.44caliberkiller
Well-known member
1. Edwards played a tighter rotation, as 7 players played the majority of the time. The problem was that yet again the minutes weren't allocated to the correct players. Gorski played 15 minutes, most of which game in the second half when UMKC made their run. Coincidence? I would argue that Gorski being a vacuum, and sucking up minutes and giving us nothing (0pts/1reb/0asst/0stl/0blk) in return was a major reason for our second half struggles. Adams should have seen a majority of those minutes, but for some reason Edwards doesn't like playing James and Adams at the same time. Edwards said in the post game interview Adams didn't play more because "James kinda had it going." He mentioned something earlier in the season about not liking playing those two together, but I thought he had backed off that stance and started playing them more together. I fail to see how having multiple players on the court who are play makers is a bad thing.
2. Dalton was also a major factor in our second half struggles. Time after time it seemed he would pass up a good shot and then end up forcing a bad shot. That seemed to be a trend in the second half as multiple guys failed to attempt wide open shots to later settle for bad shots, but Dalton was the main culprit as he did it several times. Maybe we're too hard on Dalton, but I think we have seen the type of player he can be and just get frustrated that he doesn't always play up to his capabilities.
3. So far on the season we are undefeated win James starts. 2-0 is nothing to be too excited about, but it's a wonder at what starting your best player can do. On the first possession of the game James hits his patented mid range jumper to give us the lead, a lead which we held for 39 minutes and 45 seconds. Maybe the Air Force game goes a little differently had he started. Not to rag on Edwards too much because "at the end of the day" I'm an Edwards supporter and I'm happy he is our head coach. But his rotations are darned frustrating at times.
4. Moemeka with a very solid performance (6pts/6reb). I'm not sure he will ever be more than a Derek Cooke Jr. on offense (i.e. limited to finishing at the rim), although he has shown some low posts moves in his limited action. But I think he has more basketball instincts than Cooke and he will be a force on the defensive end and quite possibly be a defensive player of the year candidate.
5. Say what you will about Lieberman but he played a fantastic game against UMKC. He was extremely efficient on offense, as he was 4/6 from the field with 7 assissts and only 1 turnover. And on defense he held their leading scorer to only 5pts on 1/12 shooting. Lieberman probably won't ever be a star but since the midway point of the season he has played winning basketball.
6. I thought that we played excellent defense for the most part. The one blemish to that is we gave up way too many offensive rebounds (16). Holding the opposing team to 34.4% from the field and 25% from three is marvelous, but when you consistently give up multiple shots per possession your opponent will eventually score. There are multiple problems preventing us from being a good rebounding team. First and the most obvious is that we're a very scrawny team, and quite a few teams can just push us around. Hopefully this gets addressed in the off-season and our guys put in the necessary work in the weight room. The second problem with our rebounding is that often times it feels like it's 3 on 5 fighting for the rebound. Lieberman/Mcmanamen/Gorski played a combined 72 minutes but they only collected 4 total rebounds. That is just unacceptable.
7. For the most part I thought we had a good offensive performance. We shot the ball very well 49% from the field, 43.5% from three, and 83.3% from the free throw line. I thought we were decent with a 18/13 assist to turnover ratio, however we did have several silly turnovers which seems to be our MO. I think at the pace we play, anything under 10 turnovers is acceptable and where we need to be at for next season to be an upper echelon MTN West team.
8. It was nice to see Naughton get some playing time. I thought he looked pretty good and I'm still optimistic he can be a very good player. I just wish that he had played more this season since we weren't a championship caliber team anyway, it would have been nice to play the young guys with high ceilings a little bit more. But now it seems like his progression has been stalled and he will begin next year not much more advanced than he was as a freshman.
9. I know some may not agree, but so far playing in the CBI has been a positive experience. We have got to play an extra 3 games and at the very least we didn't end our season with the Air Force debacle. Any Wyoming basketball win is a good thing, and so far we have gotten 2 more of those than I thought we would when I was sitting in the Thomas & Mac center staring at a 25-0 deficit.
2. Dalton was also a major factor in our second half struggles. Time after time it seemed he would pass up a good shot and then end up forcing a bad shot. That seemed to be a trend in the second half as multiple guys failed to attempt wide open shots to later settle for bad shots, but Dalton was the main culprit as he did it several times. Maybe we're too hard on Dalton, but I think we have seen the type of player he can be and just get frustrated that he doesn't always play up to his capabilities.
3. So far on the season we are undefeated win James starts. 2-0 is nothing to be too excited about, but it's a wonder at what starting your best player can do. On the first possession of the game James hits his patented mid range jumper to give us the lead, a lead which we held for 39 minutes and 45 seconds. Maybe the Air Force game goes a little differently had he started. Not to rag on Edwards too much because "at the end of the day" I'm an Edwards supporter and I'm happy he is our head coach. But his rotations are darned frustrating at times.
4. Moemeka with a very solid performance (6pts/6reb). I'm not sure he will ever be more than a Derek Cooke Jr. on offense (i.e. limited to finishing at the rim), although he has shown some low posts moves in his limited action. But I think he has more basketball instincts than Cooke and he will be a force on the defensive end and quite possibly be a defensive player of the year candidate.
5. Say what you will about Lieberman but he played a fantastic game against UMKC. He was extremely efficient on offense, as he was 4/6 from the field with 7 assissts and only 1 turnover. And on defense he held their leading scorer to only 5pts on 1/12 shooting. Lieberman probably won't ever be a star but since the midway point of the season he has played winning basketball.
6. I thought that we played excellent defense for the most part. The one blemish to that is we gave up way too many offensive rebounds (16). Holding the opposing team to 34.4% from the field and 25% from three is marvelous, but when you consistently give up multiple shots per possession your opponent will eventually score. There are multiple problems preventing us from being a good rebounding team. First and the most obvious is that we're a very scrawny team, and quite a few teams can just push us around. Hopefully this gets addressed in the off-season and our guys put in the necessary work in the weight room. The second problem with our rebounding is that often times it feels like it's 3 on 5 fighting for the rebound. Lieberman/Mcmanamen/Gorski played a combined 72 minutes but they only collected 4 total rebounds. That is just unacceptable.
7. For the most part I thought we had a good offensive performance. We shot the ball very well 49% from the field, 43.5% from three, and 83.3% from the free throw line. I thought we were decent with a 18/13 assist to turnover ratio, however we did have several silly turnovers which seems to be our MO. I think at the pace we play, anything under 10 turnovers is acceptable and where we need to be at for next season to be an upper echelon MTN West team.
8. It was nice to see Naughton get some playing time. I thought he looked pretty good and I'm still optimistic he can be a very good player. I just wish that he had played more this season since we weren't a championship caliber team anyway, it would have been nice to play the young guys with high ceilings a little bit more. But now it seems like his progression has been stalled and he will begin next year not much more advanced than he was as a freshman.
9. I know some may not agree, but so far playing in the CBI has been a positive experience. We have got to play an extra 3 games and at the very least we didn't end our season with the Air Force debacle. Any Wyoming basketball win is a good thing, and so far we have gotten 2 more of those than I thought we would when I was sitting in the Thomas & Mac center staring at a 25-0 deficit.
