Having watched every game in person or on TV except for Fordham, a really unusual situation has occurred in our last 4 games. First the good news before the bad. In the first half of Miami, Michigan State, Wisconsin, and Fordham, this young and mostly inexperienced team with talent has gotten out to 10 point first half leads and even more impressively 3 of those games have been on the road . For those who have followed us forever on the road, first half leads are very rare so this team has the talent to get ahead of ranked teams and unranked teams. That bodes well for this season and next.
Now the bad disturbing trend. Leaving Michigan State aside because that 10 point lead was right out of the gate, the other 3 games at Miami, at Wisconsin and at Fordham we were up 10 more than halfway through the half or at late as the under 8 timeout. Actually just checked Miami we were only up 6 with 2 plus and turned the ball over up to the half. But Wisconsin and Fordham and the end of the half against Michigan State we did not put our throat on them and were only up 4 at Miami, down 1 against Michigan State and clearly outplayed them and should have been up 6-8, up 5 against Wisconsin and Fordham with identical 31-26 scores.
Now even worse, we gave up the lead in all 4 games either by the first timeout or the under 12. We were careless, stopped attacking down low with our bigs, stopped guarding and even did not crash the boards like usual.
Now most people have heard that the last 4 minutes of the first half and first 4 minutes of the second half sets the tone and will tell you how tough a team we have . I hope Coach is seeing the same trend and if he has to change defenses, pound the ball down low to both Shaquille’s, and Myles by set plays , or switch his offensive sets because adjustments have been made at halftime , play Geo off the ball as the 2 guard or anything else to stop the funky 8-10 minutes that are critical to our success.
Interested in hearing what the board thinks are the problems and proposed solutions.
Now the bad disturbing trend. Leaving Michigan State aside because that 10 point lead was right out of the gate, the other 3 games at Miami, at Wisconsin and at Fordham we were up 10 more than halfway through the half or at late as the under 8 timeout. Actually just checked Miami we were only up 6 with 2 plus and turned the ball over up to the half. But Wisconsin and Fordham and the end of the half against Michigan State we did not put our throat on them and were only up 4 at Miami, down 1 against Michigan State and clearly outplayed them and should have been up 6-8, up 5 against Wisconsin and Fordham with identical 31-26 scores.
Now even worse, we gave up the lead in all 4 games either by the first timeout or the under 12. We were careless, stopped attacking down low with our bigs, stopped guarding and even did not crash the boards like usual.
Now most people have heard that the last 4 minutes of the first half and first 4 minutes of the second half sets the tone and will tell you how tough a team we have . I hope Coach is seeing the same trend and if he has to change defenses, pound the ball down low to both Shaquille’s, and Myles by set plays , or switch his offensive sets because adjustments have been made at halftime , play Geo off the ball as the 2 guard or anything else to stop the funky 8-10 minutes that are critical to our success.
Interested in hearing what the board thinks are the problems and proposed solutions.
