Richmond game thoughts....

Random thoughts from last night's game...

* Whoever is in charge of scheduling has really done a nice job of increasing the competition level as we move towards Duke. Richmond was just the type of game we needed, one where our guards get tested because let's face it, that's our weakness.

* It was funny to watch us send our "small line-up" on the floor & then watch Richmond counter by going small on our "small line-up". For those did not see the game they were very small & #0 was a full head shorter than Dre & looked like a very good 14 year old.

* MVP last night was Dre Hollins imo. Midway through the 2nd half we were down by 7 & it was starting to look like we might lose this one. I was thinking "Hey, Richmond has all the momentum/confidence right now, our guys are just standing around, no one can hit a jumper....YOU Dre Hollins need to take this team on your back & will something to happen, right now.", then he did. He drove his man & pulled up for a jumper. Hustled back on D & got a piece of a pass, dove to the floor to grab the ball, lost it, lunged forward, got the ball back, passed it ahead Austin who ended up getting a trip to the line for 2 points, then he made another steal, drove the lane again for a lay-up, almost had another steal, came back up the court & drained a 3 (normally it would have been a bad shot, but he was the ONLY guy doing anything offensively, he was feeling it & it gave us the lead, so fire away Dre!), suddenly the 7 point deficit was gone, we're up by 1 & had all the momentum/confidence. Ball game.

* Trevor good & bad, still getting back to where he was. He committed some really dumb fouls, missed key free throws & killed our hard earned momentum at the end of the 1st half. That said, the dude is called "The Beast" for a reason & in the second half he was an absolute monster on the glass. I think he had 9 (?) alone in the 2nd half, plus some blocks & generally played physical which we needed.

* Austin held their top scorer, who averages 20ppg to 2 points. Anything else was gravy.

* Rodney had a couple Willie Burton type moments in the 1st half where we needed a basket & he basically just decided he was going to score, period. Would love to see more of that aggressive mentality from him. Down side is he's still not quick enough to take guys off the dribble & his jumper, while improved looking still isn't enough to keep people honest if he's playing the 3.

* More of the same for Joe. He's able to play at a high level against teams like Richmond because he's more physical than them, but he'll be shut down again in the B1G if he doesn't learn to dribble with his left hand & start taking/hitting jump shots. He hit a pretty looking 3 last night which was good to see, but it was his only attempt & I've probably been the most disappointed with Joe of any player this non-conference. He really hasn't used his left hand or shot jumpers at all. We already know he can drive the lane (to his right) & out-rebound guys his own size. What he needs to work on his these finesse things or he's one dimensional offensively & that's no good for a starting 3 in the B1G.

* Welch....Man does he look slow. I'll leave it at that.

* As noted Mav has been playing solid. He's the Ryan Collado of the basketball team. A guy who never in a million years should have been playing as a True Freshman. A guy who was never recruited or intended to play as a True Freshman, but lightening struck & he was forced into action. Like Collado, fans got it into their heads that he was absolutely horrible in every way & have a hard time changing their opinions of him. If you recall, by his Sr year people were lamenting that Collado didn't have one more year to play & we may find ourselves doing the same with Mav in 16 months. There was a stretch last night when he looked like the only one who knew wtf was going on out there.

* I got to the game about 10 minutes in & just caught the end of Elliot's time. He looked like a 7'er trying to keep up with a bunch of guards (which he was). It was a bad match-up for him so he didn't play much. Don't read anything into it.

* Mo should be at his best in B1G play where the players are bigger & more physical because honestly in the two non-conference games I've watched he's looked painfully slow. Not trying to rip on Mo, just a square peg in a round hole against the smaller non-conference teams.

#00 was 5'8'' 140#s. someday soon they'll let him on his first roller coaster

Agree with all of your comments. Coleman could dominate Minnesota HS bball because of his explosiveness. But he is not big enough to finish at the rim against taller, more athletic players consistently. My guess is that he seldom worked on his left hand ball handling much either because he didn't have to. Contrast that to Dre making an impossible left-handed lay-up last night. Equally troubling is Joe's FT shooting; missing those 2 technical shots says something. I hope he can elevate his game or he will be a liability against quality teams in the B1G.

gopherMD said:

Agree with all of your comments. Coleman could dominate Minnesota HS bball because of his explosiveness. But he is not big enough to finish at the rim against taller, more athletic players consistently. My guess is that he seldom worked on his left hand ball handling much either because he didn't have to. Contrast that to Dre making an impossible left-handed lay-up last night. Equally troubling is Joe's FT shooting; missing those 2 technical shots says something. I hope he can elevate his game or he will be a liability against quality teams in the B1G.

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coleman is 6'4" his size isnt the issue his ball handling is his issue. he struggles with his jump shot but can attack the rim aggressively. only thing that hampers him imo is his lack of skill with ball handling, against better guards they sit on his dominant hand and ten he has problems

I'll never understand the Coleman hate ever since his career started, especially since he's now only a true sophomore. He brings something to the table that none of our other guards do and he compliments them well. He has a fearlessness about him to slash and straight line drive to the hoop. He is our best rebounding guard and the best guard at drawing fouls and contact. He has completely destroyed zone defenses early with his cutting ability this season and thrives on transition offense.

Of course he needs to work on some ball handling and shooting, as does the majority of our team. But why do you want a guy that isn't a known shooter to hang around the perimeter and pull up at the 3pt line consistently in games? I'm glad he plays to his strengths while he is developing other parts of his game. He's coach-able and a gym rat by everyone's reports, so those parts of his game can only get better. I've also seen one or two 3pt attempts and pull up jumpers in every game this year, he already has over the half the attempts he did all of last year and he's connected at 40% from 3pt range so far.

People just seem to get enamored with the long ball and ignore the things that Coleman and Williams do to balance out a lineup.

Gold Vision said:

I'll never understand the Coleman hate ever since his career started, especially since he's now only a true sophomore. He brings something to the table that none of our other guards do and he compliments them well. He has a fearlessness about him to slash and straight line drive to the hoop. He is our best rebounding guard and the best guard at drawing fouls and contact. He has completely destroyed zone defenses early with his cutting ability this season and thrives on transition offense.

Of course he needs to work on some ball handling and shooting, as does the majority of our team. But why do you want a guy that isn't a known shooter to hang around the perimeter and pull up at the 3pt line consistently in games? I'm glad he plays to his strengths while he is developing other parts of his game. He's coach-able and a gym rat by everyone's reports, so those parts of his game can only get better. I've also seen one or two 3pt attempts and pull up jumpers in every game this year, he already has over the half the attempts he did all of last year and he's connected at 40% from 3pt range so far.

People just seem to get enamored with the long ball and ignore the things that Coleman and Williams do to balance out a lineup.

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but but but, according to our GH experts, if a kid can't make 100% of his 3 pt attempts, he should sit on the pine.

I will give Richmond credit they have a good little team and played the Gophers tough. They made us make some stupid mistakes and if they would have shot the ball a little better would have made it close the whole game.

As far as our turnovers go...we had some terrible passes, terrible decisions, terrible attempts at scoring which has to do with a lot of it. However, I noticed that our offense (especially in the first half) was so slow that I can see why we turned it over. Nobody moved. There was one guy with the ball and 4 standing around asking for the ball. My wife even asked me why nobody was moving and why we kept trying to pass it to guys just standing there. I said I didn't know and said she could be playing defense against the gophers and getting steals.

Dumb play aside, that offensive effort early on was brutal and to me was part of the reason why people were forcing things. With that being said the Gophers battled back when they needed to which was good to see. It was also good to see Mbakwe get quality minutes before the Duke game as we will need his size and athletic play inside. Good to see Austin playing solid D against their best player as we will need him to shut down Curry.

gopherMD said:

Agree with all of your comments. Coleman could dominate Minnesota HS bball because of his explosiveness. But he is not big enough to finish at the rim against taller, more athletic players consistently. My guess is that he seldom worked on his left hand ball handling much either because he didn't have to. Contrast that to Dre making an impossible left-handed lay-up last night. Equally troubling is Joe's FT shooting; missing those 2 technical shots says something. I hope he can elevate his game or he will be a liability against quality teams in the B1G.

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You realize he shoots 80% right? He hit some clutch ones last year and he is definitely one of our best free throw shooters. Not sure how that area is troubling for him.

GophersOnTheRise said:

You realize he shoots 80% right? He hit some clutch ones last year and he is definitely one of our best free throw shooters. Not sure how that area is troubling for him.

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Oh, GOTR, watching and judging one game, one event in one game, makes an expert.

Dr.Don said:

Oh, GOTR, watching and judging one game, one event in one game, makes an expert.

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So do you ever actually have an opinion of your own or is your role of condescending internet police enough for you?

Glad to see Trevor get some minutes. EE isn't the answer and I hope his minutes get cut. TM was on the floor with the other starters which hasn't been the case to this point. We need him in there and now with the Dukies next.

Don't get the hate on EE. He does some good things when he's out there, his rebounds/blocks per minute are through the roof. It's not pretty but it doesn't have to be. Obviously his minutes are going to go down as Trev gets back in the swing of things but it's not because EE is playing badly.

Prolific said:

Don't get the hate on EE. He does some good things when he's out there, his rebounds/blocks per minute are through the roof. It's not pretty but it doesn't have to be. Obviously his minutes are going to go down as Trev gets back in the swing of things but it's not because EE is playing badly.

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EE deserves more criticism than Mav at this point, but for some reason everyone is hating on the guy shooting 50 percent from three and has two turnovers.

afurry91 said:

EE deserves more criticism than Mav at this point, but for some reason everyone is hating on the guy shooting 50 percent from three and has two turnovers.

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Criticism for what?

Gold Vision said:

I'll never understand the Coleman hate ever since his career started, especially since he's now only a true sophomore. He brings something to the table that none of our other guards do and he compliments them well. He has a fearlessness about him to slash and straight line drive to the hoop. He is our best rebounding guard and the best guard at drawing fouls and contact. He has completely destroyed zone defenses early with his cutting ability this season and thrives on transition offense.

Of course he needs to work on some ball handling and shooting, as does the majority of our team. But why do you want a guy that isn't a known shooter to hang around the perimeter and pull up at the 3pt line consistently in games? I'm glad he plays to his strengths while he is developing other parts of his game. He's coach-able and a gym rat by everyone's reports, so those parts of his game can only get better. I've also seen one or two 3pt attempts and pull up jumpers in every game this year, he already has over the half the attempts he did all of last year and he's connected at 40% from 3pt range so far.

People just seem to get enamored with the long ball and ignore the things that Coleman and Williams do to balance out a lineup.

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+100000

Gold Vision said:

Criticism for what?

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Sloppy play, careless with the ball. Oven mitts on his hands. Not to mention that he was absolutely worked by 34 on Richmond yesterday. That guy could have scored at will on him, and is one of the reasons that we went to Trevor and Mo so early and left EE on the bench in the second half. That's what it will be like in the Big Ten.

The maverick defenders need to look at team stats when he is on the floor, not his individual stats.

From the Barn said:

The maverick defenders need to look at team stats when he is on the floor, not his individual stats.

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He brought composure to the 2nd team yesterday in his limited minutes. He is the better option than Welch at this point in this season.

afurry91 said:

Sloppy play, careless with the ball. Oven mitts on his hands. Not to mention that he was absolutely worked by 34 on Richmond yesterday. That guy could have scored at will on him, and is one of the reasons that we went to Trevor and Mo so early and left EE on the bench in the second half. That's what it will be like in the Big Ten.

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He has the same amount of TO's (2) and more assists (7) than Mav, not sure where you get the "sloppy play" from. He's 29th in the country and 2nd in the conference in Block %. In his very limited offensive usage he has a floor percentage of 70.7 and a offensive rating of 140.3. Basically he clogs up the middle, alters shots, doesn't turn it over and grabs rebounds at an average rate.

Gold Vision said:

He has the same amount of TO's (2) and more assists (7) than Mav, not sure where you get the "sloppy play" from. He's 29th in the country and 2nd in the conference in Block %. In his very limited offensive usage he has a floor percentage of 70.7 and a offensive rating of 140.3. Basically he clogs up the middle, alters shots, doesn't turn it over and grabs rebounds at an average rate.

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By "sloppy play" I mean he can't catch a pass or grab a ball out of the air. The turnover gets credited to someone else because he can't catch. He'd have many more rebounds if he could catch as well.

Do you have any thoughts on his defensive performance against 34 of Richmond yesterday?

afurry91 said:

By "sloppy play" I mean he can't catch a pass or grab a ball out of the air. The turnover gets credited to someone else because he can't catch. He'd have many more rebounds if he could catch as well.

Do you have any thoughts on his defensive performance against 34 of Richmond yesterday?

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Yes, for the majority of EE's minutes, he was not guarding 34 of Richmond. He was guarding #33, there 6'9" F/C. Dwill (34) also scored about half of his points from the first half on the perimeter, nowhere near EE's help D.

Gold Vision said:

Yes, for the majority of EE's minutes, he was not guarding 34 of Richmond. He was guarding #33, there 6'9" F/C. Dwill (34) also scored about half of his points from the first half on the perimeter, nowhere near EE's help D.

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Watch the replay. Every time EE was on him. 34 backed him down and got on easy bucket or he fouled him. It was hard to watch.

I am not a big poster however have followed the Gophers for past 50 years...and enjoy watching the elite officials coming to the Barn....Rucker,Hightower,Bain etc and yet everytime Mike Sanzere is officiating there is usually a crucial call...and it has seemed to go against the Gophers.. Keady and the General were two who seemed to work Mike for that correct call last night he seemed to have an excellent night and is improving immensely

afurry91 said:

Watch the replay. Every time EE was on him. 34 backed him down and got on easy bucket or he fouled him. It was hard to watch.

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I don't have to, I just watched it last night, and I can see the play by play and box score. EE had no fouls yesterday. 8 of 34's 16 points came when EE was not in the game, 5 points were on perimeter jump shots at the beginning of the game. That leaves 4 points where EE possibly got backed up by 34 on (even though he wasn't guarding him).

Gold Vision said:

I don't have to, I just watched it last night, and I can see the play by play and box score. EE had no fouls yesterday. 8 of 34's 16 points came when EE was not in the game, 5 points were on perimeter jump shots at the beginning of the game. That leaves 4 points where EE possibly got backed up by 34 on (even though he wasn't guarding him).

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Ee didn't play well yesterday, ee will be fine-guys have bad games from time to time

The fact is we went small because we could, not because EE was being dominated on the defensive end of the floor.

Gold Vision said:

I'll never understand the Coleman hate ever since his career started

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No hate at all, I just don't want to see him go 5 games in a row without a bucket like last year in B1G play. Last year, like this year, he looked great in non conference where he was able to out-muscle guys, then we hit the B1G schedule & reality sunk in. See, Joe's not really a guard at all, he's an undersized forward which is why he plays small forward instead of shooting guard. The other B1G teams have small forwards who go 6'6", 6'7", 6'8" & generally can shoot the ball. Word got out quick that all you had to do was block his path to the lane to shut him down. Just back off him & dare him to shoot jumpers or drive to his left because he can't do either very well.

So, I appreciate his hustle & tenacity, I think he plays very good defense, jumps passing lanes very well, steals the ball well, has a bright upside, etc. but if you're an undersized, 6'4" forward in the B1G you better be able to shoot the ball well & drive to your left, & Joe just hasn't shown much improvement in either so far in non-conference.

Sophie said:

I am not a big poster however have followed the Gophers for past 50 years...and enjoy watching the elite officials coming to the Barn....Rucker,Hightower,Bain etc and yet everytime Mike Sanzere is officiating there is usually a crucial call...and it has seemed to go against the Gophers.. Keady and the General were two who seemed to work Mike for that correct call last night he seemed to have an excellent night and is improving immensely

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7 prior posts and you decided to chime in on offical performance.... I like you, you should post more often!

Costa Rican Gopher said:

No hate at all, I just don't want to see him go 5 games in a row without a bucket like last year in B1G play. Last year, like this year, he looked great in non conference where he was able to out-muscle guys, then we hit the B1G schedule & reality sunk in. See, Joe's not really a guard at all, he's an undersized forward which is why he plays small forward instead of shooting guard. The other B1G teams have small forwards who go 6'6", 6'7", 6'8" & generally can shoot the ball. Word got out quick that all you had to do was block his path to the lane to shut him down. Just back off him & dare him to shoot jumpers or drive to his left because he can't do either very well.

So, I appreciate his hustle & tenacity, I think he plays very good defense, jumps passing lanes very well, steals the ball well, has a bright upside, etc. but if you're an undersized, 6'4" forward in the B1G you better be able to shoot the ball well & drive to your left, & Joe just hasn't shown much improvement in either so far in non-conference.

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That pretty much says it. If he's your shooting guard, he needs to be able to shoot. If you call him your small forward, that position should be able to shoot from the perimeter as well. I like some of the things Joe does, but he's an incomplete player at this point.

afurry91 said:

Watch the replay. Every time EE was on him. 34 backed him down and got on easy bucket or he fouled him. It was hard to watch.

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Why was Elliot guarding a 6'6" forward? Where were Trevor & Rodney?