys, but honestly I think we might be a little better than I thought and have outside shot at an NIT. I know it is spilt milk but again Jones would have certainly made us better this year. I think people are crazy saying he wouldn't have played.
Question if you need a basket down low would you rather have the ball in Jones hands or any of the bigs on the current roster?
Click to expand...

 
Defensively I think we'll have to get comfortable with a balance. Our guards have probably been gambling too much, in part because it's early and in part because of the competition, and I agree with the analysis to reel that in because better competition is going to make us pay more for the misses than we have to date.

But squaring the shoulders and playing underneath 40 minutes a game isn't going to play to our guards' strengths either - this is not a roster full of Josh Harts. We have small quick guards with a nose for the ball, and shot blockers as a safety net to assist the recovery. We also want to speed the game up to increase possessions to play to our depth and transition game.

Can't rely exclusively on this either, has to be a bit more strategic than it's been, but I think issue has been more with not striking the right balance yet than fundamental approach on that side of the ball.
 
Winning on the road OOC would set a nice tone for sure. I keep thinking back to that early season matchup with Wisconsin. That was a really good Wisc team but we lost that game because of a lack of teamwork/chemistry and it set the tone for the whole season.
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Spot on Paul. That game was emblematic of so many things, but perhaps none more than that seeming more like an early season experience/experiment as opposed to a team looking prepared and ready to win a game in November the same way it would in February. Strikes me that different approach now in place, try to get a win first and worry about secondary (and valid) analysis like what a good early-season test a particular game was later.
 
some highlights of Min vs Mt St Marys. I noticed they were hitting on that weak spot in our defense that Binghamtom was taking

 
Jon Rothstein-
Friday's game between Minnesota and St. John's has a big game feel. Two undefeated teams trying to regain respectability. Here. We. Go.
 
This should be a good early test to see where we are at. Young team on the road against a big conference opponent that is trying to do pretty much the same thing we are. I always worry about us defensively covering the three point shots. They do not appear to be a big three point shooting team so maybe that is good news. We did a lot of running out at shooters against Bingo on Monday. That is not good enough against good shooting teams. I think our guards are going to be special and this type of game will start to give them the experience they will need.

Finally, isn't it nice to see people posting a day before the game. Feels like a big game. Nice to see some enthusiasm surrounding our basketball program. Win or lose I am starting to feel a building optimism. Be great to get a win here.
 
Saw someone on line note we are 6 point dogs. Let's see what local sources indicate.
 
Saw someone on line note we are 6 point dogs. Let's see what local sources indicate.
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Opened at 5. Has moved to 7. Take the points. And the money line :)
 
This is a near impossible game to create a spread for. SJU and Minny were both terrible last year and much changed this year. That spread I suspect is mainly their undefeated status, being at home, and an extra win under their belt... That's about it.

We need to defend and play offense like we know how. I wouldn't mind somebody developing that d-lo type intensity and leadrship? I suspect Lovett is that guy in a more understated way...
 
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