Rebounding Huge Weakness-

[SHOXAAC]

Rebounding is mostly about the will to have the "That ball is mine" mentality and rebounding instinct. Meaning good rebounders just have the DNA gene to know where the ball is coming of the rim. Some of the great rebounders weren't 6-10 sky walkers. X was 6-7 on a good day, Cheese was 6-5, Warren Armstrong was 6-2, Charles Barkley was 6-5, Clarence is 6-5. These are players that have the will (the ball belongs to me)!!! They also just know where the ball is going to be. Udeze and Chandler don't have either of the components I just explained. They won't have it tomorrow, they won't have it next week or next month. They weren't gifted with the will, or the instinct to rebound. Place blame where ever you want. It's just not in the cards for Mo and Bear.

[CBB_Fan]

One thing that is less talked about is our shooting. Our starting roster has Etienne who is shooting 38% on a very solid volume and Udeze who doesn't shoot 3s but has been very consistent in the paint. But Dennis, Trey, and Gilbert are all shooting 25% from beyond the arc. And it isn't that we are getting bad shots. I saw a graphic the other day that had a bunch of teams on a scatter plot with the X axis being shooting percentage and the Y-axis shot quality. We were outliers in the top-left corner along with Tulane: high shot quality, low shooting percentage. Basically, no team that gets the quality of shots we do shoots as badly as us.

This compounds with the rebounding issue, as we aren't getting many of our ample misses. But I think it is a cultural thing that we notice the rebounding woes but not the shooting woes; we pride ourselves on a being a tough team and hitting the board so we are quick to notice when the rebounding battles are lost.

[pie n eye]

Rebounding is mostly about the will to have the "That ball is mine" mentality and rebounding instinct. Meaning good rebounders just have the DNA gene to know where the ball is coming of the rim.

So, is rebounding mostly about will or is it “just having the DNA gene”? Those two things seem at odds with each other.

Effort and desire certainly play a part in good rebounding as does technique, consistency, strength and timing. Rebounding is at a skill. Like any other skill it can be improved with practice but some will have a higher ceiling, more room to improve or natural ability to work with, than others.

Mo does a good job of boxing out but he needs to do a better job of pursuing the ball and timing his jump. It would also help to continue working in the weight room. Poor Bear has shown a knack for offensive rebounding but needs to work on boxing out and overall consistency.

I assume you also said Mo would never improve his free throw shot. I hope the team doesn’t share your defeatist attitude.

[Shockm]

Give it up. I've pointed out some of GGG's weaknesses - and he had some. I've never hated the guy. Some out here think that if any posters don't slobber all over GGG's sack of nuts, that they hate GGG. It's not black and white. The absence of unconditional love doesn't imply the presence of hate.

The moment you start a post with a false assumption in order to cast the poster you're responding to in a negative light, you've pretty much lost credibility.

The point I'm trying to make in this uninformed evaluation of IB's player development is that the players Marshall worked with for 2-1/2 years aren't rebounding now and IB is being blamed for that because their inability to rebound is proof that IB can't develop players. SMH on that leap of logic.

If 2-1/2 years of player development under Marshall could produce adequate rebounding, then IPBC and MU would be adequate rebounders. If 2-1/2 years under Marshall's player development and 3 months under IB's player development don't produce adequate rebounders, then either Marshall and IB both failed, or maybe those guys were never going to be adequate rebounders.

2-1/2 years is 54 months. 3 months is 3 months. 54:3 is an 18:1 ratio. MU and IPBC had 18 times the player development under Marshall than they've had under IB. Blaming IB for their lack of player development because of their lack of rebounding is taking 1/18'th of their player development at WSU and assuming that's all IB's fault.

Seems like some of this hatred for IB goes to something other than the results in games. People are inventing ways to badmouth him as a coach. Blaming IB for the lack of rebounding ignores so many things that it's a loser's argument.

You don't talk about statistics/facts by saying that this year's poor rebounding should be blamed on GM.

I mentioned only facts. Yes, we miss Jamie from last year but Poor Bear and MU are rebounding less efficiently (rebounds per minute played) this year than last. They need to pick it up and coaches should demand it from them.

I remember a colorful and funny story from Charles Barkley. He said that if you run up and down the court making layups, and time it followed by you doing a timed layup drill again but I chase you, screaming and yelling at you, you'll do it faster the second way. While one could make a strong argument that GM stepped over the line with his motivational antics, his 330 wins are telling that at least sometimes, it was effective for winning, although it harmed his relationships. But likely he should have used it more sparingly to motivate than he did.

[pie n eye]

Deleting due to **** formatting.

[TheShocktocles]

Give it up. I've pointed out some of GGG's weaknesses - and he had some. I've never hated the guy. Some out here think that if any posters don't slobber all over GGG's sack of nuts, that they hate GGG. It's not black and white. The absence of unconditional love doesn't imply the presence of hate.

The moment you start a post with a false assumption in order to cast the poster you're responding to in a negative light, you've pretty much lost credibility.

The point I'm trying to make in this uninformed evaluation of IB's player development is that the players Marshall worked with for 2-1/2 years aren't rebounding now and IB is being blamed for that because their inability to rebound is proof that IB can't develop players. SMH on that leap of logic.

If 2-1/2 years of player development under Marshall could produce adequate rebounding, then IPBC and MU would be adequate rebounders. If 2-1/2 years under Marshall's player development and 3 months under IB's player development don't produce adequate rebounders, then either Marshall and IB both failed, or maybe those guys were never going to be adequate rebounders.

2-1/2 years is 54 months. 3 months is 3 months. 54:3 is an 18:1 ratio. MU and IPBC had 18 times the player development under Marshall than they've had under IB. Blaming IB for their lack of player development because of their lack of rebounding is taking 1/18'th of their player development at WSU and assuming that's all IB's fault.

Seems like some of this hatred for IB goes to something other than the results in games. People are inventing ways to badmouth him as a coach. Blaming IB for the lack of rebounding ignores so many things that it's a loser's argument.

It literally broke my heart when Coach M resigned. I was and I am still a big fan of him. But no man or coach is perfect. You make a good point. Go Shocks.

[pie n eye]

Rather than just look at an average rebounding % for the year I wanted to break it down on a game by game basis. I think that provides more insight.

Opp	D Reb %	O Reb %
ORU	60.0%	36.6%
Missouri	72.4%	32.6%
OSU	64.1%	21.1%
At Tulsa	69.2%	37.5%
At USF	59.6%	23.9%
At Ole Miss	64.3%	33.3%
At Houston	64.3%	31.8%
Cinci	66.7%	32.5%
Tulsa	73.3%	27.0%
At Memphis	67.6%	30.8%
UCF	75.9%	22.2%

I couldn't find and didn't want to calculate the average offensive and defensive rebounding % for NCAA teams so I am going to use the NBA numbers instead. The average offensive rebounding % for NBA teams is 27%. The average defensive rebounding % is 73%.

Based on the above data, our defensive rebounding performance has been below average in 8/11 D1 games. Not good.

On the other hand, our offensive rebounding performance has been at or above average in 8/11 D1 games. That's pretty good.

[SHOXAAC]

So, is rebounding mostly about will or is it “just having the DNA gene”? Those two things seem at odds with each other.

Effort and desire certainly play a part in good rebounding as does technique, consistency, strength and timing. Rebounding is at a skill. Like any other skill it can be improved with practice but some will have a higher ceiling, more room to improve or natural ability to work with, than others.

Mo does a good job of boxing out but he needs to do a better job of pursuing the ball and timing his jump. It would also help to continue working in the weight room. Poor Bear has shown a knack for offensive rebounding but needs to work on boxing out and overall consistency.

I assume you also said Mo would never improve his free throw shot. I hope the team doesn’t share your defeatist attitude.

Your right about Mo. I thought he would never be a good free throw shooter. I was wrong...good on Mo. Free throw shooting and rebounding are two different animals. You can corner me into the defeatist attitude category if that makes you sleep better at night. All I know is my years of observing what good rebounding is. The determination and will, in addition to just having the instinct are 2 different things. I don't know why that is so hard to understand. Being in their 3rd year in the program, both Udeze and Chandler are what they are in the rebounding department. They don't have the will or the instinct. Those that think it is going to change will be disappointed.

[pie n eye]

The point of any competition is to outperform your opponent. With that in mind, I thought it would be interesting to look at how we fared in the rebounding % battle vs. the other team in each game. As in, how often did we achieve the goal of outrebounding the opponent in terms of the percent of rebounds stat?

Opp	Diff
ORU	-3.4%
Missouri	5.0%
OSU	-14.8%
At Tulsa	6.7%
At USF	-16.5%
At Ole Miss	-2.4%
At Houston	-3.9%
Cinci	-0.8%
Tulsa	0.4%
At Memphis	-1.6%
UCF	-1.9%

So, again, we have only won the rebounding % battle in 3/11 D1 games. Our average differential of all games is -3%. Obviously neither of those things is good.

If you take out our two worst rebounding performances, OSU and @USF, our average differential decreases to -0.2%. Still not where we want to be but essentially a stalemate on the boards.

[ShockingButTrue]

One thing that is less talked about is our shooting. Our starting roster has Etienne who is shooting 38% on a very solid volume and Udeze who doesn't shoot 3s but has been very consistent in the paint. But Dennis, Trey, and Gilbert are all shooting 25% from beyond the arc. And it isn't that we are getting bad shots. I saw a graphic the other day that had a bunch of teams on a scatter plot with the X axis being shooting percentage and the Y-axis shot quality. We were outliers in the top-left corner along with Tulane: high shot quality, low shooting percentage. Basically, no team that gets the quality of shots we do shoots as badly as us.

This compounds with the rebounding issue, as we aren't getting many of our ample misses. But I think it is a cultural thing that we notice the rebounding woes but not the shooting woes; we pride ourselves on a being a tough team and hitting the board so we are quick to notice when the rebounding battles are lost.

Gotta' agree with this 100%.

Yes, our team rebounding is not where it could be. Could it be better, or could it be worse, is the question?

As your schematic showed WSU's offense isn't even at the baseline. It's basically been an eyesore for 3 years, but is a little more palatable today. Which is easier to fix; smart shots/offense spacing/wise ball movement, or knowing where the ball is going to carom before the other guy does?

Someone needs to start a thread about WSU's offensive short-comings.

[MikeKennedyRulZ]

From Top 14% rebounding team to 70% or bottom 30%. That’s a drop off a Cliff.

Heres last years Top 6:
Jamerious was averaging 3.5 last year. AG is averaging 3.3 this year.
Eric S. Was averaging 4.7. Clarence is averaging 4.5
Sherfield was averaging 3.0. Tyson is averaging over 3.0
Trey Wade is averaging the same 5.8.
Dexter down 1.5 but Ricky is more than covering for him.

The biggie is that Jamie E. Was ave. 7.1, Morris at 2.8 ( same as this year in 1/2 the minutes), P.B. 2.1 ( same as this year in 1/2 minutes) Mitt 2. In 8 minutes. They didn’t all play in every game.
Last year we averaged 5+ Rebounds p/game. This year we are averaging -1 p/game, and that -1 includes out boarding ESU and KNC by +24.
We are not efficient rebounders. Morris and P. Bear are averaging the same in 1/2 the minutes. Why are we worse this year ? I think you need to find another answer.

So IB is a poor coach or poor at developing rebounders because Echinique graduated?

[pie n eye]

Your right about Mo. I thought he would never be a good free throw shooter. I was wrong...good on Mo. Free throw shooting and rebounding are two different animals. You can corner me into the defeatist attitude category if that makes you sleep better at night. All I know is my years of observing what good rebounding is. The determination and will, in addition to just having the instinct are 2 different things. I don't know why that is so hard to understand. Being in their 3rd year in the program, both Udeze and Chandler are what they are in the rebounding department. They don't have the will or the instinct. Those that think it is going to change will be disappointed.

Which do you think is more difficult to improve, shooting skill or rebounding skill?

Yes, I agree that determination and will is different than a natural rebounding instinct, if such a thing exists. I think it's more likely that some players were taught the importance and fundamentals of rebounding at a younger age and therefore appear to have an innate ability by HS or college that in reality is just the result of years of training.

Of course height is something you're either born with or not and being taller is certainly an advantage when it comes to rebounding, even if not all tall players are necessarily better rebounders. Athletic abilities like quickness, leaping, timing are in large part things we are born with but those too can be improved through training.

If Mo puts the same time and effort into improving his rebounding that he did to improve his free throw shooting and offense this past offseason I have no doubt he can get better in that area. How much better? I don't know but anything would help. Will he do that? Again, I don't know. If he does great, if not, so be it.

[Ashockalypse]

So IB is a poor coach or poor at developing rebounders because Echinique graduated?

Almost certainly not a poor coach and jury is out on whether he can develop rebounders but he hasn’t yet.

[Shockm]

So IB is a poor coach or poor at developing rebounders because Echinique graduated?

I didn't say anything about IB. I just stated that PB and MU are playing twice as many minutes (app. 20) this year and rebounding at the same clip as last year when they averaged app. 10 minutes.

On a separate note, I think that more successful head coaches are fiery and feisty and I haven't seen that in IB. For example, against Memphis, we were getting our butts kicked and I still saw none of that feistiness I'm talking about.

[WeWillShockU]

I think the original intent of this thread was to ask where the coaching/developing is happening. I don’t see IB being even decent in that regard. Seems like assisting the head coach is his strength, and that’s okay.

Coach Brown was the big man coach under Coach Marshall. He helped develop a number of big men over 7 years and now you are saying that he doesn’t have that ability? This doesn’t make any sense.