Penn State, Sun. Dec. 18, 11am, FS1/970AM

[monte]

Ponds 3 for 17. We're not going to win many games with him doing that. Fortunately, one thing I am confident of is that being an abberation.

When things went sour he looked disinterested as if he basically gave up. For this game anyway.

Agree, bad body language. He wasn't the only one. Shamorie better get used to staying focused and playing hard even when he's having an off game, especially since there are going to be others now that he's going to be going up against bigger, more athletic and more physical guard types

 

[ErickTheRed]

Bash outta control not impressed w him

 

[lawmanfan]

As I have said from the beginning of the year:

1. No defense - squarely on the staff for not teaching and/or not holding players accountable. Not once have I seen any member of the staff instruct a player or get in anyone's face after a defensive error of which there are dozens every game.

2. Ahmed is a team killer. He has talent but his "every man for himself" approach is poison and ends up infecting Lovett and Ponds. Also squarely on the staff, I posted weeks ago that he needs to be benched every time he fails at team play, which is basically every time he touches the ball.

3. Ponds and Lovett checked out of this game, but there's talent there. Ellison made his usual mistakes with turnovers but other than that played well. If he can limit the turnovers and move his feet on D he can be useful. Owens gives you 100%, gotta like him. Freudenberg a year away but making small progress every game.

4. The staff needs to either add 3 NBA players next year so they can coach NBA basketball and not worry about pesky things like defense, ball movement, structured offense, and discipline, or they need to hire a basketball lifer who was a high level HS coach or college coach to do the things they clearly can't or won't be bothered doing. All you had to do today was watch the two huddles at the timeouts. The Penn State coach, who basically has a good-not-great guard and a decent big man and that's it, grabbed players coming off the floor to teach and correct, and then went straight to the huddle to work with his team. We have the player huddle so they can yell at one another while the staff huddles to figure out what CM should say to the team. That clearly isn't working for us.

I still think we will jump up on a couple of teams when the stars line up right, but the fundamental flaws and the fact that they have gone totally uncorrected for this long is very discouraging.

 

[redmannorth]

Ponds Lovett Clark brown Owens Simon Mussini yakwe we'll be better next year

vThats a nice viewpoint but we added Ponds ,Bash ,Lovett and Owens and last years freshman have more exp. and we look no better than last year, which is hard to do,

And we lost 5th year players Johnson and Mouvika,
4th year players Belamou and Jones. Please do not discount experience.

 

[Ray Morgan]

Ponds Lovett Clark brown Owens Simon Mussini yakwe we'll be better next year

vThats a nice viewpoint but we added Ponds ,Bash ,Lovett and Owens and last years freshman have more exp. and we look no better than last year, which is hard to do,

And we lost 5th year players Johnson and Mouvika,
4th year players Belamou and Jones. Please do not discount experience.

The team we played was very inexperienced. Yet, like bottom feeders Delaware State and LIU, they looked like top 20 squads. This was a well prepared young team against an unprepared one. This is the worst defensive team I have ever seen in college basketball, and maybe even in the history of the sport.

 

[doodyny33]

Expecting any minute for a phone call from St John's soliciting a donation. SMH (happened last two weeks-I spared the caller by not answering).

Considering how frivolous the school is with money, I'll be withholding my donations until this program actually wins an NCAA Tournament game. Based on what I'm currently seeing, my money will be safe for quite awhile.

 

[ras]

Ponds Lovett Clark brown Owens Simon Mussini yakwe we'll be better next year

vThats a nice viewpoint but we added Ponds ,Bash ,Lovett and Owens and last years freshman have more exp. and we look no better than last year, which is hard to do,

And we lost 5th year players Johnson and Mouvika,
4th year players Belamou and Jones. Please do not discount experience.

We could have had 5 th year Sr. Jones on the roster.

 

[JohnnyFan]

Wonder what Mullin doesn't like about Darien Williams. If nothing else, he plays hard. We should reward intensity and attention to detail on defense.

 

[Section3]

What we've just witnessed over the past few minutes may be the single worst stretch of basketball that we have ever witness out of an SJU team. Inexcusable.

Georgetownesque (back in Ewing days) and then some,

 

[mjmaherjr]

Until we learn to play defense and understand how hard you have to work on defense and that good defense creates good offense this will be a common occurrence.

They got frustrated and stopped playing

so did the staff during that 75-2 run

 

[Section3]

One week of rest and a week to prepare, and this? Have to put this on the staff. PSU is very young as well. What's the excuse for today's game?

Yep. 13th youngest team in nation and they b$$^%-slapped us starting 3 freshmen all of whom are built like men

 

[mjmaherjr]

This has now turned in to a West 4th street park game

why bash west 4th st ?

 

[isham]

I encourage every Alum to express their dissatisfaction to our new A D. Mullin needs help and he needs to swallow his pride and start listening to others.Now you know why Slice jumped ship.

 

[mjmaherjr]

I suspect even JC would not attend "Come to Jesus" SJU meeting you know will happen this week.

I'm pretty sure the come to jesus meeting was attending and run by a bunch of atheists ( Austour can confirm this )

 

[dee]

I encourage every Alum to express their dissatisfaction to our new A D. Mullin needs help and he needs to swallow his pride and start listening to others.Now you know why Slice jumped ship.

Slice saw the writing on the wall. Mullin cannot coach

 

[Ray Morgan]

One week of rest and a week to prepare, and this? Have to put this on the staff. PSU is very young as well. What's the excuse for today's game?

Yep. 13th youngest team in nation and they b$$^%-slapped us starting 3 freshmen all of whom are built like men

Having no size out there certainly a problem. Now that we have shooters, time to recruit some real men for this team. Real nasty men that will stare down a teammate for lack of intensity, even if the coaches won't. Interesting watching Freud and Owens fight over a rebound, and losing it because neither was strong enough to keep it from the other. Easy basket, PSU. Grab the ball like you mean business. This is a man's game.

 

[Section3]

Ponds Lovett Clark brown Owens Simon Mussini yakwe we'll be better next year

vThats a nice viewpoint but we added Ponds ,Bash ,Lovett and Owens and last years freshman have more exp. and we look no better than last year, which is hard to do,

And we lost 5th year players Johnson and Mouvika,
4th year players Belamou and Jones. Please do not discount experience.

I always appreciate your posts but there is no justification for this performance, They have as little experience as we do and thoroughly embarassed us.

 

[Section3]

What really made this especially tough game to attend was doing so with my daughter, a recent Penn State grad. I expected to console her (LOL). On top of that, for some inexplicable reason, I didn't realize that the game was included in the season ticket package - and bought 2 tickets on StubHub. Ugh!!!

That said, all of MSG knew there should be a time out some time during that run. Just don't understand it.

The lack of defense or even the attempt to play it - is unfathomable.

I'll keep going, but hard pressed to see where the wins are going to come from. Not sure that next year will be much better. Simon and Clark may be upgrades -- but they still transferred because they didn't expect to get sufficient PT.

 

[mjmaherjr]

What really made this especially tough game to attend was doing so with my daughter, a recent Penn State grad. I expected to console her (LOL). On top of that, for some inexplicable reason, I didn't realize that the game was included in the season ticket package - and bought 2 tickets on StubHub. Ugh!!!

That said, all of MSG knew there should be a time out some time during that run. Just don't understand it.

The lack of defense or even the attempt to play it - is unfathomable.

I'll keep going, but hard pressed to see where the wins are going to come from. Not sure that next year will be much better. Simon and Clark may be upgrades -- but they still transferred because they didn't expect to get sufficient PT.

Literally all of us in 114 were yelling for a timeout to stop the bleeding or at least slow it down. jesus WTF

Also not that it would matter but when you have pretty much your best big man performance last game of the season how do you only give him 4 minutes this game ? I mean he can't at least get 10-15 ? It's not like we are starting Karl Malone out there

 

[paultzman]

As I have said from the beginning of the year:

1. No defense - squarely on the staff for not teaching and/or not holding players accountable. Not once have I seen any member of the staff instruct a player or get in anyone's face after a defensive error of which there are dozens every game.

2. Ahmed is a team killer. He has talent but his "every man for himself" approach is poison and ends up infecting Lovett and Ponds. Also squarely on the staff, I posted weeks ago that he needs to be benched every time he fails at team play, which is basically every time he touches the ball.

3. Ponds and Lovett checked out of this game, but there's talent there. Ellison made his usual mistakes with turnovers but other than that played well. If he can limit the turnovers and move his feet on D he can be useful. Owens gives you 100%, gotta like him. Freudenberg a year away but making small progress every game.

4. The staff needs to either add 3 NBA players next year so they can coach NBA basketball and not worry about pesky things like defense, ball movement, structured offense, and discipline, or they need to hire a basketball lifer who was a high level HS coach or college coach to do the things they clearly can't or won't be bothered doing. All you had to do today was watch the two huddles at the timeouts. The Penn State coach, who basically has a good-not-great guard and a decent big man and that's it, grabbed players coming off the floor to teach and correct, and then went straight to the huddle to work with his team. We have the player huddle so they can yell at one another while the staff huddles to figure out what CM should say to the team. That clearly isn't working for us.

I still think we will jump up on a couple of teams when the stars line up right, but the fundamental flaws and the fact that they have gone totally uncorrected for this long is very discouraging.

Spot on post LM. This NBA style nonsense CM & staff trying to sell for this team is silly. In the NBA they hold off until the playoffs to play D. Lord knows SJU has no post season. Experiment gone bad I suspect