Rutgers Post Game Thread

[btownqb]

Just now, 13th&Jackson said:

So, let's just say he averaged out to 100

I'm just going to wait and see him play. 

[tdhoosier]

....good chat. 

[Kdug]

2 hours ago, 13th&Jackson said:

The team lacked shooters and guard depth last season. Johnson goes down and JHS had to play ironman the whole season. Everyone knew JHS was leaving before the season was over. Unfortunately, Cupps isn't JHS and shouldn't have been expected to be him. 

Newton missed nearly his entire senior season due to his knee injury. His availability for this season was questionable last spring. He also wasn't a shooter in high school, he was a physical driver who Woodson recruited especially for his defensive potential. That's great to have, but even if healthy, I'm not sure he would have helped much offensively this season. 247 had him as a 4 star, #127 overall and #15 combo guard. That's solid, but not likely to be an impact player as a freshman. 

"He's a tough competitor, a little bulldog," Woodson said. "He just plays hard. He loves to compete ... He can play the one and the two, that's what he played in high school. That's what attracted us to him, in terms of him being able to play both ways and score and initiate the offense. But defensively is where I think he's going to really excel because he's just tough."

The reality is that the die was cast for this season during the offseason. Hopefully, over the rest of the season, they overachieve their personnel deficiencies. But, we're halfway through the season and the same issues keep appearing. 

Here are Trey Galloway's 3pt and FT% by season:

FR      18%    74%

SO     21%    65%

JR     46%    64%

SR     24%    50%

Which number looks like the outlier?  Last season, TJD became phenomenal at passing out of the double and triple teams. That had to be a big factor in Gallo's one season of three point shooting. Otherwise, his confidence appears to be shattered. 

Maybe the light switch will fully come on for Gunn and Mgbako and they can have a strong finish to the season. 

I agree with a decent amount of this, but disagree with what you’re implying with the bold. There is no team in the country that would not have a significant impact to their depth by losing their best guard to injury.

Our guard depth was fine going into last year. You can’t plan for your best guard to break his foot and miss most of the year. This year is a different story.

[Indykev]

On to the next.

[NotIThatLives]

1 hour ago, tdhoosier said:

....good chat. 

I read that post twice trying to find one thing confusing.  Now I'm confused how he's confused.  

[NotIThatLives]

4 hours ago, HMSHoosier said:

The overreactions on here are comical. 

After Nebraska game "coach needs fired he sucks, can't coach...blah, blah, blah". 

After Ohio State game "best game I've seen coached".

Rutgers "coach needs fired he sucks" and now I see we are wanting to kick players off the team for a bonehead move, but in the same breathe complain about not having a enough depth the guard position. It absolutely bogles my mind to read some of this crap.

Lets start with the firing the coach argument.  Who do you replace him with? At what point do you quit firing coaches every 3 or 4 years so something can actually be built? Believe me I can't stand seeing them play like they do especially on the road and I absolutely hate losing. My expectations are yes we should be contending for BIG championships and National titles, but realistically I know that's not going to happen every year.  If you came into this year not expecting growing pains after losing 4 starters (who were the 4 leading scorers) and 2 transfers (who were usually the first 2 off the bench) than in my opinion you didn't have very realistic expectations.  Go back to 1987, win the national title the top 2 players graduate, come back the next year and have a record of 19-10 overall 11-7 in the BIG get a #4 seed and get knocked out to the first round. Did that meet everyones expectations? College basketball is as competitive as its ever been in my opinion with NIL and the transfer portal. In this day and age where do you think a 19-10 overall record would get you seeded in the tournament?

Do missed free throws annoy the crap out of me yes, but I highly doubt they are not being worked on every day in practice.  I find it hard to believe that Cheaney and Hulls are not working with these guys on their shooting woes, but than again I'm not at the practices to know that 100%. Maybe some of the "insiders" have info to debunk that.

Why don't they recruit shooters argument.  Every kid that gets recruited in a top college program can shoot, are some better than others yes.  Take Galloway for example, he shot like 40% from 3 last year this year they are just not falling, it happens its not like he forgot how to shoot from last year to this year. Now I'm sure if I went to the recruiting page and searched through all of the recruits we have there would be threads on probably all of these kids talking about their high school stats and how they were the leading scorers of their teams and shot a certain percentage from three, and average this many points per game.

Why don't they recruit guards argument.  Do people forget JHS last year? Going into last year I honestly thought he would be at minimum a 2 year player but he played good enough to go to the next level and good for him. There's also Newton who is injured and red shirting who was a highly rated recruit. I would venture to say that wasn't in their game plan.

Substitution pattern argument. Do I get frustrated with this, yes, but I'm also not in practice to see what the staff sees. Again if there is insight to tell me otherwise please by all means correct me on it. There's been moments this year when the bench has came in and a certain 1 or 2 of those players had been really productive and actually seemed to get things going. Than there have been moments when they come in and look lost it happens. If the staff didn't think they deserved the minutes I truly don't believe they would get them. 

Sorry for the long post

Good post.  We don't know everything and we all don't have to agree on everything either.  

What are your thoughts on leaving a scholarship left open when everyone on this board was aware of the need back in like March or april?

[Kdug]

Anyone who follows ITH, they have a video breaking down the 4 airballed threes: https://www.insidethehall.com/2024/01/11/film-session-indianas-rough-night-from-deep-against-rutgers/

I honestly don’t even know how you’d address that as a coach. They took the shots they were supposed to, with the 2 Mbagko airballs not even having a defender closing out. I hope this doesn’t cause IU to start passing up open threes. Need to keep shooting those, just have to make them.

[OGIUAndy]

18 hours ago, OGIUAndy said:

Sorry, but this is a silly overreaction. 

You think Duke fans were calling for the suspension and dismissal of any of their players who were literally notorious for some cheap shots? Allen got suspended ONE GAME by Coach K for kicking and tripping players  Do you think their fans or team "bloggers" were starting polls online? Remember when Cody took Draymond's hand and banged himself in the nuts to get a phantom foul? Jadlow throwing a ball off a guy's face? You don't think Fife and M. Lewis played "dirty" at times? I don't condone X's actions, but the outrage people have for certain players is misguided if you ask me. I'm just tired of people bashing our own players online every chance they get. Bitch about Woody, fine. But posting a poll or saying a player should be suspended or kicked off the team for some rough play (yes maybe even dirty) on social media is ridiculous. IU fans tend to be too righteous and it doesn't do the program any good. 

Addition: He got booted from the game. IU lost. I'm not sure why IU fans would want him to miss more games.  Potentially throw away any chance IU has left this season. Some IU fans have failed to realize there has been a sea change in college sports. In the player empowerment era, it is not a good idea to take the extreme hard line every time a player messes up. Why handcuff yourself even more? All the hardliners have zero clue what was overlooked back in the day because information/news wasn't as easily accessible/available, the coaches were buddies with the beat writers or had a relationship with the local law enforcement. Now every time some kid messes up the whole world hears about and if there is a play ie X's bird check or whatever the video is played online over and over and over and over purely to incite more clicks, more outrage, and more opinions. 

Edited January 11 by OGIUAndy

[HMSHoosier]

1 hour ago, NotIThatLives said:

Good post.  We don't know everything and we all don't have to agree on everything either.  

What are your thoughts on leaving a scholarship left open when everyone on this board was aware of the need back in like March or april?

I would think the staff looked at all the options available and probably determined either no one fit what they are doing or the players they were looking at that wound up going to other schools for one reason or another. I don't think they purposefully left it open.

I do feel their priorities were probably on trying to get some inside players initially since Malik was the only big left and there were 6 guards either upperclassman/ incoming freshman already committed to the roster. I know as a fan I was more concerned about getting some inside players to help with what was lost. I guess I would have to take time and go back and look who was available at the time to see if maybe I would have like to see them try to get a certain player. I do remember they were talking to Love from UNC. I'm sure there were others, but that one just sticks out because I'm in North Carolina and everybody kept telling me you don't want him (UNC fans).

 

[IU Scott]

15 hours ago, OGIUAndy said:

Sorry, but this is a silly overreaction. 

XJ should never wear the IU uniform again

[IU Scott]

5 hours ago, btownqb said:

Sub-pattern discussions, just like many of you had during Crean/Archie, are just such a waste/blown absurdly out of porportion. I can understand Woodson's reply to the reporter who asked that stupid question. 

Totally disagree because we seem like we get off to good starts then after 6inutes the dubs start coming. It kills momentum. There should be at least 3 starters on the court at all times 

[btownqb]

20 minutes ago, IU Scott said:

Totally disagree because we seem like we get off to good starts then after 6inutes the dubs start coming. It kills momentum. There should be at least 3 starters on the court at all times 

👍

But you also said TG is a 7th man, XJ should be kicked off, Malik gets in foul trouble, MM can't dribble, and Ware isn't playing 40 mins a night..  36 mins tops. .... 

On paper your idea sounds nice, I don't think it has a lot of functional reality to it. 

Edited January 11 by btownqb

[Kdug]

45 minutes ago, IU Scott said:

Totally disagree because we seem like we get off to good starts then after 6inutes the dubs start coming. It kills momentum. There should be at least 3 starters on the court at all times 

Eh, the 3 starters in at the same time isn’t needed. Imo just try to have one of Ware/Reneau and one of XJ/Galloway always in. Mbagko doesn’t really play starter minutes anyway.

[KoB2011]

6 hours ago, btownqb said:

Sub-pattern discussions, just like many of you had during Crean/Archie, are just such a waste/blown absurdly out of porportion. I can understand Woodson's reply to the reporter who asked that stupid question. 

I think it can be overplayed, but this season especially it's legit. The data doesn't lie - when we play 4 bench players together we have one of the worst lineups possible in college basketball. We are halfway through the season, we have enough to know that's a really stupid thing to do.

Woodson should get asked about it and should have a much better answer than he did. The fact that he either doesn't know how bad the lineups he puts in are performing or doesn't care is alarming. 

Edited January 11 by KoB2011

[btownqb]

27 minutes ago, KoB2011 said:

I think it can be overplayed, but this season especially it's legit. The data doesn't lie - when we play 4 bench players together we have one of the worst lineups possible in college basketball. We are halfway through the season, we have enough to know that's a really stupid thing to do.

Woodson should get asked about it and should have a much better answer than he did. The fact that he either doesn't know how bad the lineups he puts in are performing or doesn't care is alarming. 

I dont see that it is...play better. Talent issue, which lies on his shoulders, skill issue that lies on his shoulders. Heck, there's probably cohesion issues, again.. that lies on his shoulders. 

Your data lacks context. 

Edited January 11 by btownqb

[KoB2011]

5 minutes ago, btownqb said:

I dont see that it is...play better. Talent issue, which lies on his shoulders, skill issue that lies on his shoulders. Heck, there's probably cohesion issues, again.. that lies on his shoulders. 

Your data lacks context. 

Yes, all those things lie on his shoulders. We agree.

It's a choice to continue playing 4 bench players together, and it's a bad choice. He should have to defend repeated bad choices that cost us games. He certainly isn't shy about throwing players under the bus when he thinks they cost us games. 

[btownqb]

4 minutes ago, KoB2011 said:

Yes, all those things lie on his shoulders. We agree.

It's a choice to continue playing 4 bench players together, and it's a bad choice. He should have to defend repeated bad choices that cost us games. He certainly isn't shy about throwing players under the bus when he thinks they cost us games. 

I don't see that cost us the game, though. 

Throwing players under the bus or was he just correct in his summation of their play that evening? 

Edited January 11 by btownqb

[NCHoosier32]

1 hour ago, Kdug said:

Eh, the 3 starters in at the same time isn’t needed. Imo just try to have one of Ware/Reneau and one of XJ/Galloway always in. Mbagko doesn’t really play starter minutes anyway.

See I mainly agree with you here.  Sure, we need at least 2 starters in, but the big thing that isn't that tough to figure out is more of not having 3 guys who can't play the wing or struggle to score in general in at the same time.  For instance, I could be okay with 1 Galloway  2  Cupps  3 Gunn  4 Walker and 5 Reneau or Ware for a few minutes.  Only 2 starters, but not a horrible fit.  Now, I don't think it is really necessary to only have 2 starters in, but maybe you could survive that for just a few minutes.  A lineup of 1 Cupps 2 Gunn 3 Banks 4 Walker 5 Reneau or Ware should happen for 0 minutes EVER.     

[IU Scott]

1 hour ago, KoB2011 said:

I think it can be overplayed, but this season especially it's legit. The data doesn't lie - when we play 4 bench players together we have one of the worst lineups possible in college basketball. We are halfway through the season, we have enough to know that's a really stupid thing to do.

Woodson should get asked about it and should have a much better answer than he did. The fact that he either doesn't know how bad the lineups he puts in are performing or doesn't care is alarming. 

https://indiana.rivals.com/news/a-deep-dive-into-mike-woodson-and-his-history-with-substitution-patterns

I guess it is important enough for someone to write an article on this subject 

[IU Scott]

15 minutes ago, NCHoosier32 said:

See I mainly agree with you here.  Sure, we need at least 2 starters in, but the big thing that isn't that tough to figure out is more of not having 3 guys who can't play the wing or struggle to score in general in at the same time.  For instance, I could be okay with 1 Galloway  2  Cupps  3 Gunn  4 Walker and 5 Reneau or Ware for a few minutes.  Only 2 starters, but not a horrible fit.  Now, I don't think it is really necessary to only have 2 starters in, but maybe you could survive that for just a few minutes.  A lineup of 1 Cupps 2 Gunn 3 Banks 4 Walker 5 Reneau or Ware should happen for 0 minutes EVER.     

We can all agree that Teri Moren and women's teams are very good. At least the games I have watched she has never had more than 2 subs on the court together.  If you have great players coming off the bench then player a deeper rotation but most teams shouldn't play more than 8 in the rotation.

[NCHoosier32]

41 minutes ago, IU Scott said:

We can all agree that Teri Moren and women's teams are very good. At least the games I have watched she has never had more than 2 subs on the court together.  If you have great players coming off the bench then player a deeper rotation but most teams shouldn't play more than 8 in the rotation.

i don't watch women's college bball, but we agree on this as well.  

[tdhoosier]

29 minutes ago, NCHoosier32 said:

i don't watch women's college bball, but we agree on this as well.  

I recommend making just one exception and watching the game against Iowa on Saturday. I’m expecting that game to be off the hook. 

[Inequality]

13 minutes ago, tdhoosier said:

I recommend making just one exception and watching the game against Iowa on Saturday. I’m expecting that game to be off the hook. 

Yes! Can’t miss this one!

[dgambill]

6 hours ago, NotIThatLives said:

Good post.  We don't know everything and we all don't have to agree on everything either.  

What are your thoughts on leaving a scholarship left open when everyone on this board was aware of the need back in like March or april?

I assume they didnt want to commit a long term scholarship to someone just to fill the spot. I think they wanted a grad transfer guard to fill that last spot or a one and done type…and no one would commit to signing with us because they didn’t see the dedicated minutes with two senior guards already locked into the rotation and a 5* top 10 prospect locked into the 3.

Fact is though late in the game we were still chasing shooters Reeves from UK and Hart who committed to UK. Had we landed Reeves who has been great this year….this team would be a B1G favorite. Problem I believe isn’t identifying need but not closing on the needs. We can’t strike out two years in a row in landing studs for the back court.

[IU Scott]

59 minutes ago, NCHoosier32 said:

i don't watch women's college bball, but we agree on this as well.  

Coach K and Bill Self never played their bench Ayers that much. I know this year when KU played here he played the starters the majority of the minutes. I just don't by that you can't play your starters at least 35 minutes.