Hard Fought Game

[archdog]

Thanks to the players for fighting hard for MSU tonight. Too bad it didn't come out with a w but thanks none the less.

Couple of notes.
1. Our inbounds plays suck.
2. We did make layups tonight. Finished strong around the basket pretty much the entire game.
3. We had our patented 6-8 minutes without a single fg again Right after Johnson went out.
4. D hustled.
5. We have to play a game where someone doesn't have a career day or set a high sec mark for the season.
6 Turnovers. Damn.

[GTHOM]

My biggest takeaway is that we had 2 TO at the end of the game and called neither. Gave up.

4 or 5 losses in a row, (not sure either way it is unacceptable) to a team Stans lost to a total of 8 times.

We have 1 decent win in RRs 3rd year.


How long will people keep saying we are ''improving'' before they want a change

[HancockCountyDog]

I swear when I opened this thread, my mind went to this.


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1qEsTXVj57M

I mean it has come to this. My old ass is going to drink two more and go to ****ing bed.

[archdog]

Well not as sarcastic as that asshole kid.

[Rayburn8]

4 or 5 losses in a row, (not sure either way it is unacceptable) to a team Stans lost to a total of 8 times.

For the love of all that is holy in this work. Quit comparing Rick Ray to Stans. Just stop it.

[Maroonthirteen]

I don't know if I would call it hard fought. We looked timid in the 2nd half. Bone head after bone headed mistake in the last 10 minutes...... How about players dropping like flies from a graze of a elbow or hand....

[msstate7]

I don't know if I would call it hard fought. We looked timid in the 2nd half. Bone head after bone headed mistake in the last 10 minutes...... How about players dropping like flies from a graze of a elbow or hand....

We've gone from ripping our coach to accusing our players of faking injurues. I don't think for one minute our players faked anything. Geez...

[thf24]

It's the turnovers that are killing us. Shooting still isn't great, but it's good enough to have won us several more games if we could just take care of the ball better. I don't know if it's a fundamentals or focus issue or what, but Ray's #1 point of emphasis for the rest of this year and going into next year is teaching our guys to take care of the ball better. Do that and we'll have a good team, and he'll have a great chance at the postseason and another year.

[msstate7]

It's the turnovers that are killing us. Shooting still isn't great, but it's good enough to have won us several more games if we could just take care of the ball better. I don't know if it's a fundamentals or focus issue or what, but Ray's #1 point of emphasis for the rest of this year and going into next year is teaching our guys to take care of the ball better. Do that and we'll have a good team, and he'll have a great chance at the postseason and another year.

I'm hopeful tookie and weatherspoon will help us tremendously next season with that.

[IMissJack]

I'm sick of searching for positives...losing is losing.

[fishwater99]

Playing hard can only get you so far..

1. This team is just horrible on offense. Our motion has less motion than Stands Stand and shoot. This is all on Ray..
2. We were in the double bonus and failed to drive to the hole, we shot multiple 3 pointers.. Why? Drive and get to the line for FT's..
3. Turnovers are killing us, this comes back to Ray not having players that can handle the ball on the floor.
4. Where was Houston last night? We could have used his length and athleticism..
5. Fred is horrible on defense, Moody abused him all night long.
6. I see no reason to bring Ray back just to be fired after next year. Cut our losses now..

[HSVDawg]

Regarding inbounds plays and dating all the way back to the beginning of the Stans era and continuing to Ray, have we EVER even been to run a successful inbounds play? And by successful, I don't even mean making a basket. I just mean passing the ball to someone standing on our end of the court without turning the ball over.

Here our our two inbounds plays from under our basket from the past 17 years total:
1) 75 foot hail mary to the other end of the court because that is the only guy open. We then have to run our half court offense with a shortened shot clock and give the other team time to set their defense. Not to mention if a defender makes a break and intercepts the pass, he has an easy bucket on the other end. For some reason this continues to piss me off to no end, mainly because we do it more often than any other college basketball team that I have ever seen. It also makes me mad because GOOD coaches use these opoortunities to get high percentage shots on goal while the defense is on its heels.
2) Attempted pass to anyone within 30 feet of the basket (results in turnover 90% of the time).

There is no reason why any coach in year 3 should have a team with this much difficulty practicing basic inbounds plays.

[HancockCountyDog]

6. I see no reason to bring Ray back just to be fired after next year. Cut our losses now..

He will win 20 games next year and make the NIT with a senior laden club. He won't get fired after that.

[Maroonthirteen]

Didn't say they were faking. However some people have a higher pain tolerance than others. Some people really want to win games. Sometimes people are tired from a long losing season. Who knows the reason. But if he has a concussion from that graze of a elbow, he might consider his future playing any physical sport.

[TheDogFather]

We've gone from ripping our coach to accusing our players of faking injurues. I don't think for one minute our players faked anything. Geez...

I agree totally. Faking an injury at this point is far-fetched. That being said, we may have a toughness issue. At the end of the game when sword went down, the injury was legit. But all of the non-coaching, inexperienced, know-nothing fans around me we yelling for him to get up. You could see it happening. If sword stays down, ref takes him out, Kennedy chooses Black to shoot free throws, and he misses them both. And it happened at a very important time in the game where we had to have those points.

[msstate7]

I agree totally. Faking an injury at this point is far-fetched. That being said, we may have a toughness issue. At the end of the game when sword went down, the injury was legit. But all of the non-coaching, inexperienced, know-nothing fans around me we yelling for him to get up. You could see it happening. If sword stays down, ref takes him out, Kennedy chooses Black to shoot free throws, and he misses them both. And it happened at a very important time in the game where we had to have those points.

Like sword is gonna fake an injury when he knows he has FT's coming. You're right. He was hurt

[fishwater99]

He will win 20 games next year and make the NIT with a senior laden club. He won't get fired after that.

We won't win 20 without Malik...

[msstate7]

Didn't say they were faking. However some people have a higher pain tolerance than others. Some people really want to win games. Sometimes people are tired from a long losing season. Who knows the reason. But if he has a concussion from that graze of a elbow, he might consider his future playing any physical sport.

I think his career in basketball will end very soon whether he wants it to or not. I like johnson, but he isn't wearing a uniform after he takes ours off

[maroonmania]

It's the turnovers that are killing us. Shooting still isn't great, but it's good enough to have won us several more games if we could just take care of the ball better. I don't know if it's a fundamentals or focus issue or what, but Ray's #1 point of emphasis for the rest of this year and going into next year is teaching our guys to take care of the ball better. Do that and we'll have a good team, and he'll have a great chance at the postseason and another year.

Its our lack of offensive skill even moreso than the turnovers. Stans' teams were terrible at taking care of the basketball and used to drive me nuts with that but performed much better than what we have now because they were competent on offense for the most part.

[msstate7]

Its our lack of offensive skill even moreso than the turnovers. Stans' teams were terrible at taking care of the basketball and used to drive me nuts with that but performed much better than what we have now because they were competent on offense for the most part.

Stans got better players. If Ray wants to stay here, he'll have to too

[Coach34]

Hell, we fall down and turn the ball over on rebounds. We just dribble the ball out of bounds. We jump up in the air and then throw it to nobody to turn it over. There's only so much a coach can do.

Sometimes you you just need better players because the ones you have suck. Not having Houston and then Roq going out the last 30 minutes was a killer. We can't not play with 2 of our top 7 players against a better team and expect to win very often

[maroonmania]

Stans got better players. If Ray wants to stay here, he'll have to too

Agree, better players mean guys that come into the program with skills to actually play on both ends of the floor. Ray has been way too lopsided on only recruiting guys that primarily only have defensive skills.

[thf24]

I tend to agree that a lot of the issues are likely on the players at this point. There's only so far teaching can go when it comes to nuances like protecting the ball while handling, seeing passing lanes, and just basketball IQ in general. The better recruits and players just have a knack for it coming in, and I'm afraid several of our guys don't. I do think Ray does have some room to improve on teaching fundamentals and keeping the players focused.

[solodawg]

Hell, we fall down and turn the ball over on rebounds. We just dribble the ball out of bounds. We jump up in the air and then throw it to nobody to turn it over. There's only so much a coach can do.

Sometimes you you just need better players because the ones you have suck. Not having Houston and then Roq going out the last 30 minutes was a killer. We can't not play with 2 of our top 7 players against a better team and expect to win very often
I agree with this. Our ball handling skills are as bad as I have ever seen.

[GTHOM]

The fact is we have 1 decent win in year 3 of RR, i guess you could count TN and FSU if you really wanted too but to me personally, i think we just need a change. Something to excite the fanbase, bring people back to the Hump, i was there last night and besides the students it was dead.

Sword is the only player we have that could start somewhere else in the conference. Unless RR has some studs coming in (Im not as big on basketball recruiting) i think we need to move on and thank him for cleaning out the dumpster fire that we were

[shannondawg]

It appeared to me that Roq hit the top of his head on the floor, not from an elbow. May be wrong, but that's what I think I saw.

[drunkernhelldawg]

Didn't say they were faking. However some people have a higher pain tolerance than others. Some people really want to win games. Sometimes people are tired from a long losing season. Who knows the reason. But if he has a concussion from that graze of a elbow, he might consider his future playing any physical sport.

Dude this is crazy. Athletes don't play with concussions anymore. They are people.

[Eric Nies Grind Time]

Rick Ray has been so terrible that he has lowered everyone's expectations. People are seriously going to be happy with maybe making the NIT next year? Jesus.

[KB21]

Hell, we fall down and turn the ball over on rebounds. We just dribble the ball out of bounds. We jump up in the air and then throw it to nobody to turn it over. There's only so much a coach can do.

Sometimes you you just need better players because the ones you have suck. Not having Houston and then Roq going out the last 30 minutes was a killer. We can't not play with 2 of our top 7 players against a better team and expect to win very often

That's the biggest issue. There may be 3-4 SEC quality players on this entire team. It's hard for me to blame Rick Ray since he has had to build this thing from the ground up after inheriting the mess that Rick Stansbury left. I think Rick Ray would like to run more of a motion oriented offense. That's what he came from with Purdue, but you need smart players that buy into that style. We don't have that yet. We have guys that consistently pick up their dribble before they cross half court against a press. We don't get the ball to the middle of the floor and let the other team use the out of bounds line as an extra defender.

Is it time for a coaching change? Probably, but Rick Ray was doomed to failure when he took this job. It was a complete dumpster fire, and unlike some other coaches we tried to hire, Rick had enough self confidence that he felt like he could win here. It didn't really matter who we hired back in 2012.