MBB v Texas State

[chef dixon]

Glad we have a capacity excuse this year.

Where the hell are they setting up the camera this year in the hump? It's horrible.

[Jacksondevildog]

We have been operating game attendance under COVID guidelines for nearly a decade. We were early adopters.

[RocketDawg]

We have been operating game attendance under COVID guidelines for nearly a decade. We were early adopters.

Are there any fans at all? I don't see any. I hear a few but that could be fake crowd noise.

[chef dixon]

Are there any fans at all? I don't see any. I hear a few but that could be fake crowd noise.

Yea max 2500. We might have 1000 there.

Tolu Smith is good at least.

[Leeshouldveflanked]

Yea max 2500. We might have 1000 there.

Tolu Smith is good at least.

Closer to 100 than 1000... 1A basketball games draw bigger crowds than this.

[MetEdDawg]

What has to happen for us to can Howland mid season?

If we start 0-3 and go something like 2-5 in non conference, how do we continue forward?

I get we aren't great, but we can't be losing some of these games and I'm concerned we will.

[chef dixon]

Early season observations:

We are a 2 man team: Tolu and Stewart, at least until Molinar can play.
Ado: Same guy as he always has been
Cameron Matthews: Still trying to figure out what he does.
D Smith: Very raw, unfortunately that immediate impact we needed may not be there right off the bat.
Davis: Strong body but sloppy. Probably shoots too many outside shots.
J. Johnson: Really need this guy to score points for us.
Post: Need to see more.

[99jc]

Early season observations:

We are a 2 man team: Tolu and Stewart, at least until Molinar can play.
Ado: Same guy as he always has been
Cameron Matthews: Still trying to figure out what he does.
D Smith: Very raw, unfortunately that immediate impact we needed may not be there right off the bat.
Davis: Strong body but sloppy. Probably shoots too many outside shots.
J. Johnson: Really need this guy to score points for us.
Post: Need to see more.

ADO is a walking foul and always will be. horrible

[parabrave]

Lazy ass passing. And someone can head east back down 82.

[99jc]

We have nothing but butter hooks out there...dang when do the women play again this team makes me wanna puke!

[Lord McBuckethead]

How hard is it to get a Dee Bost, Jamont Gordon, Timmy Bowers type of guy? Molinar is one of those dudes, but literally no one on our team outside of Tolu looks to be interested in working hard to be a DUDE.

[R2Dawg]

Lots of new players, we lost a lot. No Molinar is big. We don't know who we are, no team ID yet.

[Lord McBuckethead]

Our defense is pretty bad too. No one challenging passing lanes. We are having trouble inbounding the ball too.

[Lord McBuckethead]

Also, i would have a rule, if you do not go out there and ball out, you cannot have cool hair.

[R2Dawg]

Times like this make you realize how good of teams we have had in the past. Yep some of those Stansbury teams and Williams too.

We have no identity on our teams now. Looks like a pickup game at the city park?

[Lord McBuckethead]

Lots of new players, we lost a lot. No Molinar is big. We don't know who we are, no team ID yet.

Yeah. I agree. I am going to ask this, can Ben Howland coach an offensive philosophy? Set plays? Cause what we try to do on offense looks like an SEC team is going to hold us to 35 pts for the game.

[chef dixon]

D Smith seems to be a step behind with his decision making. Seems like he needs to settle in and realize he's been playing this game his whole life and this is no different

[msstate7]

Post was doing a decent job till that BS. Sit him

[chef dixon]

Post was doing a decent job till that BS. Sit him

We do need to figure out who can shoot though, cause right now its no one

[msstate7]

We do need to figure out who can shoot though, cause right now its no one

No one should take that shot though

[msstate7]

We really need Molinar to be as advertised. He would allow Stewart to play his real position. It would also give us a 3rd scoring option to go with t. Smith and Stewart

[parabrave]

Need Molinar back. And desperately need a big man down under.

[R2Dawg]

Wish Ado would have grown into a real offensive threat but he has gotten no better since he got here.

[parabrave]

Stat line we are shooting 37% 10-27, 3-9 3pts. We are 100% 3-3 FTs though. Now 10 TOs compared to 3.

[SteelCurtain74]

We will be fortunate to win 4 conference games this year. If we can't finish at the rim on a offensive rebound or feed into the post, we have no chance. Stewart is playing well but he and Tulo are all we have right now in terms of offensive production.

[R2Dawg]

Strange is the other transfer guy is a 1000 pt scorer? You would never know it?

[chef dixon]

To me we are a little easier to stomach this year because we just don't have the talent or experience

[msstate7]

That was pretty. Good job, matthews

[parabrave]

Well DJ is coming out hot.

[chef dixon]

That's what we need from Johnson

[msstate7]

Hopefully Johnson is finding his stroke.

[parabrave]

Shooting much better.

[chef dixon]

Gonna be a lot of FTs the rest of the way

[chef dixon]

Aside from some careless fouls, much better play in the second half all around

[msstate7]

Thats where I wanna see more of post. I like the occasional 3 from him, but way too many tonight. I wanna see his midrange shot now

[parabrave]

Dam Glad Howland brought in the Co SEC special teams player of the week to give a inspirational Halftime ass Chewing

[chef dixon]

Update: Matthews is a passer

[HoopsDawg]

Glad Molinar is going to be back on Friday.

[msstate7]

Glad Molinar is going to be back on Friday.

Great news

[msstate7]

We were a 6.5 pt favorite tonight. I thought that was easy money, but didn't bet it

[Coach34]

This team is athletic and plays hard. Getting arguably our best player back will certainly help things. I enjoy watching this team

[HoopsDawg]

We were a 6.5 pt favorite tonight. I thought that was easy money, but didn't bet it

are you serious? damn, I wish you had posted that. Free money.

[R2Dawg]

This team is athletic and plays hard. Getting arguably our best player back will certainly help things. I enjoy watching this team

I agree. I've liked what I've seen from them early this year. Need experience and some chemistry. I don't see any pouting or lazy play. I like the body language of this team.

I said other day, it took a record bad FT shooting to lose to Clemson and a record 19 3s to lose to Liberty. An average night on either and we are 3-0

[msstate7]

are you serious? damn, I wish you had posted that. Free money.

Ended up closing -7

https://i.postimg.cc/cHH7XnhS/2098-DC97-DD68-48-A3-901-B-7-BF05-D185-FC0.jpg (https://postimg.cc/f3G0bk12)

[parabrave]

Congrats to Coach Howland on number 500.

[99jc]

This team is athletic and plays hard. Getting arguably our best player back will certainly help things. I enjoy watching this team

yeah i like watching paint dry too.

[parabrave]

That 2nd half was very enjoyable to watch. DJ really got things going by being on Fire coming out of the Lockerroom.

[HoopsDawg]

gotta be a misprint on the opening line, -25? Either that or someone put a HUGE chunk of change on Texas State.

[msstate7]

gotta be a misprint on the opening line, -25? Either that or someone put a HUGE chunk of change on Texas State.

Not sure. I saw it was 6.5 on espn, so I double checked it on Vegas insider. It was truly 6.5-7.0

[Ari Gold]

yeah i like watching paint dry too.

Then don’t watch... maybe WKY plays soon

[HoopsDawg]

I'm really interested to see how Howland manages the minutes of Cam Matthews and Jalen Johnson with Molinar coming back. I think he should play Matthews at the 4 some, but that's not really Howland's M.O.

[Ari Gold]

Ucf picked to finish 9th in the AAC knocks off Auburn.
Fire Pearl***

[Ari Gold]

gotta be a misprint on the opening line, -25? Either that or someone put a HUGE chunk of change on Texas State.

It tipped at -7...

[HoopsDawg]

It tipped at -7...

Crazy line movement if accurate. -7 is accurate. I just don't know if it really opened at -25.

[Ari Gold]

Crazy line movement if accurate. -7 is accurate. I just don't know if it really opened at -25.

It actually opened at 6.5

[msstate7]

Crazy line movement if accurate. -7 is accurate. I just don't know if it really opened at -25.

-25 has to be wrong.

[Ari Gold]

I'm really interested to see how Howland manages the minutes of Cam Matthews and Jalen Johnson with Molinar coming back. I think he should play Matthews at the 4 some, but that's not really Howland's M.O.

Ben might mix and match with this team .. if we want to go smaller our best offensive team might be
Smith
Iverson
DJ
Johnson
Tolu

And that lineup still isn’t that small .. just not sure how good it is defensively..

[chef dixon]

Howland clearly likes what Matthews brings. Definitely seems like a glue guy. To me so far if Johnson isn't scoring he's not adding much, and that's really what we need him to do. His stroke looked good tonight.

[RougeDawg]

Just watched on DVR. I will not even try to say I am a basketball person, but I can observe objectively.

Similar to almost every other action sport, real time in game vision is one of the most important aspects of being successful. I?m not sure if it is this team not having much game experience together yet or not, but there are offensive plays there to execute on. We just don?t make the correct pass. Same as The Cowboy and receivers getting to know and learn each other, this basketball team will have to do the same thing. They have to learn each other as much as they have to learn the plays and other aspects. And most times, learning your teammates is the most difficult aspect.

People are unpredictable. Offensive plays or defensive sets are not. These guys need to learn each other in game situations. I predict a much better product at the end of the season than what we are seeing. It is only basic human nature.

[HoopsDawg]

Howland clearly likes what Matthews brings. Definitely seems like a glue guy. To me so far if Johnson isn't scoring he's not adding much, and that's really what we need him to do. His stroke looked good tonight.

Johnson is a scorer. He's like the wiley old man at the YMCA.

[preachermatt83]

Read the whole thread and never saw the score posted once. Thanks for the informative game thread. Geez.

[Lord McBuckethead]

This team is athletic and plays hard. Getting arguably our best player back will certainly help things. I enjoy watching this team

Yeah, I have enjoyed watching this team play, but I am waiting for 5 guys to want to be a badass.

[parabrave]

Read the whole thread and never saw the score posted once. Thanks for the informative game thread. Geez.

Come on you have been here since the beginning. If you are able to look for a score here you can go to HailState and follow the game there/ I do and I listen to the game on WFCA.com/ Besides if we listed the score during the 1st half you would've been pulling your hair out.

[RLM38654]

This is a good win. Lost two games against NCAA tournament potential teams. Lost one by 11 State shot 8-27 from FT lost another to Liberty by 11 which Liberty played out of their freaking minds and hit 19 3's(school record), also both games without Molinar. Looking at the glass half full.

[ScoobaDawg]

Read the whole thread and never saw the score posted once. Thanks for the informative game thread. Geez.

I agree here... our basketball game threads suck... post the damn score every few posts instead of just saying... we are losing and suck.

I skipped to the last page of the thread for the score but.. no suprise nothing. took to the last post to find out we won.

State wins 68-51. howland gets win 500 as a head coach.

[basedog]

I watched most of second half, saw lots of good things, very young inexperience team learning to play together and will get better. Losing two players to the NBA and a decent shooter is hard to overcome especially early in the season.

500 wins is a nice milestones, congrats to Howland, he has shown a lot of class as our Coach, he is one of the good guys.

[chef dixon]

Read the whole thread and never saw the score posted once. Thanks for the informative game thread. Geez.

If you can access this thread you can access about 100 websites or apps that can tell you the score with a lot less clicks. Join the 21st century.

[StarkVegasSteve]

Got off to a slow start, but we'll get it going. Starting off with Clemson and Liberty was a tough draw. Couple that with having a historically bad shooting performance against Clemson and Liberty careering it against us and you could see why we were 0-2. Getting Molinar back will be big. That'll either A) Allow us to move Smith to the bench and let Molinar be the point or B) Let Molinar play the 2 and move DJ back to the 3. I imagine we'll roll with A though. I'll also say this, Tolu Smith is going to give A LOT of people problems this year. He runs the court extremely well for 6'10 and can handle the ball as well. I'm not so sure our best lineup moving forward isn't Smith, Molinar, Stewart, Matthews, and Tolu. We could play WAY faster that way and I don't think our D drops off that much. It also could give us a veteran in Ado to anchor the second group.

[chef dixon]

Got off to a slow start, but we'll get it going. Starting off with Clemson and Liberty was a tough draw. Couple that with having a historically bad shooting performance against Clemson and Liberty careering it against us and you could see why we were 0-2. Getting Molinar back will be big. That'll either A) Allow us to move Smith to the bench and let Molinar be the point or B) Let Molinar play the 2 and move DJ back to the 3. I imagine we'll roll with A though. I'll also say this, Tolu Smith is going to give A LOT of people problems this year. He runs the court extremely well for 6'10 and can handle the ball as well. I'm not so sure our best lineup moving forward isn't Smith, Molinar, Stewart, Matthews, and Tolu. We could play WAY faster that way and I don't think our D drops off that much. It also could give us a veteran in Ado to anchor the second group.

I think we gotta get D Smith as much PT as possible. He definitely looks like he needs some time to adjust to the speed of the college game, but the talent is obviously there. The sooner he gets there the higher our ceiling is this year. You're not worth a crap in CBB without good guard play. Agree on Tolu, he brings some good skills with his size. Also some good minutes from Post last night, but not sure Howland trusts him yet against good competition. This group could be really good next year after a year to gel.

[parabrave]

2 main takeaways from last night. 1. The team started to trust each other in the 2nd half. 2. DJ became the alpha male in the 2nd Half. Got to have a leader.

[R2Dawg]

2 main takeaways from last night. 1. The team started to trust each other in the 2nd half. 2. DJ became the alpha male in the 2nd Half. Got to have a leader.

Agree. I saw Johnson get comfortable in what he wants to do - spot up and shoot the three. Yeah DJ is the alpha and I think he is slowly taking it on too. T.Smith is the inside alpha and he knows it.

Get Molinar back and we are looking like a team that can compete.

A few others players are still finding their way - Matthews, D.Smith, Davis, etc.

[HoopsDawg]

I really like Dev Smith, but I hoped his 3 point shot was a little more advanced.

[StarkVegasSteve]

I think we gotta get D Smith as much PT as possible. He definitely looks like he needs some time to adjust to the speed of the college game, but the talent is obviously there. The sooner he gets there the higher our ceiling is this year. You're not worth a crap in CBB without good guard play. Agree on Tolu, he brings some good skills with his size. Also some good minutes from Post last night, but not sure Howland trusts him yet against good competition. This group could be really good next year after a year to gel.

Agree that D Smith needs as much PT as possible and I'd love to be able to roll out a 4 guard lineup with him at the point and Iverson at the 2, but I know Howland likes to have two post players in most of the time. However, I think Tolu rebounds well enough that we'd be fine to just go with him down there. It helps that he could also bring the ball up to really speed up things.

[StarkVegasSteve]

I really like Dev Smith, but I hoped his 3 point shot was a little more advanced.

It'll get there. Right now he's really focused on his passing more than anything. He's not really looking for his shot from 3. He'll balance it out as he gets more comfortable to the college game speed. Reminds of a freshman year Lamar. Was always looking to pass more than anything.

[HoopsDawg]

Agree that D Smith needs as much PT as possible and I'd love to be able to roll out a 4 guard lineup with him at the point and Iverson at the 2, but I know Howland likes to have two post players in most of the time. However, I think Tolu rebounds well enough that we'd be fine to just go with him down there. It helps that he could also bring the ball up to really speed up things.

Yep, Howland is still an inside out coach and half court grinder. But the type of player he has recruited need to run. We have to push the ball on every miss.

[parabrave]

2 athletes who will be studs, Walley and T Smith. T Smith is going to be fun to watch.

[BiscuitEater]

ADO is a walking foul and always will be. horrible


And, just like last year .. he leads the team in shooting FG % at 63.6% and FTs at 77.8%. With Ado, you get what you get.. not all bad .. not all good.

At least he can shoot FTs! Meanwhile, Matthews is 0 for 4 and Davis is 1 of 8!

[parabrave]

And, just like last year .. he leads the team in shooting % at 63.6%. With Ado, you get what you get... not all bad .. not all good.

Yep. But at least he has quit putting the ball on the court when he gets it. He has learned how to drive to the basket and he showed that when he got that surprise pass and scored on it. But he is a foul machine waiting to happen. But we need to develop a big man ala Charles Rhodes. Need a force down there.

[tcdog70]

i think the big 7' EURO needs some props---has some skills. Can Score and well-he is 7 foot.

[basedog]

i think the big 7' EURO needs some props---has some skills. Can Score and well-he is 7 foot.

His time is coming, he looks pretty young, a good weight program will do wonders for him I think. He has decent movement for a 7' guy.

[NCMSTFAN]

We actually have the potential to be a pretty good team. We lost two games with Molinar out and starting a true freshman PG. Liberty also beat South Carolina the other night also. I think we will begin to gell more once we get Molinar back this Friday.

[BiscuitEater]

a good weight program will do wonders for him I think.

Sorry, had to laugh. Like, WHEN has our BB team had a "good weight program?"

Tyson Carter didn't gain a single ounce in over four years!

[R2Dawg]

Sorry, had to laugh. Like, WHEN has our BB team had a "good weight program?"

Tyson Carter didn't gain a single ounce in over four years!

Tyson added some muscle, go back and look at freshman year to senior. He ain't going to add 40lbs not his DNA. Tyson was tough as nails down the stretch. He was strong enough. Don't want too much mass to take away his speed.