***OFFICIAL ST. LOUIS AT MINNESOTA IN-GAME THREAD!!!***

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Good free throw shooting by the team.

Need to see less hero ball by Carr.


Robbins was soft, no wonder Curry/GermanKD finished the game.

We couldn't hardly break the press but still put up 90.

Good offense finally for Pitino, moving ball, cutting without the ball, less forced shots.

Confidence booster going into B1G play
 

die hard gopher said:
Gach hasn't been meeting expectations? He averaged 10 points a game at Utah last year shooting 39% from the field and 25% from 3. This year he has been averaging 13 a game, shooting 48% from the field and 40% from 3. He is also rebounding the ball much better, passing the ball better and turning the ball over less than he did last year. That is pretty solid improvement and Gach has been a good player for us.

Unless you were expecting him to be an All Big Ten player this year which I don't know why you would have thought that then I don't know how you can say he is not meeting expectations.

And Robbins has been brutal defensively? He wasn't great against UND guarding on the perimeter and can foul but aside from that, he has been our most impactful defender. It's not just the blocks, he also contests a lot shots that lead to misses and sometimes just his presence in the paint lead to misses or kick outs or inefficient mid range jumpsuits. And when he just walls up and forces his opponent to shoot over him, thats not usually an easy shot. I'd rather he do that than deflect post entries which can lead to cheap fouls which happened today or him giving up his position leading to an easy dunk. If the opponent can score over Liam than I'll take that.
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Well, like most things we disagree. We have only played one conference game.
Gach was 0 for 9 and disappointing in all phases, 3 rebounds and zero steals. St Louis is a top 25 team. Gach did have 11 points but 5 turnovers and 0 steals.
He is a much better player than that. You feel he is playing up to your expectations or exceeding them. I think he is much better than he has shown playing vs better competition. He can be spectacular! Steals, dunks, threes, assists and finishing in transition he can be a highlight machine.

Robbins as our most impactful post defender does not make him good. I agree he is our best defender but? Myself, Dan Dakitch and many others would wonder if we ever do any post defense drills in practice. Curry has no post defense fundamentals and has the disadvantage of giving up height. Robbins is a rim protector yes.
But, We let Illinois and St Louis post up right under the hoop. You want guys out or up from the block so help can come and the offensive post isn’t at the rim without having to make a move.

Robbins is taller than our opponents. Why doesn’t he just stand in front of the rim and we toss it to him like Illinois and St Louis? Opponents Post defense doesn’t generally allow that. We do.

We have a different idea of how post defense should be played and what we’ll tolerate. I’d prefer to keep the post entry out of the post all together but absolutely not allow it as deep as we do. Farther out, you can more easily dig it out with help like Carr did, Ihnen and Gabe did deep because the offensive spacing for St Louis was bad bringing their defender to the ball. At Illinois they were deep and spaced and it was too easy....same early for St Louis.

I‘m very glad they are both Gophers. I just think they both have more to give.
 




60's Guy said:
Why? I saw Gach play a ton in high school and some in college. He is better than he is playing.
Robbins from high lights is probably about what I’d expect. But he is brutal defensively. He lets everybody post up at the rim.
He cannot defend anybody UNLESS he blocks their shot. Once for the first time tonight he moved his feet and deflected a post entry.
I expected and expect more from both.
Ihnen is playing as well as I hoped and knew he could.
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Agreed
 

What happened to BJ last night? He aggravate his injury? Gave us a big goose egg.

Double-double from Ihnen! He had a few blocks as well. He is a player. Nice to have 26 points off the bench again!

Curry! I like my chilli with extra Curry please! Very nice Game from him!
 

If you'd ask me who this team is---the one that got thumped by Illinois or the one that won last night--I'd like to say it's last night's team. They're fully capable of beating good teams like St. Louis. And make no mistake, the Billikens are very good. The Gophers have some players. When they move the ball and play good help defense they're fun to watch.

But can they play this way consistently, and how will it continue to go against the murderers row of the Big Ten? Time will tell, of course. But I'd noted in another thread that a challenging non-conference game would do them way more good than a cupcake, and that turned out to be true. This was a test AND a confidence builder.
 



Spottedmuskie said:
Yeah it was miserable, I'm not liking Carr right now. He takes his own teammates out of the game thinking he's James Harden. He already has the play style down perfectly for the G-league
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He had 7 assists He also scored 32 points. If all those assists were 2 pointers (they weren't) he scored or assisted 46 points, AKA 1/2 of the teams point. He also played nearly 40 minutes and had 2 turnovers. You're delusional.
 

UpAndUnder43 said:
He had 7 assists He also scored 32 points. If all those assists were 2 pointers (they weren't) he scored or assisted 46 points, AKA 1/2 of the teams point. He also played nearly 40 minutes and had 2 turnovers. You're delusional.
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Are you sure his assists weren't hockey assists, where other players scored after collecting the rebound off of his misses?
 





Otis said:
You just reminded me of my favorite bumper sticker of all-time!

"Jesus SAVES! But Gretzky scores on the rebound."
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As a casual hockey fan, this is now my favorite bumper sticker of all-time
 

Seems to me I've heard about the strategy of having your point guard who can score assert himself as scoring threat early in the game. Establish that they are always a scoring threat to keep the defense honest. Then the passing game opens up and assists & points for everyone else will be more readily had. Especially when said point guard scores 14 of the first 17 and requires a double team to stop.

Wouldn't it be great to have a guy like that?
 

Moonlight said:
Seems to me I've heard about the strategy of having your point guard who can score assert himself as scoring threat early in the game. Establish that they are always a scoring threat to keep the defense honest. Then the passing game opens up and assists & points for everyone else will be more readily had. Especially when said point guard scores 14 of the first 17 and requires a double team to stop.

Wouldn't it be great to have a guy like that?
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Or to have a shooting guard who could make like four of five threes to start a game so players could drive the lane and feed the post with impunity the rest of the game.

But that'll never happen.
 

LongLiveMilesTarver said:
Around 20 years ago they experimented with the first rule in the preseason tournaments. I want to say Xavier kept electing to inbound at the Great Alaska Shootout and someone racked up like 17 fouls in 30 seconds or so. It was a disaster but kudos to them for managing to get the ball inbounds every time.
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Have a triple bonus -- after a team commits 17 fouls you get a point and the ball... (y)

... and if they can't tell who last touched it when it went out of bounds, the team that last had possession should keep possession.
 

Otis said:
Or to have a shooting guard who could make like four of five threes to start a game so players could drive the lane and feed the post with impunity the rest of the game.

But that'll never happen.
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Difference of course is that you're making a wish, and I'm stating a reality.
 

Does anyone else think Carr has issues with Robbins? He flat out refuses to throw the entry pass to him no matter what. There was a late shot clock situation last night where Robbins was wide open at the top of the key for 3, Carr looked at him, took three more dribbles then jacked up a contested 27 footer.
 

4:00 minutes left in the game and Pitino goes to the milk the clock offense; Carr dribbles out front waiting for the 8 seconds left on the shot clock, then run a ball screen where Carr dribbles some more and usually get double teamed, and finally takes a terrible shot as the shot clock buzzer goes off with the shot more than likely clanks off the rim. I do not like our late game strategy, run offense, take quality shots especially with 4 minutes left in the game. As Herm said, "You play to win the game."
 
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Otis said:
What happened to BJ last night? He aggravate his injury? Gave us a big goose egg.

Double-double from Ihnen! He had a few blocks as well. He is a player. Nice to have 26 points off the bench again!

Curry! I like my chilli with extra Curry please! Very nice Game from him!
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I barely notice Johnson when he is on the floor. Not sure why but he doesn't seem to get his hands on the ball much on offense, hasn't rebounded well and doesn't seem to get deflections, blocks or steals. This surprises me because I thought we were getting a junk yard dog scrapper type. It's early yet.
 



bga1 said:
I barely notice Johnson when he is on the floor. Not sure why but he doesn't seem to get his hands on the ball much on offense, hasn't rebounded well and doesn't seem to get deflections, blocks or steals. This surprises me because I thought we were getting a junk yard dog scrapper type. It's early yet.
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He has had some nice games. The ankle may be an issue still. He looks and acts like a dude who would be mixing it up, hopefully he is because the Gophers lack that. Curry and Robbins aren't that type.
 

CurveballJesus said:
Does anyone else think Carr has issues with Robbins? He flat out refuses to throw the entry pass to him no matter what.
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I have made similar observations, but I don’t know if it is a Robbins thing. I think Carr has issues passing it in the interior altogether. Multiple times Carr has ignored the back door cut from Robbins, Gach, and Curry when there is an opening there. I don’t know if he is slow to pull the trigger on the pass or if it is a lack of confidence in the receiving player, but Carr doesn’t try to pass in a small window or thread the needle very often.
 

Spottedmuskie said:
Yeah it was miserable, I'm not liking Carr right now. He takes his own teammates out of the game thinking he's James Harden. He already has the play style down perfectly for the G-league
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I thought Carr played his best game as a Gopher last night. He scored when he needed to, but made sure to get teammates involved with 7 assists + many other nice passes that led to free throws, all while playing amazing defense on a very guard guard.
 

tikited said:
When was the last time you could say the Gophers won because of free throw shooting?
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In 2018-19 the gophers were 17th in free throws made in the country and 2nd in the big ten.
They had a higher FT% than 5 of the 16 teams in front of them.
22.7% of their scoring was from the free throw line.

I am going to guess if not sometime last year: some time two years ago
 

Some guy said:
In 2018-19 the gophers were 17th in free throws made in the country and 2nd in the big ten.
They had a higher FT% than 5 of the 16 teams in front of them.
22.7% of their scoring was from the free throw line.

I am going to guess if not sometime last year: some time two years ago
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Feels like a decade ago.
 


bga1 said:
I barely notice Johnson when he is on the floor. Not sure why but he doesn't seem to get his hands on the ball much on offense, hasn't rebounded well and doesn't seem to get deflections, blocks or steals. This surprises me because I thought we were getting a junk yard dog scrapper type. It's early yet.
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As exciting as Ihnen's progress was last night, Johnson's disappearing act was equally concerning. Johnson was probably our 3rd best player when he went down with the ankle injury. We desperately need him to get back to that point. Especially now that Jarvis left & we're down to 4 playable bigs.
 

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