Davidson with a nice win on the road. + Catch the replay of GW on ESPN+

Alum1 wrote:

Wake me when we play someone not at the juco level. So far we are 2-0 against two teams in the bottom 37 of D-1. That’s the dregs. And that’s the facts.

Pretty much. At least we had fun for one night. Buchanan is a handful, Castro has a lot of potential and Autry looks pretty good. In these difficult times, I am looking to GW bball for some fun. For some escape. A silver lining.

Last edited by Alum '04 (11/08/2024 10:00 pm)

There was much to like this game Free.   In the first half, giving up all of those offensive rebounds was legit cause for concern, but the defense was otherwise excellent.   Much better forcing Hampton to take low percentage shots.   In the second half, we seemed to fix the defensive rebounding woes and had a couple of players (Autry and Jones in particular) open up a high teens lead, after which Hampton pretty much threw in the towel.   Jones had a Maximus/Kethan look about him.  My favorite was his steal and dunk in the second half.   Autry again showed versatility in his scoring and also played solid D.  Castro looked like he did the first game...he seems to be a nice player.  Hensen was scoreless and looked kinda lost the first half, but in the second half he began to show us signs of what he could do, namely pass, set a high screen and rebound.  Buchanan forced issue too much, especially in the first half, but in the second half he demonstrated that he was a superior athlete that Hampton couldn't really guard.  My favorite of the night, however, was Hutchinson.   He had some ugly turnovers on telegraphed passes, but otherwise did a great job of both running the offense and scoring.  It became clear in the first half that they could not guard Hutchinson and towards the end of the half and the start of the second half we exploited that, resulting in turning a somewhat close game (6-8 points) to a blowout. He is a remarkable athlete.

Amir Harrington, a non scholarship player, hit a 3 point shot tonight.   He appeared to bank a shot in from the corner, but he hit it.  After the game, there was a mob of his friends waiting for him to cheer him on.   Later, the entire team joined in the good natured mock cheering for Amir.  The kid's face was just beaming.   Team looks like a good bunch of guys who seem to like each other.   That is always good to say.

At first glance Team play and defense seems to have improved greatly. I really liked the post game interviews.  Try is very well spoken. Liked Caputo post-game talk. Comments about how the game has changed. World of College Basketball has changed from what he experienced as an Assistant Coach. Strange environment, player personnel ever changing, so keeping staff is very important to maintaining stability.  Tough world out there where you train for 20 years, get to run the show, and the show changes. No wonder why so many older coaches left the sport. Liked all the smiles on the team. 
 

My takeaways from first two games ...

Positives:

Balanced Scoring - without James the ball is moving better and more guys are contributing
Defense is improved - holding teams to under 33% from floor and under 28% from three
Deeper bench - playing 8-9 guys double digit minutes
Bounceback games for Jacoi and Trey versus Hampton

Areas of Continued Concern:

Three-point shooting - first two games have been a struggle ... 11-50 on season (22%)
Defensive Rebounding - too many offensive rebounds allowed
Loose Balls - we have to get more 50/50 balls and control the ball when we get it especially on rebounds

Last edited by GWRising (11/09/2024 2:41 pm)

Florida Colonial wrote:

Thx for posting, more of this ....and less whiny old crank get off my lawn posts would improve the niche GW fan site

30 point wins are good no matter what year no matter what the opponent and this was a good one