Looks like the Owls are going to drop this one. 70-67 USA, 15 seconds remain.

Down by 3 and Bishop air balls a 3.....grrrr

Inconsistency has been the dog that has bitten us all night. We close to one or two and then give up baskets or foul and let S Ala expand the game past one possession.

74-67. The final margin flatters South Alabama.

The defense folded at a really bad moment for us. A good effort overall, but still lots to address.

Lose by 7 a game we could have had with a better job on the offensive end. Unfortunately we just don't have a dependable scorer to put on the floor behind Evans and Egor. Connor had some nice buckets and Quez had a few but nothing we could count on when we needed a basket.

We just don't have enough scoring depth right now. It's Evans and koulechov and that's it. Letcher-Ellis shows promise, but the real culprit is guercy, who should be stepping up here. The team needs him

(12-22-2015 09:58 PM)Wiessman Wrote:  74-67. The final margin flatters South Alabama.

Not bad, but the defense folded at a really bad moment for us. A good effort overall, but still lots to address.

Definitely not a 7 pt game and agree that D along with my lack of available scorers led to the defeat. At New Mexico we were able to go on a 10-0 run down the stretch...tonight that didn't happen.

Guercy and Mency have not provided much this season. I actually think Cashaw is the better player than Letcher-Ellis AT THE MOMENT. Letcher-Ellis seems to have a knack for fouls.

Growing pains.

(12-22-2015 10:02 PM)ExcitedOwl18 Wrote:  Guercy and Mency have not provided much this season. I actually think Cashaw is the better player than Letcher-Ellis AT THE MOMENT. Letcher-Ellis seems to have a knack for fouls.

Having Ben Simmons playing in front of him at Montverde means Quez is now getting minutes he could have gotten at a high level last year. He shows flashes but makes some poor decisions and has some lapses that he should overcome with playing time. It is tough that we have to depend on him for so many minutes.

(12-22-2015 10:02 PM)Tiki Owl Wrote:  

(12-22-2015 09:58 PM)Wiessman Wrote:  74-67. The final margin flatters South Alabama.

Not bad, but the defense folded at a really bad moment for us. A good effort overall, but still lots to address.

Definitely not a 7 pt game and agree that D along with my lack of available scorers led to the defeat. At New Mexico we were able to go on a 10-0 run down the stretch...tonight that didn't happen.

The thing is, our two scorers have 30+ point potential every time out. You can win like that, but the supporting cast has to take care of just about everything else. Tall order.

South Alabama shot ~60% in the second half apparently. Rhoades can't be happy about that.

(12-22-2015 10:06 PM)Wiessman Wrote:  South Alabama shot ~60% in the second half apparently. Rhoades can't be happy about that.

They had a run of about 3 or 4 baskets that were either open 3's or open layups under the bucket at about the 5 minute mark that really hurt. We stopped New Mexico down the stretch while we caught up tonight we couldn't stop the critical buckets. Come back with a win against Incarnate Word and then get ready for 3 road games to open up CUSA.

Re:Max scoring. Rhoades has said Max needs to get close to 10 a game by getting to the FT line....said after the HBU IIRC

Walked up to the corner again but failed to go around.

Guercy's scoring disappearance is a bit surprising so far this season. I remember last season when several posters were kind of down on him about halfway through conference, saying he had reached his peak, and then he ripped off a few games where he scored around 20 and took it up a notch or two. I know his focus is different this season having Koulechov and Evans to look to, but they basically replace Gearhart and Jackson.

I'm wondering how much Dan Peera's senior leadership last season is missed. He really seemed to help glue the team together and keep them focused. The defensive shortcomings so far this year lead me to see how we are basically a new team starting over, and have to learn to come together again.

I thought New Mexico win on road was great, certainly a very big win, but having seen the HBU game, it seemed clear it was a combination of New Mexico not playing up to par and Rice overachieving a bit. That is why I have always called for multiple Signature wins in a sport rather than just one. Consistency of taking care of business against the lesser teams on the schedule is a baseline of expectations to build streaks that include special big wins in them.

I was afraid of the letdown with this game, and it did happen, but fortunately basketball season is much longer than football, and each individual game is a bit less critical. Rhoades still has work to do on the defensive end in getting the team to play more together as he did last season. Remember, it wasn't until about 1/4 way through conference that we seemed to get the idea and started to be more consistent in effort.

I don't know how this season will go, but the conference overall does appear softer than last year, so we have a chance to do a bit better. Also need Drone to be more involved. I think Mency will become a better player overall as he ages, but he will have new competition every year from now on for his playing time.

(12-23-2015 09:35 AM)GoodOwl Wrote:  Walked up to the corner again but failed to go around.

Guercy's scoring disappearance is a bit surprising so far this season. I remember last season when several posters were kind of down on him about halfway through conference, saying he had reached his peak, and then he ripped off a few games where he scored around 20 and took it up a notch or two. I know his focus is different this season having Koulechov and Evans to look to, but they basically replace Gearhart and Jackson.

I'm wondering how much Dan Peera's senior leadership last season is missed. He really seemed to help glue the team together and keep them focused. The defensive shortcomings so far this year lead me to see how we are basically a new team starting over, and have to learn to come together again.

I thought New Mexico win on road was great, certainly a very big win, but having seen the HBU game, it seemed clear it was a combination of New Mexico not playing up to par and Rice overachieving a bit. That is why I have always called for multiple Signature wins in a sport rather than just one. Consistency of taking care of business against the lesser teams on the schedule is a baseline of expectations to build streaks that include special big wins in them.

I was afraid of the letdown with this game, and it did happen, but fortunately basketball season is much longer than football, and each individual game is a bit less critical. Rhoades still has work to do on the defensive end in getting the team to play more together as he did last season. Remember, it wasn't until about 1/4 way through conference that we seemed to get the idea and started to be more consistent in effort.

I don't know how this season will go, but the conference overall does appear softer than last year, so we have a chance to do a bit better. Also need Drone to be more involved. I think Mency will become a better player overall as he ages, but he will have new competition every year from now on for his playing time.

The issue with Max is that he's just not even looking for his shot, and other teams can see this in the tapes and develop a game plan around it. He only put up 2 shots all game last night. This allows double teaming of Egor and Marcus. Max is a very poor outside shooter, but he needs to look to drive to the basket jat least 5 - 6 times a game. This is especially a no-brainer since he's our best, most consistent FT shooter. With Mencey, I'm convinced it's a confidence thing. Even last year, he was reluctant to shoot, and passed up many open looks. Again, very easy to pick up in anyone's scouting report. IMO, to get him into the offensive flow, you've got to go to him with a couple set plays early, and try to build off that. Lichter-Ellis is simply a very raw player; immensely talented with almost unlimited upside on both ends of the court, but still a year or two away from reaching his potential. Right now he's incredibly inconsistent. And his awful FT shooting is killing us. IMO, Cashaw is the one most likely to step into the 3rd scorer roll for us this season, but it appears Coach is limitting his playing time somewhat due to struggling defense (vs. what Mencey provides).

I also wonder how much the reduced shot clock has affected our team's chosen style of play. Shorter clock means all teams have more urgency to push the ball up sooner, so the trapping "havoc" style is somewhat less effective.

Personally, I feel the college shot clock would be better back at :45 seconds. These kids are still growing and learning, and it allows for more variety of styles of play to win games.

I was also never a fan of the :24 sec pro clock, as to me it ruins the game. :30 secs for the pros would be my preference. That and make the pro court wider overall by about 4 feet (and add a foot width to the lanes). Players are much bigger now. Perhaps even look at raising the basket a bit. Make dunks worth only 1 point.

Disappointing loss, but the team is still young and growing. While the New Mexico win was great, I think some of us were getting a little too excited about what it would mean for the rest of the season. Agree with some of the other posters above about Rice really becoming more consistent about halfway through conference games last season. Hopefully it can happen earlier this year, but it certainly hasn't happened yet.

Mency 2014-15: 29.2 min/game, 33.4% 3-pt, 64.3% FT
Mench 2015-16: 27.3 min/game, 15.6% 3-pt, 30.0% FT

Guercy 2014-15: 33.0 min/game, 27.9% 3-pt, 4.5 asst/game
Guercy 2015-16: 31.6 min/game, 19.0% 3-pt, 5.7 asst/game

Drone 2014-15: 22.7 min/game, 6.7 pts/game, 5.4 reb/game
Drone 2015-16: 18.3 min/game, 7.0 pts/game, 3.2 reb/game

A couple interesting things to me. First, all 3 of these returning players are actually playing fewer minutes than last season, even though they were all starters last season and this year's team is arguably even less deep because of injuries. Additionally, all 3 seem to have taken a big step back in some part of their game (3-pt shooting for Mency and Guercy, rebounding for Drone), though they are still contributing in other ways.

So my hypothesis is that for Rice to take another step toward consistency, there are 3 categories where things can improve:
(1) Growth from the true freshman. I fully believe this will happen, though it is hard to imagine any more growth from Evans!
(2) Jackson and/or Lott return.
(3) Some combination of Drone rebounding and Mency/Guercy shooting better.

Obviously there are other "team" factors as well that come with playing together for longer. So this is just on an individual level.

Last night's poor FT shooting by Letcher-Ellis perhaps cost Rice the game. (you never know how the flow of the game is altered if those shots are made). (Please don't read this as if I am blaming his performance for the loss) We can also see that the team was out-rebounded by 10, meaning up to 10 more opportunities to score for the opposition. In fact, so far in 2015-2016, the opposition has taken 30 more shots from the field compared to the Owls (2.5 more shots per game). When you add in the fact that the opposition is hitting their shots at an average rate that is 4% to 5% higher than the Owls, you can understand why their record is at this point in time. Last night South Alabama's FG percentage was 54% compared to Rice's 40%.

Bishop Mency is playing approximately the same number of minutes per game as he did last year, but is scoring at a rate about half the level of the previous season. Plus his free throw % is down to 30%, compared to 64% in 2014-2015. In fairness, he has only 10 FT attempts to date this year compared to 42 attempts last year. His FG shooting percentage for 2015 is about the same as a year ago.

Until last night, Letcher-Ellis was shooting free throws at a 68% success rate. His 1-6 night at the line really hurt, especially missing the end of the one and one near the end of the first half. Cashaw is currently shooting free throws at a 55% rate, which has to improve if he expects to earn significant minutes in crunch time.

Walt made an interesting observation about Max's outside shooting, which seems to be validated by his shooting statistics. As a freshman he shot 37% from the 3-point line, his sophomore year that shooting percentage dropped to 30% from the arc. Last year, the percentage dropped to 28% and year-to-date he is clicking at only an 19% success rate from the 3-point line. His overall point production for the first 3 years hovered between 9.3 and 9.8 ppg. This year he is producing points at a rate of 6.6 ppg. My guess is that much of that decline is due to the other scoring options present on the team, since he is averaging about 1/2 of the number of shots per game compared to the number he averaged for the previous season.

It hurts to lose games like this but it is part of the maturation process for a young team with limited depth. I am enjoying watching this team compete and improve (albeit sporadically) and look forward to conference play.

(12-23-2015 11:27 AM)Kayjay Wrote:  Last night's poor FT shooting by Letcher-Ellis perhaps cost Rice the game. (you never know how the flow of the game is altered if those shots are made). (Please don't read this as if I am blaming his performance for the loss) We can also see that the team was out-rebounded by 10, meaning up to 10 more opportunities to score for the opposition. In fact, so far in 2015-2016, the opposition has taken 30 more shots from the field compared to the Owls (2.5 more shots per game). When you add in the fact that the opposition is hitting their shots at an average rate that is 4% to 5% higher than the Owls, you can understand why their record is at this point in time. Last night South Alabama's FG percentage was 54% compared to Rice's 40%.

Bishop Mency is playing approximately the same number of minutes per game as he did last year, but is scoring at a rate about half the level of the previous season. Plus his free throw % is down to 30%, compared to 64% in 2014-2015. In fairness, he has only 10 FT attempts to date this year compared to 42 attempts last year. His FG shooting percentage for 2015 is about the same as a year ago.

Until last night, Letcher-Ellis was shooting free throws at a 68% success rate. His 1-6 night at the line really hurt, especially missing the end of the one and one near the end of the first half. Cashaw is currently shooting free throws at a 55% rate, which has to improve if he expects to earn significant minutes in crunch time.

Walt made an interesting observation about Max's outside shooting, which seems to be validated by his shooting statistics. As a freshman he shot 37% from the 3-point line, his sophomore year that shooting percentage dropped to 30% from the arc. Last year, the percentage dropped to 28% and year-to-date he is clicking at only an 19% success rate from the 3-point line. His overall point production for the first 3 years hovered between 9.3 and 9.8 ppg. This year he is producing points at a rate of 6.6 ppg. My guess is that much of that decline is due to the other scoring options present on the team, since he is averaging about 1/2 of the number of shots per game compared to the number he averaged for the previous season.

It hurts to lose games like this but it is part of the maturation process for a young team with limited depth. I am enjoying watching this team compete and improve (albeit sporadically) and look forward to conference play.

I am no basketball expert, but while visisting my daughter's family in the Mobile area I had the pleasure of watching the Owls last night. Although the score stayed close, South Alabama had a sight edge in play throughout - primarily due to their inside play. I enjoyed the fast pace game both teams seemed determine to play.
Rice is obviously a young team that is short in numbers and inside players. While Drone probably can be effective in certain situations, he appears to be unsuited for the fast game of last night. Letter-Ellis is athletic and will become a real force, but last nigth he missed several shots near the basket and hurt us with missed free-throws. The scoring burden falls on Evans and Koulechov but Cashaw should provide help as the season progresses. Also,
I think involving Mercy more would help especially since we need inside help. I wonder why Smith has not been played more in the preseason games so that he might help during conference play. Lastly, I believe that Jackson and Lott were present in sweat clothes and seem to be moving freely without any type of support.