Men vs USC Upstate Post Game

[FoundationEagle 637]

Auburn wins 90-83

Great win tonight to get us back in the W column. 5-1 is a pretty nice start.  

I saw some growth tonight. The guys had me worried a couple times when there were a few dry spells along with USCU getting hot that I thought they were going to get discouraged and let it slip away. That didn't happen tonight. The one time I saw the team start getting lazy for a few possessions, Bruce called a TO and we didn't see it again. That alone is nice growth from the last game. Add to that getting a little cold at the end and USCU getting hot and this one could have turned south quickly. When they got it down to 5 points with 1:30 left, our guys could have panicked and gave the game away. Instead they stayed under control, used time wisely, made crucial shots and crucial free throws and sealed the game.  Heron is a leader in the making.  That guy is calm under pressure and was a big part of us sealing the game.  The rest of the team did well also and didn't commit any dumb fouls down the stretch.

While it wasn't a complete game, it was noticeable growth. That is a good sign of good coaching and players listening and working together. Can't ask for much more. 

[aufan57 922]

3 point shooting was bad, only 7-33. 

Also, ft 13-22, need to get closer to 70%

Only 7 turnovers. Good job 

[AU64 10,122]

8 minutes ago, aufan57 said:

3 point shooting was bad, only 7-33. 

Also, ft 13-22, need to get closer to 70%

Only 7 turnovers. Good job 

yep...if the 3 is to be considered as a weapon, the completion rate needs to be in the 40% range,...plus a missed 3 is an invitation to a fast break by the opposition.

But as noted....another W.....so on to the next game....   

[gravejd 3,269]

Defense left a lot to be desired tonight. Way to many open looks and we just got out muscled underneath. But we also got good scoring out of our bigs and Heron had his best game yet. 

Hey mods can we get a "gotta get better a free throw shooting" shortcut or linky? I think I'll be posting that often this season. But great to see Heron seal it with some clutch ones to end the game. 

[auburnphan 6,050]

5 hours ago, AU64 said:

yep...if the 3 is to be considered as a weapon, the completion rate needs to be in the 40% range,...plus a missed 3 is an invitation to a fast break by the opposition.

But as noted....another W.....so on to the next game....   

how/where did come up with the 40% number?? A missed 3 is an invitation to a fast break, lol.   It is just one more thing for you to b*tch about cuz you don't like BP.  

[johnnyAU 3,630]

We were horrible at the line last season. I hope it improves this year. Looking forward to watching the team continue to get better throughout the year. 

[AU64 10,122]

4 hours ago, auburnphan said:

how/where did come up with the 40% number?? A missed 3 is an invitation to a fast break, lol.   It is just one more thing for you to b*tch about cuz you don't like BP.  

Actually I watch a lot of basketball and see the stats....if you do some math you see some point where swapping 3 points at a lower percentage is equal to or better than shooting 50 percent for 2s which used to be the goal.   I accept that many teams, including AU often shoot in the low to middle 40 % from two point range....but generally that is not winning basketball.   And just from observation, missed threes (other than air balls) usually rebound long giving defensive guards an opportunity to take it down court before the offensive big men (usually under the basket) have a chance to get back.  I'm no expert obviously but there are numerous articles by coaches on the net with instructions and stats on rebounding and shooting as well as analytical studies.     https://www.breakthroughbasketball.com/fundamentals/rebounding.html    is interesting.

[steeleagle 2,945]

Even Pearl was more concerned with the defense. He said if you get 90 points, but still give up 83 then you didnt play solid Defense. He know defense is still what controls games, and also feeds your fast breaks and scoring streaks. Now adays no teams run half court offenses all the time unless you are Duke, NC or an Ivy league team.

And don't expect the FT shooting to get better until the young guys get comfortable into SEC play. Its proven most FR struggle early in FT shooting but get better as they start to relax and play more under control later in the season. At least that is what i am hoping for. 

[JwgreDeux 1,279]

64 is correct in that 50, 40, 70 are the numbers you want from 2, 3 and the stripe. He is also correct that long shots often produce long rebounds. The fast break issue is linked to the location of the shot and who took it. Purifoy shooting threes takes our 4 out of the rebounding equation, and that obviously hurts our offensive rebounding. Our post players run so well, I'm not sure that it is as big factor in hurting our transition defense. Also as 64 said, I think CBP is willing to live with the rebounding issue as long as Purifoy is shooting a certain percentage. 

[Tiger 8,818]

I didn't feel very good at the end of this game. We should've beaten this team by 20 IMO. Our defense was really poor and we are very hot and cold offensively, but when we are cold I'd really like to see Purifoy or Heron take control and attack the basket as opposed to settling for jumpers. Or Harper with a drive and kick if he can't get a clean shot off. It seemed like we settled too much. I can see this team beating a top 15 opponent just as I could see us losing to somebody in the bottom of the SEC. I love our young talent, but last night I felt like we could really benefit from having a senior or 2 who has been in the program to help calm our guys down. We are not in that position however because of terrible roster management prior to Pearl's hiring, but I'd rather learn lessons through a win rather than a loss!

[WeagleAU 594]

18 minutes ago, Tiger said:

 

I didn't feel very good at the end of this game. We should've beaten this team by 20 IMO. Our defense was really poor and we are very hot and cold offensively,

 

This is the problem I've seen in the last several years with Pearl's tigers.  They seem to start off very hot and play a great first half.  However, in the second half they look nothing like the team in the first half.  Time after time they seem to blow big leads and limp their way to the finish.

They appear to be sluggish and unable to adjust in the second half.  This is okay against teams like USCu, however, this will be a major problem in league play.

Also, they are not a very good free throw team.  Our opponents know this and I believe use it to their advantage.  We also seem to play fast at inopportune times, not getting very good looks at the basket and not using the clock to our advantage. 

[AuburnArch13 185]

7 hours ago, auburnphan said:

how/where did come up with the 40% number?? A missed 3 is an invitation to a fast break, lol.   It is just one more thing for you to b*tch about cuz you don't like BP.  

Yeah, 40% would be phenomenal, but generally fewer than 10 teams can hold that mark for a full season. So that seems an unnecessarily high bar to set. I think if we could level out somewhere around 36% we'd be just fine. 

[ShocksMyBrain 9,362]

You guys who start the post game threads should put the outcome in the title. 

"W/L [score]"

[Tiger 8,818]

4 minutes ago, WeagleAU said:

This is the problem I've seen in the last several years with Pearl's tigers.  They seem to start off very hot and play a great first half.  However, in the second half they look nothing like the team in the first half.  Time after time they seem to blow big leads and limp their way to the finish.

They appear to be sluggish and unable to adjust in the second half.  This is okay against teams like USCu, however, this will be a major problem in league play.

Also, they are not a very good free throw team.  Our opponents know this and I believe use it to their advantage.  We also seem to play fast at inopportune times, not getting very good looks at the basket and not using the clock to our advantage. 

I think we can improve with the hot/cold streaks. The players are still defining their roles on the team and when we are in a cold streak it seems we don't know what to do and everyone takes turns taking a bad shot. I'm actually willing to throw out trends from BP's first 2 seasons as he was just trying to make it through. It doesn't help we are made up of basically freshman and sophomores. I think our young guys get complacent too quickly within a game once we start hot.

You're absolutely right though, we can survive such swings against lesser opponents but in SEC play it will bite us. Defensively we just seem to give up too many wide open shots. We are still learning to play with one another though which shows up on both ends, so I know we won't hit out stride for a little while.

[GBAU83 212]

7 hours ago, Tiger said:

I didn't feel very good at the end of this game. We should've beaten this team by 20 IMO. Our defense was really poor and we are very hot and cold offensively, but when we are cold I'd really like to see Purifoy or Heron take control and attack the basket as opposed to settling for jumpers. Or Harper with a drive and kick if he can't get a clean shot off. It seemed like we settled too much. I can see this team beating a top 15 opponent just as I could see us losing to somebody in the bottom of the SEC. I love our young talent, but last night I felt like we could really benefit from having a senior or 2 who has been in the program to help calm our guys down. We are not in that position however because of terrible roster management prior to Pearl's hiring, but I'd rather learn lessons through a win rather than a loss!

Agree on the senior leadership.  Seemed like when we went cold, the young guns wanted to get it all back quickly by shooting threes (and missing them last night).  I noticed when LaRon Smith came in, we tended to push inside a bit more and get 2-pointers to get settled again and then play more aggressive to the inside and make some 3s.  That comes froma guy who has been around to say make the money in the lane to control the game.  By the same token, USCUpstate did similar by bringing in their big guy, Buchanan (7-0, 285) to get rebounds and put backs which kept them in the game.

[cole256 17,039]

40% from three as a team isn't that realistic, long shots does lead to long rebounds but with this particular team it really doesn't hurt that much since we don't have an advantage with big men anyway. Plus you're pretty much luring the team into playing the pace and style game we want to play anyway. 

This is what cbp wants because he's trying to get his best players on the floor, but besides that you could see that's what he wanted since he's been here as he tried to get bowers to play like that as well. 

 

Also purifoy stretching the floor is more valuable than the rebounding as he's not going to make that much of an impact in that area anyway. And it still doesn't necessarily hurt us rebounding as he's pulling somebody out of the box to guard him.

 

As far as the other stuff in this thread it's just my opinion but go back and read what I expected and what's being discussed. We're going to have games where we'll look on fire and other games where we'll be cold. We'll have games where scoring will be stagnant because our scorers on the team hasn't even played yet so their roles aren't defined. 

We don't have a post threat as far as scoring so our perimeter shots are going to be more contested, and actually yes once you start getting tired in the second half you're going to see a decline because we're a jump shooting team, when you get tired first thing you start to lose is your legs and that REALLY effects your jump shot, not to mention remember we're playing a faster pace than normal. 

But anyway I guess I just said that to say these results are actually expected, there's nothing going on bad that is alarming. Also know that the 1st year players will hit freshmen walls. Also know that Harper will lose some pep as the season go and he deals with always being taken to the post and spending a great deal of time pressing the other team's ball handler full court.

If pearl had Fox from Kentucky or ball for ucla you'd be able to see what he wants to do on offense and defense

[JwgreDeux 1,279]

17 hours ago, cole256 said:

40% from three as a team isn't that realistic,

There are 78 teams shooting 38% or better, 30 of which are shooting 40% or better. We need to be among those teams if we want to make the tournament. 

[cole256 17,039]

39 minutes ago, JwgreDeux said:

There are 78 teams shooting 38% or better, 30 of which are shooting 40% or better. We need to be among those teams if we want to make the tournament. 

It's unrealistic with us having as many freshmen taking the shots as we do and us not having any scorer yet established that a team would choose to double, also us not having a post scorer to pass out of doubles. And to be honest we ourselves don't even know if we have over 40% shooters on our team. At least enough to say we would average 40%

[JwgreDeux 1,279]

6 minutes ago, cole256 said:

It's unrealistic with us having as many freshmen taking the shots as we do and us not having any scorer yet established that a team would choose to double, also us not having a post scorer to pass out of doubles. And to be honest we ourselves don't even know if we have over 40% shooters on our team. At least enough to say we would average 40%

TJ Lang shot 40% last season. Brown shot 37% as a freshman. Both of them are capable of shooting 40+%.  Currently, Herron is shooting 43%, Purifoy 37%, Johnson at 37%, Harper at 32% with Brown at 26% and Lang at 29%. It isn't the freshman that are hurting our percentages. If Brown and Lang come on, we can absolutely shoot close to 40%, not unrealistic at all. 

[AuburnArch13 185]

1 hour ago, JwgreDeux said:

There are 78 teams shooting 38% or better, 30 of which are shooting 40% or better. We need to be among those teams if we want to make the tournament. 

Not to be too nit-picky but your 78 and 30 numbers are a bit misleading statistically. The season is still very early so you'll see a wider statistical range before regression to the mean takes hold and the numbers normalize. Looking at last season's stats, only 10 teams shot 40% over the whole season and around 40 teams shot 38% or better. And last year was even a "good year" in that regard.

So while I do think we should be shooting a better percentage than we are, I agree with Cole that thinking we'll hit 40% or close to that is a bit unreasonable to expect from this team. I also think that we don't necessarily have to. If we could land somewhere in the 36%-37% range, I think we'll be fine.

https://www.teamrankings.com/ncaa-basketball/stat/three-point-pct?date=2016-04-05

[mustache eagle 2,389]

Lang seems to be having a hard time finding is place in this team.  He doesn't seem to be as active getting the ball and then when he does, he can't find his shot.

how is he doing defensively?

if he can't find his shot, then would new Williams be better off getting those minutes?

[aufan57 922]

11 minutes ago, mustache eagle said:

Lang seems to be having a hard time finding is place in this team.  He doesn't seem to be as active getting the ball and then when he does, he can't find his shot.

how is he doing defensively?

if he can't find his shot, then would new Williams be better off getting those minutes?

I was going to ask earlier about New Williams. He has not played one minute this season. He has all kinds of athletic ability, but evidently not a good basketball player or possibly not a good team player.

[AU64 10,122]

2 hours ago, AuburnArch13 said:

Not to be too nit-picky but your 78 and 30 numbers are a bit misleading statistically. The season is still very early so you'll see a wider statistical range before regression to the mean takes hold and the numbers normalize. Looking at last season's stats, only 10 teams shot 40% over the whole season and around 40 teams shot 38% or better. And last year was even a "good year" in that regard.

So while I do think we should be shooting a better percentage than we are, I agree with Cole that thinking we'll hit 40% or close to that is a bit unreasonable to expect from this team. I also think that we don't necessarily have to. If we could land somewhere in the 36%-37% range, I think we'll be fine.

https://www.teamrankings.com/ncaa-basketball/stat/three-point-pct?date=2016-04-05

Why?   ....we have some serious young talent and there should be high goals for them.   Granted those are not gospel numbers but how can we play winning basketball unless we are shooting and scoring with upper level teams as Deux pointed out.   I get the feeling that some folks just like to argue and look for any item to nit-pick rather than accept that we can't win against SEC competition unless we can shoot competitively and that means being in the range noted for all three shooting categories. 

Last season we were among the worst shooting teams in all three categories FT, FG 3PT .  Most of those players are gone now but based on their HS stats, this is a team that has the potential to be more competitive with shooting....and hopefully winning more games....this year.

 

PS..check the full season stats from last year to see what we are talking about  http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/statistics/team/_/stat/3-points/group/23

[AuburnArch13 185]

34 minutes ago, AU64 said:

Why?   ....we have some serious young talent and there should be high goals for them.   Granted those are not gospel numbers but how can we play winning basketball unless we are shooting and scoring with upper level teams as Deux pointed out.   I get the feeling that some folks just like to argue and look for any item to nit-pick rather than accept that we can't win against SEC competition unless we can shoot competitively and that means being in the range noted for all three shooting categories. 

Last season we were among the worst shooting teams in all three categories FT, FG 3PT .  Most of those players are gone now but based on their HS stats, this is a team that has the potential to be more competitive with shooting....and hopefully winning more games....this year.

 

PS..check the full season stats from last year to see what we are talking about  http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/statistics/team/_/stat/3-points/group/23

I've looked at the full season stats from last year. In fact, I linked to them in my post that you quoted. Last year, no team in the SEC shot 40% from 3, and only two shot better than 38%. Seems unlikely that we'll do better than that this year, or that we'd need to in order to be successful. 

[AU64 10,122]

5 minutes ago, AuburnArch13 said:

I've looked at the full season stats from last year. In fact, I linked to them in my post that you quoted. Last year, no team in the SEC shot 40% from 3, and only two shot better than 38%. Seems unlikely that we'll do better than that this year, or that we'd need to in order to be successful. 

just saying that 40 is a worthy goal...and if we can't shoot close to that for 3, we better be hitting the 2s at a good pace...and hitting the FTs.  We were a bad shooting team from every where on the floor.  If there is hope for an NIT or NCAA berth....shooting must be better and if we are going to shoot a lot of 3s...and don't shoot them well, we are just aiding the opposition.  JMO