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Quick stuff (Auburn game)...

gary-7

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Jan 27, 2003
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....and this is important for everyone to read.

For real, I'm dog-tired but this needs to be said, so please pay attention:

- Start right here: If you haven't done so, please read my scouting report on Auburn in last night's analysis. What they can put on the floor right now is, quite simply, the most complete team in the country. They are better than KU, bama, Zags, dook,uk, name it. Please don't bother arguing, because if you do, you will be wrong. I'm not saying this because of my Auburn connections --- I was pulling for UNC as hard as I could --- just stating fact. Granted, they could very well lose tomorrow --- they are, after all, undisciplined (an achilles heel of Pearl teams) --- but make no mistake as to what they have.

- So... the reason I'm leading with this is to give y'all some perspective. 1) They are very good and played very well. 2) We did not. Thus, please spare me the "woe is us" nonsense. We aren't doomed, we're just not there yet.

With that out front, let's get into some analysis:

- Let me start by giving credit where due --- this was a generally well-officiated game. Refreshing to have a solid crew, so no complaints there.

- I told you that Broome was a stud, and he started out just being ridiculous (he ain't normally THAT good), but we adjusted and contained him in the second half. Trouble is, their other weapons came thru when they needed them.

Negatives:
- Hubert, please do NOT change your inbound scheme just because an opponent pressures. That was a coaching mistake.
- Ian, take your blinders off. When you get bogged down, look for your teammates
- Ball-movement in general --- long before things got desperate the ball was sticking to one side. REVERSE it!
- We've got to get JWash in a more aggressive and confident mindset on offense. He's too good of a shooter to be hesitant,, and misses are ensuing.
- We uncharacteristically missed too many FTs
- While we had some success driving off of it, we did not attack Pearl's 1-1-3 Zone as smoothly as we should have

Positives:
- Back to my scouting report --- We defended their Flex-cut action very well and only gave up one bucket off of it. And we often forced them into long 3 looks. Trouble is, they made a lot of those.
- We kept fighting amidst a lack-luster performance
- FINALLY!!! We saw some scramble!!! That's right, 43 reared its head and dadgummit, it worked!!! Three possessions of 43 resulting in a forced timeout, a stop, and a turnover. PLEASE Hubert... don't wait for desperation time. This team needs to be multiple!

Anyway, here's the deal: FLUSH this game and move on. In fact, in many ways tomorrow's game vs Mich St is the most important of this young season [edit] This is a challenge for us to get back on track that can set the tone --- good or bad --- for the rest of the season. Players and staff --- time to get after it with both barrels, no matter what sort of zebra crew we draw... 😡
 
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....and this is important for everyone to read.

For real, I'm dog-tired but this needs to be said, so please pay attention:

- Start right here: If you haven't done so, please read my scouting report on Auburn in last night's analysis. What they can put on the floor right now is, quite simply, the most complete team in the country. They are better than KU, bama, Zags, dook,uk, name it. Please don't bother arguing, because if you do, you will be wrong. I'm not saying this because of my Auburn connections --- I was pulling for UNC as hard as I could --- just stating fact. Granted, they could very well lose tomorrow --- they are, after all, undisciplined (an achilles heel of Pearl teams) --- but make no mistake as to what they have.

- So... the reason I'm leading with this is to give y'all some perspective. 1) They are very good and played very well. 2) We did not. Thus, please spare me the "woe is us" nonsense. We aren't doomed, we're just not there yet.

With that out front, let's get into some analysis:

- Let me start by giving credit where due --- this was a generally well-officiated game. Refreshing to have a solid crew, so no complaints there.

- I told you that Broome was a stud, and he started out just being ridiculous (he ain't normally THAT good), but we adjusted and contained him in the second half. Trouble is, their other weapons came thru when they needed them.

Negatives:
- Hubert, please do NOT change your inbound scheme just because an opponent pressures. That was a coaching mistake.
- Ian, take your blinders off. When you get bogged down, look for your teammates
- Ball-movement in general --- long before things got desperate the ball was sticking to one side. REVERSE it!
- We've got to get JWash in a more aggressive and confident mindset on offense. He's too good of a shooter to be hesitant,, and misses are ensuing.
- We uncharacteristically missed too many FTs
- While we had some success driving off of it, we did not attack Pearl's 1-1-3 Zone as smoothly as we should have

Positives:
- Back to my scouting report --- We defended their Flex-cut action very well and only gave up one bucket off of it. And we often forced them into long 3 looks. Trouble is, they made a lot of those.
- We kept fighting amidst a lack-luster performance
- FINALLY!!! We saw some scramble!!! That's right, 43 reared its head and dadgummit, it worked!!! Three possessions of 43 resulting in a forced timeout, a stop, and a turnover. PLEASE Hubert... don't wait for desperation time. This team needs to be multiple!

Anyway, here's the deal: FLUSH this game and move on. In fact, in many ways tomorrow's game vs Mich St is the most important of this young season [edit] This is a challenge for us to get back on track that can set the tone --- good or bad --- for the rest of the season. Players and staff --- time to get after it with both barrels, no matter what sort of zebra crew we draw... 😡
Excellent analysis. It will be big to get JWash going to create some balance offensively. Thanks gary-7.
 
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Washington and Withers aren’t Carolina level starters. That’s the bottom line. The coaching staff gets an F- in the transfer portal this offseason. Absolutely pathetic. Love our great shooter Cade Tyson. 1 minute against Dayton and 2 minutes last night. Winning big is no longer important to this University. It’s only going to get worse. Recruiting is beyond pathetic right now.
 
Washington and Withers make guys like Ed Davis and Tony Bradley look like Joel Embiid and those were backups on championship teams. I still cant fathom how those 2 are the best big men we could put on the court
 
Washington and Withers aren’t Carolina level starters. That’s the bottom line. The coaching staff gets an F- in the transfer portal this offseason. Absolutely pathetic. Love our great shooter Cade Tyson. 1 minute against Dayton and 2 minutes last night. Winning big is no longer important to this University. It’s only going to get worse. Recruiting is beyond pathetic right now.
Couldn't agree more on the portal comment. Absolute FUMBLE of a portal season we had. It truly is insane to me. Like you said, Washington and Withers simply cannot start right now, they just can't. It's so discouraging. Auburn is a GREAT team, but the Heels should be competing better than that. I would just love to see them put an entire game together, just one.
 
This was arguably JWash's worst game of the season. I don't want to read too much into that, but I'm beginning to worry that he won't ever get where we hoped he'd be. He's a fine shooter and decent rebounder, but the questions we all had about him were strength and stamina. The answers so far on those 2 measures are not encouraging.

JWit continues to be inconsistent. Some games he looks good, some not. Is he better starting or coming off the bench? My sense is he's better starting, but might need a shorter leash.

OTOH, Lubin seems to be getting more comfortable. Is he good enough to be getting more minutes, and maybe even starting? I'm inclined to think so, but maybe his game has some shortcomings I'm missing.
 
Going into the MSU game, we have dropped to 293 on team height (based on minutes played, not roster average). With Seth becoming a star and with our freshmen getting better and better, it's easy to see why.

If we're going to play a lot of small ball, should we be committing to that? And should we be pressing more?
 
Washington and Withers aren’t Carolina level starters. That’s the bottom line. The coaching staff gets an F- in the transfer portal this offseason. Absolutely pathetic. Love our great shooter Cade Tyson. 1 minute against Dayton and 2 minutes last night. Winning big is no longer important to this University. It’s only going to get worse. Recruiting is beyond pathetic right now.
And it's not getting better anytime soon
 
So far, Hubert has started the same 5 guys all 6 games. Would you change that? If so, how?

Elliot
RJ
Seth
JWit
JWash

How about starting Lubin at the 5 and moving JWash to the 4?

Or starting Drake at the 4 and Lubin at the 5?
 
And it's not getting better anytime soon
Is it money, or is UNC less appealing to bigs these days?

To be fair, the difficulty getting top bigs didn't start with Hubert. It started when UNC was under the NCAA cloud. Now further complicated by NIL.

Hubert needs to break that slide. But how?

I worry that if Hubert can't show he knows what to do with bigs, it will only get harder to attract them.
 
Going into the MSU game, we have dropped to 293 on team height (based on minutes played, not roster average). With Seth becoming a star and with our freshmen getting better and better, it's easy to see why.

If we're going to play a lot of small ball, should we be committing to that? And should we be pressing more?

Where do you find the team height rankings data? Thanks in advance
 
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