jf wrote:

Glad Bishop.had a nice stat line as usual,while we are 1-5 against MEAC,Patriot League,CAA--prob School Without Walls in ascrimmage,etc.
Enjoyed the team play,especially at the end.
First half turned out to be an outlier and The Bishop Show returned to form.
You can see the frustration from JNJ,Battle,Maceo,etc.,waiting around to be involved. We are going to lose them for the year,if not for good.

First half, Jack starts and gives us a different look with JNJ providing spark off the bench. Second half, Jack gives up a 4-point play, travels on an open layup and gives up 22 on simple, repeated drives to the basket. Paar is Goss with leaden hands and cement shoes. Moyer's next gig is doing stunts in Three Stooges remakes. Our 3FG% Defense and PPG Allowed must be 325+. Blowing a 19-point lead at home at William & Mary. Wow.

WisconsinColonial wrote:

When we play man, we constantly switch on screens instead of fighting over them. This creates mismatches that I think resulted in a lot of their drives to the basket. They constantly beat us on drives.

Good observation and something you’d think we’d make adjustments to after multiple possessions with the same result.

Really and truly may have been the most surreal GW game I have ever seen.  In the first half, they finally started playing like the team we want to believe they can be.  Bishop was still getting shot attempts yet looked like a point guard that was trying to get his whole team involved.  Chase was finishing again and again down low.  Matt was active on both ends.  JNJ came off the bench and immediately made his presence felt.  Jamison was quiet at first but then went on a run of his own.  Maceo was providing well needed energy.  Sloan hit a couple of big 3's.    The final minute of the half was less than ideal, giving up a 4-0 run and as Squire correctly points out, not fouling when they absolutely should have.

And then came the second half.  The first thing I noticed was that Maceo was assigned to cover Loewe, W&M's best player.  I was curious about this decision so I paid close attention to it.  When Loewe scored on a couple of drives, I thought it was time to get him out or at least change defenders.  Nope, Maceo continued to try to guard this kid, and continued to fail miserably at it.  Excluding his game winning attempt in regulation, Loewe went 5-7 from the floor and 3-3 at the line over a 14 minute stretch with Maceo trying to guard him.  Wisconsin Colonial is absolutely correct in pointing out that we had no idea how to defend against a screen.  I believe all of these baskets came on drives; in fact, they were the same left-to-right drives with Loewe scoring off the glass.  

I can't begin to answer why you would continue to allow Maceo to guard this young man who was killing us.  JNJ?  Moyer?  Brelsford?  Ball?   Even, dare I say it, a zone to try and cut off all of these drives?  In a season thus far filled with dubious coaching decisions, this one is at the top of my list.  KeithGreene say no, no, no, it's the players.  No, it's the players and the coaching.  No question about that.

I really don't want to harp on Maceo who appears to be a great young man and a willing teammate.  Some of you feel he's a good defensive player and what he is good at defensively is his ability to use his length to disrupt passing lanes and deflect passes.  However, his lateral foot speed is sorely lacking which means that he will be challenged to defend almost anyone man-to-man who is committed to taking the ball to the hole.

Incidentally, at the start of overtime, a switch was made and Matt started guarding Loewe.  And yet, we went back to Maceo for the final minute where Loewe's eyes undoubtedly lit up and he scored two more buckets, including the game winner, in the final minute.  This is just completely inexplicable.

Aside from Maceo's defense, the second half reverted back to the first five games filled with turnovers, bad decisions, Chase Paar spending almost the entire half on the bench after scoring 11 in the first half, and of course, James Bishop's game-winning air ball which caused SirValient Brown to giggle.  The team essentially stopped playing like a team.  Overconfident thinking the game was already won?  Filled with nerves as W&M was mounting its comeback?  Hard to know for sure but no matter the case, this needs to be figured out.

Laughs of the night go out to Bob Wenzel who is normally one who does his homework.  Wenzel made  a point several times to talk about JC's tendency to change defenses within the same game.  This resonated with me since this is what I've been clamoring for when appropriate.  However, aside from the UMBC game where we scrapped the zone midway through the game, each and every JC coached game at GW has featured man or zone but not both in the same game.  I just have no idea what Wenzel was referring to.  Maybe JC did this often at MSM or Siena?

Am starting to feel we should turn into the Paul Westhead Loyola Marymount teams.  Let's not give a shit about defense since we can't really play it (exemption to JNJ who works his butt off defensively).  Let's play Sloan, Maceo and Jamison at the same time.  Let's run and shoot and press and make them shoot quickly.  Let's win or lose games 100-95.  No 20 point lead or deficit should ever feel safe.  Could this end up any worse than what we're witnessing these days?  

Last edited by Gwmayhem (12/15/2020 10:12 am)

Post Game Press Conference



 

Dude's last post at halftime yesterday - Bishop having another monster game.

It's like me saying at 1:00 pm - the stock market having another monster day - when it takes a dump the last 2 hours and closes 300 points down!

Can't wait for dud's pre-game analysis on Charlotte!

I'm sickened.

Nice job fungerhall, Gwmayhem, and GWRising! It was indeed Big T at 6'6" and 254 pounds. No worries Gwmayhem - I am glad you actually provided some hints because I was torn on how much to reveal in terms of clues. Considered mentioning that he wore #44, but wasn't sure if that was a dead giveaway. The funny thing about him getting injured over the summer in Philly after his freshman year as GWRising mentioned is that he ended up missing the opener against UConn before returning to action against JC's MSM squad.

As for the game itself...

The good news:
- We have eight days between the W&M game and the next Charlotte contest as of now. This is good for the team to work on a number of things/focus on exams, and for us fans to go a week without getting our blood pressure up about the poor team performance because boy do both sides need that right now.

- While Bishop's halfcourt heave was hilariously awful, I am not sure it tops Moyer's missed game-tying dunk against Hampton, so I guess that makes it less bad? Debatable for sure.

General thoughts from the game:

- What made the first half enjoyable to watch (other than the fact that we went up 15 of course) was that we turned the ball over just once and actually showed some inclination towards passing the ball with a goal of taking the best possible shot in the halfcourt. Is it unlikely that we have a half again where we turn the ball over just once, but something that can be repeatable (and something to take away from the game) is that we can make shots more frequently when we pass the ball more. There was one sequence in the game where Matt drove a bit and passed it out to Chase along the perimeter. At that point, there was three seconds tops left on the shot clock, but Paar showed great recognition to see that Jamison was open in the corner and made the extra pass instead of forcing up a three (Jamison ended up swishing the three before the shot clock ran out). Those are possessions that we can have more often as a team if we do pass the ball around.

- If we can do that with a bit of pace in the halfcourt, whipping the ball around will leave someone uncovered, and the opposition will be forced to move around to keep up. This might not sound like much, but that can tire out the opponent and affect their performance offensively, possibly also getting them to take forced shots on the other end. When we pass 0-1 times and just take the ball to the hoop, defenses can not only anticipate what we want to do, but they also don't have to exert any energy to guard us. This is what happened in the second half. Congrats to W&M on the win I guess, but it's not like they turned it on defensively or anything. We just simply decided to stop doing what was working for us offensively.

-  I also liked JNJ coming off the bench and finding more ways to get him involved offensively. Using Sloan in late-game situations for offense also seemed to be a good strategy.

 - As someone who has been hard on Bishop so far, I thought he made some nice strides on both sides of the ball. He clearly made more of an effort to pass the ball, and while it was inconsistent I saw moments of him trying to make stops defensively. While unfortunately his boneheaded play at the end of the game is probably what will be remembered, I thought he was decent otherwise. I blame that deep shot on the Steph Currys and Damian Lillards of the world. I don't buy for a second that the coaching staff drew up a play for him to heave the ball from near halfcourt, nor do I think Bishop intentionally ignored JNJ or Jamison who freed themselves up on the play. However, Bishop had plenty of space and time to at least dribble up closer to the three point line before letting it fly. It definitely came across that he just blacked out in the final seconds before realizing he didn't have a full shot clock to work with.

- One other thing about Bishop that I've noticed is that when he passes the ball it tends to be either to Matt or Chase underneath (often times as a bail out because he has nowhere to go with the ball). This is a big change from Armel last year who used to look more for Maceo and Jamison along the perimeter when he drove than look inside. That definitely seems to factor in to fewer threes being shot, other than the lack of ball movement for not getting any of the shooters consistent touches. Maybe finding Jamison open along the perimeter for a catch-and-shoot play will not force him to put the ball on the floor consistently, pump fake, and take a contested midrange shot for the 100th time this season.

- Has there been a lineup where both Tyler and James have played this season? I feel like there probably were a couple possessions, but I'm surprised we haven't seen more of that given their experience as teammates at MSJ. Any opportunity to increase chemistry on the floor is a good thing.

- On court chemistry continues to be an issue. It just feels like the team is playing a pick-up game against an opponent than an actual college team based on how they play together. There is always a lot of mention of talent, but I think that word gets overused after a certain point, and playing hard and as a team doesn't get mentioned enough. The latter is why the sub 200 teams that have played us have won.

- Speaking of energy, perhaps the biggest negative of the game was how lethargic the team looked during the entire game, and that included the first half. There was a game just a few days before on the road against Delaware, but man did it seem like the team wanted to be anywhere else. The commentators in the game mentioned lackadaisical, but honestly it looked more lethargic to me than anything else. I like that JC preaches loving to the players and letting them play through mistakes and that's one thing, but if there is no effort/energy being shown by a guy on the floor, I think they should be pulled in favor of a freshman for stretches to send a message. The first years will always come with a chip on their shoulder trying to take someone's spot.

- Does anyone know if Noel was dealing with an injury/illness? If he was a healthy scratch, that seems like a questionable decision to me. Clearly the big hole in our defense is the lack of rim protection which is why JC likely wanted to pivot to zone. Chase will get a lot of heat as the primary big on the team, but honestly it's not fair that he doesn't have any support (and the continued comparisons to Goss and Cimino are confusing...at least Chase can stay on the floor). Paar is a great finisher and I do like him as a starter (he is a respectable defender, just not a rim protector that we need more), but at the end of the day he isn't a guy who should be playing 30+ minutes a game. Keeping him fresh and playing him as a rotational big I think would be best. As much as I like seeing Ace come in for a couple high-energy plays in the first half, the fact that he has played seven minutes in back to back games says a lot about what our depth is like up front right now. For a team that is perhaps above average in size in the backcourt, we are not very big up front and perhaps my original expectations of the team didn't really put too much consideration into our frontcourt. AT and Javier might not have been game-changers by any means, but they provided size up front/took up space in the paint. Chase is more of a finesse big (which is not a bad thing, I think that is an important role on the team). Hopefully, Hunter being eligible soon helps out here, but I don't know how much he will provide in terms of being an enforcer up front. This may be an area to address in the offseason. All of this goes back to the fact that Noel should have played more on Monday if healthy. He has played pretty good defense so far when he's been in and at 6'11", I am really hopeful he can be the rim protector long term. On court experience will help him get there eventually but he needs to get those minutes in as much as possible this season.

- Obviously no one likes that Maceo was called for a technical, but it was early enough in the second half that it wasn't at the worst moment in the game. I personally liked seeing one of our guys actually show some kind of emotion on the court - to me it told me that Maceo was really angry that we weren't playing well (it was partly frustration as well of course). Unfortunately, no one on the team really reciprocated that anger in their play. Jack might not have had the best of games (or played the best defense) but setting the tone in terms of effort is I think a good model for others on the team to follow.

- This team needs to do some soul-searching. Obviously all are frustrated by what is happening, so hopefully this loss didn't lose anyone on the team and that all are still willing to buy in. Right now, the other team just seems to want it more than us. Jamison clearly looked one of the most frustrated on the team. There was one moment where the camera cut to JC trying to tell him something when he came out of the game but Battle was trying to ignore it before JC made sure he took in what he said. Seemed a bit out of character for him, but I'm sure others on the team feel similarly frustrated. Outside of the players, what is the plan from the coaching staff in terms of how we run stuff on offense and defense? Defensively, will we ever switch up defenses during a game when the set style isn't working as planned? Offensively, what is the plan? I thought playing with pace was going to be a constant given the play in the early games of the season, but we have suddenly slowed things down to a halt the past couple of games in comparison. Unfortunately, the latter only cut down on the turnovers for one half and I think the team is constructed in a way that playing faster appears to be more beneficial.

- Turnovers. If we do play fast, turnovers are inevitable and actually even having 15 turnovers a game won't kill you if you can balance it out somewhat on the other end. Many of the good Hobbs teams weren't exactly sound with the ball, but they created a lot of disruption on the other side. I am not sold that anyone on this team is a plus defender minus JNJ so that may be tough to replicate (the reality is that this will be a below average defensive team, however effort would go a long way in improvement), but one thing we definitely can cut down on is the number of traveling turnovers where a guy starts heading towards the basket before even dribbling the ball. For the past three seasons, this has always seemed to be an issue specifically for our team compared to our competition. Someone mentioned earlier about getting nervous when Moyer starts heading towards the basket. I feel that way about every guy on this team. There is just a sense of tentativeness and lack of flow offensively that I feel like has plagued the team for the past three seasons. We were bailed out by a number of whistles on drives to the hoop, and honestly could have been called for another 10+ travels in the game if I am being honest. Hope to see us play freer (obviously not too free) and less tentative by the end of the season.

- At the end of the day, the team is 1-5. From the other how vested are you thread, even those who are in group 1 would consider this an underwhelming start. We are not a blue blood program, but we have historically been a top 100 team even with the ups and downs and inconsistent commitment from the administration. GW is not an impossible place to win at. We may be in the midst of rebuilding, but 1-5 against the competition we have faced is less like an A10 team and more like an NEC team. I'm glad JC was candid in the postgame presser (I wish more coaches would just be honest and not sugarcoat things consistently). The reality is that conference play is not going to be easier, and we aren't facing any sub 200 teams the rest of the way (depending on how you value Fordham from the current rankings). Charlotte just beat Davidson on the road by double digits, and Tre Mitchell will not be easy to handle with the kind of performance he had today and the frontcourt we currently have. Playing together and straightening out late game issues is a must ASAP otherwise things could potentially really fall apart. That being said, any fire JC posts right now are laughable.
 

I think too much of the focus is on James Bishop here.

Sure, James' defense leaves much room for improvement. And yes, there is no question that the last play of the William & Mary game was mishandled for whatever reason.

But I think you really have to look at the rest of the team to explain why James makes some of the decisions he does on offense. Paar 12 turnovers, Moyer 18 turnovers, Battle 17 turnovers, Nelson 13 turnovers, Brown 8 turnovers. Hard to completely trust guys who kick the ball away at a high rate. Remember, none of those five players handle the ball nearly as much as James. In fact four of the five hardly handle it at all. 

James has 41 assists. I'd venture a guess that if his teammates didn't turn the ball over as much he would have north of 50 in 6 games.

So trust is a two-way street. If you want the ball you have to earn the right to get the ball. You don't earn it by kicking it away, missing other open teammates and shooting it at a low percentage.

I'm all ears if you want to say Bishop needs to play better defense. But he's not even the first, second, third, or fourth problem on offense. Take Bishop out of the equation and the other starters have 29 assists and 60 turnovers! They are also shooting a collective 15-57 from 3 (26%). You aren't going to win too many games with those numbers. Seems to me the emphasis for JC ought to be getting the other guys to play better on the offensive end so that Bishop does not feel he has to do it by himself.

As for defense, the whole team needs to improve. Same with rebounding.

 

Last edited by GWRising (12/17/2020 12:05 pm)

GWRising, your point would have more merit had James made a concerted effort to get his teammates involved from the outset.  His decision-making was dubious in game #1 and has stayed that way for the most part.  The first half against W&M was an exception where he consistently made sound decisions.  Then, this strong play suddenly disappeared after halftime.  Specifically, he is not finding his three point shooters.  This is incredibly important because James is the one with the ball in his hands almost every possession that he's in the game, and because the offense is designed to free up open shooters from behind the arc based on James drawing in additional defenders.  JC has spoken about his desire to take 3's.  Thus far, our opponents are attempting over 8 more three point shots per game than GW is.  This flies in the face of what JC wants to accomplish.  Less than 1/3 of our FG attempts have come from 3.  By contrast, one of JC's MSM teams took 48% of its shots from 3 over the course of a season.  One way that this year was supposed to improve over last year was that we've added more players who can supposedly shoot more consistently from 3.  If the ball is only rarely being kicked out to find these shooters, then that's not good enough.

All of this is not to suggest that real problems concerning the defense and rebounding don't exist because they most certainly do.  However, it's become apparent that the only way this team will be successful is by outscoring its opponents in high scoring games for the most part.  If the offense is humming the way it's supposed to, the defensive and rebounding struggles become less important (still important, but less important).  

True LSF.  But given the construction of this team and its (in)ability to play defense, I am not foreseeing any championships this season.