Official Meltdown Thread

[ShockerFever]

Wiggins needs to get A LOT more looks. He's the only one shooting the ball with any type of meaningful efficiency. I don't care what they do. GIVE WIGGINS THE DAMN BALL MORE.

The more I look at D-Will, the more I get a selfish vibe out of him. I know Marshall would like to reward 4-year seniors for their dedication to the program, but that kid only passes to the wings or tries impossible shots down the lane. He either is selfish or has really low BBIQ.

Armstead just thinks he's better than he actually is.

I wish Marshall would let those two know about their issues.

[shoxlax]

Wiggins needs to get A LOT more looks. He's the only one shooting the ball with any type of meaningful efficiency. I don't care what they do. GIVE WIGGINS THE DAMN BALL MORE.

The more I look at D-Will, the more I get a selfish vibe out of him. I know Marshall would like to reward 4-year seniors for their dedication to the program, but that kid only passes to the wings or tries impossible shots down the lane. He either is selfish or has really low BBIQ.

Armstead just thinks he's better than he actually is.

I wish Marshall would let those two know about their issues.

This. Also if we went balls to the wall pressure, Wiggins defensive liability in the half court becomes less of an issue. Fever, I think we have it figured out.

[GoShockers89]

DWill is a nice role player who can provide energy from time to time. He hustles on defense and finishes better than about anyone on his insane drives to the basket.

However, he has been a borderline terrible passer for the last three years. He showed a lot of promise at the end of his freshman season as a point guard, which is part of what makes his inability to feed other players so perplexing.

Looking at our roster, I am not really sure we have any alternative but to keep playing him 20+ minutes though. I guess we can hope that Wiggins shows HCGM enough in practice over the next week or two to become a guy capable of getting 30 minutes.

[Ricardo del Rio]

These are partial stats of winning teams.

[DUShock]

Sam Malone?

You really dated yourself with that one Sub :)

[SubGod22]

You really dated yourself with that one Sub :)

I've been watching Cheers on Netflix at night before bed. I was a very young lad when that show began.

[rrshock]

I will give Mal some credit for his 6 assists last night.

I hadn't noticed DWill not passing to Wiggins, but if that's the case, we can add him to Early, Hall and Ehimen as guys that won't catch a pass from DWill.

It is pretty hard to catch a pass from someone that doesn't dish the rock.

[Shockeriffic]

Last night only Armstead, Williams and Van Vleet had an assist. This seems to be more a team problem and not an only Demetric problem.

[ShockerFever]

Last night only Armstead, Williams and Van Vleet had an assist. This seems to be more a team problem and not an only Demetric problem.

It is a guard problem. In general, our guards are not that good. FVV gets an obvious pass. He at least showed much brighter light last night than the other two supposed better senior guards did.

No doubt the game plan needs to be more passing, less dribbling. Marshall seems to be trying to tell them this in spurts after timeouts, but that's about it.

[WuDrWu]

Mal has won a couple of games for the team earlier in the season. DWill has WILLED us to victory on occasion. Watch Nick Wiggins work when he doesn't have the ball and get back to me on how we're going to get him more shots.

Are things bad now? You bet. But I'd rather slump now than in March. Plenty of time to improve.

If we had lost to VCU, Tennessee, Air Force (tied for 2nd in the MWC) Creighton and UNI, would everyone be this upset?

[pinstripers]

dunno how that matters, doc

[SubGod22]

If we had lost to VCU, Tennessee, Air Force (tied for 2nd in the MWC) Creighton and UNI, would everyone be this upset?

I would

[GoShockers89]

The trendline is what matters most right now. We need to do a 180 from our last 3 games in a hurry.

[Kung Wu]

dunno how that matters, doc

Let me explain in terms that will piss off a bunch of the older folks on here:

You are young and you are trying to figure out where to put your savings so you can get an average 6% return year after year and retire to the good life at, say, 65.

But while you are hoping for an average 6% lifetime annual return on your investment you realize that you are getting 15%(!) average return year-after-year in your 401k. So what do you do? You plow it all in there, 100%. And it's great! 15%! Growing like a weed.

You run some calculations and realize if this keeps up you can retire EARLY and with more money than you thought!

And after 40 years of saving you turn 60 and suddenly the mortgage crisis hits and your entire life savings, which is 100% invested in the stock market, tubes in and you are staring at a 30% loss in a single year.

Your f$*&ing pissed at the world, at presidents past or present, at whatever congress could allow this, at the banks, at wall street for being greedy, at gun owners, at environmentalists, and everybody else in between.

But let's look at the cold hard facts:

1) When that crash came and you were 60 ... it only set you back __2 years__ from where you would have been if you had been getting that 6% you should have been expecting all along.

2) Who was responsible for investing your money? Why you were, of course.

So why are you so f^%ing pissed? Because of that little calculation you ran which set an expectation without even once considering the risk you were taking.

And here's the kicker. Even though the market has returned to returning that 15%, and you could be getting your stash cranking for those last few most important years of your investment's life, you are too spooked to act and it sits there collecting 1.5% in some CD or government bond.

So the questions are .. did you set your expectations for the Shox a little too high based on prior results? And are you going to stop attending games or not cheer when your team COULD turn this around and get cranking right when it matters most?

Not me. We may not have even seen the bottom of this crash -- but I can assure you I will be investing in these guys until it turns around.

[ShockTalk]

Mal has won a couple of games for the team earlier in the season. DWill has WILLED us to victory on occasion. Watch Nick Wiggins work when he doesn't have the ball and get back to me on how we're going to get him more shots.

Are things bad now? You bet. But I'd rather slump now than in March. Plenty of time to improve.

If we had lost to VCU, Tennessee, Air Force (tied for 2nd in the MWC) Creighton and UNI, would everyone be this upset?

Don't know about others, but I wouldn't be. I thought this team would have some rough days early. However, because of the talent level I felt we had and HCGM, I thought we would become a team no one would want to to play as we got deeper into Valley play. I'm on record saying I felt that this team would have an excellent chance of winning the Valley tournament. This sudden funk of losing 3 in a row, the last to a 1-10 SIU, has me concerned as we appear to be getting worse, not better, losing to a lesser team each game. I still think this team has the ability to turn it all around quickly and finish strong......it just doesn't seem as likely.

And @Kung Wu:, no I don't feel I had my expectations too high. If we had done as the Good Doctor proposed and lost those 5 games earlier, I still would have thought by half way through Valley play, we would have done much better in those particular 3 games. I've also said that I'm more worried about the end of conference play when we have 3 of 4 games on the road with IN St, Ill St, and CU and probably lose at least 2 of them. Can you or Doc really say that you feel as confident now about our chances for those 3 games?