Dejulius, Castleton, Nunez appear far away from the rotation. Rotation is going to stick to 8, at least until Johns can be trusted enough to play.
Freshman + Baird outscored 8-0 in last 3 minutes of play. 36.7% shooting, 6/26 from three, and 45% from the line against Norfolk State portends a scary future for this team offense.
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Poole 0-5, three turnovers tonite.
Livers and Brooks looked great.
Surprised how much better Livers ball handling and attack off the dribble seems. Also very impressed with Brooksā defense.
Matthews seemed frustrated. He made a lot of bad decisionsā¦Just trying to force it too much to tonight.
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Thereās going to be some growing pains with JP Iām sure!
Poole really showed some flashes though. He had some nice finds.
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I actually was very happy with Poole. The box score aside, he played with maturity, unselfishness, and just seemed composed and a leader out there. Couldnāt care less what the box score says, I feel he really grew in the off-season.
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The only performance I was disappointed in was Matthews. Not because he missed shots but because he seemed to be forcing things. He dribbled into pressure a lotā¦
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I agree on both. Brooks looks better than Simpson right now, at least offensively. Livers does so many things well, so versatile.
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Someone needs to get this team to grab rebounds with two hands.
Tonightās stars:
1 Livers
2 Teske
3 Brooks
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Really hope they get things figured out at the free throw line. This team wonāt be able to give away points and win consistently like they did last season. In particular with Matthews, you have to think that nba scouts told Him that is one of the things heās really going to have to fix if heās going to get to the next level.
Good:
-Everything Isaiah Livers did. He had two blocks, two threes, ran the break, threw a few good passes. Great game.
-Eli Brooks showing up and knocking down a few threes, handling some ball duties well.
-Teskeās overall activity level, Pooleās vastly improved vision and ability to create for others, X putting in a pretty standard X game, overall defensive performance, regardless of competition
Bad:
-Matthews and especially Ignasās entire offensive performance. Ignas looked like he was doing way too much, and Matthews still has bizarre moments of indecision when he gets the ball.
-I am still utterly perplexed by Teskeās inability to finish at his size. I loved when Poole threw an alley oop too high for him because he forgot Teske doesnāt jump
-Free throw shooting still disgusting
-While Poole impressed with his ability to handle the burden of having the ball much more, and creating for others, he struggled to get his own offense.
Overall hard to take much other than if you were hoping to have them put your concerns about shooting (3ās and FTās) at bay, they certainly did not accomplish that.
Not gonna lie Iām worried about this team. They struggled shooting against what may be the worst team we play all year. The speed of the games are only going to increase from this, and they canāt shoot free throws or jump shots. Livers and Brooks shoot well but when other teams play them they will have more size, length and athleticism to contest shots better or keep them from shooting altogether. Defense looked great and I feel like that will largely translate to other teams, but we are going to struggle to score and against the best BIG teams and the top non conference teams like Nova and UNC, good offense will trump good defense. We will see how the season pans out. Hopefully a NCAA tourney run and we beat our main conference rivals.
Also, if anyone watched Indiana, what were your thoughts? They looked good to me. Bad team that they played of course, but they got talent. Romeo Langford is the truth. Wouldnāt be shocked if he contends for BIG Player of the year. Doubt heād win over Happ and Edwards but wouldnāt be shocked if he was in the running.
The shooting was abysmal outside of Livers/Brooks. Brooks would have had 3 more assists if folks had canned some of the wide open looks he fed them on.
Livers played beyond my expectation. Freshman other than Iggy are not ready. we are pretty much set on the 8-men rotation for the season, with Johns goes in occasionally.
I withhold my judgment until more info is available.
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Just got a chance to watch it. If Livers comes in as a 6th man supersub and JB can manage the bad decisions/swings from CM and Iggy that will be big. Teske so active and aware. Heās so good with using his body to shade his man away from the play. Jordan and Iggy will mostly have better shooting/scoring nights but definitely werenāt on tonight. My biggest fear for this team is Charles playing hero ball at times thinking about improving his draft position. But boy can he sky.
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