It is not the number of threes or the lack of FTs that bothers me, it is how many of those threes were taken from near the halfcourt logo and how much time was on the shot clock when they went up. Hurried NBA threes do not win many games in DI, and taken with more than 15 seconds on the shot clock they will not get you the opportunity to be fouled, either. Still, 32 trey attempts in 40 mins is an ugly number, especially when GW averaged less than one made every 4 mins. Add in the turnovers and that comes to at least an empty possesion every 60 seconds. Not a recipie for winning...

Last edited by GW Alum Abroad (10/22/2025 2:51 pm)

Free Quebec wrote:

Gwmayhem wrote:

One thing that the Georgetown exhibition showed us, at least for one game but quite possibly many more, is that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Many of the players are new but the offense is the offense.  GW took 32 three-point attempts on Saturday or one every 75 seconds of playing time.  Tre Dinkins himself tried a three every two minutes he was on the court.  They attempted a grand total of five free throws or one every eight minutes of play. 

Last year, I made a huge point questioning whether we had the personnel (particularly with Garrett sidelined for the season) to run an offense that is designed to produce so many open three-point shots.  I understand the analytics involved, how 40% from 3 equals 60% from 2.  Yet last season, reaching 40% was very much the exception and not the rule.  On Saturday, the team shot 9-32 from 3 which works out to 28%.  

Sure, it was one off night against a very aggressive defense.  When we factor the return of Garett coupled with the addition of shooters like Tre Dinkins and Bubu Benjamin, there is little reason to think that GW will not vastly improve its three-point shooting percentage and effective field goal percentage.  Still, this team must prove that this is the right offense for them, and there's no other way to prove this than to simply be better from three.

About those five free throw attempts, this simply can't happen.  This was the result of an overreliance on hoisting 3's while sacrificing opportunities to drive to the basket.  Again, the Georgetown defense had much to do with this and most defenses GW goes up against will not be nearly as stingy.  Nevertheless, we have more than enough players who are capable of driving to the basket and finishing (or getting fouled) as well as driving and dishing. 

Noticing three point attempts relative to free throw attempts will be a worthwhile endeavor.  A ratio of 32 vs 5 will lose far more games than it will win.  Let's hope that more balance is achieved in the future.

You sound like an old man 😂

Threes are where the game is now and I believe we’ll be a good shooting team this year. It was a first game with lots of nerves and guys overhyped so airballing threes. But that’s just modern basketball so no sense complaining about it.

As for the FTs, the refs were REALLY letting them play.

But regardless of this first exhibition game, we were too 25 in the nation last year in getting to the line (FTA/FGA), so I’m not worried about that part of our game. P

Well, we shot 31.66% from 3 last year which placed us in a three-way tie for the 298th best three-point shooting team in the country.  Pretty sure it's not an "old man" thing if the concern is very real.  Am also pretty sure that a basketball team should not be doing anything very frequently if they are simply not good at it.

I get it....new team, jury is still out, etc.  Just something to keep an eye on.

Yes, there were lots of goofy threes taken prompting "you've gotta be kidding?"  They were forced because Gtown fought over every predictable boring high pick.  How many times did Hunger get stuck 28 feet away after using his dribble trying for 12 seconds to unsuccessfully hand the ball off to an overplayed Autry or Jones or Johnson. By then the only thing left was a crappy desperate attempt at a 3 over and over and over.  I'd like to see the offense initiated by a drive, or 3 man game from the low post, or anything non 28 feet away. We have solid talented athletic cutters who want to win!!!   Use them!!  The threes will fall, especially from the corners, which seem to be the only ones we know how to set up.  Things will improve.  It doesn't take much. 

CC admitted postgame that the 32 three point attempts was higher than he would like. This was a concern that I had going into the season, but the way guys were cutting to the basket early in the game made it seem less of an issue. That is, until Georgetown made some adjustments and GW seemed to not care about taking the best possible shot/looking inside for much of the game. At that point, it definitely turned into more of an exhibition-like affair.

I'd be surprised if the team ends up taking some of the threes that were attempted on Saturday. It will be interesting to see the quality of threes moving forward though. Cooley's bunch did a good job of closing out/contesting shots and many of the airballs came after having to adjust. If more of the attempts that are taken are of the spot up variety, I think the shooting will be fine.

Something else I'm watching early in the season is PG play. One guy doesn't have to be calling all the shots/setting others up but at times it would be beneficial to keep the offense organized. CJ had just 1 assist to 6 turnovers. Whenever the ball was in Tre's hands, he was launching - he finished with just 1 assist (should be a lot more off ball). There wasn't an extended enough look at Jean to determine whether he could be that guy. Tricky showed some passing chops, but I'd be surprised if he is handling for extended stretches. I'm not going to overreact after one game, but I will be keeping my eye on that.

As for the FTs, I largely agree with FQ's stance (they were calling nothing, and Georgetown was top 100 in keeping teams off the line last year), however the top 25 FT rate last year was largely due to Slim and Jun, who ranked #1 and #2 respectively in the league in FT rate (and top 30 nationally). With Buchanan out of the fold, it would be surprising to see GW finish top 100 in that metric right now. Slim's presence will prevent an absolute drop off, but there will be a regression as Woo/Bubu are more perimeter-oriented. All three CC squads have been above average in this category, but the first two squads also had JB on them.

My question is which guard on the roster is going to generate more attempts? It can't be just Rafael getting to the line. CJ showed some nice drives and seems like a good bet, but he will also need to convert at a much higher clip once he gets to the line. Tricky just isn't a guy that really takes contact on drives to the rim. Tre doesn't really look to the rim that often either. Assuming GW doesn't abandon the cutting and rim attempts after the first ten minutes of a game moving forward, perhaps there's still hope on this front as well but I doubt that it will be at rates seen in previous years under CC as of now.

It's pretty clear to me that Caputo's offense is to shoot threes and layups, and very few if any mid-range shots. Georgetown was bigger than us, so we had a hard time getting inside. Castro really struggled in the first half, although he did better in the second. When we play smaller teams, I expect we will go inside more and shoot less threes. If you are hoping for more mid-range shots, however, I think you will be disappointed.

As for the 3-pt percentage, I think you need to break it down by player:
Autry shot 2-5 (40%), which is good for me.
Bubu shot 3-7 (42%), which is good for me.
Luke, Jean, and Jones all missed their shots, but they were low volume (combined 0-4).
Johnson shot 1-4 (25%), which is bad, but I think we all recognize he is a good shooter (40% from three two years ago) that just needs time to get back to form after being out all of last year.
Dinkins shot 3-11 (27%), which is bad, and the high volume skewed the team percentage. Dinkins shot between 34% and 38% in his previous three years, so I think he just had a bad night. Still, I think he needs to be more selective with his shots, as several of them were not high percentage shots (including one that he made off the backboard). Hopefully he was just trying too hard to impress in his first game on a new team that is very deep.

Last edited by DC Native (10/23/2025 9:02 am)

Maybe I’m crazy but other than the crazy deep Dinkins threes I was generally happy with our offense 🤷‍♂️

Didn’t see too much dribbling around for 25 seconds and then throwing up a shot before the shot clock expired.

The passes near the basket seemed to be of the type that they work on in practice but are harder to execute when there’s an opposing team clogging the paint.

I feel that Rising's point of having a group of combo guards running the point and not a true point guard is an excellent one.  The older you are, the more conditioned you likely are to think of a true point guard as a "pass-first" player and over the years, we've had players like Mike O'Reilly, Alvin Pearsall, and Joe McDonald among many others who have fit this description.  On the other hand, CC would likely to point to today's game as a game where the point guard must be equally as adept as both a scorer and a distributor in order to be effective.  Nevertheless, the point guards through the years that have been explosive scorers, players like Walt Frazier, Nate Archibald and Allen Iverson, or to bring things closer to home, players like Shawnta Rogers, Tony Taylor and Carl Elliott, each possessed a passer's mentality.  The best ones instinctively realize whether to pass or shoot.  Will we see this from players like Jones, Moss, Dinkins or Aranguren?  (Am not thinking of Autry or Bevins as guys who will be handling the point.)  Remains to be seen.