Men vs Texas A&M Game Thread

[ArgoEagle 1,771]

5 minutes ago, GwillMac6 said:

What do you think Aden Holloway is? And genuinely curious what college team in 2022 do you know that has more than even 1 dominant big man? Hell that is even rare….

We had 2 last year. They are both in the NBA now.. We had Harper & Bryce a few years ago. It is not unheard of and we have had both very recently.

[GwillMac6 20,666]

1 minute ago, ArgoEagle said:

We had 2 last year. They are both in the NBA now.. We had Harper & Bryce a few years ago. It is not unheard of and we have had both very recently.

From the sound and wording of your post you want 2 dominant interior big men. Thats why I asked. That’s not how basketball is played now. Walk and Bari worked so perfectly because they had defined roles as 1 was mr outside and the other mr inside. 

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,662]

The philosophy of just playing defense zeroes out god awful offense has hit its absolute ceiling as far as I’m concerned. It’s not the 90s, dudes can score freaking points. We didn’t go to the final four just because we generated a hell of a lot of steals and blocks, it’s because those turnovers led to points. We generated a high amount of points from being able to stroke the ball. I guarantee you an entire core of offensive specialists who put the same detail into that side as we do into defense goes further in the tourney than what we got going on 

[NoALtiger 3,850]

I mean losses are gonna happen guys. If anyone was under the impression this is a championship roster we’ve got then you’ve set yourself up for disappointment. We are definitely a decent to good team and will win more than we lose, but this isn’t a roster setup that’s gonna win a title. Is what it is, gotta move on to the next one. 

[e808 3,025]

58 minutes ago, GwillMac6 said:

Yah you are def going on ignore. 

🤙🏿

[AuburnNTexas 7,140]

I know some people are upset with the way Bruce is coaching. I think he has actually done a decent job with the talent he has. This year he has used the zone more than any other time  since he has been at Auburn. The zone hides some of our players one on one weaknesses on Defense. He probably should have tried it in 1st half against A&M as it initially caused them some issues in the second half.  The Problem with the zone is if the other team has a big like marble who can hit the Mid-range jump shot the zone falls apart. 

The real issue is the overall talent level of this team and their basketball IQ.  Broome is a talented Center and Williams is a talented forward, Greene is a decent to solid PG after that there is a talent drop off especially since Moore got hurt. The basketball IQ is in certain things I have seen. When other teams press Green others don't react to help him.  To much reaching on D out front instead of moving feet to keep player in front of you. To many bad passes because they don't see the whole floor. 

Prior to this game on offense Flan seemed to be willing to pull up and take solid mid-range shots he didn't force things last few games he was scoring gust under or just over double figures while hitting around 50%. In this game he insisted on getting in among the trees where he had to try and score over the trees his shooting % tanked because of that.

I remember Harper or Brown after a long rebound or steal taking off and depending on defender go to rack and scoring or pulling up and hit an open 3.  Our current players if they pull up to shoot a 3 on a break probably won't hit it and if they go to the rack they will miss, get it blocked, get called for a charge, or get stripped way to often.

Bruce tried to address some of the issues we saw  at end of last year.  He brought in Broome, Traore, and Westry.  Broome has worked out well and to be honest everybody expected more from Traore and Westry. Sadly while Traore has some talent it needs development and sadly Westry got hurt. With the Westry and Traore we expected this would be a very good team without them Bruce has to coach his backend off. 

[KansasTiger 3,248]

24 minutes ago, AuburnNTexas said:

I know some people are upset with the way Bruce is coaching. I think he has actually done a decent job with the talent he has. This year he has used the zone more than any other time  since he has been at Auburn. The zone hides some of our players one on one weaknesses on Defense. He probably should have tried it in 1st half against A&M as it initially caused them some issues in the second half.  The Problem with the zone is if the other team has a big like marble who can hit the Mid-range jump shot the zone falls apart. 

The real issue is the overall talent level of this team and their basketball IQ.  Broome is a talented Center and Williams is a talented forward, Greene is a decent to solid PG after that there is a talent drop off especially since Moore got hurt. The basketball IQ is in certain things I have seen. When other teams press Green others don't react to help him.  To much reaching on D out front instead of moving feet to keep player in front of you. To many bad passes because they don't see the whole floor. 

Prior to this game on offense Flan seemed to be willing to pull up and take solid mid-range shots he didn't force things last few games he was scoring gust under or just over double figures while hitting around 50%. In this game he insisted on getting in among the trees where he had to try and score over the trees his shooting % tanked because of that.

I remember Harper or Brown after a long rebound or steal taking off and depending on defender go to rack and scoring or pulling up and hit an open 3.  Our current players if they pull up to shoot a 3 on a break probably won't hit it and if they go to the rack they will miss, get it blocked, get called for a charge, or get stripped way to often.

Bruce tried to address some of the issues we saw  at end of last year.  He brought in Broome, Traore, and Westry.  Broome has worked out well and to be honest everybody expected more from Traore and Westry. Sadly while Traore has some talent it needs development and sadly Westry got hurt. With the Westry and Traore we expected this would be a very good team without them Bruce has to coach his backend off. 

The issue I've had is less to do with his current coaching (though I do think he should be instilling way more discipline on the offensive side with KD, WG, and Flan at times), but with his talent evaluation and commitment to the current core of guards on this team. Even if Westry was healthy, I don't think he'd be helping as a sharpshooter zone buster that we would need, and we all knew Traore was a project coming in. But we had clear deficiencies at guard that came out in the last half of last season that were never truly addressed. WG has a tendency to react badly if you put him in certain situation, and he falls in love with deep iso 3's way too often. KD is a mess discipline wise on the offensive and defensive end that leads to either wasted posessions, turnovers, or him being out of position. Flan has had trouble consistently producing at the level we need him to be at. We needed real guard help and it was out there to go and get.

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,662]

30 minutes ago, AuburnNTexas said:

I know some people are upset with the way Bruce is coaching. I think he has actually done a decent job with the talent he has. This year he has used the zone more than any other time  since he has been at Auburn. The zone hides some of our players one on one weaknesses on Defense. He probably should have tried it in 1st half against A&M as it initially caused them some issues in the second half.  The Problem with the zone is if the other team has a big like marble who can hit the Mid-range jump shot the zone falls apart. 

The real issue is the overall talent level of this team and their basketball IQ.  Broome is a talented Center and Williams is a talented forward, Greene is a decent to solid PG after that there is a talent drop off especially since Moore got hurt. The basketball IQ is in certain things I have seen. When other teams press Green others don't react to help him.  To much reaching on D out front instead of moving feet to keep player in front of you. To many bad passes because they don't see the whole floor. 

Prior to this game on offense Flan seemed to be willing to pull up and take solid mid-range shots he didn't force things last few games he was scoring gust under or just over double figures while hitting around 50%. In this game he insisted on getting in among the trees where he had to try and score over the trees his shooting % tanked because of that.

I remember Harper or Brown after a long rebound or steal taking off and depending on defender go to rack and scoring or pulling up and hit an open 3.  Our current players if they pull up to shoot a 3 on a break probably won't hit it and if they go to the rack they will miss, get it blocked, get called for a charge, or get stripped way to often.

Bruce tried to address some of the issues we saw  at end of last year.  He brought in Broome, Traore, and Westry.  Broome has worked out well and to be honest everybody expected more from Traore and Westry. Sadly while Traore has some talent it needs development and sadly Westry got hurt. With the Westry and Traore we expected this would be a very good team without them Bruce has to coach his backend off. 

I think their defensive coaching has been great. I think their general laissez-faire offensive philosophy is just biting them. The guys who are the decision makers in this system shouldn’t have the  free reign to do what they do, it’s just that simple. The difficulty comes in the fact that they’d have to shift what they’ve done for almost a decade - a scheme that works when he gets the talent at the guard spot that he hasn’t had often in the past 4 years. It just feels very inflexible 

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,662]

“Irregardless” of the constraints, after Davion Mitchell’s class, we’ve gotten much more Jvons, Tyrells, Jamal Johnson’s, guys that could probably score but had no business being asked to play extended PG minutes. Jvon did a decent job there, just wasn’t consistent…the other two though 

point being, were like 2:1 with project pieces at point guard to actual point point guards since 2018 Which wouldn’t matter if we didn’t run a system that basically gives the point guards absolute autonomy 

Edited January 26, 2023 by Dual-Threat Rigby

[Scottie 124]

3 minutes ago, Dual-Threat Rigby said:

I think their defensive coaching has been great. I think their general laissez-faire offensive philosophy is just biting them. The guys who are the decision makers in this system shouldn’t have the  free reign to do what they do, it’s just that simple. The difficulty comes in the fact that they’d have to shift what they’ve done for almost a decade - a scheme that works when he gets the talent at the guard spot that he hasn’t had often in the past 4 years. It just feels very inflexible 

This is where my frustration comes in the most. I spend a lot of the time questioning hero ball/Curry shots when the games aren't going their way. It is a desperate attempt to make a statement that consistently falls flat this year, and that is because either the basketball iq or talent isn't there (yet). I'm not going to bash individual players; overall the % of 3's made over the years has decreased. Some players this year are seeing over a 10% drop in efficiency. 

[Dual-Threat Rigby 8,662]

29 minutes ago, Scottie said:

This is where my frustration comes in the most. I spend a lot of the time questioning hero ball/Curry shots when the games aren't going their way. It is a desperate attempt to make a statement that consistently falls flat this year, and that is because either the basketball iq or talent isn't there (yet). I'm not going to bash individual players; overall the % of 3's made over the years has decreased. Some players this year are seeing over a 10% drop in efficiency. 

To me it just hard caps what we can be, no matter how good the front court is. I mean we had two all Americans, one of which looks like arguably the NBA ROTY,  and basically looked hapless for most of March (and some of February). If you can’t figure out any way to amplify that, then I simply just don’t think we can overcome bad guards. And it doesn’t even really take “bad” from all guards. In the two years this core has existed, we’ve gotten good Wendell and Flanigan and almost lost cause of the other guys just existing (Miss St a couple weeks ago comes to mind). 
 

Dissertations aside, I don’t think you should just be unable to really contend for a championship if your front court is amazing but you rolled out a stable of mediocrity in the back court. We aren’t even looking competitive in the last few matchups where our guards got really exploited (basically every loss except USC since last March) 

[Scottie 124]

11 minutes ago, Dual-Threat Rigby said:

Dissertations aside, I don’t think you should just be unable to really contend for a championship if your front court is amazing but you rolled out a stable of mediocrity in the back court. We aren’t even looking competitive in the last few matchups where our guards got really exploited (basically every loss except USC since last March) 

Fair point. This is a perfect storm of past issues all being present within the same team without all stars being able to stem the flow.

[milehighfan 1,240]

From what I can see all you have to do is run some kind of trapping defense on them... anywhere or anytime.

[AUinMS9528 1,086]

19 hours ago, ArgoEagle said:

We had 2 last year. They are both in the NBA now.. We had Harper & Bryce a few years ago. It is not unheard of and we have had both very recently.

That just gave me a thought….

Could you imagine if we had Jared and Bryce, and Walker and Jabari all at the same time?   Throw in Okeke or Okoro at the 3 just for fun!   Man, that would be an unstoppable lineup!!!!!!

Maybe we can put together a lineup like that (meaning top level guys at all 5 positions) in the future.   🤞🤞🤞🙏🙏🙏

[JuscAUse! 1,404]

1 hour ago, AUinMS9528 said:

That just gave me a thought….

Could you imagine if we had Jared and Bryce, and Walker and Jabari all at the same time?   Throw in Okeke or Okoro at the 3 just for fun!   Man, that would be an unstoppable lineup!!!!!!

Maybe we can put together a lineup like that (meaning top level guys at all 5 positions) in the future.   🤞🤞🤞🙏🙏🙏

You actually can have too many top level guys at each position. We need one player that is money from the outside and a little more basketball IQ from those already here and we'd be a tough out. We have enough shooters to compliment a Bryce or Jabari type player. Just my opinion.

 

[AUGoo 2,659]

19 hours ago, KansasTiger said:

Traore was a project coming in

I think I remember hearing that Traore was the second highest rated player we've ever recruited to AU.

If true, I don't consider that a project.

[KansasTiger 3,248]

4 minutes ago, AUGoo said:

I think I remember hearing that Traore was the second highest rated player we've ever recruited to AU.

If true, I don't consider that a project.

That's interesting. Cause I remember hearing he was talented, but raw. So I assumed that meant he needed development. Regardless, that doesn't take away from the larger point I was trying to make. BP's talent evaluation and priority on which players to go after was lacking in many instances. This team would have been better served if he had focused on getting some guard talent over bringing in Traore. Maybe Traore can make an impact in the future and be worth the investment, but this team this year was always going to suffer unless he magically turned into Jabari Smith.

[ArgoEagle 1,771]

4 hours ago, AUinMS9528 said:

That just gave me a thought….

Could you imagine if we had Jared and Bryce, and Walker and Jabari all at the same time?   Throw in Okeke or Okoro at the 3 just for fun!   Man, that would be an unstoppable lineup!!!!!!

Maybe we can put together a lineup like that (meaning top level guys at all 5 positions) in the future.   🤞🤞🤞🙏🙏🙏

It is not out of the question..I just think Treore has a lot of developing to do and we just don't know much about Westry BC he been injured basically all year... We should be due for a way better upcoming class this year..

[Tiger 8,818]

Scoot Henderson should be our PG right now.

Wendell was a last minute emergency plug in I'm sure Bruce is as frustrated with the PG play at times as the rest of us. I'm just ready for the Aden Holloway era.

That doesn't mean Wendell is trash or anything he's just limited. I trust Bruce is getting the most out of him because he turned J'Von McCormick into a viable SEC starter and he came out of literally nowhere. To be honest with the right breaks this team could still get to a Sweet 16 IMO. We just gotta get a little lucky and hope we get matched up with smaller guards. And avoid that 8/9 seed.

It's not my expectation that the team gets there but it's still the team's ceiling if all things break right

[Butthead 525]

Todays game is offensive efficiency. Sure you have to play D but it’s not as important as scoring. And we ain’t efficient. 

[GreenTiger 1,005]

Just lacking in talent this year. I’m a little surprised like others that we are in this position. Hopefully we will improve