Posts made by SoftballDad2011

@blackmild33

Yes, it looks like one guy switched his pick from KU to Duke…I believe that he had originally picked Alabama for Bolden before switching to KU a couple of weeks ago.

Hopefully it is just an isolated hunch and not inside info.

Hope Payne comes out swinging hard in the third set, she’s been tentative in the first two.

Not playing great, but have USC flustered.

Proud of them girls!

One more set to go for a date w/ the Cornhuskers in the Final Four in Omaha!

Hawks take the first set over #1 overall seed Southern Cal 25-18

@Texas-Hawk-10 I

True, it is common, but not at all atypical relative to the performance of other elite programs… If you measure since 2003 we are tied for first with the most championship appearances

@HighEliteMajor I am more than happy to keep and capable of keeping an open mind. In fact that is why I partake in this board…I enjoy hearing and considering the opinions of others. Sometimes my perspective changes, sometimes they don’t. And my profession requires it of me every day to boot.

But one could very easil ask you whether you are you capable of keeping an open mind when you encounter opinions that are contrarian to your own?

please know I intend no disrespect in that question. I offer it solely because you are widely known as one of the most rigidly opinionated posters on this site.

And your opinion rarely is swayed by the opinions or the data provided by others.

And BTW I LOL every time I read a post from you that calls Coach Self stubborn.

But that doesn’t mean I don’t respect your viewpoint and carefully consider your opinions.

.i am however saying that should you choose to point a finger just take notice that several of your own fingers are pointing right back at you everytime you do.

Just because it is your opinion and in your opinion is incapable of being refuted…doesn’t mean every one has to agree with you

So with that said, in my opinion, the fallacy with your point is that our seed is always high because of our consistently strong regular season performance. We are given a 3rd or higher seed almost automatically every year simply because we were the regular season champions of a power 5 conference. …and regardless of whether we are a team built for a tournament run or not.

Because of that, unless we are a final four or elite 8 team EVERY SINGLE YEAR (highly unrealistic)…we will under achieve in your metric more than we could ever hope to over achieve.

“…quick exit from the tournament as usual…”

So two recent early exits override the five elite 8 appearances (w/ two finals appearances) in the previous 10 seasons and to make early exits “usual”?!?!?!

Lol.

@DoubleDD said:

Could it be that coach opening up and letting the boys play might be swaying some of these numbers?

I would think low post and/or back 2 basket guys like Bolden and Allen would be more interested in Self’s hi lo game.

@Crimsonorblue22

Looked like a decent sized KU contingent in San Diego to cheer them on!

@Crimsonorblue22 if he continues like he has, he sure could be gone. Needs to avoid the roller coaster up and downs he is accustomed to. Even if it means a fresh haircut every game day!

Frank D’Tae and Jackson on the perimeter along with Bragg and Bolden down low could be fun!

@Crimsonorblue22

Read where Bolden thought he might announce in December.

I don’t think anyone knows what Allen is thinking.

Last I read on Jackson was that he would be a spring commit.

Bolden mentioned the benefit to KU was immediate playing time (departure of Mick, Jam Tray and Perry - at a minimum- will free up minutes).

I know Jackson is listed as a shooting guard, but at 6’7" and purportedly having great handles, great passing and a nice shot he could play anywhere from the 1-3…so he may be more worried about Wayne’s plans.

For what is worth we are still leading the Crystal Ball on Allen and have picked up some ground on Josh Jackson too - as @jayballer54 mention earlier.

Crystal ball shows we are gaining momentum and trending in the Bolden sweepstakes.

Been Three Duke analysts switch their picks to KU in the last few weeks.

Historically this is when the crystal ball has been most reliable…big margin, getting close to a possible announcement and lots of late picks getting on board with popular pick.

Will be fun to see how we stack up vs the overall #1 seed Southern Cal in the Elite 8…unless Creighton can work some magic and upset them for us.

Pretty awesome for the team and Coach B. He was the coach at Barton County CC when I took my first job out of college in Great Bend. Good guy!

Way to go Ladies!!!’

Payne is a beast!

True! I watched both games last weekend.

Zenger can’t monopolize NCAA tournament games…yet!

I sent a couple of Nasty grams to the WatchESPN help desk. Come up shortly after. Good news is they are doing well. Bad news is we may only get to watch a set.

Did anyone else see the look on Greene’s face when he got pulled from the game against Holy Cross?

Piper had just said These are the type of things that keep Greene off the floor…catching passes one handed, not keeping control of the ball when it was in his possession, etc…then he made another bobbled one handed catch and some sloppy ball control. Piper said Greene will be coming out because of that as his sub checked in at the scorer’s table.

Before a stoppage in play Greene made a very nice and aggressive Drive to the rack for a layup …next time the horn sounded Greene saw he was being subbed for and the look on his face was not good. Couldn’t tell what he muttered.

I hope he keeps things in check.

I will be surprised if the winner of the big 12 regular season title has less than 5 losses.

The top 5 teams are all top 25 caliber teams…3 in the top 10.

And the lower 5 are all improving and capable of beating anyone at home on any given nite.

18 game double round robin schedule is brutal. Never a cupcake game.

14-4 or 13-5 will be a very solid conference mark.

@drgnslayr

If the actual court storming and the injury weren’t enough…the AD’s and the coach’s indifference toward it should be enough to bring on the punishment

Sorry @Crimsonorblue22 Accidentally was editing your post…

Meant to say

Yes, very sad.

Coach Prohm does not appear to be media relations guy…his comments seem a little insensitive giving the injury to a reporter …

Unless the newspaper is sensationalizing the event.

@Crimsonorblue22 I

Absolutely horrible.

And then to make it even worse the ISU contingent down plays it as being part of the emotion of college athletics.

Hard to fault the fans when their leadership is too clueless to know right from wrong.

@Crimsonorblue22

I heard the ovation. He is lucky van vleet and baker are there to carry the load.

WSU fans are fickle. Hopefully they give him a chance to settle in.

Expectations can be a heavy burden for a hometown boy who comes home and its annoited the chosen one…before he’s even made a bucket.

Hilton Magic. Win by 1. Their First lead since 4-3 was taken with 9 seconds left.

Fans storm the court…thought the Big 12 was going to end that.

@drgnslayr

Good post. I hope he does well too. He wasn’t ever going to make the cut at KU and was never going to be more than a role player…so I don’t blame him for moving on.

Marshall isn’t doing him any favors with comments like - if what the tv broadcasters for the UNLV game was true- he’s the best shooter I’ve coached in my 31 years.

Broadcasters were really hyping him…CF has a lot of expectations on his shoulders. I hope he can deal with them.

@Bwag

Re: rebounding- Holy Cross head coach said in his post game that he told his team to not even pursue offensive rebounds…he wanted all 5 falling back immediately to stop transition points.

“I actually told the team, ‘Do not go near an offensive rebound,’” Carmody said. “‘A shot goes up, just get back.’ And they still beat us down the court a lot.”

Holy Cross postgame

maybe their expectations are more lenient?

Three times in the first half the broadcasters have referred to Coach Prohm having had to replace a legend after Hoiberg.

@HighEliteMajor

I am cool with disagreement on philosophy or conceptual items too.

We all have different perspectives and pre-existing beliefs that cause us to perceive things differently.

I completely understood your question about Lucas and I responded by saying we wouldn’t have missed him at all if he hadn’t been available.

But the context in which your question was rendered moot as soon as Lucss stepped on the court.

My response was simply my belief that by the time we had arrived in a dogfight late in the game, I thought Lucas body of work to that point of the game seemed to provide the best option to win.

I wish our youngsters had more of a chance to play, because there is no doubt that Diallo, Cliff, Bragg,…are all better long term choices and that they need repetition to get there.

But in Self’s system where he is not afraid of building character through earned playing time they just don’t get the minutes they should.

And this is compounded because Self doesn’t mind close games that cause him to shorten the bench and that limits their minutes even further.

At the end of the day, that is the player’s penance for not sticking around long enough to figure things out and earn the time.

And Self’s penance is having to go through it every time he lands a top recruit who leaves early.

But in his defense he is going to sign any top recruit who he thinks can help, regardless of how long he is projected to stay. He has to.

Side bar - my preference would be to go back to the old days when we built around having a core group of Ellises, Mason’s, Lucases every season, with a pipeline of replacements learning the system while they wait their turn.

but I don’t think he can do that without having two or year below ordinary years while he gets the pipeline full of three or four year guys.

And I don’t think coach Self or the fan base would tolerate even one ordinary year…so we are stuck with making the most of the status quo

@HighEliteMajor

I stand by my comments. Saw too many times even during the stretch you reference in which Diallo and Bragg did not do their job. Harvard just didn’t capitalize. And we were making shots so we made a run while they were turning it over and missing shots.

I am sorry we see things through different eyes.

In regard to Lucas . Had he been unable to play at all, sure we would have never missed him. The game flow would have taken a different path and adjustments would have been made.

But I FIRMLY believe, based on what did happen in the game that had Bragg or Diallo been on the court instead of Lucas during crunch time that we would have lost.

Their defensive lapses that would have given up points and the lost offensive possessions because of miscues that naturally come from developing freshman would have resulted in more than we could have overcome.

I suppose the one benefit that may have resulted is that had they been on the court Harvard might have been scoring 2s while exploiting them…instead of spending 20-25 seconds trying to get it in the paint to no avail before having to launch long range threes late in the shot clock…many of which scored.

I felt that way before the final horn sounded, before I heard Self’s comments and even after my third viewing of the game.

Lucas, no matter how low the bar he set, provided just enough defense, rebounding and deterance to hold the tide until we made some shots to extend the lead enough to hold on.

Again, sorry I don’t see things the same way you did.

But I disagree with you on this subject.

Style points don’t matter to Self. Never have.

He would prefer to make the team execute his game plan and win by 5 than a free for all display of athleticism that wins by 30. AAU style doesn’t appeal to him.

Forcing them to execute the lesson plan for the day - and when necessary breaking the stallions to lead - does.matter to him.

Do it until you get it right and can retain it …and then we’ll move to the next page of the playbook.

And if that approach creates adversity and tough in game situations , all the better. It keeps the team humble and gives them experience in contested games that undoubtedly will pay benefits later.

But at the end of the day once he is in that tough in game situation he is going to shorten his bench and go with the people he thinks will give him the best chance to win.

In those situations the youngsters who have yet to earn his trust or who have shown a propensity to turn it over, take ill advised shots or play bad defense aren’t going to be on the court…he is playing to win.

If you are after style points, Coach Self will never be your guy.

He prefers teaching moments and keeping their feet in the fire. Right or wrong, that’s just him.

I am not a big X and O guy, but on Saturday it appeared to me as though Hunter’s and Cheick’s tendency to contest every shot - even when on help defense - left their men open for entry passes and back side rebounds. Bragg tends to play matador defense anyway and is slow to react on help side D.

And none of them are especially good at being able to guard when they are drawn to the perimeter and have to switch on ball screens.

Harvard was eating us up on those weaknesses.

Like Jamari or not, is our best big at defending the perimeter and on switching ball screens.

Like Landen or not on Saturday is was our best option to defend in the paint and to get rebounds.

So they were on the floor.

To me, the biggest problem we had on Saturday was Wayne’s foul trouble.

When he was on the bench it caused Frank and D’tae to carry more of the perimeter load (which apparently tired then) and allowed Harvard to have one fewer true scoring threat to deal with. I thought we were just out of sorts with Wayne out of the game.

Of all games for BG to have missed, I think Harvard was a big one. They weren’t especially good at guarding the perimeter without dedicating additional resources to doing so and they lacked the athletes to guard both the perimeter and the post.

Had they elected to guard BG, we would have feasted in the post and had they sagged off of BG, he would have had great looks.

@DinarHawk

This team’s best transition offense comes off defensive rebounds…and so many of those were contested that we weren’t getting quick outlets.

I wasn’t paying attention to Harvards guards…were they falling back on the shot?

@Texas-Hawk-10

Great points.

@DinarHawk agree on 10 & 11.

I thought 14 had lots of players but was severely lacking in leadership (Black was a great leader, Nadir was an anti leader)… Our best players seemed to defer responsibility when we needed them most. And we were severely lacking experience (Selden, Mason, Greene Wiggins Embiid (hurt) Frankamp …) were all too young to get it. And aside from Frankamp lacked the handles and decision making to play fast. Frankamp had the handles and decision making to play fast but was a plodder who preferred a slow pace of play.

Like not just rare off the grill raw…but sushi raw!

@DinarHawk

Good news is that we finally have the personnel, experience and depth this year to get thru it.

I don’t think he minds making them work their way through these things…past couple of years it was a mistake because they lacked the leadership and resolve to fight through it…so they shut down in tough situations

This year’s team will learn from it and grow.

@DinarHawk

I wish we used the transition game more too in this type of game.

But if we are hitting our FT and acting like we care on the boards this would have been a 25 point win w/out transition.

I think Self doesn’t like letting them off the hook that easy when he knows his system should be working but that it isn’t only because of execution.

Kind of like Mr Miagi…you do it until you get it right…wax on, wax off.

@5541-james

Wish I could see them in practice.

I like a lot of the things Mick does except his out of control play that often leaves his man alone on the block for a simple put back

Hopefully it’s a moot point by Christmas when Diallo and Brag are getting most of the minutes.

@Eric-san

Phone is going to the charger now!

@DinarHawk I don’t disagree.

@Eric-san

Good luck with the move and the new job.

We got this.

@Eric-san

Lol

@VailHawk is usually the one telling me that!