When the guards go to the basket or drive the paint, they do not dish for a dunk/layup or kick out to an open shooter outside. When they drive they are shot first, passing never seems to enter the equation. Rarely do we see a pass…..do they know how to do this??? Is this emphasized by the coaches??? This is a basic basketball skill, especially for a guard, Noah, Simpson and Davis all have displayed a poor ability to do this based upon what we’ve seen through 11 games.
Guards lack of ability to dish or kick?!?!
- Thread starter RAC93
- Start date
Simpson has Montez Mathis syndrome on fast breaks.
This is a huge problem and they cannot even run pick and roll effectively. We do not even run pick and roll enough. This 5 play we run repeatedly has to end. Stop having Cliff away from the basket and hoping the guards can beat their man and get to the basket , when it doesn’t happens against a decent defensive team. The guards are then stuck and no one is moving with Gavin or Aundre stuck in the corner waiting for the pass that never comes.
They are a very easy team to defend. Rarely do we see teams scrambling and switching to defend them due to passing, ball movement, screens, ball being swung around the perimeter, etc..RU does not do these things well.
Pick up, street ball. That’s the offense so that’s what they practice.
Me and my son watch games together. I said same thing to him about this team that it looks like a bunch of guys playing a pickup game getting in their cardio for the day.
Paul was not aggressive with his shot but at least he had height working for him. Noah is not aggressive with his shot and he is tiny.
That is because of that stupid 5 play Pike runs too much. Go back to dribble drive , swinging the ball , playing inside to out and we will see the other team scrambling.
When you are doubled up on the boards and you can’t make wide open shots the rest is just noise.
Having sat two or three rows from the court a few times last and this year you can often read Simpson’s eyes and know that he isn’t looking to pass. It’s easy for the big men to collapse and impede his path to the basket. Then he forces a bad shot.
This team has many holes, the two you listed are big ones amongst too many others. When you can’t shoot you need to drive to the rack, draw fouls, try and hit easier shots, pass to teammates for easy hoops, etc.. This team shows little interest in passing it off to a teammate for an easy hoop. They would rather fade away from the rim and heave up some garbage off the backboard (See Simpson and Davis) as opposed to pass to a teammate.
Hopefully. It takes more than recruiting rankings to win games.
So much for all the preseason talk that the current guards would open up our offense with a more up tempo style. Not shocked.
The guard play was not our issue today….. sorry you can try to blame Derek or Noah all you want. Bell 17 pts 18 rebounds. Cliff 3 points ZERO rebounds. That is it. There is no way he is going to the NBA.
Paul also rebounded and regularly set up Cliff perfectly. None of our guards can do either. Take out the Seton Hall game and the cupcakes and our guards have been atrocious.
You are correct, frontcourt play takes the most blame. But we’re not just talking about today. They have played 11 games thus far, has the guard play been good thus far? No. The frontcourt has sucked all year too as they can’t get a rebound.
We can only hope. Not trying to be a downer, but it’s a team game. Unfortunately we see GG is struggling in a big way. I don’t see two touted freshman making a whole lot of difference in their first and maybe only year
Other than Hyatt, the team struggled offensively. 17-51 (.333) FG, 0-11 3P.
The number of trash pull ups was obscene, especially early in the shot clock. We hit a few of them, but even then they were generally dumb shots. Several times we had open shots for Griffiths or Hyatt in the corner, but the guards instead dribbled around to take a 17-footer. One time Simpson pulled up in transition from the FT line and bricked it - if that wasn't a perfect encapsulation of our guard play. Simpson should not be taking 14 shots in a game ever.
Yes, Omoruyi disappeared - outmuscled, out-toughed, and out-positioned. But the guards were no treat either, and they have the ball in their hands every possession.
The number of trash pull ups was obscene, especially early in the shot clock. We hit a few of them, but even then they were generally dumb shots. Several times we had open shots for Griffiths or Hyatt in the corner, but the guards instead dribbled around to take a 17-footer. One time Simpson pulled up in transition from the FT line and bricked it - if that wasn't a perfect encapsulation of our guard play. Simpson should not be taking 14 shots in a game ever.
Yes, Omoruyi disappeared - outmuscled, out-toughed, and out-positioned. But the guards were no treat either, and they have the ball in their hands every possession.
In fairness to Simpson - he took 6 of those
Shots in the last 5 minutes of the game starting when we were down 13 and made 3 of them.
Earlier in the game he missed at least 2-3 fast break attempts. He has to take those.
So it wasn’t quite as bad as your making it out to be.
Cliff not rebounding is a big problem because it basically means Hyatt can’t check out. Hyatt now does a lot of things we really need, but he also limits us on defense. I don’t mean this in a negative way either - without him we are way worse. But he’s not a good pressing player and his help defense just doesn’t come close to Mag / Caleb. When you have a player like that on the floor the whole game it’s harder to win with defense. But rebounding is part of defense and Hyatt does that for us. Full stop.
When Cliff rebounds, we could slide Mag to the 4 and play some stretches of 3 guard press with our best defending guards - Davis, Simpson and probably Noah (Austin not looking in form right now). Jeremiah would really help too…
Simpson took the same mid-range trash he had taken earlier in the game and previously bricked. He's the best FT shooter on the team and didn't get a single trip to the line - people don't foul you when you stop and pop 15 feet from the basket. If I were defending Rutgers, I'd want him to do that all day - he misses more than he makes and he doesn't put foul pressure on the bigs or draw them away from Omoruyi. And he ends up with lines like 3-14 with 6 points.
Stop. Taking. 15. Footers.
Fernandes and Davis are guilty of the same.
Part of this is because we're running with three undersized guards, and Austin Williams hasn't given us much. Our guys are out-sized on the perimeter and can't get clean looks (or in Fernandes' case, gets clean looks but doesn't take them), and while they can break down their defender to get to the paint, they then run into trees.... so they settle for mid-range trash. Their height also contributes to their lack of rebounding - but Mike Williams was 6-2 and rebounded plenty, so a lot of it is technique and heart.
And they take those low value shots as their first option - earlier in the clock, without even trying to get a good look for three or a lane to the rim. It's like they're hunting those mid-range opportunities, rather than settling for them when there are no other options available. When they hit them it's almost worse, because it rewards that approach and will lead to several more bricks later.
These are excellent points. If the guards kept possessions alive longer to get a better look or a lane to the rim, it sure would be nice to see one of them drop it off to Cliff for a bunny or kick out to Hyatt or Gavin for an open three. It seems as if this part of the offense barely happens. The offense is basically a guard creates a shot for themselves, Mag, Hyatt or Gavin creates a shot for themselves or just take a jumpshot, the ball goes to Cliff in the post and well……we know how that goes. There is no continuity, no flow, no connectivity on offense……where is the passing, ball movement, screens, cuts, etc.. When do they hit a player on the floor cutting to the hoop for an easy bucket? Rarely. The offense looks the same through 1/3 of the season, maybe it improves but it seems that many of these guys have some bad offensive habits that don’t seem likely to change. It’s the job of coaches to change those habits.
This is true. Paul also got into the lane and could pass out for the open shot. Gavin would excel with Paul because he can hit open shots.
Telling you... Mulcahy is the biggest loss from last year. He was a crazy good ball distributor. Pick and roll monster...idk what I was thinking wanting him off the ball in favor of Fernandes. Grass isn't always greener..
I’m not seeing Simpson as the major problem Saturday. Miss State is huge. He wasn’t getting shots at the rim in this game. Any attempts would’ve been blocked and a potential run out the other way.
His shot selection really wasn’t bad in the game and wasn’t the reason we lost. He was 0-5 on the jumpers you are talking about in the first half but he was open at least and they were in good flow with the offense. We went into the locker room tied 29-29.
He didn’t attempt another jumper in the second half until the game was essentially over. He missed two 3 and a fast break lay up where he was blocked (further support for the point that this wasn’t a game for him to be driving). That brought him to 0-8.
He went 3-6 down the stretch in the last 5 minutes of the game starting when we were down 13. He hit 2 of those jumpers in a row but then went cold - again the game was basically over so it really didn’t matter who took the desperation shots. He misses two 3s and a jumper (after just hitting on 2 of them. Then he made a meaningless lay up with 30 seconds left to play.
Many people drank the kool-aid with Fernandes. I fell for it somewhat myself.
It's not just Simpson, but our guards over the start of this year. In this particular game, though, Simpson went to his bag and pulled out "early shot clock midrange jumper" again and again and bricked shot after shot. Even on a fast break in transition, he pulled up at the FT line and clanged iron. If you're already not going to take it to the rim on a fast break, at the very least pull up at the arc not the FT line.
It was maddening.
Fernandes did similar. Looked off Griffiths wide open in the corner, as his man had sagged off him toward the paint.... then dribbled around inside the arc a bit before pulling up from the elbow, which he missed. It was wide open, yes - but so was the three from the corner he passed up, and there was no effort to swing the ball and open up the defense either.
Penetrating guards need to probe the paint - get defenders to commit to them, and dish to a big or kick out to a shooter. If our guards are getting stuffed by trees, those trees have left their man - dish to Omoruyi or Mag on the block.
There's little movement off the ball, and few screens being set for shooters. And when a shooter (Fernandes) gets the ball kicked to him with room to shoot.... he puts the ball on the floor instead.
A lot of people didn’t understand Paul’s value and discounted his play last year while playing injured. This team would look so much different with Cam & him on the floor.
We had no control over Cam leaving. Paul is another story.
Bottom line - trading Paul for Noah didn’t turn out to be a good move. As far as I can see - Paul is better at everything. Literally everything.
Drank the kool-aid is great way of putting it. I did too, I feel like somebody who bought a used car based upon some salesman techniques and now it’s a lemon. Everything we heard about him and were promised that he would deliver has been nonexistent. He is stunningly ordinary as far as ability and on court production.
