Bonnies vs Davidson

Jive36 said:
Its pretty simple to me you cant play from down 10+ and expect to win very often. In all of our losses we have allowed large runs at the end of the first half/start of the second half lets take a look.
vs Davidson - Bonnies up 1 then a 19-2 run (last 2 minutes of first half/first 4 of second half)
@ Mason - Bonnies down 5 then a 18-2 run (first 4 minutes of second half)
@ Dayton - Bonnies up 3 then a 23-4 run (last 10 minutes of first half and first 2 possessions of second half)
@ VT - pick your run but probably 13-0 to start the game
@ UConn - Bonnies up 3 then a 18-2 run (14-9 minutes left in the second half)
vs UNI - Bonnies up 3 then a 25-3 run (last 4 minutes of the first/ first 3 minutes of the second half)

In every one of these games it went from a competitive game to enormous hole to dig out of. We don't have a run killer on this team. The guy you give the ball to and say we need a basket make it happen. We were spoiled by years of Stockard, Adams/Mobley, Posley, Kloof being able to get a shot or create an open look for others in those situations. Lofton was on this list until this year but you cant be on that list for me if 6+ times in one season a team goes on a 13+ point run. No one else has stepped in to fill that role. My eyes/mind says that Adaway is the guy for this team but it takes at least two passes to get him to any of his spots. (in a different time i would have gone back to see which bonnie actually ended these runs but i dont have time to do that).

Other musings from the reds.
- WTF is up with our fans heckling when our guys are on the line? Making free throws ultimately would have won us this game but we got students making bird noises when Holmes shoots, some idiot townie sitting courtside yelling at the refs once the ball is in Lofton's hands on back to back free throws. This stuff cant happen, it also shouldn't effect the shooter but why are we making it harder for ourselves.

- Q Adams does two things as well as anyone on the team, aggressively defend the ball handler and cut off passing lanes. If you are playing a press and trying to trap Davidson's guards a guy that can cut off passing lanes and make aggressive plays on the ball is exactly who i want on the floor. Also he has fresh legs and 4 fouls to give, I can't understand how he didnt get any action. How big of a mistake could he make? Once the ball was across half court we were fouling anyway.

- Down 5 with 30-40 seconds left you cant pass up shots, dribble into double teams and throw a pass out of bounds/back court. If one of the bench guys made that decision at any point in the game they wouldnt be seen for a month. We play 5 seniors that have such sloppy habits and lack game awareness so often.

- This game called for the Tyler Relph offense. What is the Tyler Relph offense? It is real simple. PG gets a flat pick at the edge of the logo, SG/SF/PF are in a stack on the block, SG/SF pop to opposite wings, PG can take the pull up three coming off the pick, pass to either wing for a quick shot or try to drive the basket. Why is that the Tyler Relph offense? Because I can see Relph, Mike Lee and Fereti running that play in my sleep. They went to that set at the 2-3 minute mark of every game because we were always down 5-10 and needed a miracle to comeback. (forgive me if this isnt 100% true. I watched most of those games through a drunken stupor so my memories shouldnt be trusted).
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Jive- with respect: the "Tyler Relph offense" had us finishing last place for years, no thanks. Kyle Lofton & Osun Osunniyi ran this pick & roll based offense to a prep national title and an Atlantic 10 title, and they are still the ones playing so I'd stick with that

What you say about the runs is a good point though, Schmidt should call a timeout before a 7 point run turns into a back breaking 15 point run. It has happened too much

Wish the referees would do something about Davidson's moving screens, I dont understand how that is allowed year after year
 
commie21 said:
I've said it all season to anyone who would listen (which is nobody really) but everyone keeps focusing on the Schmidt riding his starters until they collapse. The problem isn't with those 5 seniors playing 35+ minutes, it's the fact that the bench for the last 2 seasons has been so bad that you can't take those guys out. Winston and Roberts both transferred because they wanted to be starters getting 10+ shots per night. No other bench player sniffed a D1 team.

You can talk about substitution patterns all you want, but at some point, the recruiting efforts are the real issue here. You can't fill a bench year after year with D2 players and expect it to perform as a top 4 team in the A10. Look at next year's teams:

VCU 2 4-stars
GMU 1 4-star 1 3-star and everyone back
Davidson 2 3-stars and everyone not named Luka back
Dayton 1 4-star 1 3-star
SLU (rumors are Perkins may return)
Loyola added to the conference

Even Fordham and St. Joe's are pulling 3-star recruits.

I'm all for finding guys that fit your system and I'm hopeful that Rumpel and Evans are players, but who knows. Year after year, we go after diamonds in the rough, and then ship them off to a D2 school the following year. If something doesn't change quickly in regards to the players being brought in, we could be on the wrong side of the conference standings again rather quickly.
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I'm not necessarily sure how to respond to this.

While you're certainly correct with the bench status, how to you expect to recruit kids knowing they've had the same four to five starters returning two years in a row? These kids know they're not going to take minutes from any of these guys, so why burn a year or two of eligibility?

I think next year you will see a more complete team because there could be FIVE spots up for grabs. It's a much easier sell next year than this year. Not many recruits give a shit about being on an NCAA team if you NEVER play.

Kids want two main things when looking at a program. They want to PLAY and they want to play for a winner. That wasn't going to happen for virtually any player Bona was recruiting this offseason. Whether it was Rick Pitino or Mark Schmidt recruiting, this year was going to be a very hard sell for recruits.

Yes, it sucks Schmidt doesn't play his bench, but this isn't anything new. At a certain point, we know who Mark is and need to stop expecting it to change.

The last seven years have been the best in Bona basketball history since we've joined the A10. Pretty impressive all things considered.

Would we have made the dance in 2016 or 2019 had we utilized the bench or would we have lost another game or two that would have killed our hopes?

No one really knows for sure.

I'm skeptical for sure, but I'm going to put some faith in Mark Schmidt. He's earned it even though this team truly makes no sense given this day and age of CBB.
 
3rdShayCripSet said:
I'm not necessarily sure how to respond to this.

While you're certainly correct with the bench status, how to you expect to recruit kids knowing they've had the same four to five starters returning two years in a row? These kids know they're not going to take minutes from any of these guys, so why burn a year or two of eligibility?

I think next year you will see a more complete team because there could be FIVE spots up for grabs. It's a much easier sell next year than this year. Not many recruits give a shit about being on an NCAA team if you NEVER play.

Kids want two main things when looking at a program. They want to PLAY and they want to play for a winner. That wasn't going to happen for virtually any player Bona was recruiting this offseason. Whether it was Rick Pitino or Mark Schmidt recruiting, this year was going to be a very hard sell for recruits.

Yes, it sucks Schmidt doesn't play his bench, but this isn't anything new. At a certain point, we know who Mark is and need to stop expecting it to change.

The last seven years have been the best in Bona basketball history since we've joined the A10. Pretty impressive all things considered.

Would we have made the dance in 2016 or 2019 had we utilized the bench or would we have lost another game or two that would have killed our hopes?

No one really knows for sure.

I'm skeptical for sure, but I'm going to put some faith in Mark Schmidt. He's earned it even though this team truly makes no sense given this day and age of CBB.
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We're the only program in Division 1 that has to recruit kids to come play behind upperclassmen? Interesting take to blame the lack of recruiting ON the lack of recruiting. For purposes of the teams I highlighted above, all of the 4-star recruits that are joining their respective teams next season have a player returning as a starter at that position. So apparently Rick Pitino was not needed.

You are also highlighting the point that it's the best 7 year run since we've joined the A10 and our recruiting still results in D2 players which is not good.

Schmidt has done an excellent job with this program and I am not discounting that, but continually saying he's earned the right for no criticism is a Bannedwagon mantra at best.
 
commie21 said:
We're the only program in Division 1 that has to recruit kids to come play behind upperclassmen? Interesting take to blame the lack of recruiting ON the lack of recruiting. For purposes of the teams I highlighted above, all of the 4-star recruits that are joining their respective teams next season have a player returning as a starter at that position. So apparently Rick Pitino was not needed.

You are also highlighting the point that it's the best 7 year run since we've joined the A10 and our recruiting still results in D2 players which is not good.

Schmidt has done an excellent job with this program and I am not discounting that, but continually saying he's earned the right for no criticism is a Bannedwagon mantra at best.
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I did not say he is without fault.

Most clubs don't ride their starters 38+ MPG. This is a Schmidt staple and is nothing new.

Who wants to sign up to play at Bona when there's 2-5 mins up for grab a night? Other clubs that have a more balanced lineup can attract players because they'll actually see 10-15 minutes a night.

I'll take the past seven years. Yes, we've underachieved to date, but still 12-6 with a odd but decent resume.

I just have a hard time ripping on Schmidt. The school does not put him in a fantastic position to succeed in relation to the rest of the conference. We are near the bottom of spending, play in an outdated area with no real training/practice facility. Add in the fact that have a brutal time putting together quality and fair OOC.

We will play more road games OOC next year than Dayton, VCU, SLU and URI COMBINED.

Tell me why Bonaventure should be at the top of the conference every year and I will tell you why they shouldn't be.

Recruiting will get better if we actually put $$$$ into this program.
 
tastylicks said:
Jive- with respect: the "Tyler Relph offense" had us finishing last place for years, no thanks. Kyle Lofton & Osun Osunniyi ran this pick & roll based offense to a prep national title and an Atlantic 10 title, and they are still the ones playing so I'd stick with that
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Dont get me wrong I dont think they should move away from our normal offense in most situations. But when you are down two to three possessions with under a minute to play I think you need more urgency than our typical methodical offense allows for.
 
3rdShayCripSet said:
Most clubs don't ride their starters 38+ MPG. This is a Schmidt staple and is nothing new.
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I agree with everything in your post, except this point. It's nothing new to ride a few of the starters this much for him. It is new for him to ride all 5 of the starters this much.

Take a peak at sports reference- we have 2 guys this year averaging doubles outside the starters at 13/10. Take away the 3 games Kyle didnt play, and that would be 1 guy with Linton at 10 mpg.

Look next at 2016-2020. Each of those years features 3-4 guys in the 30s, and 3-4 more in double digits with at least one bench guy hovering at around 20. That's even after you remove the random outliers like Chef in 2019, who played a lot of minutes in a small number of games before being benched. I said it in a prior post but it rings true- we've always had a thin bench, but it's reached a new level.

I totally get last year was out of necessity. Coming into the season this year though, the understanding was supposed to be, the bench is up for grabs. Come in and earn your minutes. Of course we couldnt expect that to work on 7 of 7 open spots, but we apparently only added one guy with scoring prowess and a deep stroke who's ready to go. To have no one else who could hold their own and get some buckets- while surrounded by 4 very good other players- I have hard time justifying that. I think we had a great opportunity to not have to rely on all 5 for well north of 30 mins, and we didn't use it as wisely as we could have.

I couldn't agree more though on the last 7 years, and those are what give me confidence that after the hiccups of a fresh slate, we'll still be around most years, as long as Schmidt is.
 
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Community Bank 3Pt Tee said:
I couldn't agree more though on the last 7 years, and those are what give me confidence that after the hiccups of a fresh slate, we'll still be around most years, as long as Schmidt is.
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This is why I am not sad to see this season go. At the beginning of the year I wanted it to never end but this group has gone stale and are a large bottleneck. Nobody should be playing more than 35 min a game. Kyle maybe here and there but the rest should all sit for small stretches. I think Adaway might be reaching the zone where I dont want him out for very long. This is where Schmidt deserves the criticism for this year. Holmes clearly did not have it Tuesday. He was 1/10 with 4 TO's. Maybe if Brown were healthy we see him get 10+ minutes but I have to think Adams can give something. He did sub Adams in the 2nd half only to have him commit a really dumb foul and then Holmes was back.

I am most disappointed in Holmes this year. All credit for how he played when Lofton was out. He busted his ass and sacrificed his stats for the team and I love that. Largely this year he has been underwhelming, especially his 3 pt shooting. Hes at 28% this year and its not like hes throwing up prayers. Many of them are wide open looks. Last year he was 38%. His scoring is up 1 pt this year so he is driving and getting to the line more but he has had multiple games where he was just lost. He hasnt come through in the biggest games. Its one thing to have a great night vs St Joes but in most of our losses he has been MIA.

A remarkable stat I noticed: Adaway has 11 assists on the year. Thats it! Not a knock or complaint at all just caught me by surprise. I guess its mainly because he gets a lot of buckets and passes into the paint from our other guys.

Having said all that, dont get me wrong, I want to see this group play well and succeed. I will be in the front row cheering them on but I just dont view them leaving the same way I did last year and beginning of this season. I feel like 1-2 will use their Covid year.
 
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