I was a student back in the late 80s/early 90s where playing St Bonaventure evoked audible laughter as they were an atrocious bottom feeder. Through the years, we have seen the ineptitude of Rutgers for almost 30 years while the Bonnies shook off their doormat status somewhat, yeah only 3 NCAAs in that time but its 3 more than RU and now St Bonaventure has beaten RU the last two games. Somethings change, something stay the same....same old Rutgers. And it truly is same ole Rutgers until something changes and the glaring reality is that Rutgers has not finished over 500 since 2006 yet we are seeing some sort of hype and expectations of post season this year that makes you scratch your head given the first 4 games.
So many things disturbed me about this game but in retrospect the level of play vs Bryant and Drexel was quite telling. When your experienced players are struggling against those kind of teams where you are life and death and your guards cannot hit the broadside of a barn, Its pretty easy to see as the level of competition rises that its going to bite you in the ass and it did. I am not going to give too much credit to RU playing better in the 2nd half....they did..and its a shame because if they played like they did the full 40 minutes they would have won the game. The D tightened up on the Bonnies and held them down to like 3 points for almost 6 minutes. The game was lost in the first half, you cannot go down 19 on a neutral court that was pro Bonnies and expect to win. The team is soft and lacks toughness (yes cliche terms I know), seems way overconfident in just how good they are and in the approach to the game. Mentally this team isnt not good at being the hunted at all.
The hard truth is there are no stars on this team and while balance is good, its not good when you do not have players that can take over a game. St Bonnies had two freshmen from the local area who combined for 39 points and were 7-10 from 3. Does RU have guys like these? Through the first 4 games I would say no. This was St Bonaventure not Michigan State. Our guards shot 12-35 and 6-21 from 3. Our junior guard continues to put up poor shooting numbers. Our inside game is a positive. We have some success. Myles had a solid game when he got the opportunity. Unfortunately the inside game is not consistent enough nor is their a consistent effort to get the ball inside. I have criticized the offense all year and tonight is no different. Ditto for the offense. Tonights game was just a continuation of the poor games vs Drexel and Bryant. If I keep repeating myself, I am.
I think this was one of Pikiell's worst coached games here. One, he didnt have the team prepared at all for this game and thats a trend this year. Secondly, he seemingly didnt prepare for a freshmen tandem chucking up outside shots. Third his time management down the stretch was simply horrific. St Bonnies got the ball up 4 with 59 seconds left, RU called its last timeout and the proceeded to take 27 seconds to give 3 fouls to put in STB in the one and one. Absolutely terrible terrible terrible. How can that happen. You either set up quick aggressive traps or really go for a hard steal there quickly. Not to mention I still do not get Pike's manlove with Jacob Young, its hurting the team. Pike is struggling with the lineup and the program is also struggling without Eugene. No one can tell me otherwise.. Yes eventually we will move on as we go into the season but his loss may cost us a few wins and a few months of developing. When Caleb is your top rebounder that is an issue.
At some point the program has to shit or get off the pot. Its not unreasonable to expect to beat a middling 0-3 St Bonaventure team. Cue the propping up of the Bonnies as a quality team.....This was a bad loss no question. Can the program recover. Yes it is only one game, one loss, RU can win at Pitt and that will be a test to see if they are improving. But 4 games in, it seems like we have more questions and more worries than we did coming into the season. Uncertainty isnt a good thing. RU has a very very tough matchup this week with a dangerous program in SF Austin. This game to me will answer some short term questions I think. For longer term questions, its going take until January to know where we really sit but call me concerned....I am concerned because I am not sure the level of talent on this team is good enough overall to be a consistent winner and I dont see us winning needed recruiting battles for next year. So while RU as a program is slowly getting better, do we have the impact players...are the players we have touted on the team now..our guards...are they good enough. We have seen Young struggle, Mulcahy appears nowhere near ready for even midlevel competition. Doucoure and Kiss are non factors. Geo just doesnt have a high percentage shooting though I love the guy overall. Yeboah is a nice addition for some offense but he is gone next year. Myles doesnt appear to be strong enough to a main option for our offense. So then we have 3 other guards who at times have looked good but other times do not. Thus far we look quite ordinary and ordinary will not cut it in Big 10 play to get us to 500 in league. We do not have good shooters, without good shooters you have to rely on great defense and we dont have that. We do not have a three point shooter 4 years into the Pike regime. So we are reaching a crossroads point right now....where are we headed and what kind of identity do we have. I wasnt expecting to have to ask those questions this early in the season. Its year 4, its okay to have expectations. I do not think I am being unreasonable with such a negative recap tonight.
So many things disturbed me about this game but in retrospect the level of play vs Bryant and Drexel was quite telling. When your experienced players are struggling against those kind of teams where you are life and death and your guards cannot hit the broadside of a barn, Its pretty easy to see as the level of competition rises that its going to bite you in the ass and it did. I am not going to give too much credit to RU playing better in the 2nd half....they did..and its a shame because if they played like they did the full 40 minutes they would have won the game. The D tightened up on the Bonnies and held them down to like 3 points for almost 6 minutes. The game was lost in the first half, you cannot go down 19 on a neutral court that was pro Bonnies and expect to win. The team is soft and lacks toughness (yes cliche terms I know), seems way overconfident in just how good they are and in the approach to the game. Mentally this team isnt not good at being the hunted at all.
The hard truth is there are no stars on this team and while balance is good, its not good when you do not have players that can take over a game. St Bonnies had two freshmen from the local area who combined for 39 points and were 7-10 from 3. Does RU have guys like these? Through the first 4 games I would say no. This was St Bonaventure not Michigan State. Our guards shot 12-35 and 6-21 from 3. Our junior guard continues to put up poor shooting numbers. Our inside game is a positive. We have some success. Myles had a solid game when he got the opportunity. Unfortunately the inside game is not consistent enough nor is their a consistent effort to get the ball inside. I have criticized the offense all year and tonight is no different. Ditto for the offense. Tonights game was just a continuation of the poor games vs Drexel and Bryant. If I keep repeating myself, I am.
I think this was one of Pikiell's worst coached games here. One, he didnt have the team prepared at all for this game and thats a trend this year. Secondly, he seemingly didnt prepare for a freshmen tandem chucking up outside shots. Third his time management down the stretch was simply horrific. St Bonnies got the ball up 4 with 59 seconds left, RU called its last timeout and the proceeded to take 27 seconds to give 3 fouls to put in STB in the one and one. Absolutely terrible terrible terrible. How can that happen. You either set up quick aggressive traps or really go for a hard steal there quickly. Not to mention I still do not get Pike's manlove with Jacob Young, its hurting the team. Pike is struggling with the lineup and the program is also struggling without Eugene. No one can tell me otherwise.. Yes eventually we will move on as we go into the season but his loss may cost us a few wins and a few months of developing. When Caleb is your top rebounder that is an issue.
At some point the program has to shit or get off the pot. Its not unreasonable to expect to beat a middling 0-3 St Bonaventure team. Cue the propping up of the Bonnies as a quality team.....This was a bad loss no question. Can the program recover. Yes it is only one game, one loss, RU can win at Pitt and that will be a test to see if they are improving. But 4 games in, it seems like we have more questions and more worries than we did coming into the season. Uncertainty isnt a good thing. RU has a very very tough matchup this week with a dangerous program in SF Austin. This game to me will answer some short term questions I think. For longer term questions, its going take until January to know where we really sit but call me concerned....I am concerned because I am not sure the level of talent on this team is good enough overall to be a consistent winner and I dont see us winning needed recruiting battles for next year. So while RU as a program is slowly getting better, do we have the impact players...are the players we have touted on the team now..our guards...are they good enough. We have seen Young struggle, Mulcahy appears nowhere near ready for even midlevel competition. Doucoure and Kiss are non factors. Geo just doesnt have a high percentage shooting though I love the guy overall. Yeboah is a nice addition for some offense but he is gone next year. Myles doesnt appear to be strong enough to a main option for our offense. So then we have 3 other guards who at times have looked good but other times do not. Thus far we look quite ordinary and ordinary will not cut it in Big 10 play to get us to 500 in league. We do not have good shooters, without good shooters you have to rely on great defense and we dont have that. We do not have a three point shooter 4 years into the Pike regime. So we are reaching a crossroads point right now....where are we headed and what kind of identity do we have. I wasnt expecting to have to ask those questions this early in the season. Its year 4, its okay to have expectations. I do not think I am being unreasonable with such a negative recap tonight.
