Wisconsin game

Tonight you saw the difference between a well coached, well oiled machine and the champions of youtube. Highlight reel dunks don't win games. Tougher to get open looks and make 3's in a real game than in an empty gym. There is serious athleticism and limited basketball smarts and finesse. A lot of complaining though. First remedy is keep Branch off the floor. He has shown me zero from day one. Need to run more (got to rebound or turn teams over first). We need Sanchez on the floor leading the break or getting more touches. He runs and sees the floor well. We need to rebound better. Do we have a strength coach? Need to win more loose ball battles. Need more toughness, mentally and otherwise. Hate to say it, but this team needs someone like Grady Reynolds. On the floor that is, not in the dorms.
 
It was a tough spot away from home to start, but a dismal first half and yet again we can't defend the 3 ball. Hopefully we learn from it and move on.
 
Wisconsin is good. We're not there yet. I'm not surprised that in the first game of the year we jumped at every fake, lost people at the 3pt line, and that Sanchez and Jordan struggled at different times. I'm certainly not surprised that Bo Ryan, as good as they get, dissected us early and often. But we battled back, flashed some talent, and were done in by 3s and sloppy D. For some of us older guys, I was thinking about 98 and how we played Stanford and Purdue close and lost but how we showed promise. I'm sure if we had played IU that first game that year they would have worked us the same as tonight...
 
We will be fine tho this is just the 1 st game of the season. I still think we finish 2 nd in the big east as long as we play man to man. Offense won't be a problem fellas the problem is if we can guard the 3 point shot and the answer is yes we can as long as we play man to man. Sheed is going to get better every game that kid is a big time player he is fearless come march he is going to be scary. It was the slow start that killed us but if we play the way we played in the 2nd half all year we will be awesome.
 
Wisconsin hustled the whole game. Our guys looked sloppy and lazy the entire first half except for a spurt near the end. Second half was better but Obekpa looked like he was pouting the whole game both on the floor and on the bench. I'm mystified at how our guys play defense. I'm not sure that Wisc is as good as we made them look. They hit wide open 3s which they deserve credit for. They hustled and went after the loose balls like they meant it. They definitely deserved to win. A KISS approach to this game may have had a different outcome. I think just driving it to the hole every trip drawing the fouls and getting their guys in trouble would have been a decent strategy. To the extent that we did it, it got us to within 4 points in the second.
 
Very little good to take out of this game; no sense of team on either end of the court. We have all the athleticism in the world; we don't have much in the way of basketball players. Still insist on playing D with our hands and lose balnace at the simplest of fakes. Still have NO shooters to space the floor.
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Find me a team with less collective basketball IQ. You'd be hard pressed.
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BINGO!!
We lost to a less talented but better coached and more cohesive team
Ryan gets much more out of his talent that Lavin does
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I've been saying that for 2 seasons, Moose.

@Mark: Ryan generally has smarter players. But Wisconsin will throw up a few stinkers each season. They usually throw up a stinket in the NCAA Tournament.

By the way, I said before the game that we should press Wisconsin throughout most of the game. We waited too late to do such. A coaching faux pas.

Nevertheless, I think this team will be a good bunch, this year. I saw some good things. Jordan needs more time. Did anyone see his step-through on the blocks (although, he missed the shot)? He could teach our bigs that move.
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They may have thrown up a few stinkers in the NCAA Tournament but they have been there 15 straight years
How many teams can say that?
 
This speaks volumes:

@jeffborzello: Wisconsin drops 86 on St. John's. Only teams they scored 85-plus on last season were SE Louisiana, Presbyterian, Samford, Nebraska-Omaha.
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New rules and fouling part of that... scoring will be up this season. I will bet anyone that they will score more than 85 points against four teams this season. Takers?

btw, i'm not saying that our D wasn't bad, i'm just saying that Borzello is citing a not great comparative statistic... if Borzello had said SJU let up more wide-open than any Wisconsin opponents last year, then i would have applauded in spades.
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Scoring will be up but Wisconsin is not a high scoring team in the least.

The fouls had nothing to do with Wisc nailing wide open 3s.
 
Tonight you saw the difference between a well coached, well oiled machine and the champions of youtube. Highlight reel dunks don't win games.
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true but Sampson's reverse dunk was sick. He needs to stick with that and forget about the 3pt shooting.
 
Like I said earlier, anyone thinking we were a good defensive team last year and the replay of that defense tonight might want to reconsider that evaluation.And, yes, Virginia, Wisconsin is a lot better team than San Francisco was last year..both shot our lights out from 3.

Did I hear the announcers say that Wisconsin will be the youngest team in the BIG 10?
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You're like 'Eeyore' and have a 'Crab mentality.' Why would anyone listen to you?
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There you go again.. Man up, say we played terrible and let's move on...
 
Deja vu all over again!
The offense is still D'lo.  The defense still cannot guard the trey.  The chemistry is still bad.  The substitutions still helter-skelter.  Lavin out coached by a rival.

Some observations:
Had Primo not committed some foolish fouls this would have been much closer as he took himself out of the game early.
Our assistant coaches seem powerless to advise Lavin on the sidelines.  When your team is behind double digits one would think your athletes would be told to press. The only press came with under two minutes to play. 
Branch has no business starting as I cannot see his value on defense where Pointer is much stronger.  The Badgers all seem to be able to hit the 3 while our great white hope was used like a checker piece in a chess game.  Hooper being put in the game to hit a 3 with under 2 minutes is a sad statement by Lavin who clearly has no game plan for the kid.  He also got Gift amnesia in the second half. The freshman Jordan will only get better and showed both his youth and talent. 
Kudos to the Wisconsin kids who clearly practiced their free throws and played smart BB.
In the end it was a bunch of old fashioned basketball players outplaying a bunch of under coached athletes.
Lavin and the coaches have a lot of work to do.  
 
Very little good to take out of this game; no sense of team on either end of the court. We have all the athleticism in the world; we don't have much in the way of basketball players. Still insist on playing D with our hands and lose balnace at the simplest of fakes. Still have NO shooters to space the floor.
Click to expand...

Find me a team with less collective basketball IQ. You'd be hard pressed.
Click to expand...

BINGO!!
We lost to a less talented but better coached and more cohesive team
Ryan gets much more out of his talent that Lavin does
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Less talented?
I don't know that we'll see a team this good all season.
They can shoot, rebound and defend.
I was very impressed with Wisconsin.
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Tom, I was also impressed with Wisconsin and agree that they are as good a TEAM as we will see all season
But, comparing player for player, I think we have more talent than they do
The difference is that they play as a cohesive team in a system that plays to their strengths
That's why they have been in the NCAA Tournament for 15 straight years and we haven't
 
For the record, how many of you guys were certain Lhota was going to win Tuesday? How about Buono?
 
Like I said earlier, anyone thinking we were a good defensive team last year and the replay of that defense tonight might want to reconsider that evaluation.And, yes, Virginia, Wisconsin is a lot better team than San Francisco was last year..both shot our lights out from 3.

Did I hear the announcers say that Wisconsin will be the youngest team in the BIG 10?
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You're like 'Eeyore' and have a 'Crab mentality.' Why would anyone listen to you?
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There you go again.. Man up, say we played terrible and let's move on...
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Just calling a spade a spade. It's all good.
 
It was a tough spot away from home to start, but a dismal first half and yet again we can't defend the 3 ball. Hopefully we learn from it and move on.
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When are we going to learn? This isn't a young team anymore.

While I'm at it, we missed out on way too many 50-50 balls.

Wagner is starting to look like a tough matchup.
 
It was a tough spot away from home to start, but a dismal first half and yet again we can't defend the 3 ball. Hopefully we learn from it and move on.
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When are we going to learn? This isn't a young team anymore.

While I'm at it, we missed out on way too many 50-50 balls.

Wagner is starting to look like a tough matchup.
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Really? Let me know when one game makes a season.
 
It was a tough spot away from home to start, but a dismal first half and yet again we can't defend the 3 ball. Hopefully we learn from it and move on.
Click to expand...

When are we going to learn? This isn't a young team anymore.

While I'm at it, we missed out on way too many 50-50 balls.

Wagner is starting to look like a tough matchup.
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Really? Let me know when one game makes a season.
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When that one game is a clone of the sixteen losses we had last year.
 
Deja vu all over again!
The offense is still D'lo.  The defense still cannot guard the trey.  The chemistry is still bad.  The substitutions still helter-skelter.  Lavin out coached by a rival.

Some observations:
Had Primo not committed some foolish fouls this would have been much closer as he took himself out of the game early.
Our assistant coaches seem powerless to advise Lavin on the sidelines.  When your team is behind double digits one would think your athletes would be told to press. The only press came with under two minutes to play. 
Branch has no business starting as I cannot see his value on defense where Pointer is much stronger.  The Badgers all seem to be able to hit the 3 while our great white hope was used like a checker piece in a chess game.  Hooper being put in the game to hit a 3 with under 2 minutes is a sad statement by Lavin who clearly has no game plan for the kid.  He also got Gift amnesia in the second half. The freshman Jordan will only get better and showed both his youth and talent. 
Kudos to the Wisconsin kids who clearly practiced their free throws and played smart BB.
In the end it was a bunch of old fashioned basketball players outplaying a bunch of under coached athletes.
Lavin and the coaches have a lot of work to do.  
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Everything is pretty much spot on except the pressing. Wisconsin probably would have ripped it to shreds and got even more wide open 3s. Why can't they just play solid man to man D
 
I wish some of you would stop judging the team after one game.
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There is no poster that I respect more than MJ. That being said, I must respectfully disagree with MJ that the criticism offered in this thread is related merely to one game.

Lavin has not shown over the past 2 season that he can coach and blend talent. Yes, Lavin has recruited talented athletes but he has not blended the talents of his players. I hope this season Lavin proves me wrong but his team's play against Wisco did not show him to be a good coach. IMO the talent of Lavin's individual players exceeds his team's performance.
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p.s. OK, let's hear the chorus of Lavin admirers reply that he is a solid coach.
 
The only thing enjoyable about the game was the crowd at legends. Thanks to nycredmAn for setting it up.

I will reserve judgement for a bit longer but there was a lot wrong tonight. They have a month to fix it.
 
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