Villanova Game Thread

[beast of the east]

Hooper shots didn't go in yesterday but, he wasn't awful.. And, his defense is no worse than others on the team. They all get beat off the dribble, some more than others. DLO for one, Sampson for another. jordan, not so much.

As for Hooper stuck in the corner, here's my take. Lasr year , when Marco played, rare as it was, drifted to the same spot as HOOPER. When Greene was in there, Marco never sniffed the ball, even when open. Yesterday, same thing, Greene never threw Max the ball, ignoring him completely. Greene4 preferring to dribble incessantly for 15 seconds , prior to hoisting his own poorly aimed shot.

While neither Hooper or Marco are 5 star players, they could be effective occasionally, if they got the ball in a position to shoot, which the other guys make sure doesn't happen. Phil could make a move to basket, instead of his habitual side to side and draw Max's defender to him,leaving HOOPER A OPEN LOOK. he will drain them but, not if he gets 3 shots a game while DLO hoists 13 with 9 misses. Or, last week, his 1-12 outing. DLO is not a good % shooter, neither is Greene.

It's on Lavin why the shooters on this team are frozen out of play..

Hooper got a lot of touches in 18 minutes, and 5 shots. He wasn't frozen at all. I saw one obvious time when Branch had blinders on with Hooper wide open in the right corner. To Hoopers credit, he doesn't launch wild shots, but he also cannot seemingly catch and shoot when a defender is closing in on him. He appears comfortable shooting only when pretty wide open. Guys who are deep threats, and we've seen plenty over the years, can cut to a spot on the floor, arrive at that spot as the ball is being passed to them, and with a very small amount of daylight, shoot a 20'6" three point shot with pretty good accuracy. Hooper isn't one of them. He's purely a specialist, a wide open three point shooter, albeit one with good court sense. He MUST make shots to earn his keep on the floor, and anything to the contrary is, as Joe Biden would say, malarkey.

 

[westchesterjoe]

Hooper shots didn't go in yesterday but, he wasn't awful.. And, his defense is no worse than others on the team. They all get beat off the dribble, some more than others. DLO for one, Sampson for another. jordan, not so much.

As for Hooper stuck in the corner, here's my take. Lasr year , when Marco played, rare as it was, drifted to the same spot as HOOPER. When Greene was in there, Marco never sniffed the ball, even when open. Yesterday, same thing, Greene never threw Max the ball, ignoring him completely. Greene4 preferring to dribble incessantly for 15 seconds , prior to hoisting his own poorly aimed shot.

While neither Hooper or Marco are 5 star players, they could be effective occasionally, if they got the ball in a position to shoot, which the other guys make sure doesn't happen. Phil could make a move to basket, instead of his habitual side to side and draw Max's defender to him,leaving HOOPER A OPEN LOOK. he will drain them but, not if he gets 3 shots a game while DLO hoists 13 with 9 misses. Or, last week, his 1-12 outing. DLO is not a good % shooter, neither is Greene.

It's on Lavin why the shooters on this team are frozen out of play..

Hooper got a lot of touches in 18 minutes, and 5 shots. He wasn't frozen at all. I saw one obvious time when Branch had blinders on with Hooper wide open in the right corner. To Hoopers credit, he doesn't launch wild shots, but he also cannot seemingly catch and shoot when a defender is closing in on him. He appears comfortable shooting only when pretty wide open. Guys who are deep threats, and we've seen plenty over the years, can cut to a spot on the floor, arrive at that spot as the ball is being passed to them, and with a very small amount of daylight, shoot a 20'6" three point shot with pretty good accuracy. Hooper isn't one of them. He's purely a specialist, a wide open three point shooter, albeit one with good court sense. He MUST make shots to earn his keep on the floor, and anything to the contrary is, as Joe Biden would say, malarkey.

Beast, I'll defer to you since I know you were at the Game. I only saw the TV coverage, which doesn't show a lot of the off the ball movement. No one is saying Hooper is MULLIN or "Hardy, the best shooter Lavin Coached," but, why is he on the team if he isn't a good enough shooter to play some meaningful minutes in a Specialist role? And, it still doesn't reflect why Greene never passes to a shooter, whenever he dribbles incessantly to no purpose, other than to launch his own usually errant shot?

Does Greene shoot any better than Hooper, with way more attempts?

 

[mjmaherjr]

Honestly this was one of the worst games I have ever seen because of the Ref's. I'm not blaming the game on the ref's who I thought were bad but they called so many fouls there was no flow to the game and it really made it unenjoyable. There were 5 or 6 team fouls called in the first minute and 10 seconds in the 2nd half, Give me a freaking break. Let's play some freaking ball.

And I'm being totally honest when I say that I thought there was better ball movement by the 2 kid teams scrimmaging at halftime than what we resorted to

 

[jumbo_peanuts]

We were playing 4 v 5 when Hooper was in the game on offense because the other 4 players looked past him. They were not playing as a team when he was in the game. I am not sure why it took Lavin the whole first half to realize this and reduce his minutes in the 2nd half.

When he first came in he had one play where he got the ball and was semi open but made the extra pass to find a wide open Harrison next to him which was refreshing to see. I thought Hooper played a solid game. Didn't kill us on defense. Missed 2 open shots but he will make more of those than he will miss.

Hooper played a solid game?
He is a one trick pony and shot 1 for 5 from 3 point range for a total of 3 points in 18 minutes played
He's too slow to defend against a guard and too small and not strong enough to guard a forward
He's the college basketball equivalent of the wildcat in football - good to use once in awhile but a steady diet is not a good idea
He should not be playing 18 minutes unless he's really on fire from the field (and he wasn't today)

People complain when he doesn't play and they complain when he does play. He didn't force his shots and didn't kill us on defense. Missed shots that he usually makes but that happens. I honestly didn't think he played a bad game. Fact of the matter is when he was in we played better than when he was not in. They had a guy in his jockstrap all day and that helped our other guys get decent looks.

If Hooper isn't helping us, he's hurting us. Trust me, they weren't overplaying him, just keeping an eye on him. Unless he has enough time to square and release, he can't get his shot off. That's why defenders didn't jump out at him until the ball was swinging his way. Max saw the defender coming before he caught the ball and got rid of it. Compare that to Ryan Arcidiacono and you will see what a big time college shooter should do.

Unless you are Hooper's dad, I'm surprised at your post. You couldn't be Hooper's mom, because I'm sure she'd mad that he left Harvard to come here.

He was +8 in the first half and wasn't in the game when nova took control in the 2nd half. I could be way off and I didn't look at the box score before I posted my original post but my feel from watching was that when Hooper was in he played solidly. Might just be because Dom kept making crucial mistakes when he replaced Hooper.

I've said this before. I don't dislike Max, who has far more basketball skills and court vision than he is given credit for. But still and all, since he doesn't rebound, doesn't drive, and appears to be more of a spare part than an integral piece of the offense, unless he is drilling baskets, he can't be on the court.

The quickest way to ruin a shooter is to make his minutes contingent on making shots. If Max misses three shots in a row, there is still a 40+% chance he drills the next. I'm glad the kid got a chance to get some meaningful minutes today. He has a lot of adjustments left to make to his game to improve, but every game like this will only get him to where he needs to be and where we need him to be.

At every college at every level in America, guys are on the court because they are performing. Beneath them on the depth chart are guys who in limited minutes have to come in and perform well. At the bottom, are guys who haven't performed well on the court when given the chance. It's survival of the fittest. From what I've seen, he isn't the type of shooter who makes shots under pressure in game situations. It limits him, and is part of the reason, I believe, that he doesn't merit major minutes. Wide open, I expect him to make 60% of those shots in big game situations. Re-read that - WIDE OPEN. You can't expect to be a great outside shooter if all you can shoot is wide open. However to be a great college shooter from 20'6", you have to make more of them wide open than you miss. In every other facet of Hooper's game, there are more talented guys on this team.

You expect someone to make 60% of their 3 pointers? It appears that no matter what happens, you are going to be disappointed because your expectations are unrealistic. What is your definition of wide open? Even in an empty gym with no one else there, 60% would be quite the accomplishment.