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I’m afraid the snakebit/voodoo/cj meme is obscuring some hard truths about the state of the program. Sorry, we didn’t loose to the Leo’tards three times this year because of CJ’s foot but because of Brett Reed’s poor recruiting and game coaching. CJ was not recruited to be the “savior of the program” any more than AD was. CJ’s emergence into an NBA lottery type talent was dumb luck for Dr. Reed.
Even WITH CJ we were struggling with lesser programs and relying too heavily on CJ’s heroics. CJs 34 point performance at Stabler (on a bad ankle) in a loss to Bryant comes to mind.
While the ‘tards were patiently whipping the ball around the lane all evening waiting for the inevitable mismatch or backdoor cut, we were rolling the dice with the same, tired high screen and pray type maneuver. As painful as this 13 point loss was, I think we actually OVER-achieved due to some really remarkable moments from Mackey McNight. Lafayette sophmores Trist and Hinrichs and Freshman Scott go for 13, 18 and 12. Our D’Orazio, Schaefer and Cvrkalj go for 0, 5, 6.
I’m sure AD is a heck of a nice kid and probably a hell of a practice player. But, after three full seasons and one season of starting, I think we can conclude (I concluded this a long time ago) that he adds NOTHING to our program. Recruiting FAIL and Game Coaching FAIL. I believe if BR had invested AD’s minutes into SC all season, we would have had a much more diverse and difficult offense to defend. SC was 2-2 with the 3 ball yesterday; why so few looks? Even CS looks far more promising.
Here’s hoping the Kempton, Chuku, Goldsboro combination can solidify our interior defense and rebounding next year. Here’s praying that BJ comes back for another season. But seriously, where are the points going to come from? Is Mackey going to have any help or is it going to be a full season of high screen, dribble penetration and crashing to the rim and floor for Mackey?