MSC wrote:

I like both pick-ups in Drumgoole and Moss. We need experienced scorers losing Bishop and Max and their 31 ppg last season. Both of the these additions averaged over 13 PPG last year (13.9 and 13.5; respectively)

Drumgoole is a career 34.3 3 FG% while Moss is a mere 27.7 3 FG%. I expect Moss to penetrate and score inside or create open looks inside and out rather take a lot of 3’s. We needed Drumgoole for more perimeter and all around shooting. Drumgoole has 1 year of eligibility and Moss 2 years. Bevins can learn from Drumgoole and all of our Super Sophomores then slide into a more featured scoring role Year 2. For comparison Bishop shot 32.9% and Max 35.6% from 3 for their respective careers. Drumgoole 3# are better than Bishop and a notch below Max.

For the last open spot, I am not as worried about landing a P6 or P5 recruit. I believe team and culture fit as well as the player’s skill set are more important attributes than what school they came from. This team is pretty deep currently, so there’s not too many minutes available for the last recruit. I prefer to invest a young athletic BIG that can currently rebound and provide 5-7 minutes at the 5 or 4 positions.

       Whether we play them at the 3 or not, how many "guards" do we have, compared to front court
players on a 12-scholarship roster? Now, we do have some big guards, which seems to be a point of emphasis and can play with 3 guards or play one as a forward. Though not sure 6'5 is an ideal size in A-10, it's certainly possible. Max co-led the team in rebounding, a skill which will be sorely missed. Let's hope any of the new players can
make that up from their natural guard skillset.
    All of the transfers are welcome, given the difficulties of the competitive market. CC still appears to be a really smart recruiter talent-wise.
  The question is, to play on a common saying, "how many guards spoil the broth?"
   As pointed out above, someone bigger, PF and up or at least hits the boards, would be helpful if we 
are filling the last spot.
    Keegan doesn't count at the moment, even if he was inclined to hit the boards or use his size along with reported shooting ability. He played truly negligible/miniscule minutes last year for whatever reason. (Yes obviously we know what coaches think about his ability to contribute). So unless things change next year, one of our forwards is not going to matter for actual playing purposes.
 

Gwmayhem wrote:

 
I am perhaps being naive but I was very comfortable heading into the season with Jacoi, Trey, Ty and Christian as our primary backcourt players.  We shall see.

A backcourt consisting of two sophomores and two freshmen wouldn't have been ideal, even as someone who thinks all four bring something to the table. Having such a young team doesn't play well in any league (but especially one like the A10) and I think CC realized that. I get what he was trying to do last year, but with the transfer rules changing it definitely doesn't make sense now.

I especially like Ty's tenacity on defense, but hopefully we get to the point where it's mostly upperclassmen playing major minutes unless a freshmen is truly special (like DBJ showed last year). It's unfortunate that things are like that nowadays, but it's what is needed to have a good team. There is a need to recruit freshmen to fill out a roster, but the reality is that someone's development is going to be hampered, leading to them probably transferring out eventually.

Long Suffering Fan wrote:

Gerald averaged 13.9 ppg on 43.3% shooting and 37.3% from the 3. Defense I have no way of knowing, but at least based on these offensive numbers, it would seem that Gerald would be able to slide into the Max role on the team.

Gerald's offensive numbers look good on the surface, but they are elevated against CAA competition. As I wrote in the recruiting thread, in nine games against competition from the top 10 conferences in CBB he's gone a combined 24/92 (26.1%) from the field and 18/62 (29%) from 3 over the past two years. Perhaps a small sample size, but not great. Drumgoole and Moss both had poor games against GW's below average defense. Hoping it's just a small sample size and not the case moving forward. I think overall though he's probably a slight upgrade over Max despite less rebounding - he can be a playmaker and makes better decisions.

As for defense, I'd say it's more or less a push (perhaps even a downgrade) when compared to Max. Drumgoole's career defensive rating is around 109 points surrendered per 100 possessions. Part of that is playing on some mediocre to bad teams, but he's generated just 49 steals over 64 games the past two years. That doesn't tell the whole story, but it's not particularly good and he simply did not stand out there from what I've watched of him.

Poog wrote:

Hard to duplicate players based on stats as much as we'd like. Different team, different skill set, different personality, different year. But at least Caputo has his core back. McCombs is literally starting from scratch with the departures of  her leading scorer and rebounder and 8 new incoming players to date. Alas, hope springs eternal for both teams. 

It's funny, if McCombs could give CC a few pointers on defense and CC could do the same for McCombs on offense perhaps things work out for both parties. When I watched Miami last year it looked like I was watching GW with how poor they were defensively. WBB has landed some nice players from the portal so far but there are concerns about shooting next year as of now.

MSC wrote:

I like both pick-ups in Drumgoole and Moss. We need experienced scorers losing Bishop and Max and their 31 ppg last season. Both of the these additions averaged over 13 PPG last year (13.9 and 13.5; respectively)

For the last open spot, I am not as worried about landing a P6 or P5 recruit. I believe team and culture fit as well as the player’s skill set are more important attributes than what school they came from. This team is pretty deep currently, so there’s not too many minutes available for the last recruit. I prefer to invest a young athletic BIG that can currently rebound and provide 5-7 minutes at the 5 or 4 positions.

I agree that losing both JB and Max made it necessary to bring in a couple veteran guards that had a history of scoring. Having guards that can penetrate was a secondary need, but going into this offseason I was convinced that CC was looking at guards with some defensive ability that can contest shots along the perimeter and stay with their man on drives after what transpired last year. Both Jacoi and Autry showed great promise there and will only get better going into year #2, but have we upgraded from the transfer portal? JB and Max were two of the worst defenders on the team, but we're replacing them with a guy who blocked zero shots all of last year (Moss) and I already posted Drumgoole's steal stats from the past two years above. I think interior scoring will improve offensively, but GW can't take the next step without improvements defensively. Both Moss and Drumgoole have abilities to be effective there, but internal development isn't something that I've necessarily seen to believe the staff can get them to be good defenders. I'm more inclined to excuse Moss shooting only 29% from 3 given what CC and co. did to improve BA's percentages his senior year. Defense is another story though.

That's why for the final spot, a guy who can defend would definitely fit a need. They don't need to have scored a lot, but anyone who can defend guards/wings can play minutes here and there when needed.

Alum1 wrote:

Maybe it’s just me,….but I’m beginning to wonder if it’s just CC's strategy to build teams that have defensive liabilities and live or die by the trey torpedoes be damned. If that’s the case, then we will likely be headed for another year of facing blowouts when they aren’t falling and tight W’s over inferior teams. Maybe there will be improved defense and rebounding with the newcomers but I don’t know. Just posing the proposition.

I think the additions of Castro/Hansen up front and Moss/Drumgoole in the backcourt will allow GW to be more balanced offensively (scoring inside as well as outside) but I agree that defense is a major question mark and concern heading into next year. There was some improvement on D towards the end of the season but a major step forward is still needed to even contend for a double bye spot in the A10.
 

Good point gwstudent.  I would love to see that and thought he was developing towards the end of last season before injury setback. 

Any thoughts on what position and classification (portal transfer or high school recruit) the staff is looking to complete roster and fulfill last scholarship?  Do they possibly not fill the opening and wait for next year?

MG14 wrote:

Max Edwards to Duquesne 

https://twitter.com/maxgotgame2/status/1787595877449626017

Really?  Why?

It does seem odd. Is Duquesne really giving out more $. Not sure about that. Did he leave thinking P6 and it never worked out and he isn't able to return? Did his bench time last year sour his relationship with CC. Wish him well against all but us.

H&R..71 wrote:

Definitely the worst uniform of the 3 he’s worn.  Max has a lot of work to do.  His rebounding and athleticism was quite good. His ballhandling, passing, and attitude sucked.  I was calling for him and JB to be benched 5 games into the losing streak.
Now that he and JB have moved on, we can have an offense that is balanced, rather than the ball getting stuck while they “needed to get theirs.”
Thanks for the entertainment Max and good luck.

If he plays within the role given is gonna be fine. Probably thought he’d have better choices.

My hope was to firmly believe in Maximus if for no other reasons than his first name and the fact that Bruce Weber saw enough to successfully recruit him.  My first glances of him came at Kenner when it was apparent that he was playing the game the right way while roughly 75% of the other players on the court were not.  From the early looks of things, Max could shoot, score, rebound, and even play defense.  His basketball IQ was commendable.

Maybe it was the fact that Max was fine playing second fiddle to JB for one year, only to see that turn into two.  Maybe it was the realization that Jun's ascent and Garrett's offense were such that 2024-25 was no longer going to be "Max's team" the way he once possibly envisioned.  For those reasons and perhaps others, Max lost his way last season.  The defending conference rookie of the year became lackadaisical, lost focus, exhibited terrible body language, and looked much like Terry Nolan, Jr. did down the stretch of his GW career. 

Some players are naturally uplifting leaders.  They applaud their teammates when they do well and pick up those feeling down.  They play with emotion.  Many other players understand that the best way for them to consistently perform well is to try to leave emotions out of it for the most part.  Don't get too high when things are going well and don't be down in the dumps when they are not.  Teams can win with both types of players.

What makes winning tough is when a talented player's game gets negatively impacted when things are not going their way.  They become visibly "down" and this tends to bring teams down.  Max so desperately wanted not to feel this way that he would often counterintuitively attempt the difficult play to pull himself out.  The cross-court pass that would lead to a wide open three if it was delivered just right.  The very low percentage three point shot that was open but which was simply taken from outside of his range.     And then, the poor decisions would often be compounded by being a step slow on defense rather than digging deep and making sure that the player he was guarding would not get open under any circumstances.

Kind of hard not to make a bad "Max Headroom" joke here but Max's head likely had as much to do with his pressing after mistakes, careless play, subsequent benching (where he seemed to play better coming off the bench, but a role he likely would not relish in the future) and eventual decision to transfer.  That he winds up at Duquesne, a school which could be the next likely home to Bronny James should LeBron's son opt to return to college, would be an incredible piece of irony if this were to materialize.  If being a #2 to JB was hard, I can't imagine being one to The King's son (do people call Bronny The Prince?) would be any easier.  And this assumes that Grant and Clark are gone (unsure about their remaining eligibility if any.  Both are being inducted, along with Coach Dambrot, into the Dukes Hall of Fame which leads me to think they are both gone). 

So Max leaves GW as the rare player who I was hoping would become one of my all-time favorites (and you have to be quite good to qualify) but instead leaves as a player who IMO, just got too caught up in his own play rather than that of the team.  Playing without Max means there will be more than enough plays, both outstanding ones and careless ones, to confidently assume he will be missed, for better or for worse.   

 

Last edited by Gwmayhem (5/07/2024 11:17 am)

Gwmayhem wrote:

Maybe it was the fact that Max was fine playing second fiddle to JB for one year, only to see that turn into two.  Maybe it was the realization that Jun's ascent and Garrett's offense were such that 2024-25 was no longer going to be "Max's team" the way he once possibly envisioned.  For those reasons and perhaps others, Max lost his way last season. 
 

  This has merit. Being Rookie Of The Year, staying at GW and playing 3rd to 5th fiddle to JB (more on that sometime) would seem to have an effect.
Whatever happened in the locker room and outside the court (please do give some examples), as a basketball proposition purely, not sure he should have been benched. Think some of us noted back then that effectively sealed the deal he wouldn't return. Hope that was the realization. Yes, Max was in a funk. But frankly, the entire starting 5, excluding Jacoi if he was in there, could have been benched and we will still lose 12 games in a row. Maybe a message needed to be sent.
     His defense, while lackluster, was par for the course of pretty much the entire team, except for Jacoi and Stretch's one aspect of shot-blocking. While his shot selection could indeed be poor even when he unaccountably made some of those ill-advised shots, Max could and did will us to stay in the game if not win at times. In 28 minutes, he averaged 12.4 points.
    Outside of the rebounding, my thoughts may be influenced by his gracious comments on GW helping him become Rookie of The Year and appreciation for the loyalty he showed by staying, though don't know if he had that option
       We may well be better off without him, certainly attitudinally, though want some more details. One could say the same things about another critical player, outside of the emotional situation. Just hoped we are using our scholarships in a way that will pan out, because Max was 6'5 and co-led the team in rebounds, which has been an Achilles heel in the past.
    Having said that, unless he was promised a starting role at Duquesne or they have a lot of NIL money, agree with everyone how truly odd this seems.
And it seems like the high majors saw something about Max's value for them.

 

Maybe Max has been watching the NBA playoffs and saw a former Duquesne A10 Rookie of the Year in TJ McConnell playing well for Indiana. 
Or maybe he saw Jamal Murray throw shit onto the court when things weren’t going his way.
I’m pulling for Max to fix his bad habits and improve his game. 
As an aside, CC should make the team watch Minnesotas first half of yesterday’s beatdown in Denver. Some are saying it was the finest display of defense ever!! Some of it is great coaching but mostly it was pure effort!! We need some of that badly.

All valid points LSF. I had hopes for Max as well, and felt he was a victim of coaching and role difficulties.  It was reminiscent of the departures of Keethan and Pauli J to Butler…both talented but headstrong. These are tough times with coaching and player musical chairs. It’s now become like a good golf swing…you only borrow it.  Any success is short lived, like FAU.  Dusty May final 4, then early exit in tourney, then blown up!
I’m optimistic for this year and hope our sophomores step up and develop a tight chemistry with the new arrivals.  And when we play Max,Noel, and Bam, it will be a little extra special.