Gwmayhem wrote:

The real shame of the K State loss was that because GW hadn't played anyone who remotely resembled K State with respect to size, speed or athleticism up until this game, they spent the first half a bit shell-shocked by the opponent.  During the second half, they realized that Kansas State may have been a bit more talented but not demonstrably so, and they played a lot more like themselves.  Had they been better prepared mentally to start that game, it's not unreasonable to think that GW could have pulled off the upset.

Alternatively, had they played someone remotely close to Kansas State they could have lost that game and still lost to Kansas State. They were mentally prepared. Just couldn't hit a shot in the first half. Shots started falling in the 2nd half and they made a comeback. Let's not over-complicate things. They realized they could play with Kansas State in the first half - just didn't make shots.

They missed 8 layups in the first half according to the running play-by-play of the game.  Five of these came in the game's first 6 minutes.  They had missed 6 layups before successfully making their first one.  I get that many of these are contested but that feeds into my point even more.  They were likely a bit intimidated to start the game and as DMVPiranha correctly points out, were rattled by K State's defense.  

8 missed layups is not quite the same thing as "missing shots."

Getting the games scheduled, even if were ready (are we?) is very difficult in today's NCAA

Took Mark Few and Gonzaga forever to get into these Tier 1 Top Shelf tourneys and a few juggernauts, even as with Elite 8 trips etc.   They play Kentucky UCONN and UCLA in the next 2 weeks, already having banked 5 Quad 1 and Quad 2 wins 8 games into the season, and ranked #3 in the NET

If CC aspires to be something like that and who wouldn't want that, its going to take a long time, to even get those kind of teams on the schedule.

 

How about instead of thinking we should have upset Kansas State. we win at American on Wednesday night.  Last two times (12/10/22 and 11/12/19) we played AU it was at the Smith Center and we lost both times.
When we start winning easily at American and at Old Dominion (Saturday) we can go back to complaining about the weak schedule.  

GW73 wrote:

How about instead of thinking we should have upset Kansas State. we win at American on Wednesday night.  Last two times (12/10/22 and 11/12/19) we played AU it was at the Smith Center and we lost both times.
When we start winning easily at American and at Old Dominion (Saturday) we can go back to complaining about the weak schedule.  

This really misses the point.  First, are the two mutually exclusive?  Second, my post had far more to do with the team's lack of confidence to start the game against K State than it did the OOC schedule.  Simply playing a P5 program, something that GW has done less and less with each passing year, could have been enough on its own to get inside the minds of our players.  Of course this can't be proven as a fact, but it's more than reasonable to conclude that when a team misses 5 layups in the game's first 6 minutes and 8 by halftime, they might feel a bit intimidated, nervous, or both.  Which is what was the shame as I don't feel that GW's team was significantly worse than K State's team.  A more confident first half may easily have resulted in a different outcome.  That, too, does not mean we SHOULD have pulled the upset.  It is to say that the upset would have been well within the team's reach. 

Gwmayhem wrote:

GW73 wrote:

How about instead of thinking we should have upset Kansas State. we win at American on Wednesday night.  Last two times (12/10/22 and 11/12/19) we played AU it was at the Smith Center and we lost both times.
When we start winning easily at American and at Old Dominion (Saturday) we can go back to complaining about the weak schedule.  

This really misses the point.  First, are the two mutually exclusive?  Second, my post had far more to do with the team's lack of confidence to start the game against K State than it did the OOC schedule.  Simply playing a P5 program, something that GW has done less and less with each passing year, could have been enough on its own to get inside the minds of our players.  Of course this can't be proven as a fact, but it's more than reasonable to conclude that when a team misses 5 layups in the game's first 6 minutes and 8 by halftime, they might feel a bit intimidated, nervous, or both.  Which is what was the shame as I don't feel that GW's team was significantly worse than K State's team.  A more confident first half may easily have resulted in a different outcome.  That, too, does not mean we SHOULD have pulled the upset.  It is to say that the upset would have been well within the team's reach. 

 If missing layups (or shots) early were primarily the result of being unprepared or nerves, you could argue that was the case against Mercyhurst where we scored 9 points in the first 10 minutes. But nobody argued that. Wonder  why?

GWRising wrote:

Gwmayhem wrote:

GW73 wrote:

How about instead of thinking we should have upset Kansas State. we win at American on Wednesday night.  Last two times (12/10/22 and 11/12/19) we played AU it was at the Smith Center and we lost both times.
When we start winning easily at American and at Old Dominion (Saturday) we can go back to complaining about the weak schedule.  

This really misses the point.  First, are the two mutually exclusive?  Second, my post had far more to do with the team's lack of confidence to start the game against K State than it did the OOC schedule.  Simply playing a P5 program, something that GW has done less and less with each passing year, could have been enough on its own to get inside the minds of our players.  Of course this can't be proven as a fact, but it's more than reasonable to conclude that when a team misses 5 layups in the game's first 6 minutes and 8 by halftime, they might feel a bit intimidated, nervous, or both.  Which is what was the shame as I don't feel that GW's team was significantly worse than K State's team.  A more confident first half may easily have resulted in a different outcome.  That, too, does not mean we SHOULD have pulled the upset.  It is to say that the upset would have been well within the team's reach. 

 If missing layups (or shots) early were primarily the result of being unprepared or nerves, you could argue that was the case against Mercyhurst where we scored 9 points in the first 10 minutes. But nobody argued that. Wonder  why?

You don't think that starting off so slowly against Mercyhurst could be attributed to nerves, playing as a team in a real game for the first time?  Of course it can.  Wondering why nobody argued this?  Perhaps because GW won that game by 17!!!

My whole point in bringing this up was to say that GW lost the K State game primarily because of the nerves they experienced during the first half.  This, again, was a shame because the teams were closer in ability than the one sidedness of the first half would have indicated.  Why you're bringing Mercyhurst into this is anyone's guess.

Gwmayhem wrote:

GWRising wrote:

Gwmayhem wrote:

This really misses the point.  First, are the two mutually exclusive?  Second, my post had far more to do with the team's lack of confidence to start the game against K State than it did the OOC schedule.  Simply playing a P5 program, something that GW has done less and less with each passing year, could have been enough on its own to get inside the minds of our players.  Of course this can't be proven as a fact, but it's more than reasonable to conclude that when a team misses 5 layups in the game's first 6 minutes and 8 by halftime, they might feel a bit intimidated, nervous, or both.  Which is what was the shame as I don't feel that GW's team was significantly worse than K State's team.  A more confident first half may easily have resulted in a different outcome.  That, too, does not mean we SHOULD have pulled the upset.  It is to say that the upset would have been well within the team's reach. 

 If missing layups (or shots) early were primarily the result of being unprepared or nerves, you could argue that was the case against Mercyhurst where we scored 9 points in the first 10 minutes. But nobody argued that. Wonder  why?

You don't think that starting off so slowly against Mercyhurst could be attributed to nerves, playing as a team in a real game for the first time?  Of course it can.  Wondering why nobody argued this?  Perhaps because GW won that game by 17!!!

My whole point in bringing this up was to say that GW lost the K State game primarily because of the nerves they experienced during the first half.  This, again, was a shame because the teams were closer in ability than the one sidedness of the first half would have indicated.  Why you're bringing Mercyhurst into this is anyone's guess.

 I am bringing Mercyhurst into this because there are going to be periods when we don't play very well or shoot it well when there is no other explanation except that we aren't playing to our ability. There is no evidence that it was nerves versus Kansas State anymore than it was Mercyhurst. If it was primarily nerves, surely they would have made a ton of turnovers as well. That didn't happen either. One would also think that if it was primarily nerves then GW would have been blown out because they would have said at half down 19 that we can't play with these guys and would have had nothing to alleviate those nerves. Actually, what happened was they were mad that they were missing some good wide open looks and understood that if they kept playing hard they had a chance to get back into it. I don't  think it goes any deeper than 25% FG in 1st half to 48% FG in 2nd half. Finally, I have sources who would defnitely say if it was nerves. But if you want to continue to insist it was nerves be my guest. We had a bad half - it happens against opponents of all levels.

Last edited by GWRising (12/02/2024 6:04 pm)

Wisconsin Colonial 1974 wrote:

As I think I noted, what I saw in person in the VI is that we were initially unable to handle to K St’s size and speed but adjusted in the second half. Great comeback to get within 4, and then Hawkins hit a big 3. Never got any closer.

I continue to be concerned that our frequent switching on defense creates bad matchups. My observation about good defensive teams is that they usually fight over screens instead of switching.

 

I think switching everything, or at least switching 1 through 4, is modern basketball.  The ideal is to have enough versatile athletic guys out there to switch and guard everything without mismatches.

I will say, last year, teams could hunt Bishop or Max for mismatches, but this year it’s tougher.  Maybe teams can try to exploit Moss’ lack of size or get a quicker guy matched up on Drumgoooe or Autry, but there’s no one who is just a bad defensive player out there like the past few years.