Bonnies vs. Blue Raiders

MTSU is off to a good start. They are coming off a MTE win of their own where they beat 3 quality teams (SFA, Hofstra and Montana St). They are 0-2 on the road so far though. This is not a game we can just show up and win but like Bill said, lets avoid a letdown.
 
Yep. MTSU has been good enough in the early going that they deserve better than to call this a trap game. These are the type of games where a vet who's been there like Banks will hopefully pay dividends in keeping the young guys focused after a big win.

As an aside- anyone else notice Friday that the play by play guy always referred to Banks as "Banks the third"? It is his name after all, but I found it funny that he spoke out the full name every single time.
 
Banks the third thing was weird and made me wonder how it is written on the pronunciation sheet the team provides to all announcing crews.
 
Game thoughts.

MTSU was effective with their press, they forced 15 turnovers, but more than that we consistently were setting up the offense with 20 on the shot clock. This led to a number of possessions where after the first cycle of a play didn't generate a look, Luc or Banks would be dribbling out top with 10 on the clock and forced into creating out of a pick and roll with Venning very late in the shot clock. Luc converted a number of those attempts but we cant rely on him bailing us out multiple times a game.

We somehow ended up shooting 70% from the line but we struggled until the final couple minutes. I think this team is going to have to win ugly and that means figuring out the issues at the line.

The Mellouk at center lineup with the 4 starters should only play zone. That group has so much length that if they play with their hands up they will force a lot of tipped passes. Mellouk needs help anytime a big gets the ball near the paint and the zone allows us to send the help as well as makes that entry pass difficult. This might help the Amadasun lineups as well but its hard to tell since he cant keep his hands off guys.

Rumpel officially got 2 minutes of run and didn't look terrible. He only had 4 offensive possessions and shared the floor with Flowers the entire time.

That brings me to Flowers... I cant figure out how he fits into our system. He seems most at home with the ball in his hand and trying to create his own shot off the dribble and that doesnt really line up with Schmidt's offense very often. He is 6'3 and had a history of being a decent rebounder at Hartford but that hasnt translated yet. He is only shooting 20% from 3 when he is a career 34% shooter. Some of that could be small sample size and not getting into game flow from playing fewer minutes. Nothing we have seen so far suggests he will be in the rotation in A10 play.

We need someone to bring in for Evans if he is in foul trouble, needs a breather or needs some coaching and Flowers has been the answer so far this season, its not working. As a poster the obvious answer is give Farell minutes at that spot and get Mellouk or Hill more time at the 4. People (me) calling for Farell to get minutes at SF is quickly going to turn into #freeQuandry or why isn't Chef in the rotation, but it doesnt change that I would like to see it at some point.

One final dumb point. We run a play for Venning where Banks and/or Farell set a flare screen on the block to free Venning up. We have run it in both the ND and MTSU games multiple times. Why did we never run that the last 4 years for Shoon? I assume it was the lack of resect of our shooters made defenses sag off making the entry pass harder and clogging the paint but its been a great way to get easy looks for the offense and Venning
 
Jive36 said:
Game thoughts.
We need someone to bring in for Evans if he is in foul trouble, needs a breather or needs some coaching and Flowers has been the answer so far this season, its not working. As a poster the obvious answer is give Farell minutes at that spot and get Mellouk or Hill more time at the 4. People (me) calling for Farell to get minutes at SF is quickly going to turn into #freeQuandry or why isn't Chef in the rotation, but it doesnt change that I would like to see it at some point.
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I think Hill is the answer here, but early on he's struggeling with playing the 4 in Schmid'ts system. They must want to him to concentrate on learning the 4 because I dont understand why they wouldnt flip Hill and Mellouk at the 4 & 5. It seems like more natural for the both of them.

I don't see anything that says Flowers is an A10 level player, but in the post game ptesser Schmidt said they need his scoring off the bench so I guess they have some plan for him.

Tuff game for Rumple to get his 1st D1 minutes especially coming off injury. Hopefully he can spell Luc & Banks the Third some as the season progresses.
 
1946TobaccoBowlMVP said:
I think Hill is the answer here, but early on he's struggeling with playing the 4 in Schmid'ts system. They must want to him to concentrate on learning the 4 because I dont understand why they wouldnt flip Hill and Mellouk at the 4 & 5. It seems like more natural for the both of them.

I don't see anything that says Flowers is an A10 level player, but in the post game ptesser Schmidt said they need his scoring off the bench so I guess they have some plan for him.

Tuff game for Rumple to get his 1st D1 minutes especially coming off injury. Hopefully he can spell Luc & Banks the Third some as the season progresses.
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Yep. I am assuming Hill is struggling to fully grasp the system at the 4; otherwise, it seems wasteful to not try him out as a long, mobile 5 to match up with certain opposing lineups. Give him time, though. The attributes are there. He seems like a perfect physical fit for Schmidt’s system.

Rumpel was shot out of a cannon. Clearly, he was a little amped after his time away from live game action. I expect him to be a solid part of our rotation going forward, and that may come at the expense of Flowers’ minutes.

MTSU was tough. They’re super long and active as hell on defense. I’m pleasantly surprised that this young group was able to adjust to that disruptive style in the second half. Encouraging signs.
 
I have the same thoughts on the 3. There's combinations we havent seen and I'm not sure on why. Seems to be a stubbornness to keep Evans, Farrell and Mellouk each only at the 3, 4, 5 when their versatility should be one of the draws of their game. Maybe it's just me, but this seems to have increased with Schmidt in recent years. The lineup combinations for positions 3-5 were much more diverse and fluid in Jay's era than recently, at least as far as I remember.

In that same vein, I hope we don't have a situation where Rumpel/Luc is either or. We need to diversify our guard sets too. Banks does a lot of great things, so not a knock on him- but his green light is a little too generous right now. He's not so prolific a creator that he can't sit for a few minutes. If Rumpel turns out to be able to create shots for himself the way we all hope, getting Banks a breather will help to both keep him fresh, and keep the offensive flow fresh.

I loved how quickly we seemed to figure out that you beat an over-aggressive style by being patient, and waiting to attack the inevitable openings the style lends itself to. VCU will be a more talented version of that, but it's a good primer.

Luc has ice in his veins. Only two things I want to see are, less of the sets Jive refers to where it seems like we run nothing and then hoist, and stop picking up his dribbble in half court sets.

Overall very satisfying win.
 
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