vs TTUN (1-24, 6pm CBSSN)

[fanatic13]

It's still not good enough.

Butler is shooting threes below 30% since his 35 point game, Campbell really struggled tonight, Thomas is streaky and we did not get his good side tonight. Bench sadly improved to 6 points with no minutes for green or squire. Johnson has to be the guy on offense and we know he's not the guy on defense.

I'm really starting to question the offensive system because we continue to struggle shooting. Thomas had his best shooting year as a freshman and butler shot 5 percentage points higher last year at central. There's a lot of dribbling, little passing, and no movement. Most of us thought this roster could compete and I still don't think we're far off but we're simply not winning which is the most important metric

[hammb]

Our guard play has been ridiculously inconsistent. Having Humphrey back is a great help on the defensive end but he doesn't offer much offensively.

I'm with you that the offensive system kinda sucks. We waste tons of shot clock time not doing anything really worthwhile. About the only thing we do with consistently enough to look like a plan is to get the ball to Johnson, but then it's still asking him to go get his own buckets (which last night he did).

Defensively we're a mess. If Johnson is on the floor we're bad. Mostly played zone with him out there last night but they'd just shoot over the top of it...we never expanded the zone to be anywhere near their 3pt shooters instead hoping they'd just miss.

The development of Felt this season has been a revelation but other than that not much good going on. I'd love to see a bigger lineup with He, towns, and YoYo together but 2 of those guys can't get on the floor. The injuries and depth have killed us, but this is a guard game and our guards play is not good enough.

[guest44]

My hope is that Simon uses the two years of MAC experience to realize this isn’t the WAC. You have to have good guard play and you have to be more physical. Squire and even Spurgin last year type players aren’t going to work unless you have great distributors. The only good BG teams the past 20 years have had great guard play minus that random Orr fluke year. The refs will call a million fouls all season and then when Cleveland arrives they mostly swallow the whistles and the more physical teams win.

[Matty B]

I thought we played well enough in the first half to be up 10 at the break. Unfortunately UT just made a ton of tough shots. Then in the 2nd half every time we'd go on a mini run they'd throw in another tough shot and eventually broke our spirits and the easy shots started coming for them.

I credit this team for gutting it out the way they have. On top of 3 of our top 8 players being out, Campbell's dominant hand is BROKEN and he's still out there giving all he can.

This is a roster capable of competing in Cleveland, but injuries just suck man. They can derail a promising season and that's exactly what's happened here.

Remember what we did when we were at full strength against Michigan State, who by the way has lost ONE game since we played them and are now ranked #8. We gave them all they could handle and then some.

Just tough wondering what could have been.

[hammb]

I thought we played well enough in the first half to be up 10 at the break. Unfortunately UT just made a ton of tough shots. Then in the 2nd half every time we'd go on a mini run they'd throw in another tough shot and eventually broke our spirits and the easy shots started coming for them.

I credit this team for gutting it out the way they have. On top of 3 of our top 8 players being out, Campbell's dominant hand is BROKEN and he's still out there giving all he can.

This is a roster capable of competing in Cleveland, but injuries just suck man. They can derail a promising season and that's exactly what's happened here.

Remember what we did when we were at full strength against Michigan State, who by the way has lost ONE game since we played them and are now ranked #8. We gave them all they could handle and then some.

Just tough wondering what could have been.

I would love to know what "tough shots" they were making.

Even if they're 1-2 feet beyond the arc if we're not even close enough to really close out these aren't tough shots. Not every team hits tough shots on us every game. I'm fact very few ever do because they don't get tough shots.

Our defense is absolutely putrid on roughly 70% of the possessions and I hope (I know) the coaches aren't just telling the kids to tip their caps on guys hitting tough shots. That's not what I saw last night and it's not what I've seen all season.

Yeah we played tough competent ball to make MSU work. We can keep hanging out hat on a close loss all we want, but other than that singular night our effort has been mostly bad on defense.

We can blame injuries but realistically Felt wasn't expected to contribute much and has handled himself admirably...that's basically a wash for one injury. We need to find a way to score the ball without Johnson on the floor. We have to work harder in our zones so we're actually effecting shooters.

[hammb]

My hope is that Simon uses the two years of MAC experience to realize this isn’t the WAC. You have to have good guard play and you have to be more physical. Squire and even Spurgin last year type players aren’t going to work unless you have great distributors. The only good BG teams the past 20 years have had great guard play minus that random Orr fluke year. The refs will call a million fouls all season and then when Cleveland arrives they mostly swallow the whistles and the more physical teams win.

Felt has a chance to be an upper echelon MAC big. I'm with you that I have zero use for whatever Squire is right now. To be honest I've got very little use for Johnson but his offensive skill set is so high it can work if you find a way to hide him defensively.

But you don't win the MAC without an all MAC guard, and this group just doesn't have that. Butler and Trey are inconsistent and at their best as shooters. None of our guards can make plays for teammates.

[BleedOrange]

Ha! I told you guys about Felt prior to the season.

[bghkyfan74]

Ha! I told you guys about Felt prior to the season.

I was one who wasn't too high on him to start the year. Coming off injuries plus he had a few fiascos in the handshake lines while he was injured. I have been pleasantly surprised and he seems to only get better... BTW, what are the lottery numbers for this week?

[Matty B]

I'll say it over and over again. There are ZERO MAC teams that can lose 2 starters + a key rotation piece mid-season, AND have their best guard playing with ONE HAND, and be competitive in this league.

Zero.

Injuries suck, man.

[hammb]

I'll say it over and over again. There are ZERO MAC teams that can lose 2 starters + a key rotation piece mid-season, AND have their best guard playing with ONE HAND, and be competitive in this league.

Zero.

Injuries suck, man.

I think it can be true at the same time that no team can overcome the loss of 2 starters to compete while at the same time admitting this was likely a mid tier, at best, MAC team even if healthy.

The first month of the season the defensive effort was so bad that assistants were blowing their gaskets on guys at every timeout. Khayat and all the guards were as much the problem as a solution in that regard. I do think the effort has improved, and Simon has realized how awful Johnson is that we've started playing more zone, and there is no doubt that missing Khayat & Towns greatly decreases our chances of being a good zone defense team.

Still, we were fully healthy when we lost by double digits to a really bad Bellarmine team. We were fully healthy when we lost to a below average Southern Miss team.

The injuries are definitely part of the story on the season. And we would all love to say this team would have eventually gelled, but the way the season started this looked like a team in the 5th-8th in the MAC range when fully healthy. The injuries have made it look like an uphill battle to see Cleveland. With the resources we have for basketball and the quality of coach I believe Simon to be this season is not good enough, health or not.