Hoff at Point

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jags1998

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Tonight = Stellar.

But, how does this play out on the road v. Purdue and OSU at home, etc ...

Your thoughts.
 

Tough to know really, especially considering NU spent the majority of the game in the 1-3-1. I think Hoff will be able to hold his own finishing the season.
 

I think you'll see a slightly different style of offense. With Nolen we ran a lot of on the ball screens or let him penetrate and dish (or throw up ridiculously wild shots). With Blake I think he'll get us started in our motion offense and then he'll be doing his usual...looking for off the ball screens for open looks.
 

jags1998 said:
Tonight = Stellar.

But, how does this play out on the road v. Purdue and OSU at home, etc ...

Your thoughts.
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I'm sorry but blake was far from stellar! he played effecient against a team that is average. he gave up his dribble all night in horrible spots! our bigs dominated tonight, but without guards that can't hit mid range shots, the top tier teams will dominate us.

hoff played a decent game-but he isn't a point guard and if teams press us blake is going to look like a 6th grader vs a senior!
 

He also forced more then just a couple of passes which resulted in turnovers and one bail out call to Sampson.
 


lakesgopher said:
I'm sorry but blake was far from stellar! he played effecient against a team that is average. he gave up his dribble all night in horrible spots! our bigs dominated tonight, but without guards that can't hit mid range shots, the top tier teams will dominate us.

hoff played a decent game-but he isn't a point guard and if teams press us blake is going to look like a 6th grader vs a senior!
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I guess by stellar I'm not saying he did things that an outstanding PG would do. But, for being pressed into an unnatural position in a Big Ten game I thought he accounted himself pretty well. Call it whatever you like - I'd say stellar considering the circumstances.
 

lakesgopher said:
I'm sorry but blake was far from stellar! he played effecient against a team that is average. he gave up his dribble all night in horrible spots! our bigs dominated tonight, but without guards that can't hit mid range shots, the top tier teams will dominate us.

hoff played a decent game-but he isn't a point guard and if teams press us blake is going to look like a 6th grader vs a senior!
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38 minutes
5-10 FG
2-5 3 pt (including one huge one at 53-50)
8-8 free throws
3 rebounds
4 assists
20 pts
4 TOs (including one that was a perfect pass to Iverson and zero at crunch time - were they all in the first half?)

The **team** had 3 turnovers in the 2nd half against a defense that in the last two years has given the guards absolute fits. Blake, Rodney/Austin and Ralph were fantastic beating the 1-3-1.

I am just as curious as you to see how he does against the top-level teams. But to say he played "decent" is simply inaccurate. He played a(nother) great game.
 

lakesgopher said:
I'm sorry but blake was far from stellar! he played effecient against a team that is average. he gave up his dribble all night in horrible spots! our bigs dominated tonight, but without guards that can't hit mid range shots, the top tier teams will dominate us.

hoff played a decent game-but he isn't a point guard and if teams press us blake is going to look like a 6th grader vs a senior!
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Agreed on all counts, we dominated NW physically tonight, just pounded on them, but Blake (who did a nice job playing to his talent level & out of position) is no John Stockton.

What's far scarier than Ohio St pressing Blake on the in bounds though is who he has to pass out of the trap to in his own end! Rodney? Colt? Trevor? Ralph? Who's the next pass go to? This is the reason we saw Hollins tonight I think. At least he's got handle enough to make the second pass up court.

Maverick has to step up his game & become adequate. I don't know how, he just has to. You can't look back of course but Devoe really left this team high & dry. Also would love to have Justin Cobbs on the squad right now.

We need to find a way to keep it together until Nolen comes back & then make a Cinderella tourney run.
 




Hey, we're the number 16 team in the country...

If we make a run in either the Big Ten or NCAA tourney we won't be a cinderella. We've got some national cred. It's just a few chicken-little-the-sky-is-falling yahoos on this board that don't expect us to do well. No way anyone but the aforementioned will consider us a cinderella.

Costa Rican Gopher said:
Agreed on all counts, we dominated NW physically tonight, just pounded on them, but Blake (who did a nice job playing to his talent level & out of position) is no John Stockton.

What's far scarier than Ohio St pressing Blake on the in bounds though is who he has to pass out of the trap to in his own end! Rodney? Colt? Trevor? Ralph? Who's the next pass go to? This is the reason we saw Hollins tonight I think. At least he's got handle enough to make the second pass up court.

Maverick has to step up his game & become adequate. I don't know how, he just has to. You can't look back of course but Devoe really left this team high & dry. Also would love to have Justin Cobbs on the squad right now.

We need to find a way to keep it together until Nolen comes back & then make a Cinderella tourney run.
Click to expand...
 


brucekaupa said:
false. He often struggled to get the ball up the court, and threw far too many cross-court passes.
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Um, what?

Have you seen our team against NU the past 4-5 years? We always struggle against the 1-3-1, whether it was McKenzie, Nolen, Westbrook, you name it. And they played with 2 guards that can handle it out there...Hoff didn't have a single person to pass to tonight that could handle the ball?

Another thing, there isn't such a thing as "too many cross-court passes" against a 1-3-1 zone...it's one of the ways to attack and get a better angle, forcing the lead defender to pick a side.
 

I didn't say he was terrible...but I sure wouldn't call it stellar.

And a lot of his passes were too lofted.
 




brucekaupa said:
I didn't say he was terrible...but I sure wouldn't call it stellar.

And a lot of his passes were too lofted.
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I respect you brucekaupa, but ShowinGoldy is right. Have you seen our guards against the NW 1-3-1 the last few years? We could barely get the ball inside the 3 pt arc at times.

Question 1: How many times did we turn it over bringing the ball up the floor or outside the 3 pt arc? Answer: Not many.

Question 2: How many points-in-the-paint did we get? Answer: Lots

This has a lot to do with quality guard play against a defense that has torn us up the last few years.
 

NU's whole approach is ugly, and make the other team look bad and play bad.
Hoff looked bad. He didn't play bad.
 

GopherJake said:
38 minutes
5-10 FG
2-5 3 pt (including one huge one at 53-50)
8-8 free throws
3 rebounds
4 assists
20 pts
4 TOs (including one that was a perfect pass to Iverson and zero at crunch time - were they all in the first half?)

The **team** had 3 turnovers in the 2nd half against a defense that in the last two years has given the guards absolute fits. Blake, Rodney/Austin and Ralph were fantastic beating the 1-3-1.

I am just as curious as you to see how he does against the top-level teams. But to say he played "decent" is simply inaccurate. He played a(nother) great game.
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you can look at the stat line and not be concerned! i watched blake play and im thankful this game was against a very average NU team. the wildcats dont press and i was shocked they didnt attempt it at all last night.

blake picked up his dribble and then looked to pass nearly every time up the court. and then it was a mad scramble to get the ball to rodney or ralph or whoever. NU went on an 18-4 run to close the half and take the lead, imagine if there would have been 5 min left when NU was on their run! also, blake put our offense in some spots that led to turnovers! he may not have been given the stat for the turnover but it reflects to his position of running the offense. nolen was always blamed for things like that but blake wont for whatever reason.

blake isnt a pg and it will hurt us with him in that position. blake is a game changer and an asset, just not at the point and after last night im really concerned about this team!
 

GopherJake said:
I respect you brucekaupa, but ShowinGoldy is right. Have you seen our guards against the NW 1-3-1 the last few years? We could barely get the ball inside the 3 pt arc at times.

Question 1: How many times did we turn it over bringing the ball up the floor or outside the 3 pt arc? Answer: Not many.

Question 2: How many points-in-the-paint did we get? Answer: Lots

This has a lot to do with quality guard play against a defense that has torn us up the last few years.
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disagree! it had more to do with our ddefense kicking NU's ass and they werent able to set up the 1-3-1 effectively all night! when they hit their shots we saw them take the lead!
 

We need to find a way to keep it together until Nolen comes back & then make a Cinderella tourney run.
Click to expand...

Not that it adds to this discussion but Al is done. I don't think there is any circumstance in which he comes back this year unless it's an act of God. I think we should get used to this.
 

lakesgopher said:
disagree! it had more to do with our ddefense kicking NU's ass and they werent able to set up the 1-3-1 effectively all night! when they hit their shots we saw them take the lead!
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You couldn't be more wrong. We had very few fast break points or points in transition. Our defense did not lead to our offense last night. Their defense was set almost every possession, Gopher's played in the half court almost all game. It absolutely gave us fits for the last 5 minutes of the first half until they made some adjustments. Running everything through Ralph with the other two bigs on the blocks solved that. It was like our own little version of the Triangle. You don't dribble penetrate a 1-3-1 zone.
 

lakesgopher said:
blake picked up his dribble and then looked to pass nearly every time up the court. and then it was a mad scramble to get the ball to rodney or ralph or whoever. NU went on an 18-4 run to close the half and take the lead, imagine if there would have been 5 min left when NU was on their run! also, blake put our offense in some spots that led to turnovers! he may not have been given the stat for the turnover but it reflects to his position of running the offense. nolen was always blamed for things like that but blake wont for whatever reason.

blake isnt a pg and it will hurt us with him in that position. blake is a game changer and an asset, just not at the point and after last night im really concerned about this team!
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You must be really excited based on the never ending string of exclamation points.

Just because a team is on a run doesnt mean it continues until a half is over. Had there been 5 more minutes in the half when NU was on its run, it doesnt mean they would have outscored the Gophers 30-8. That is illogical and stupid.

Yes, Blake put our offense in some tough spots but so does every player in the history of basketball. Its stupid to tear him apart when he led the team to a win against a weird defense in his first game as a PG. He will improve and the team will help him out. I cant believe you honestly think he was bad last night. His stat line is great. If he does that every game he will be 1st team all B10 cause he will average nearly 20ppg this season while playing the PG spot, getting assist and rebounding.
 

The thing that really bugged me is just the number of fundamental errors we made in bringing the ball up the court last night. And it wasn't all Blake either. My only real point on Blake is that he wasn't *stellar* as the OP said. We got by.

- Blake did indeed struggle bringing the ball up with someone guarding him. As a result, he picked up his dribble in some awkward spots and made less-than-ideal passes. We did get by, though. I felt we got very lucky on a few of those passes that just seemed like softballs thrown in the general direction of one of our players.
- Whether it was Blake or someone else, I couldn't believe the number of times we passed to someone who was standing 2 feet on the other side of the half-court line and then they were instantly trapped, or they picked up their dribble. When you know you're facing a 1-3-1, you don't do that.
- We didn't push the ball up the court much. We could've had quite a few easy baskets last night if we'd been looking up the court more. Seemed like we did a better job of that earlier in the game, even though it resulted in a few turnovers (like that full court pass to Rodney that went right through his hands...but at least we were pushing it up at that point)


Earlier in the thread, someone stated "cross court passes are how you beat the 1-3-1". Yes, I know about passing over the zone, but think of this play (it was something like that): Blake's dribbling up the right sideline. He lofts a softball pass all the way to Rodney at the other sideline and it's nearly intercepted. Rodney takes one dribble, picks it up, gets a trap and lofts a high arcing pass back to Blake on the other sideline, which is nearly intercepted. Blake dribbles twice and picks it up. He gets trapped. He lofts it back over to Rodney...almost intercepted. Rodney then fires a line-drive pass from the scorers table over to shart[email protected]. Turnover. That's not beating the zone. That's playing scared. You beat the zone by passing, yes. But the passes need to be faster and fluid. Not catch, hold, dribble, hold, pass, catch, hold, dribble. I want pass, pass, pass, penetrate, pass, zing, pow, bam! Hammer dunk!
 

Blizzard said:
Not that it adds to this discussion but Al is done. I don't think there is any circumstance in which he comes back this year unless it's an act of God. I think we should get used to this.
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I'm in agreement with you Blizzard. I really, really hope we're both wrong, but I just don't see Al coming back. As far as "lofting" the ball, this is a quote from Blake in the post game notes and quotes, "When you're at the point guard position, and the other four players are all taller than everyone else, you have to look to lob it over the top."
 

I want pass, pass, pass, penetrate, pass, zing, pow, bam! Hammer dunk!
Bruce, you want.........Batman!
 

BTW, the "Hammer Dunk" is from Jimmy Williams.

When I went to Dutcher camp back in '82, Jimmy kept talking about this dunk he supposedly used to do in college. You clamp the ball between your wrist and bicep. You jump, hold the ball over the rim, and the other arm comes swinging over the top and you "hammer" the ball with your other fist through the basket.
 

I'm in agreement with you Blizzard. I really, really hope we're both wrong, but I just don't see Al coming back.
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Sadly, the Twitter stalker in me, is simply going by what Al seems to saying-

yea I did tryna get the season right but I broke my foot probably done for the season and my career here at the u but...idk
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And also-

thinking... how my career here is coming 2 a close not the way i had planned out n my mind but no regrets cause I gave it a 110%
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I was kind of thinking about starting an Al Nolen tribute thread that seems a bit premature. Anything could happen I guess but I think he's done. He can still play a huge role on the bench for us, but as far as playing even if he is able to come back he's going to go through some therapy, building his stamina and legs back up, it would seem it would take him a bit to get back into game shape.

It's really unfortunate and not for us but for him. All indications were that he was done after being ineligible last year but he worked extremely hard to get back and it's sad that he's likely done.
 

brucekaupa said:
BTW, the "Hammer Dunk" is from Jimmy Williams.

When I went to Dutcher camp back in '82, Jimmy kept talking about this dunk he supposedly used to do in college. You clamp the ball between your wrist and bicep. You jump, hold the ball over the rim, and the other arm comes swinging over the top and you "hammer" the ball with your other fist through the basket.
Click to expand...

You need some serious hops and hang time to pull that one off.
 

Gold Vision said:
You couldn't be more wrong. We had very few fast break points or points in transition. Our defense did not lead to our offense last night. Their defense was set almost every possession, Gopher's played in the half court almost all game. It absolutely gave us fits for the last 5 minutes of the first half until they made some adjustments. Running everything through Ralph with the other two bigs on the blocks solved that. It was like our own little version of the Triangle. You don't dribble penetrate a 1-3-1 zone.
Click to expand...

i never said fast break! NU was unable to set up the 1-3-1 effectively on missed buckets! that allowed our bigs to find nice positions in the post and they were easy finds for blake and rodney!
 

khoffman43 said:
You must be really excited based on the never ending string of exclamation points.

Just because a team is on a run doesnt mean it continues until a half is over. Had there been 5 more minutes in the half when NU was on its run, it doesnt mean they would have outscored the Gophers 30-8. That is illogical and stupid.

Yes, Blake put our offense in some tough spots but so does every player in the history of basketball. Its stupid to tear him apart when he led the team to a win against a weird defense in his first game as a PG. He will improve and the team will help him out. I cant believe you honestly think he was bad last night. His stat line is great. If he does that every game he will be 1st team all B10 cause he will average nearly 20ppg this season while playing the PG spot, getting assist and rebounding.
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i will take that bet of 1st team big ten!

he wasnt good last night at the point. ya he had 20 points, good for him. blake IS A BAD PG AND IT WILL SHOW AGAINST PURDUE. purdue will press us and beat the hell out of our poor ball handling. blake was terrible during the 18-4 run. blake is a terrible ball handler and probably the worst ball handler of any guard in the big ten. blake is a shooter and a very smart player which makes up for his lack of abilities. i love having blake on this team, i have said it a thousand times, but he cant play point.
 

lakesgopher said:
i never said fast break! NU was unable to set up the 1-3-1 effectively on missed buckets! that allowed our bigs to find nice positions in the post and they were easy finds for blake and rodney!
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How else do you start a fast break outside of missed buckets and steals? Either way you are still wrong. They were in halfcourt sets basically the whole game. Ours bigs had nice position because they were posting against a 5'10" PG and 2 foul happy Europeans.

!!!!!
 

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