What has been the biggest problem this year?

[gopherbadgerman]

What do you think the biggest problem with the BB team has been this year?

[GopherinPhilly]

No White - No Mbakwe - Lost Nolan...huge losses of athleticism at the PF and PG...

[millions2spare]

joel matury

[Honyocker]

The biggest problem on this team is lack of player leadership. Tubby really needs a coach on the floor. Great teams have talent and leadership. This team's talent is better than its leadership.

[BigTenaciousD]

joel matury

Spelling :cool:

[Rosemountian]

Lack of a legit scorer.
Closest thing would be Westbrook or Hoff.
Westbrook is probably the most inconsistent player in the conference.
Hoff would be the best 4th scoring option in the country, would be good as a 3rd option. As the batman or robin, he just doesn't have the athleticism to get to the rim. Has he ever dunked in a game?

One go to scorer would make most of the other problems go away. Westbrook could play less, the guards would have someone to go to, would allow the team to finish. Winning more games would cause you to no longer think about the bottom 3.

[From the Barn]

Senior leadership. Westbrook isn't a leader, and Damien is too laid back to be an effective leader.

[Blizzard]

Senior leadership. Westbrook isn't a leader, and Damien is too laid back to be an effective leader.

I also agree with this. The players have to hold each other accountable on the floor. Someone, anyone, needs to do it. That's not something that appears to be within Damian, which really is fine, Westbrook is too self centered.

Who will be the leader(s) next year?

[Missed-layup]

Our handling of team problems!!! Start with Maturi and go down the list.

[From the Barn]

I also agree with this. The players have to hold each other accountable on the floor. Someone, anyone, needs to do it. That's not something that appears to be within Damian, which really is fine, Westbrook is too self centered.

Who will be the leader(s) next year?

Nolen and Carter

[Blizzard]

Nolen and Carter

I've thought a bit about Nolen and I'm wondering what his role will be on the team next year. Tubby, according to his comments from his show the other day, is obviously pretty displeased with Al's failure this year to keep his academics in order. If we should be fortunate enough to land Cory Joseph do you think Al will land on the bench or at least have to earn his playing time back?

Funny scene with Carter and Westbrook last night when Carter was trying to help Westbrook off the floor and after two tries Westbrook didn't get up and rolled over and did it himself. Westbrook looked pissed as usual, Carter was like whatever.

[rrjackIII]

Not sure if this is the biggest problem but the play that typified the season most for me last night involved our 2 seniors. Johnson passing the ball to Westbrook breaking into the lane and bouncing it off the back (of his head I believe) and Michigan scores on a fastbreak on the other end. What a change in directions.

[Monty519]

Finishing games is the obvious answer, considering how many games we led late only to mess up. Win a few of those and everything changes, which leads to more confident play, which leads to even fewer blown leads. Wouldn't fix our obvious matchup problem and lack of confidence against Michigan, but we'd overlook it considering we'd have like 22 wins already.

[GophersInIowa]

Senior leadership. Westbrook isn't a leader, and Damien is too laid back to be an effective leader.

I also agree with this. I'll add no fire on the floor in some games. I've seen more 'fire' from a girls 9th grade team than this team has shown at times this year.

[SelectionSunday]

Inability to finish close games. Win half or close to half of the games we choked away and we'd be looking at a decent season.

Nothing else is close.

[From the Barn]

Inability to finish close games. Win half or close to half of the games we choked away and we'd be looking at a decent season.

Nothing else is close.

I'd argue that the root cause of that is the poor leadership. I don't once recall either of the seniors getting in their teammates faces when the collapse began and pulling things together.

[GophersOnTheRise]

[QUOTE=Funny scene with Carter and Westbrook last night when Carter was trying to help Westbrook off the floor and after two tries Westbrook didn't get up and rolled over and did it himself. Westbrook looked pissed as usual, Carter was like whatever.[/QUOTE]

Looked like Westbrook expected him to literally pick him up off the floor. Looked pretty awkward.

[josh087]

Inability to finish close games. Win half or close to half of the games we choked away and we'd be looking at a decent season.

Nothing else is close.

I voted for Guard play because better guard play would have led to close wins. We needed guard scoring and poise down the stretch and haven't gotten it in any game with the exception of maybe the Indiana game with Joseph.

Agreed, closing close games is the biggest miss of the season, but guard play is the reason for not finishing the close games.

[Gophers4Life]

Bad luck...you can't expect what happened with Royce, Trevor, and Al.

[Jimbob]

Lack of talent. White and Mbakwe would have helped, but I dont know if they would have gotten this team to the second weekend of the tournament. Which, I think is what the goal for a program such as UofM should be.

[balds]

Watching other games from around the country it is clear that we lack the following.

Good foot speed/quickness/lateral movement, etc.. It is a big reason our man defense stinks and why we are unable to get good shots against quality defenses

Nolen, White and Mbakwe would have surely addressed this at least partially.

[millions2spare]

maturi

[EverTheSkeptic]

Lack of senior leadership.

Not having Nolen hurt, no doubt. Not having White and Mbakwe is harder to assess. White, for all his talent, would still have been a freshman and prone to freshman inconsistency. Mbakwe would have been coming off of a year of less intense competition and may have needed the year to get his game together for the intensity of big ten play.

If all goes well next year, if Nolen rejoins the team and if White and Mbakwe have their off-the-court problems resolved and can play, if the team learned from the failures of this year, and if there is a senior able to assert leadership, this team could very, very good. That is a lot of ifs, though. In any event, I'll be rooting for them.

[maxwellsmart]

It must be Maturi, for the following reasons:
1. Nobody else is AD
2. He is present at nearly every home game
3. A couple of dozen Gopher Hole minds cannot be wrong

[station19]

Watching other games from around the country it is clear that we lack the following.

Good foot speed/quickness/lateral movement, etc.. It is a big reason our man defense stinks and why we are unable to get good shots against quality defenses

Nolen, White and Mbakwe would have surely addressed this at least partially.

Or defend them(especially from the 3).

Also; LW's attitude and inability to play in a team concept.

[Gopher4Life]

In LW's defense, I think he sometimes decides that the "team concept" isn't working. Rather than giving up, he opts to try taking over the game and attempting more than he can handle. It's worked a time or two, but more often he looks way out of control.

He'd be MVP in a 6-footer league.

[From the Barn]

The bad offense meme needs to die. The offense is not even close to the problem.

[Dr.Don]

The biggest problem this year is that we did not have any of the expert posters from GopherHole show up as walkons and play with no weaknesses, no drawbacks, no turnovers, make every shot, make every free throw, lead the team in rebounds and steals, be the leader, and to top it off, tell Tubby how it should and will be done.

[GopherJake]

The biggest problem this year is that we did not have any of the expert posters from GopherHole show up as walkons and play with no weaknesses, no drawbacks, no turnovers, make every shot, make every free throw, lead the team in rebounds and steals, be the leader, and to top it off, tell Tubby how it should and will be done.

I bet that one guy that claims he had a full ride on the Gopher baseball team - and earned his keep - but hates everything Minnesota, would be a great team leader.

<b>The biggest problem</b>, other than not being able to finish a game, is the dry cleaning bill.

[Dr.Don]

I bet that one guy that claims he had a full ride on the Gopher baseball team - and earned his keep - but hates everything Minnesota, would be a great team leader.

<b>The biggest problem</b>, other than not being able to finish a game, is the dry cleaning bill.

+2, Jake...either that or we needed m2s/ml to be the AD and Head BB Coach along with playing all 40 minutes of every game and earning a 4.0 GPA.

[millions2spare]

thank you for the vote of confidence dr don! I will take the AD slot---tubby is a very good coach!

[Section201]

thank you for the vote of confidence dr don! I will take the AD slot---tubby is a very good coach!

m2s/ml,

You can only have the AD position when you can spell all the student/athlete names correctly.

This includes Mbakwe.

Lord have mercy, we agree on something: Tubby is a very good coach

[Friend Of Tubby]

Roy Williams, Jim Calhoun, Ben Howland to name 3 off the top of my head.

[Drex96]

Interesting statistic:

The large majority of those responding to this poll believe "finishing games" has been the biggest problem this year. And yet, no one seems to think this has anything to do with "coaching." If the coach had a different name like "Bob Smith," would that be the case?

Finishing games is definitely something that has to do with coaching. Don't believe me? Remember the events that led up to implementation of the 30 second clock and the 5 second rule.

One consistent thing about this Gopher team is that they blow big leads in the closing minutes of games and Tubby saves his TO's until the last second. Would using a TO to "settle down" the team during those runs have prevented some of those losses?

Yes, there are many individual problems amongst the players on this team, but let's not overlook the coaching failures of which there are many.

[balds]

Not having Nolen certainly added to the end of game woes. Remember last year vs. Louisville? Late in the game when Louisville was pressing, Nolen almost every time single handedly dribbled through pressure (and made his free throws). When teams ratcheted up their defense/pressure this year we got tentative because we didn't have that ball handler, all too often it resulted in a turnover.

[tomdog]

I think Blizzard is spot-on with their assessment of Westbrook and Johnson. I disagree, however, with 'Barn' in assuming that Nolen is going to be a leader next year. He couldn't even put himself in a position to stay on the court this year with his academics. I would have serious reservations about his ability to be accountable to his teammates. I'm a bit torn about Senior Day tomorrow, generally one of my favorite games. I think that Westbrook and Johnson are two very disappointing players, although I think they were put in roles that they weren't cut out for.

[Friend Of Tubby]

Season Recap: A promising season turned disastrous with the loss of Al Nolen to grades and top recruits Royce White and Trevor Mbakwe to legal issues. Minnesota is 8-9 in the league but probably will have to win the Big Ten tournament to earn an NCAA Tournament berth.

In Focus: The Gophers need to do something fast against Iowa to put the stench of the Michigan game behind them.

[Mikie S]

Not having Nolen certainly added to the end of game woes. Remember last year vs. Louisville? Late in the game when Louisville was pressing, Nolen almost every time single handedly dribbled through pressure (and made his free throws). When teams ratcheted up their defense/pressure this year we got tentative because we didn't have that ball handler, all too often it resulted in a turnover.
Strangely enough, as of last week, the Gophers were 7th nationally in assists and 18th in Ast/TO ratio.

[freshtrout]

Well, IMO, the largest reason is that Tubby didn't have the players he thought he had at the beginning of the season....and yes a quality point guard would have helped greatly.