(01-07-2016 09:20 PM)Dukeman Wrote:  How was the attendance?

4,156.
Oh whoops that's the number of threads you've started.

We will lose Saturday. I fear this season will spiral down the crapper when we do. Longhorn was spot on with his assessment. Four of us drove from Richmond to watch guys play half ass tonight. Very disappointing.

As expected, Elon took a ton of 3's by launching 39 of them. They only took 26 shots inside the arc. This was no surprise and the Dukes held them to below average shooting.

JMU was terrible on offense and Brady talked about it in the postgame. He recently praised his team for being very good at processing the gameplan and using it wisely against specific opponents' tendencies and weaknesses. Last night was the exact opposite. He said they ignored the gameplan which was to get the ball inside against a small team. Elon is a crappy defensive team and JMU allowed them to get away with it by launching 3's.
The Dukes have been a very good 3pt shooting team this year and even a poor shooting night would have resulted in a win; however it was an atrocious shooting night.
Easy buckets inside were there for they taking with minimal basketball IQ. Let's call this a dumb game for the players.

With 18 CAA games all is not lost, but it is concerning the Dukes completely fell apart at home. This is a veteran team - no excuses.

Brady's teams at times over the years have been like Jekyl and Hyde. World beaters one game and then another game it looks like the first week of practice with miscues all over the place. It's an issue when the coach says the players "didn't follow the gameplan". One player not following the gameplan is one thing, but when the team doesn't follow it........ Morgan needs to be getting more minutes IMHO.

last night was the worst. just the worst. i left the convo hating everything... mostly myself for sitting all the way through that.

The common thread in the three bad home losses this season (and there really have been four if you count Charleston) is a seeming lack of energy on the part of the players. That's one issue. Another is that this team has never really come together this season. Their rebounding and defense, believe it or not, have largely kept them competitive, along with their three point shooting. Last night they were outrebounded in the second half, giving too many second chance points to Elon. They were 5 for 28 from three point range, which killed them. Last year's team, after the departure of Nation, put on a number of offensive displays that we really haven't seen this season for the most part. All of the plodding, slow and unathletic forwards on the team are screaming to be replaced by an athletic 4 man that can face up to the basket and shoot, play with his back to the basket and score around the basket. JMU simply does not have that player. I think Jarrell Brantley could have filled that role, but for whatever reason he's at Charleston not JMU.

What's really disconcerting is that the two conference losses are to young teams that were picked to finish at the bottom of the league, as reported by the DNR and painfully obvious. One could argue that it all gets back to coaching philosophy. Brady is not a system coach....he takes the players he has and tries to figure out how they should play going forward. Meanwhile, a lot of the teams that have succeeded in recent years in the CAA are system teams, teams like NE, W&M, UNCW and now Charleston and Elon.

Brady is going to have figure out something that works going forward or JMU will be doing two coaching searches in a 2-month span.

(01-08-2016 08:56 AM)Deez Nuts Wrote:  last night was the worst. just the worst. i left the convo hating everything... mostly myself for sitting all the way through that.

I had 1 person bail on me last night and had an extra ticket but too late to contact you about it, where did you wind up sitting?

(01-08-2016 10:54 AM)Bill Wrote:  

(01-08-2016 08:56 AM)Deez Nuts Wrote:  last night was the worst. just the worst. i left the convo hating everything... mostly myself for sitting all the way through that.

I had 1 person bail on me last night and had an extra ticket but too late to contact you about it, where did you wind up sitting?

two guys I was with bought general admission and I sat with them in the new student/general section.

This is actually worse than Withers' leaving.

(01-08-2016 12:00 PM)fanofallthatisjmu Wrote:  

(01-08-2016 11:44 AM)Deez Nuts Wrote:  

(01-08-2016 10:54 AM)Bill Wrote:  

(01-08-2016 08:56 AM)Deez Nuts Wrote:  last night was the worst. just the worst. i left the convo hating everything... mostly myself for sitting all the way through that.

I had 1 person bail on me last night and had an extra ticket but too late to contact you about it, where did you wind up sitting?

two guys I was with bought general admission and I sat with them in the new student/general section.

and then sat by himself in the corner of his house with all the lights turned off, staring at the wall and contemplating the meaning of life

well i mean after a few brews with some buddies, i went to bed, by myself with the lights off and stared at the clock for a while, which is in the corner, and contemplated a couple of things... so pretty much

There are a lot of things that we can critique regarding this team but most of the problems could be solved if someone could figure out how to bring Dalembert back from the dead. An MCL is not major surgery and Dalembert claims to be pain free. The potential best player (Nation) leaves and Curry becomes a star. Curry becomes a star and the 2nd best player (Dalembert) looks like the victim of a body snatching. It feels like a continuation of the fire Lefty curse.

With Dalembert I believe fully that it is in his head and he is thinking about the injuring his knee again instead of thinking about playing basketball. I don't it is physical in any way at this point.

The Dukes will play better on Saturday- they will be prepared for Towson's physical play and the big guys won't have to be as quick on their feet as playing against Elon who are constantly cutting and moving on offense. Hope to see more of Morgan and Curry together- I think that's a key for getting the team to the next level.