Got that confirmed, and he did look a tad sluggish Tuesday. Hopefully he'll back to his old self Saturday --- need him to help check VaTech's shot-happy Guards.
Quick stuff (Cuse game 2)...
- Thread starter gary-7
- Start date
Now you've made me nervous.
The Elliot-in-the-middle was new. Unfortunately, everybody knows to expect it now. Will it work with people expecting it? I'm assuming we'll practice it and get better at passing to EC.
Or is that something you only use against zone?
Harrison or Withers could also play that role from time to time. Withers' passing is underrated.
Brice Johnson was so good in that role. He tore up Syracuse finding the soft spot of their zone.
Yes but cuse was rolling, red hot shooting you can play all day when that kicks in. That is hard to describe, I mean you understand it if you have gone thru it but it is hard to describe.
Keep in mind, that was just for that Syracuse zone, isn't like we are going against a ton of zones and when we have so far this season we have attacked it well. I would have much preferred Ingram to step in to the middle of that zone because it is a similar action when he backs guys down and decides to either pass to a open guy or shoot it. I may be wrong but I believe that is how we had attacked zones before cuse, using Ingram in the middle, I want to say Jwit has a couple times as well. Cadeau for me is the guy I prefer to be passing it to the guy in the middle of the zone rather than the guy catching it in the middle. Maybe their guard would not have stolen the ball 5 times on us.
I totally get the in a groove feeling as opposed to having a rough day feeling like it's a grind on the court type game, but in this particular game our guys were not struggling for looks or scores, weren't pressured, and played thier normal minutes (other then Cormac). They all have been acclimated to 30 plus. I have a hard time with the tired legs for this particular game.
Syracuse usually goes much deeper, but had 4 guys play substantially more minutes, and 2 slightly more. I think it was more that they had a chance to win as the game progressed, and Coach Red was going to ride thier best 5/6 and take his chances with them on the floor.
All I know is that what I see from us appears to be physical and mental tiredness.
AJ nails it, imo. Tired mistakes by some. Just plain tired for others. Play the bench. RJ needs that.
Fatigue is a factor of both physical and mental stresses, these stresses are cumulative. Want to be more specific as to why did it showed so much for this Syracuse game, OK, let's go there. Keeping in mind these stresses are cumulative let's set the stage by realizing that this UNC team has played a LOT on the road this season, find me another top 50 program that has played as many road games that doesn't look like they are off their game from earlier season. EVERY TEAM we play is going to give us their best shot, we may not get up for every game but when we play duke effort for either team is rarely a question but every team that plays us, every team that plays duke gets that other teams best shot. Imagine just you as a fan and we playing duke every week and feel the same intensity we now do for a duke game, we fans would be mentally worn down over time.
Yeah but this Syracuse game, why, getting to it, just setting the stage. This goes back to the duke game, we had played a long series of road games and then we had duke at Chapel Hill. No matter which campus we play that game is always a pressure cooker, the intensity is always strong. No matter which team wins, after that game the players are drained, the players, some are happy other really sad but they are all worn out. But then, after all the celebration of the duke win, we get Clemson on a 3 day turn around at our place, a good Clemson team, a team we beat for a Quad 1 win and we embarassed them at their place, they were expected to lose, the pressure was on UNC to win that game, Clemson had nothing to lose. So we take that loss and go to Miami, we were not nearly as sharp as we were for duke vs Clemson, we were even less so vs Miami but we stole one. Yet then on another 3 day turn around go to Syracuse, realize on these 3 day turn around games you lose a day of rest, hard on a tired team that has not had an open date since when? Last open date was the week that began after the UConn game dec 6th, we didn't play again until we played Ky 12/16, oh joy, we got to play Ky in Kat-lanta (looked like a KY home game at Rupp), no stress there right.
So on a 3 day turn from having to play in Miami we have to go to Syracuse on limited rest and don't forget we lost the guy I consider to be our 6th starter in Seth, lost his defensive presence. So this team that has been relying heavy on 4 guards is down to 3, worn down team that loses it's 6th man, not good. We put so much effort, mentally and physically in that duke game and we lose to Clemson, stagger thru Miami, and lose to Syracuse. Now we have this @ VT game and at last we have an open date so they can not just get some rest but they can get some tweeks worked in to help some of the approaches we have seen of late. This is exactly why you play your bench ALL SEASON, and I have 1 more point to make on this.
Hubert, bless his heart, just when I start to feel he is done shooting himself in the foot, he re-loads and does it again? Dives me nutzs, look at the second half vs Syracuse (I am for this reply talking about fatigue), sure you have RJ and Ryan playing huge minutes all game our big men? First half we had decent sub in time for Jalen and Jwit and at least my opinion is they gave us good minutes in that first half. But second half is a far different story but for maybe less than a minute Jalen got in while they had to work on Bacot's leg but was pulled very quickly. Other than that Jalen/JWit/High/konkwo DID NOT PLAY? You play the first half and yeah, you can be a bit tired but you have the half to rest, good rest time for an athlete like these but second half they got no rest, Ryan got none for the game. Why in the world you would give your starters rest in the first half but not the second is beyond me. Is it any wonder we have not closed out well recently, is it any wonder we look fatigued?
OK, I see you think the Syracuse game was different then what we and every team has dealt with at this point of the year. We lost, so it couldn't have hurt the end result to switch from our norm.
Today good win @ home, used the same minute distribution as have all year, same as the Cuse game, except Withers got his 8 - 12, so Cormac was back to his 32. Been very consistent all year.
Mando 30, Ingram 36, RJ 36, Cormac 32, Cadeau 23 splitting with Trimble ( back from concussion).
I get that you prefer around 25 minutes for everyone max, I prefer the best players do not sit a smidgen under 40% of the game doing that. I think we got beat on the road, and fatigue played as much as a factor in that particular game as the others we have won or lost all year with that usage.
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I don't believe todays game had us travel as far south as UNC plays in conference games (Miami) or as far north as UNC plays in conference games both on 3 day turn arounds. Fatigue is cumulative, simply look at how many away games we have played since our last open date.
I believe in using a deep bench, always have and always will, clearly you prefer more of a Iron Man look, on that we will never agree. IN a 40min game I want my guys to have the fresher legs because I know what players on tired legs do and it isn't often good. But hey, you do you, I am good with what I believe. LOL
Yeah, good win today, badly needed win at home, yet we still gave up 81points to a team that just is not a great shooting team. We were up 11 at the half and won by 15, means we won the second half by 4pts, even with all their big men in serious foul trouble to the extent they stopped guarding and gave basically token defense inside the paint. It was not that long ago this very same team was holding teams to less than 70pts for a nice run of games and today we gave up 81 to a weak VT team in our house. We badly needed this open date, we have UVa next and we all know how they defend, we can't give them 81 and hope to win at UVa.
I think we differ on what an "iron 5" usage is. The bench usage this year is very normal in my opinion. 25 or so minute caps to preserve legs for the top players seems more extreme, out of the norm to me.
Different strokes for different folks. I like hearing the different view points. In any event I think Hubert has been very consistent once we arrived at conference play. He has his main 8 rotation, and the minutes have been doled out pretty consistently with or without foul issues in games. Withers being the guy with the most variance game to game.
Every team is different but I have always believe that a program like UNC is always going to have talent deeper than just the starters, especially now that we have the portal to fil in the blanks that graduation classes used to give us. I believe your bench today has a lot of tomorrow's starters. I believe the season is really long and road games take a lot out of you making using your bench even more important. I know that a Bacot getting 25mins a game is more of a weapon late in a half than a Bacot having to play near 40, same is true for all our guys. But I as well do believe that when a guy has a good heater going on you stay with him until he cools down before you take him out. I stay with the hot hand but Iron Man is not about staying with the hot hand, to often it is more about hoping one of our Iron Men can get heated up.
Using a deep bench for me is like buying life insurance, you don't like buying it but you know you want it there if the worst happens. If any of our stares finds foul trouble or got forbid injury, you have to be able to absorb that and not have a huge drop off. Tired players tend to pick up more fouls, tired players are more susceptible to injury, things I prefer we not risk by not having guys at the ready to step in. They get ready by playing, not just garbage minutes. JWit for example, his issue is he tends to often to rush things trying to show that he belongs in the game and it does not go well. He actually gets decent minutes for how he has played, I think he would play better if he had more minutes that he could settle in to. Seth, last season, few minutes, should have been more, look how he has helped us this season with his increased minutes, JWash looks like a every game double digit scorer with decent minutes. High may not be ready for huge minutes but he still needs some minutes every game, he may be called on for big minutes next season. I would even get Konkwo a minute or 2 every game.
A program like UNC will have a great a bench only if they create it, it is not a lack of talent, it is a lack of development if our bench is looked at as weak. We just played VT, Nickel lived on our bench last season, telling me that we could not have used his jump shooting more last season? Styles, on our bench last season and starts for GTown, Dunn getting strong minutes, even McKoy. Yet we go Iron man 5 and if he was healthy Puff as the 6th man? Made no sense...
For me Seth could not shoot a lick last year, or he would have got more minutes. I do believe he is one that improved his lacking area enough in the off season to earn the floor time. Still work to do there, but trending in the right direction.
Nickles got some minutes as a freshman, could have competed for rotational minutes this year. The others you mentioned are getting playing time on really bad teams. I do not think they would of earned those minutes in the top 8 rotation here on a competitive top 1 -3 type seed squad.
90% of good teams do not go consistently past 8 in thier regular rotation. A couple spot minute type guys, when needed, sporadically past that. Virginia is one that does this year, they have been mediocre for the season though, but on the upswing, maybe they found thier core. Houston goes deep, not sure if I know of another, for what I would consider deep usage.
Seth is my guy, he is my favored player on this team so I am not inclined to say things bad about his play but it doesn't seem to me his confidence in his jump shot is much more than was there last season, he is really shy to take it, passed up several yesterday. To me, Styles and JWit are basically the same players, neither put the ball on the floor well, both very athletic and both can jump shoot better than is expected but don't show that much. Wit is 7 or 8 in our rotation? Dunn actually showed us last season that he could help us as a shooter, as for Nickel, he hit some nice jumpers for us early but his minutes vanished, his minutes should not have vanished and Dunn & Styles needed more minutes. My opinion of course.
As for minutes, a bit of a carry over from our discussing this on another thread but you have to understand, it isn't just me calling for a limit on minutes for our starters. It is a way I want us to play, the start of this season it seemed the way Hubert wanted this team to play, rip down the board and get out in to our breaks, push push push tempo. I want that married to more pressure on the defensive end, I want switching from full court pressure trapping to token pressure but never give the other team the ability to walk the ball up court. It is a lot, to much actually to ask from a kid to doing all the work to get an open look on offense, to get out on the breaks, and then stay with your man step for step defensively, that requires fresh legs. It all ties together, to get one you kinda do need to do the other.
