St. Thomas Aquinas

Was at the game tonite and I have to say that in my 45 years of watching SJU basketball that was the worse display of basketball I have ever witnessed. Do we have talent, the answer is yes! But we looked totally out of sync! Frankly the only positive was the play of Christian Jones. This kid needs to get a lot of minutes this year. I was hoping for a more cohesive offense but most of the time we were chucking the rock from outside! We rebounded terribly even though we had the height advantage. Every time we drove to the basket we had the ball stuffed down our throats! I don't know we played that poorly, or St Thomas overachieved! Probably a little bit of both! My observation regarding CM was that he appeared to be having an outer body experience with little motivation or interaction with the players! St. Jean was the guy doing most of the coaching. I would have liked to see him roaming the side lines a bit more. It appeared like he was glued to his seat! Who knows maybe that is his persona.
My concern is where is our offense going to come from? If we don't get Lovett I think we are in for a very long season. Mussini ran out of steam midway thru the second half!
But than again we all know that Mullin was left with nothing and he did the best he could do in the time allotted. This will take 3 years before we become a perennial NCAA team again. I have faith in CM!
 
A lot might change if Lovett could play. STAC came out in a press that I am sure we will see with regularity. Lovett would have been very helpful in breaking it. Mussini could then be an off guard. Really disappointed in Mvouika and Williams. #21 took Williams to school and this was an incredible mismatch.
 
@rumbleSBN: Mullin: "It's embarrassing but there's no pointing fingers. I take the responsibility. I thought they were more prepared than they were."
 
Marillac had previously described Williams as a beast. The Williams I saw tonight couldn't pass for a beast at a Halloween party dressed in a King Kong costume.
 
Marillac had previously described Williams as a beast. The Williams I saw tonight couldn't pass for a beast at a Halloween party dressed in a King Kong costume.
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There was a reason Iowa State didn't fight to keep him.
 
Marillac had previously described Williams as a beast. The Williams I saw tonight couldn't pass for a beast at a Halloween party dressed in a King Kong costume.
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Marillac (where are you?) has a tendency to just slightly overhype our recruits and our players. Ever so slightly.
 
Wow, we stink. That is my only takeaway.

Honestly though, I'm ok with that. It's going to take Mullin and co. time to turn this around. And it will be fun to see if he can mold this into a cohesive and competitive unit this season.

But let's make no mistake about it ... We're going to be in the cellar.
 
Also ... I like how CM is already taking responsibility. Nothing embarrassed Lavin. Those words would never have come out of his mouth.
 
I knew we were going to be bad with 9 new guys, but damn not this bad.
They are a freaking turnover machine, and you can't play any defense???

I predicted 10-2 in preseaon, uhhh that's not happened. They definitely aren't beating Vandy either.

Can they match Lavins 2nd year with all those new guys and get 7BE wins and 13 total?

Not taking a shot at Mullin either, they are what they are.
 
Marillac had previously described Williams as a beast. The Williams I saw tonight couldn't pass for a beast at a Halloween party dressed in a King Kong costume.
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lol
 
K
Marillac had previously described Williams as a beast. The Williams I saw tonight couldn't pass for a beast at a Halloween party dressed in a King Kong costume.
Click to expand...

Marillac (where are you?) has a tendency to just slightly overhype our recruits and our players. Ever so slightly.
Click to expand...
Marillac said after the red, white scrimmage he was disappointed w Williams and Jones should start. I never thought I would say this, but I agree. Jones had 13 points, 11 boards. IMO Durand was also disappointing in this game, although he looked great in the scrimmage.
 
I really regret saying anything negative about my favorite SJU player in the 53 years that I've been watching this program. However, tonight's debacle was the single worst display of basketball by any St. John's team ever. It is hard to imagine how St. John's roundball has come to this, but one can only shiver to think that this team still has to face some of the best programs in America. This display tonight was embarrassing on so many levels. You can find blame for it on so many things...not the least is the abject failure of Steve Lavin to recruit any noteworthy players in two years.Yes, Chris entered with little to work with and most of the national talent headed elsewhere. But in all fairness... his coaching tonight...or lack thereof it...was noticeable and disturbing. St. John's looked like a confused team tonight. Chris was definitively uninvolved. He never spoke to a player....never sat one down next to him...he never got up off the bench...he never questioned a call....and he never rallied a soul. It was most puzzling. But even worse, he never recognized the single most significant single factor in this game. It was something I wondered about, and hoped wouldn't be an obstacle to his success as a coach. In this I refer to defensive flexability. Chris learned his defense under Louieball, and then re-enforced it with an NBA career. Or in other words= man to man....absolutelty no zone. It was clear very early in this game that our opponent was quicker and more athletic almost at every position. We had three front court players who were noticeably sluggish compared with STTA, who were smaller, but active and athletic. Both our guards were also slower (that's saying a lot because Mussini is pretty quick). Our opponents went around us and penetrated with ease while our coach watched this go on without adjustment. It was an awesome display of superior shooting and athleticism...very little from real range. At some point early, a zone was mandated here. We needed to push them out of the lanes, where they were having a field day driving to the basket. Yes, I know this is our adored Chris Mullin, but I call it like I see it. Lou Carnesecca never understood against Georgetown that you cannot play man to man against a much quicker and athletic team. It cost him a National Championship. One can only hope that Chris will go on to understand that his defensive bag MUST contain more options to address the multitude of circumstances he will face as a Div. I coach. This team has so many liabilities. His big men totally and completely lack finesse...on both sides of the court. Mussini is talented but small and slight. Ellison is relatively slow for a Div. I guard. You cannot overstate how damaging this game is to SJU's reputation and recruiting. I haven't seen Lovett play. Is he part of an answer? I would at least expect that to change the pitiful display of lost inbounds passes...something completely inexcusable for any quality Div. I team. But as things stand at the moment, there is hardly reason for optimism. I can only hope that tonight was a learning process for he team, as well as Coach Mullin.
 
Bobby G and the administration wanted to make a change, only time will tell how good it will be.
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Your guy got fired for multiple reasons, and it happened a while ago, so it may be time to let go.
 
Also ... I like how CM is already taking responsibility. Nothing embarrassed Lavin. Those words would never have come out of his mouth.
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Someone needs to tell CM to play the "youngest team in America" card.
 
Plenty of teams have lost to D2 programs and lived to talk about it. The loss is embarrassing, but what I'm more concerned about is how they come back from it. Bad losses happen, but what's important is it doesn't turn into 2 or 3 bad losses to start the season. The coaches and players were punched in the gut last night. Now it's time for them to make adjustments.

On a side note, this is exactly the reason why I thought it was inappropriate for the school to raise ticket prices this year. It's pretty easy to see this year may be a struggle. I really think they could've held off on it.
 
You cannot overstate how damaging this game is to SJU's reputation and recruiting. .
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HYSTERICAL MUCH? MAYBE GO HAVE A LIE DOWN ON THE DIVAN, FAN YOURSELF UNTIL THE VAPORS SUBSIDE. ALSO, LOSE THE BOLD FACE, IT DOESN'T MAKE YOUR PEDESTRIAN OBSERVATIONS EPIPHANIC, JUST HARD TO READ. TRY TYPING IN ALL CAPS INSTEAD AND MAYBE ADD SOME ITALICS AND UNDERLINE STUFF FOR EMPHASIS. LIKE WHEN YOU'RE RIFFING ALONG THERE ABOUT HOW SAINT JOHN'S WOULD HAVE WON A NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP 50 YEARS AGO IF ONLY LOU'D TAKEN YOUR ADVICE AND PLAYED THE TRIANGLE AND TWO OR PENTAGRAM AND NONE OR WHATEVER AGAINST GEORGETOWN AND YOU STATE BOLDLY ESCHEWING THE SPLIT INFINITIVE THAT LAST NIGHT'S EXHIBITION GAME WAS THE DEFINING LOSS OF THE MULLIN ERA AND THE MOST SIGNIFICANT EVENT IN NEW YORK SPORTS SINCE HARRY FRAZEE SOLD BABE RUTH YOU SLAM THE READER WITH THE BOLD AND [strike]KNOCK THEM OVER[/strike] BLOW THEM AWAY!!!!!!!!
 
The most disturbing element to me is that I didn't see Coach Mullin doing any coaching as the situation went from bad to worse.
 
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