To be fair, Cooks' production is not reflective of a McDonald's AA and never was. She never started at Michigan State, and we now see why.
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To be fair, Cooks' production is not reflective of a McDonald's AA and never was. She never started at Michigan State, and we now see why.
Vic always beat up on a lot of lesser opponents. That was one way he inflated his record. Last year, this team lost to two unranked opponents, and nearly lost to Vandy and Auburn 2x. The team was overrated last year but was ranked in the top 15 due to respect for Vic.Quote:
Originally Posted by confucius say
Some good points...Quote:
Originally Posted by Irondawg
Go with Yemiyah Morris at center along side Jessika Carter/Sidney Cooks at the 4 spot (maximizing size advantage, rebounding, interior defense) and zone when needed...or go guard heavy and press more (4 out and 1 in).
Coach needs to get control or move on to another job. Right now it’s all on her. Coach and do your job or hit the road. We don’t tolerate it in any other program and shouldn’t in WBB. If you can’t harness the talent on this team, you never will at any SEC school.
I mean they were 27-6, and finished second in the SEC with multiple ranked wins. They were going to be a 2 or 3 seed had the tournament been played. They weren’t as good as our previous three teams and weren’t going to win a national title, but I don’t think I’d say they were overrated. And they pretty clearly got better as the season went on, and were playing their best basketball of the season leading up to the SEC title game against an SC that was just better than them.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dawg2003
I just don’t agree with the spin that this roster actually isn’t all that good. They don’t have a McCowan or a Vivians, but there are plenty of good pieces there. And they’ve now lost three games they should not have lost, with a bunch more difficult games still to play.
You've lost your damn mind. The team was young and were the 2nd best team in the SEC behind a damn great SC team. Nevermind Vic played for a national championship. Jesus what a bullshit take.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dawg2003
Atleast we #Woke. Thanks Nelle!!
Comedy at its highest level. Wtf is nearly lost???Quote:
Originally Posted by Dawg2003
Dawg2003 has a half decent point in that other teams really closed the gap last year as we played a lot more close conference games than we had in previous years. Almost all those teams brought in transfers and such and got better.
We basically traded Danberry and Bibby for Hayes so we lost a lot there. Danberry was clutch in a lot of games last year.
Everyone expected Matharu and Jackson and even Mingo to make jumps but it hasn’t happened. How much of that is Nikki I don’t know but are any of those players playing better than they did last year or even showing new skills?
We are underperforming for sure but at lot of SEC teams got a lot better the past 2 years as well.
It went 13-3 in sec play. This team will struggle to be .500. We are worse in nearly every area this year than we were last year with the same players.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dawg2003
Jackson as a freshman last year was WAY ahead of VV as a freshman. She is your VV, she has just regressed instead of developed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Captain Falcon
This I agree with. And I was actually hoping this year that RJ would be in the league VV was as a JR and SR. But she is not even close and, as you stated, not even playing as well as last year. Biggest difference to me in this year's team is they can't play consistent through a game. They will have a stretch or a quarter when they look like a really good team but then they lose all intensity on defense or just get lost on whatever it is they are trying to accomplish on offense. They can get by with that playing the lower half league teams but they will lose doing that to any of the upper half teams. I look for TA&M and SC to both beat us by double digits.Quote:
Originally Posted by confucius say
Some of you are jumping through quite the mental hurdles to justify why a team this talented is this bad. They were 27-6 last year with virtually everyone back. There is no way you can justify this.
Also, its not just losing, but how we lost that makes it worse. To get beat because you don't shoot well or the other team lights it up, thats one thing. To get beat because you are lazy and take poor shots is another. Jessika Carter would not have shot another ball from outside of 15ft from the rim or she's out. You CANNOT be a friend and a coach.
We very well may lose the next two, and I will be interested to hear how some justify being 8-5 with this team.
To add: Can we please stop saying all of this idiotic crap about how Vic wasn't really as good of a coach as we thought, how they were lazy last year, etc...
HE GOT US TO TWO NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS. The man is one of the best coaches in the country. He didn't inflate anything with inferior opponents. He constantly beat REALLY good teams. My gosh you have to be elementary minded to try to make an assertion that he wasn't that great.
I brought up this problem last year and it seems even prevalent today. We started star chasing about Vic's 3rd or 4th season and last year you were starting to see the results of that. At first he would recruit one big time player and a bunch of grinders and 3 and D players. Once you get away from that and bring in the "AAU All Americans" then there's no turning back. You have to be an AMAZING coach to be able to mold and mesh together all that talent and all those attitudes. Vic is a good enough coach to do that. Penson will have to learn how to do it and do it fast. And being their friend isn't the way to do it. You have to be tough and you have to be a coach. It doesn't mean you hate your players, but when you step between those lines you're coaching to win. That's why Vic was so rare. He knew how to perfectly balance that love for his kids and still being able to be a hardnose coach.Quote:
Originally Posted by confucius say
Agree and it’s something Nikki seems to be struggling with. Be curious what type of players she recruits.
Some posters are also really undervaluing what Danberry did for that team last year both on offense and defense. We haven’t replaced her production at all and combine that with Rickea really struggling and it’s an issue.
Agree that effort is lacking but we had a lot of defensive problems last year as well. We got beat last night simply because they made about 10 hustle plays in the second half and we had none that I can recall. Right now I’m assigning blame on both players and coaches for that
Good post.Quote:
Originally Posted by Irondawg
The "Vic wasn't that good" idea is about as Fringy and Crackpot as you can get as an MSU fan.Quote:
Originally Posted by ZedFedder
He led by 5 points with less than 2 minutes to go in a National Championship game. He only really lost to the elites of the game, like South Carolina.
I guess my pep talk after the OM near disaster had the opposite results..
and there is no “first year” honeymoon. She has been a head coach already and took over a well oiled machine..
Black / white/ man /woman ... doesn’t matter
JC better hope this gets turned around.. that seat of his better be getting hot..
The good thing about basketball versus football is that losses are redeemable if you get on a tear at the end of the year. NMP may figure it out, but I do not like what I see right now.
It's more of lack of team chemistry, players and coaches adjusting to each other, I look for a few players to transfer next year. We have talent but I'm not saying all of the problems are with our HC, she has to grow and learn as well. Not sure we will have another run in WBB like we did during Vic's tenure. To early to say our HC want work out, hopefully recruiting will solve our problems on team chemistry.
Agree with this. Jackson has regressed in a major way. Question is why? Is it coaching? She seems like a player that if not managed correctly could really go south. Coaching or leading is so much more than X & Os but people management skills. Whatever we are doing now isn't working.Quote:
Originally Posted by confucius say
Disagree here. We were good with a less experience last year playing true freshmen. We may have slipped a little but considering the overhaul we had to do from previous year, it was a solid/good year.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dawg2003
It went on the whole game and has all year but manifested itself at one point last night that brought no hope in that game. Bama took a three, missed it, the ball bounced, I repeat, bounced between two of State's players, the Bama shooter steped in front of our girl got the ball went to the basket scored and was fouled. Game over.
Balls have been bouncing before being rebounded all year. No one, zero, moves there feet when ball is going toward the basket.
Coaching transitions suck. When a coach leaves, some step up and like the changes, others don't. I have seen very good players just flat out stop performing and working because they don't like the new coach - even if the new coach is actually better than the old (not saying NMP is better than Vic). It can kill a team through no fault of the coach.Quote:
Originally Posted by basedog
Yep I remember that play and there were a few others almost as bad. We simply don’t have pride in defense right now for whatever reasonQuote:
Originally Posted by Percho
When coaching young athletes, whatever you allow is what you promote. And we are seeing that play itself out on the court. Remember when Vic pulled William in the first title game? The reason he did that is the same reason you didn’t see consistently lazy play from his teams.
It’s obvious when you watch the games. I’m not saying she was a bad hire or the next Jomo but there is definitely reason to be concerned.
Well said. You hit the nail on the head, 100%.Quote:
Originally Posted by shoeless joe