Another failed coaching adjustment.....

[pinstripers]

Isn't there some kind of old saying about the players win or lose the blowouts and the coaches win or lose the close games?

[ShockTalk]

Back to the coaching topic, I had a number of mental notes from the game that I wanted to re-check back at home.

1) Starting at the 11:34 timeout in the second half, what was the success rate of each team coming out of that and following time outs on the teams' first possession following the TO. WSU scored on 1 of 8 possessions and that was Smith's layup off of JT's missed 3. Rack this as a fail.

SIU scored on 4 of 7. 3 times they had possession coming out of the TO and in 2 of those times, scored in 1st and 4th second of the possession. The 4th was after we shot a FT. Give an "A" grade here.

2) SIU foul problems while playing only 6 players. Did we take advantage and run plays to force those players into deeper problems. Apparently not. Surles (PG) got his 3rd foul with 5:38 left in the FIRST half and didn't get his 4th until 2:18 left in the game. Crowder (scored 8 points) had two fouls in the first half and got his 3rd at 18:20 and 4th at 10:17 in the second and no more fouls. Fay (scored 21 points) got his 2nd at 8:30 in the 1st half and his 3rd at 15:29 in the 2nd and had no more fouls.

As these 3 players and 3 others played all but 12 of 200 player minutes, SIU was not really protecting them and the Shocks did little to nothing about it. To add to that, SIU got their 9th foul at the 8:57 mark in the 2nd and didn't get another foul until 2:18 left in the game. This was not the fault of the refs.

3) WSU back to long scoring droughts. WSU scored 22 of their points in the first 5 minutes of each half or 42% of their total points. In the remaining 15 minutes of each half or 30 minutes, they scored 31 points. For 75% of the game they were barely averaging 40 points for the game. That's 15 points in the last 15 minutes of a game in which the other team has no bench and is in foul trouble. To add to that, 4 of the 15 points came in the last 23 seconds of the game.

4) What happened to the D? Even though we weren't scoring, the Shocks were up 21-11 at the 5:38 mark of the first half against the 314th ranked scoring team in DI basketball. Looking good right....wrong. In the remaining 25+ minutes, the Ugly Dogs beat WSU 45-32. That 45 points in 25 minutes is a 72 point a game clip for a team that's averaged 61 points a game.

SIU's main 6 players were Fay (6'8"), Seck (6'7"), Freeman (6'5"), Crowder (6'4"), Taylor (6'4"), and Surles (5'10"). Why were Hatch and Smith at 6'4"/5" and 210 guarding Fay at 6'8" and 225 when Blair and Ellis had been successful in the previous game? Since Durley and Stutz were guarding Seck (well at least Durley was, Garrett had no chance against the quick 6'7") that meant Blair and Ellis were on someone 6'4" or 6'5". Murry on Surles??? That rug rat ran around him like he was standing still. This was even done while Ragland was on the floor. Not saying Rags is a great defender, but that put him up against guys 3-4"s taller.

Don't pull the "coach can't score for the players" card. It's the coaching staff's responsibilty to see that the team is ready and prepared. To see that the shot selection being taken is what is needed at the time. With superior numbers and talent, to see that their players are controlling the tempo of the game and taking advantage of opponents problems (short bench, foul trouble). To have players coming out of time outs with solid plays that are matched against the opponents shortcomings and that they have successfully practiced and can run.

[shoxlax]

Add to the opponents problems that they are absolutely terrible in taking care of the basketball when pressured and trapped and you have the best post of the last two days, Talk.

[Bigshotmaker]

Not one to pile on like some others but at least GM took responsibility and didn't throw the players under the bus like he did after the UCONN game.

[wu_shizzle]

Back to the coaching topic, I had a number of mental notes from the game that I wanted to re-check back at home.

1) Starting at the 11:34 timeout in the second half, what was the success rate of each team coming out of that and following time outs on the teams' first possession following the TO. WSU scored on 1 of 8 possessions and that was Smith's layup off of JT's missed 3. Rack this as a fail.

SIU scored on 4 of 7. 3 times they had possession coming out of the TO and in 2 of those times, scored in 1st and 4th second of the possession. The 4th was after we shot a FT. Give an "A" grade here.

2) SIU foul problems while playing only 6 players. Did we take advantage and run plays to force those players into deeper problems. Apparently not. Surles (PG) got his 3rd foul with 5:38 left in the FIRST half and didn't get his 4th until 2:18 left in the game. Crowder (scored 8 points) had two fouls in the first half and got his 3rd at 18:20 and 4th at 10:17 in the second and no more fouls. Fay (scored 21 points) got his 2nd at 8:30 in the 1st half and his 3rd at 15:29 in the 2nd and had no more fouls.

As these 3 players and 3 others played all but 12 of 200 player minutes, SIU was not really protecting them and the Shocks did little to nothing about it. To add to that, SIU got their 9th foul at the 8:57 mark in the 2nd and didn't get another foul until 2:18 left in the game. This was not the fault of the refs.

3) WSU back to long scoring droughts. WSU scored 22 of their points in the first 5 minutes of each half or 42% of their total points. In the remaining 15 minutes of each half or 30 minutes, they scored 31 points. For 75% of the game they were barely averaging 40 points for the game. That's 15 points in the last 15 minutes of a game in which the other team has no bench and is in foul trouble. To add to that, 4 of the 15 points came in the last 23 seconds of the game.

4) What happened to the D? Even though we weren't scoring, the Shocks were up 21-11 at the 5:38 mark of the first half against the 314th ranked scoring team in DI basketball. Looking good right....wrong. In the remaining 25+ minutes, the Ugly Dogs beat WSU 45-32. That 45 points in 25 minutes is a 72 point a game clip for a team that's averaged 61 points a game.

SIU's main 6 players were Fay (6'8"), Seck (6'7"), Freeman (6'5"), Crowder (6'4"), Taylor (6'4"), and Surles (5'10"). Why were Hatch and Smith at 6'4"/5" and 210 guarding Fay at 6'8" and 225 when Blair and Ellis had been successful in the previous game? Since Durley and Stutz were guarding Seck (well at least Durley was, Garrett had no chance against the quick 6'7") that meant Blair and Ellis were on someone 6'4" or 6'5". Murry on Surles??? That rug rat ran around him like he was standing still. This was even done while Ragland was on the floor. Not saying Rags is a great defender, but that put him up against guys 3-4"s taller.

Don't pull the "coach can't score for the players" card. It's the coaching staff's responsibilty to see that the team is ready and prepared. To see that the shot selection being taken is what is needed at the time. With superior numbers and talent, to see that their players are controlling the tempo of the game and taking advantage of opponents problems (short bench, foul trouble). To have players coming out of time outs with solid plays that are matched against the opponents shortcomings and that they have successfully practiced and can run.

Great analysis, are you Dave Dahl?

[rjl]

HCGM recruits well. He represents the university positively. His players are good students and outstanding young men.

HCGM is not a very good game coach, nor is he particularly apt at building a schedule.

I've got to disagree a bit with the recruiting part.

Marshall was forced to recruit JuCo when he got here. Continuing to recruit JuCo is looking like an effort to produce a quick winner and get a BCS job.

Switching to HS players would have provided a slower route to success, but 4-year players don't tend to lose to weak teams at home.

When Marshall has recruited HS players, his record is hardly better than Turgeon's inability to recruit front court players. Marshall's successful HS recruits are Stutz, Kyles, Williams and Murry. That's one a year.

Marshall's plan to get out of Wichita pretty quick took a major hit tonight.

It's my opinion that Marshall is more concerned with the future of Marshall than the future of WSU. His method of building Shocker basketball looks more like an attempt at a quick fix rather than an attempt to build the foundation for something long-term.

His losing a class (Manigalt, Hamilton, TRich(?) and DWill (?) is reminiscent of Turgeon's bailing when he lost a class or with Lowery's losing players at SIU.

When the going gets tough, this team goes into "hero" mode and a few players start going one-on-one or taking stupid shots so they can be the "hero".

Unselfish when winning by double-digits, but playing JuCo ball in tough games has to go to coaching.

Oh good grief. Just because the Shockers sucked last night isn't reason to air out all your conspiracy theories, especially ones based on facts with explanations far more probable than what you attribute them.

[dregn]

...SIU's main 6 players were Fay (6'8"), Seck (6'7"), Freeman (6'5"), Crowder (6'4"), Taylor (6'4"), and Surles (5'10"). Why were Hatch and Smith at 6'4"/5" and 210 guarding Fay at 6'8" and 225 when Blair and Ellis had been successful in the previous game? Since Durley and Stutz were guarding Seck (well at least Durley was, Garrett had no chance against the quick 6'7") that meant Blair and Ellis were on someone 6'4" or 6'5". Murry on Surles??? ...

I sweat watching the first SIU game that Hatch guarded Fay the entire game...the thing was they also had Teague in the game with Seck and Fay. So we had Durley on Teague, Ellis/Blair on Seck and Hatch on Fay. Smith also saw some time on Fay, but Fay had lots of foul issues that game, eventually fouling out, so Hatch was usually in when Fay was in.

[Ricardo del Rio]

The Shockers do not have an outstanding go-to player like Andrew Warren or Kyle Weems.

While the Shockers have 8-10 pretty d*mn good players, they do not have a Warren to lead the team, when it is playing so badly.

When the Shockers must have a basket, they really don't have a player, who can go and get it for them - either by dribble penetration or jump shot.

Of course, I could be wrong.

[shock-it-to-me]

The Shockers do not have an outstanding go-to player like Andrew Warren or Kyle Weems.

While the Shockers have 8-10 pretty d*mn good players, they do not have a Warren to lead the team, when it is playing so badly.

When the Shockers must have a basket, they really don't have a player, who can go and get it for them - either by dribble penetration or jump shot.

Of course, I could be wrong.

No, you are definitely not wrong. You are as right as you could possibly be. Does anyone think players 2-10 on BYU are THAT much better than 2-10 at WSU? Not really. But what a difference that one can make. Like you said, we don't actually even have a "one". We all probably thought that Lutz article the other day was pretty cute about how we have no MVP, and that any player could lead the team on any given night. But that, in fact, is our very downfall.

[proshox]

To me this team doesn't need a "go-to guy." They do need to learn how to manufacturer points when the shooting percentages hit rock bottom.

Getting to the free throw line a few times in the last ten minutes could have really changed the game. It doesn't take a star player to put the defense in a situation with a high likely hood of fouling.

[proshox]

I think the SIU coach got it right when he said the Shockers looked tight. I think SIU put up so little resistance in the first ten minutes of the game that the shockers were lulled into getting out of rythym. Before anyone knew it things started moving backwards and everything was out of character.

[XManCometh]

You can make all the adjustments you want, but if your team shoots 8% in the 2nd half they won't matter.

In the 2nd half we shot 29.6% FG (8-27), 18.2% 3FG (2-11), and 80% FT (8-10), so I don't know where the 8% is coming from.

I was being overly sarcastic. It wasn't meant to be taken literally.

Forgot I was on a message board where everything is taken at face value. My bad.

[XManCometh]

The Shockers do not have an outstanding go-to player like Andrew Warren or Kyle Weems.

While the Shockers have 8-10 pretty d*mn good players, they do not have a Warren to lead the team, when it is playing so badly.

When the Shockers must have a basket, they really don't have a player, who can go and get it for them - either by dribble penetration or jump shot.

Of course, I could be wrong.

No, you are definitely not wrong. You are as right as you could possibly be. Does anyone think players 2-10 on BYU are THAT much better than 2-10 at WSU? Not really. But what a difference that one can make. Like you said, we don't actually even have a "one". We all probably thought that Lutz article the other day was pretty cute about how we have no MVP, and that any player could lead the team on any given night. But that, in fact, is our very downfall.

'

If any team in the Valley had Jimmer Fredette, they'd be ranked in the Top 25. Even Bradley.

[Kung Wu]

The Shockers do not have an outstanding go-to player like Andrew Warren or Kyle Weems.

While the Shockers have 8-10 pretty d*mn good players, they do not have a Warren to lead the team, when it is playing so badly.

When the Shockers must have a basket, they really don't have a player, who can go and get it for them - either by dribble penetration or jump shot.

Of course, I could be wrong.

Well we do have that guy. Except he doesn't know he's that guy half the time. Which I guess paradoxically means we don't have that guy. Dammit.

[WstateU]

The Shockers do not have an outstanding go-to player like Andrew Warren or Kyle Weems.

While the Shockers have 8-10 pretty d*mn good players, they do not have a Warren to lead the team, when it is playing so badly.

When the Shockers must have a basket, they really don't have a player, who can go and get it for them - either by dribble penetration or jump shot.

Of course, I could be wrong.

Well we do have that guy. Except he doesn't know he's that guy half the time. Which I guess paradoxically means we don't have that guy. Dammit.