team needs to come together and it will revolve more around defense. no identity to our defense now. we are missing pearson's energy and scoring. we also miss matt smith who gave us good d and little offensive boost off the bench. garber is improving but not there yet.

i think the team will really benefit once dre applewhite becomes eligible. he's a physical defensive type, kinda like lauf but with a little more offense. we may see something like him starting and justin drummond coming off the bench. that could mean a little more defensive tenacity w the first team and some punch on the second. plus, when applewhite plays-and i think he will get a lot of minutes- other players will have to adjust their roles which will ultimately be good for team chemistry. look at akron, they lost treadwell but improved because they found balance. this squad needs to find it's balance and heart.

This was one of the games we should win every year, especially at home. Looks like there is room for improvement.

These next two games on the road at Oakland and Cleveland State should give us a sign one way or the other...having 5 starters in double digits scoring is certainly nice...Defense absolutely needs to pick up the intensity, we need to take better care of the ball (we now have more turnovers than assists), and bench players need to be less tentative on offense.

I think the biggest thing happening now is that the seniors aren't playing consistently well and being good leaders. Even Juice has too many turnovers and poor shot selection. JD is probably playing the best of the seniors. As for the bench we are relying almost exclusively on freshmen and sophmores. Another thing hurting UT is their bigs are slow and not very athletic. Will this team jell and compete for a MAC title? I think there's enough talent to do this, it will take a good job of coaching by coach K to accomplish this, but building teams and chemistry are the two main things that separate elite coaches from good ones. So we'll see just how good he is.

This game Im afraid will come back to haunt them down the line. If Toledo's on the bubble at all, this loss totally killed it.

BEAT DUKE! okay be better than .500 OOC and win the MAC!!

(11-26-2014 09:18 AM)rocketinchitown Wrote:  This game Im afraid will come back to haunt them down the line. If Toledo's on the bubble at all, this loss totally killed it.

The fact that UT was passed over last by the tournament committee (and a good Akron team a couple of years before that) should make it abundantly clear that in the MAC, the only way you get to the NCAA tourney is win the MAC tourney. Win or lose, this game was never destined to factor into any bubble consideration.

(11-26-2014 10:17 AM)T-Town Wrote:  

(11-26-2014 09:18 AM)rocketinchitown Wrote:  This game Im afraid will come back to haunt them down the line. If Toledo's on the bubble at all, this loss totally killed it.

The fact that UT was passed over last by the tournament committee (and a good Akron team a couple of years before that) should make it abundantly clear that in the MAC, the only way you get to the NCAA tourney is win the MAC tourney. Win or lose, this game was never destined to factor into any bubble consideration.

Short of winning out now (OK, I'll give us a loss at Duke), it's very hard to imagine a scenario where UT is a "bubble" team. We needed a win at either VCU or Oregon, and a win last night against Detroit, to still be in that discussion today. Need to get better the rest of the season, maybe earn the #1 seed in the MAC Tournament, and then win it.

During one of the TO's last night, might have been the last one, most of the players were in front of the coach listening to his direction. But, another guy, don't know who it was but he was tall, was standing behind the coach paying little attention; looked like he was practically shaking his head and rolling his eyes. That sort of attitude isn't going to help anything.

Anyone notice that in the Bucknell game the starters played pretty late into that game. Not sure why? Knowing we had a tough opponent the following night, you would think Coach K would rest some legs once we knew that game was out of reach. Not sure if that would have helped us.

The most glaring stat for me in the Detroit game is comparing bench points. Some of our guys off the bench need to do some fast growing or it's going to be a long season. I hope Applewhite can bring the tough guy mentality like Pearson displayed. We may have talent, but we let teams stay with us and we don't seem to want to put a boot in anyone's ass.

(11-26-2014 12:20 PM)emanoh Wrote:  Anyone notice that in the Bucknell game the starters played pretty late into that game. Not sure why? Knowing we had a tough opponent the following night, you would think Coach K would rest some legs once we knew that game was out of reach. Not sure if that would have helped us.

The most glaring stat for me in the Detroit game is comparing bench points. Some of our guys off the bench need to do some fast growing or it's going to be a long season. I hope Applewhite can bring the tough guy mentality like Pearson displayed. We may have talent, but we let teams stay with us and we don't seem to want to put a boot in anyone's ass.

The bench isn't producing at the moment, that's true. We really only played 8 guys last night (Hall only played a few minutes). Nobody off the bench is an "instant offense" guy like Jon Jon was last year. If he were getting more playing time, I would lean towards Hall being more of a scoring punch as the season progresses, but man, he's not seeing too much of the floor, so maybe not. I am banking on those who say Applewhite is the "real deal", because he could either be the offense off the bench or start, allowing Jon Jon to come off the bench again. Maybe Coach is waiting to spring Aparacio in a key game and the guy will go wild with 3s! LOL

No offense intended to anyone here, but, as things stand now, any talk about us being a "bubble" team is comical.

^Maybe so, but it seems just as important to me to, in the event that we do get there, we get seeded to give us an opportunity to make it into the weekend or beyond. The MAC isn't highly respected enough to be a multi-bid league, but its champion usually ends up being seeded higher than it's projected to be.

Or maybe part of the problem is being projected and expected to do things that haven't been done here in 30+ years, and not knowing how to handle it? Maybe a humbling loss like this is a blessing in disguise that gets us back to focusing on a game at a time? I sure hope so. Better to happen earlier than later. I'm not convinced that Detroit is all that bad. They looked bad last year, even in the game we almost lost to them, but looked solid yesterday. If they go and lose at home to Bowling Green I'll rescind that statement immediately though.

(11-26-2014 04:36 PM)therockets046 Wrote:  ^Maybe so, but it seems just as important to me to, in the event that we do get there, we get seeded to give us an opportunity to make it into the weekend or beyond. The MAC isn't highly respected enough to be a multi-bid league, but its champion usually ends up being seeded higher than it's projected to be.

Or maybe part of the problem is being projected and expected to do things that haven't been done here in 30+ years, and not knowing how to handle it? Maybe a humbling loss like this is a blessing in disguise that gets us back to focusing on a game at a time? I sure hope so. Better to happen earlier than later. I'm not convinced that Detroit is all that bad. They looked bad last year, even in the game we almost lost to them, but looked solid yesterday. If they go and lose at home to Bowling Green I'll rescind that statement immediately though.

Yes...if Detroit were to beat BG (preferably handily), then my disappointment will be reduced, if just by a little, for a couple reasons...

Looks like another underachieving team this year.

(11-26-2014 11:48 AM)Toledo Football 1st Wrote:  During one of the TO's last night, might have been the last one, most of the players were in front of the coach listening to his direction. But, another guy, don't know who it was but he was tall, was standing behind the coach paying little attention; looked like he was practically shaking his head and rolling his eyes. That sort of attitude isn't going to help anything.

you see that in every college and pro basketball huddle. it could be duke or kentucky with the coach drawing up a play and a couple of the bench guys will be milling around disinterested.

All they are missing is the eye of the tiger, eye of the tiger baby!
Haven't had that though since Stempin and Fedak were there....