We've lost our edge

[wusphlash]

If the Internet had existed in Middle Earth would Gollum have responded to his own posts?

[C0|dB|00ded]

Ahhhh... that should be good for now. I'll check back in a couple days lol.


T


...:cool:

Okay, now I'm really gone.


T


...:cool:

[ShockerFever]

You’re not an expert even if you say you are. You are as Full of **** as the day you fell in LOVE with Casey Crawford LOL who was a bust. You do love to know others are interested in what you have to say. :)

Im sure Marshall had high hopes for last year. Why else would he have gambled on so many Seniors that causes problems that live onto this year. Nevertheless, he is the best Shocker coach ever and deserves our faith to bring us back to glory. However, he loves to win more than I do and if he had a choice to have twice the wins we have now and a Top 15 ranking over a 130 KP ranking and sinking, he’d choose Winning just like I do. By the way, I also mentioned the winning seasons prior to last year that led to our being the Top Ranked non football playing school in the country. I’m glad to know you claim to love the losing we are going through over that.

Casey Crawford.. wow. That's taking it back.

What was your old screen name?

[C0|dB|00ded]

CB can pull 'em outta hiding lol!

Your cover's BLOWN Shockm! Now 'Fever's gonna chase you around the block like a rabid pit bull for the next couple years.


T


...:cool:

[1989]

So you believe that last year's softness and this year's softness are two completely independent outlier events in the entirety of Marshall's coaching career at Wichita State? I'll allow you that argument, but I do believe your intentions are firmly rooted in faith. Totally understandable. I don't want to witness the end of our golden era either. The more likely reality however is that there is a regression in the implementation of a system that has brought Gregg Marshall loads of success and national acclaim at WSU.

Yes, offense is needed to win games but offense doesn't enjoy any kind of special standing in Gregg Marshall's world (or didn't use to). A celebration of offense is afforded only to the top 10-15 schools in the country with the most highly gifted pros-in-waiting. Even that is not enough sometimes as a strong defensive effort can rock their spoon-fed worlds. All you need to do is look back on historic defensive performances from schools like Wichita State *ahem*. Sure there are plenty of other schools wayyyy outside the top 15 - like Creighton - who celebrate offense first... how's that working out for them?

The bottom line is this: offense comes and goes, but a team that buys into a defense-first philosophy will be tough to beat on ANY night. The defensive-minded team will always be in the game waiting for their offense to wake up and close the deal. When your defense is spotty (or nonexistent) you must rely on your offense. This is a very dangerous game rife with wheelbarrow's full of one-and-done NCAA tourney exits. Last year's team was exceptional offensively but spotty defensively and VERY spotty Play Angrily.

Now I shouldn't speak so much on defense alone as it will confuse my readers. Defense and Play Angry are related but are not the same thing. Plenty of teams play stingy defense but I believe there have only been a handful of teams over the last decade that play what I would call Play Angry basketball; that's Wichita State and VCU. Two historically nasty teams you DO NOT want to play if you don't have to.

Hell, we even stole VCU's song (and some of their recruits lol).

Play Angry is our secret sauce that we lay on top of fundamentally sound defense. It equates to a boatload of wins.


T


...:cool:

I believe that this years team needs to be judged differently than last years team and really any other team coach has had. This is Coach Marshall’s youngest team ever and you seem to not be giving any consideration to that fact, My belief with this team is about logic and listening to how coach’s and media talk about freshman more so than faith. You are completely understating the importance of how new and young these guys are. Again, most of what you say about this team is terms of play angry and softness can be explained away by the fact that we had 9 newcomers. There is a reason why Coach Marshall at beginning of the season said “If I had a magic wand and could swing that wand to the group to give them one skill, it would be that they understand how hard you must play to be successful at this level. The great majority of players have no idea."....These guys don’t know. Coach wouldn’t need to be wishing for a “magic wand” if these guys could understand “play angry” in the span of a couple of months.

Most of your points about offense is a straw man argument. I never said that we shouldn’t think about defense first or be a defensive minded team. But we gotta be able to walk and chew gum at the same time. We have to be able to stop people AND score.

I disagree that VCU and us are the only two teams out of hundreds who play angry. You smokin that good stuff, boy.

[wuhog]

Go away bandwagon fans. I’m sick of the negativity. See you when we dominate again. Soon!!

[ShockTalk]

nm

[TheShocktocles]

As I said before, this entire thread is dumb. We have not lost anything. We have a team full of freshmen and several new Div. 1 players. Ask yourself this question if you went to college, what kind of student were you as a freshman as compared to what you were when you were a junior and a senior? Good luck to the shockpups the rest of the new year.

[WstateU]

I was a freshman All-American connoisseur...

https://pics.me.me/every-weekend-i-s...o-30132537.png

[WichitaHawk]

As I said before, this entire thread is dumb. We have not lost anything. We have a team full of freshmen and several new Div. 1 players. Ask yourself this question if you went to college, what kind of student were you as a freshman as compared to what you were when you were a junior and a senior? Good luck to the shockpups the rest of the new year.

I agree! I said the same thing to a friend of mine when trying to explain this to him. When I played soccer in during my first 2 years in college I got playing time as a freshman but I didn't get to start until the end of the year my freshman year and was a full time starter my 2nd year. I explained to him that coming into college soccer from HS I wasn't accustomed to playing against bigger men and a faster pace of the game. I can 100% guarantee that our new comers, freshman and juco players, are the exact same way. You'll see a completely different team come the end of the year and even next year. Not all incoming players excel right off the bat. Only a select few do and they're a dime of dozen and it doesn't matter what sport it is. So y'all need to have patience! I grew up during the Jason Perez era so I know what patience is but someone of y'all expect magical results which aren't gonna happen with this young of a team.

[flatlander]

Just think for a moment ... most of our players were in high school thinking about prom just a few months back. Now take out two players J.E. and D.D
out of the rotation. I, am just saying hang on ... things will get better.

[C0|dB|00ded]

I believe that this years team needs to be judged differently than last years team and really any other team coach has had. This is Coach Marshall’s youngest team ever and you seem to not be giving any consideration to that fact, My belief with this team is about logic and listening to how coach’s and media talk about freshman more so than faith. You are completely understating the importance of how new and young these guys are. Again, most of what you say about this team is terms of play angry and softness can be explained away by the fact that we had 9 newcomers. There is a reason why Coach Marshall at beginning of the season said “If I had a magic wand and could swing that wand to the group to give them one skill, it would be that they understand how hard you must play to be successful at this level. The great majority of players have no idea."....These guys don’t know. Coach wouldn’t need to be wishing for a “magic wand” if these guys could understand “play angry” in the span of a couple of months.

Most of your points about offense is a straw man argument. I never said that we shouldn’t think about defense first or be a defensive minded team. But we gotta be able to walk and chew gum at the same time. We have to be able to stop people AND score.

I disagree that VCU and us are the only two teams out of hundreds who play angry. You smokin that good stuff, boy.

Marshall never used to need magic wands over his last 20 years of head coaching. His players were ready to die on the court when the whistle blew. They didn't always shoot well, they didn't always execute solid defense, but they ran around like madmen until things started clicking. Sure there were times when players took a game off but that was usually met with a midnight practice as soon as the plane/bus landed.

Whether you realize it or not, you are putting offense on a very high pedestal. No straw man here. Marshall has said since day one that offense comes FROM defense. If your defense is piss-poor you cannot expect to have good offense in his system... unless you are playing a different kind of system, which we have been going on year 2 now. Marshall used to talk about playing to 0-0 ties. Now regardless of whether or not we win or lose, the opponent is going to get theirs.

Watching WSU play VCU the other day was like witnessing an alternate reality. VCU couldn't throw it in the ocean but never relaxed on defense for a moment. In fact, they continued to play harder. Brick after brick after brick. They didn't need their offense to "keep their spirits up". They were willing to play hard for 40 minutes in hopes of a 0-0 tie. Somehow - like magic - the score was nearly tied at the half. How many games have we played under Marshall were we looked like total **** for 20 minutes but ended up nearly tied at the half? Countless. That's the magic of defense + Play Angry. Then after the break, they made a few adjustments, found their flow, and put the hammer down. Of course we weren't likely to win this game after JE went down, but getting blown out was mental weakness plain and simple, something you'd be hard-pressed to find on a Gregg Marshall team since the very beginning. His entire M.O. is designed around forging mental toughness in his players.

Marshall has had 19 weeks to turn his boys into men. That's 19 weeks x 20 hours per week equaling 380 hours of coach-directed instruction. This does not include self-directed practice, scrimmages, and official games which should easily exceed the official practice hours. Just last week HCGM said he still has players who are out of shape......... sumfin's rotten in Denmark kids. I've watched a closed Gregg Marshall practice and if you aren't in shape after 5 months of that hell, you're either back at home with mommy or you're dead. There is no 3rd option. Well, apparently there is a 3rd option now.

I have hesitated to mention this very much before but we have other leadership problems and they reside on the court. I don't believe our seniors are weak mentally with respect to resolve, they're just not that bright. They rely on their talent, skill, and instincts but have little aptitude for in-game adjustments and decision-making. That is going to hurt a team's chances in many ways. I'm hoping some of the newcomers have more cerebral potential. I do think Jamie, Ricky, and Eric are quite smart but Jamie is operating with a language barrier, Ricky is tiny (makes it hard for him to SHOW his teammates what he means). Eric S. is without a doubt our ambassador of Play Angry at the moment. JE is a close second but he's now broken.

"I disagree that VCU and us are the only two teams out of hundreds who play angry. You smokin that good stuff, boy."

Okay, so there are more Play Angry teams out there huh? Please name some for me. You are once again either discounting the effect Play Angry has had on Gregg Marshall's success over the years and/or you just don't fully understand yet what it is (reread my comments in this thread). I suspect there are more folks on this board who are in the same boat. Every time I hear, "they're only Freshman" my clueless alarm goes off. It's okay though, I find futile discussions entertaining.


T


...:cool:

[C0|dB|00ded]

Go away bandwagon fans. I’m sick of the negativity. See you when we dominate again. Soon!!

Haven't noticed any bandwagon fans in this thread. Would LOVE to see us dominate again. That won't happen until we either start recruiting like Duke or get back to the basics - back to what got us where we are (were). Without that Coming to Jesus the best we can hope for is a repeat of last year every now and then. That will be our ceiling. Almost winning a decent conference (marginally better than the MVC in substance) and then getting ran by a nobody in the Dance.


T


...:cool:

[1989]

- You are painting such an inaccurate picture of Coach Marshall’s history. You make it sound like every player Marshall has ever coached prior to last year walked in the door ready to “play angry” the minute coach told them to. That is just not true. Ironically, play angry-the concept you claim to know so much about- was adopted because of how soft and nice he thought his team (which at the time included a young Fred and Ron) was playing which is completely opposite of your point of view that those guys never needed to grow or develop into that mindset. Marshall never needed a “magic wand” the last 20 years because he never had 9 newcomers at once.

- Simply mentioning offense is not putting it on a high pedestal. Offense comes from defense? Cool, nobody said it didn’t. All that’s being said here is that at some point you have to score. I’m sure Coach Marshall has run offensive drills and has drawn up offensive plays his whole career like any other coach, including the defense first coaches, so let’s not act like me saying you have to put the ball in the hole is some outrageous statement.

- Reading your posts is like witnessing an alternate reality. Did VCU have a good game? Yes! But you completely overstate how hard they played. VCU caught a lot of breaks to help them blow us out.

- 19 weeks isn’t enough for most freshman. A whole regular season isn’t enough for most freshman. You have a fundamental misunderstanding of what it means to be a freshman, and to have a team full of freshman, in college basketball.

- Just because you constantly talk about “play angry” basketball doesn’t mean you are the only one who knows what it is or who can define it, so I don’t need to read your repetitive straw man posts to understand it. Play angry means to play the game the right way, be the first to the floor for a loose ball, wanting it more than your opponents, offensively (which you hate, but this is a part of play angry too) turning down good shots for great shots, and just overall having the discipline to do what you are supposed to do as close to 100% of the time as possible. The highest profile program that usually plays that way is Tom Izzo’s Michigan state teams. But John Caliparis old Memphis teams use to play that way, Butler under Brad Stevens played that way, Cincy usually plays that way, West Virginia under Bob Huggins historically plays that way, John B (can’t spell his last name off the top of my head) at Michigan has them playing that way, I haven’t seen South Carolina this year but Frank Martin’s SC team the year they had Sindarius Thornwell played angry. I’m sure there are a lot of programs that neither you or I watch very closely who play angry too.

[asiseeit]

Boy, we need some more games to talk about and soon

[shelback]

Marshall never used to need magic wands over his last 20 years of head coaching. His players were ready to die on the court when the whistle blew. They didn't always shoot well, they didn't always execute solid defense, but they ran around like madmen until things started clicking. Sure there were times when players took a game off but that was usually met with a midnight practice as soon as the plane/bus landed.

Whether you realize it or not, you are putting offense on a very high pedestal. No straw man here. Marshall has said since day one that offense comes FROM defense. If your defense is piss-poor you cannot expect to have good offense in his system... unless you are playing a different kind of system, which we have been going on year 2 now. Marshall used to talk about playing to 0-0 ties. Now regardless of whether or not we win or lose, the opponent is going to get theirs.

Watching WSU play VCU the other day was like witnessing an alternate reality. VCU couldn't throw it in the ocean but never relaxed on defense for a moment. In fact, they continued to play harder. Brick after brick after brick. They didn't need their offense to "keep their spirits up". They were willing to play hard for 40 minutes in hopes of a 0-0 tie. Somehow - like magic - the score was nearly tied at the half. How many games have we played under Marshall were we looked like total **** for 20 minutes but ended up nearly tied at the half? Countless. That's the magic of defense + Play Angry. Then after the break, they made a few adjustments, found their flow, and put the hammer down. Of course we weren't likely to win this game after JE went down, but getting blown out was mental weakness plain and simple, something you'd be hard-pressed to find on a Gregg Marshall team since the very beginning. His entire M.O. is designed around forging mental toughness in his players.

Marshall has had 19 weeks to turn his boys into men. That's 19 weeks x 20 hours per week equaling 380 hours of coach-directed instruction. This does not include self-directed practice, scrimmages, and official games which should easily exceed the official practice hours. Just last week HCGM said he still has players who are out of shape......... sumfin's rotten in Denmark kids. I've watched a closed Gregg Marshall practice and if you aren't in shape after 5 months of that hell, you're either back at home with mommy or you're dead. There is no 3rd option. Well, apparently there is a 3rd option now.

I have hesitated to mention this very much before but we have other leadership problems and they reside on the court. I don't believe our seniors are weak mentally with respect to resolve, they're just not that bright. They rely on their talent, skill, and instincts but have little aptitude for in-game adjustments and decision-making. That is going to hurt a team's chances in many ways. I'm hoping some of the newcomers have more cerebral potential. I do think Jamie, Ricky, and Eric are quite smart but Jamie is operating with a language barrier, Ricky is tiny (makes it hard for him to SHOW his teammates what he means). Eric S. is without a doubt our ambassador of Play Angry at the moment. JE is a close second but he's now broken.

"I disagree that VCU and us are the only two teams out of hundreds who play angry. You smokin that good stuff, boy."

Okay, so there are more Play Angry teams out there huh? Please name some for me. You are once again either discounting the effect Play Angry has had on Gregg Marshall's success over the years and/or you just don't fully understand yet what it is (reread my comments in this thread). I suspect there are more folks on this board who are in the same boat. Every time I hear, "they're only Freshman" my clueless alarm goes off. It's okay though, I find futile discussions entertaining.


T


...:cool:

What some people are not taking into consideration is this team has 1 guy that has been around more than a year. Dont underestimate the importance of guys that have been there and done that. Coach has always had them around until this year.

[DJShocker10]

Haven’t posted in a while but for some reason I figured now would be a good time to do so. I can’t help but think back to HCGM’s first season (I think first season) with the Shockers. He was left with a bare cupboard. To many, it seemed like our players just didn’t have the fire we’d grow accustomed to seeing over the next decade. It got so bad many people began booing (presumably) at the team’s performance. As many can remember, coach was not pleased. He let everyone know about it before ever heading to the locker room. Later that season against Creighton we turned a corner. Our guys left it all out on the court. They were diving after loose balls, battling every possession, and “playing angry” before a final four run made it cool. The wins didn’t pile up that season, but they soon would.

This season is much the same story. It’s not HCGM’s first year here, but still a team with many unknowns. We have seen glimpses of the gritty attitude associated with the MTXE and Play Angry mantras (loose ball scrum to Ech for the finish comes to mind). I have no doubt in my mind that it’s going to turn around, though I can often be found cursing in CKA or at the tv. The frustrations of HCGM’s first year have become quite common this season, and it’s time to see some urgency. Unfortunately, freshman have a tendency to do things on their own schedule. I’m willing to bet that if some of our guys can’t find any urgency, Coach can give them some urgency. He will be turning these boys into men, and we’ll all get to enjoy it.

[WstateU]

Solid post otherwise, but I agree on the booing; been going to games since I was knee-high to a grasshopper and I've never heard WU or WSU fans boo our team... and the 90's teams were boo worthy.

[SB Shock]

It got so bad many people began booing (presumably) at the team’s performance. As many can remember, coach was not pleased. He let everyone know about it before ever heading to the locker room.

What? WSU fans have never booed the players under Marshall. Only time there was booing that first year was when Matt Brauer got a cheap shot and another concussion, There was a lot of booing at the refs and the Drake player who did it. With Brauer out for almost a third of season and PJ Cousinard playing hurt the whole season - any expectations for the season were quickly reset early on.

[Kung Wu]

I agree. I have never heard our fans boo our own team. Never.

[DJShocker10]

That is the way I read the situation as well. I included the word presumably because I remember Marshall believing that was the case. If I’m misremembering I apologize. But it still doesn’t change the point of the post. There are many similarities between the two teams, though this season we have much more talent IMO.

[Ashockalypse]

The only one associated with the Shockers who has lost his edge is the entitled infantile moron who started this gross overreaction of a thread who needs the instant gratification of a binker in his mouth for a season or two so that the intelligent heavy lifters who are most of the rest of us patiently await the team getting back on track which they will undoubtedly do under our Hall of Fame Coach. And baby boy no one cares what your clueless alarm tells you, the youthful nature of the team is a fact not an argument. And last season, by any standard was a fantastic season wherein we stayed ranked all year long. We lost in the first round just as many teams do occasionally who have spent many years in a row going to the tournament. So quit dissing last years team. Your impact on the success of the team is 0. You were once banned and I didn't miss you. Crawl back under that rock.