Reply To: Army – Game 16 (PL's 3rd)

[NaimParticipant]

You don’t need to be a basketball-guru to figure out why GK’s #’s dropped down drastically when CJ got injured. In now days, TK (more talented than GK, IMO) is taking the toll of playing in offence of “4 players”. It becomes so simple for the other coach to clamp TK with double team (even triple) with so small risk. I’m not sure if coaches can say any more, “We don’t have options”.
SC is one of those guys who have never gotten a chance to show his full potential at LU. As a freshman, he was surrounded with a few real stars, and it was so difficult to break into rotation in those days. Besides it, he was pronounced as a poor defender. That’s fine, he was young, and surrounded with some excellent defenders, including CJ, BJ, JA, JH and so on. It was so easy to fall behind.
I already mentioned what happened last year. He played the whole season limping, practically impossible to reach his full potential. So people created certain opinion about his game not knowing the facts.
He hasn’t started this season on time, to overcome tough injury, but he is clear now. Is it time to give him some chance? I would say yes…but why. Simple, he is not any more a poor defender, compared to the defense LU is presenting these days, some of them, even starters. I think he had some decent minutes even last night after less than 3 weeks of practice and a long break. He already proved that he can easily hurt on the other side of the court. He can kick a…s as good as anyone else on this team. So he badly missed the first shot last night, but he wasn’t confused to knock the other one shortly.
For so many times, he was taken out after first mistake he made, or as soon as he dropped the ball to the floor. Can anything else keel your confidence quicker than that? That is exactly what he was going through most of the time he spent at LU. Can anybody tell me why he was taken out last night? Does it help him to build confidence? Has he done anything bad, or was he replaced with some real star player, who can make a big difference on the court? Why he didn’t get in again until they realized that they can probably save OT with some 3’s? This is exactly what ‘s been done to SC since day one, and it happened so many times, even in the second game in Greensboro. I don’t think that’s fair, either. Give him some chance before you’re in trouble.
If they like to continue their offence with “4 people” that’s fine, but there is a very bad feedback to it.
In general, I wouldn’t say a few recent games were lost in last minutes. I would rather say they were lost much earlier, but MM with some magic, made the final scores to look like they were so close.
In some minutes of this game, the size mismatch in back court was very serious issue, and I’m not surprised that WK (#21) scored so many points, the way he was guarded. It was very noticeable on his highlights presented last night, whoever paid attention to it.
Do I need to say that I’m big fan of SC…so I just wanted to say something to support him, and to make you guys to understand some facts related to SC.
BTW, LU65….I like your stats, SC is still on the top with 3pt shot (.385), not bad for a few practice and short game time.
I am going back to “read-only mode” again
Thx