I just returned from the game and here a few thoughts on what I saw.
Attendance was ok. The upper level appeared to be more full then the downstairs at times. There were clear parts of the downstairs student section, empty. I am not a fan of this new system but I wanted to simply make that observation. Some may have viewed it differently.
We look like a very different team. I am still getting used to a lot of the new guys and twice I had to double check my roster to make sure I knew who was who exactly.
The passing was very sloppy. Lots of turnovers and missed lay-ups and generally easy baskets that didn’t seemed to go in.
I really like Jerrell Lewis. Leemire couldn’t hit anything it seemed. Curtis played well overall. D’Angelo hustles and missed a lot of shots I think he would normally make. By the way SAME ISSUES WITH FREE THROWS! We simply aren’t making them.
Overall, it’s just one game so I don’t believe we need to get too down of course. The team needs time to come together and develop some consistency. I look forward to the next game.
[QUOTE]I really like Jerrell Lewis. Leemire couldn’t hit anything it seemed. Curtis played well overall. D’Angelo hustles and missed a lot of shots I think he would normally make. By the way SAME ISSUES WITH FREE THROWS! We simply aren’t making them.[/QUOTE]
All very well said.
I know this is just 1 game, but Jerrell Lewis appears to be a great floor leader. Great vision, can feed the post, very unselfish. I like this kid and hope he gets a lot of PT this year. Leemire has improved his game, but IMO needs to look to his teammates more. I think he tries to do too much himself. D’A missed a lot of shots, I thought, but ended up putting a lot of points on the board. Was pretty good at getting to the basket. Oh yea, and Withers is a BEAST. I was also pleasantly surprised with Coleman. Great hustle, made some good hustle plays. Not much from EJ… Mitchell also looked very good. The kid is consistent. Good ball handler, good playmaker, great hustle… hate this is his last year.
We are NOT a 3 pt team this year and we need to realize that. I also think we may be worse from the line this year than last year. Looked good in spurts but we struggled too much tonight and shouldn’t have.
Jerrell Lewis can PASS THE DAMN BALL! yikes! I also was really impressed with Jerrell Jamison, that guy rebounds the heck out of the ball. He is a complete player
I’d say for exhibition it was alright. We started doing a lot better on free throws in the second half so I can’t complain too much.
The missed passes really bothered me. Curt missed several that he clearly could get and if he is going to lead the team he can’t do that.
Jerell Lewis looked a lot better than I thought he would. He may step up huge late in the season.
DA was awesome, and if he’d hit his 3s (Like I know he can) he’d have more points than Curt.
Section 104, Student Section had one area that was very empty because most of the people left after we started to run away. I think when the real games roll around the lower section will be fan. (Anyone notice the Niner Nation chant?!!?)
Eric Marsh was a great bench warmer. He didn’t have a single error all night.
Lewis impressed me the most. He passes the ball really well and has good court vision. Jerrell Jamison also impressed me because he was in there for every rebound and played solid defense. Our free throw shooting is horrible, but our defense is improved a ton. We have size and strength, so we should definately get some rebounds for second chance points, plus we have pretty good height all around, which is another plus.
[QUOTE=Chisox17;137478]Jerrell Lewis can PASS THE DAMN BALL! yikes! I also was really impressed with Jerrell Jamison, that guy rebounds the heck out of the ball. He is a complete player[/QUOTE]
Only thing that impressed me was Jerrell Lewis.
Curtis was fine but he should score 50 against a team with 12 guards.
We can’t shoot from anywhere on the floor and if we don’t find a couple guys that can hit consistantly from the perimeter, every team is going to pack it in on Withers and make us beat them from the 3 point line…which we can’t do.
I didn’t think the FT shooting could get worse than last year but evidently I was incorrect.
Whatever diet Coleman went on he should get his money back but on the bright side, I finally found a D1 player that M9H has a better vertical than.
alumni section sucks. I feel old now as i was the only one clapping and the only one with the picks up during free throws. Lewis looked good. What impressed. me the most was Coleman’s attitude. He had a few BS fouls and he just walked away. How did alexander have 20 points. i didnt see him make a shot, other than layups. On the other hand, he had a nice game on defense. I think the first half we struggled b/c of the substitutions lutz was making. He wont do that for normal games. We also played like we were playing at midnight madness, except the opposition played D. We really murdered them, just missed free throws, calls for a weaker team by refs, and numerous attempts at flashy plays lead the score to show otherwise.
i’m sure each of you have complaints about the game. Pfeiffer is one of the only teams this year we will play that does a full out press on every defensive play. That probably caught us guard and the fact that the refs couldn’t keep themselves from blowing the whistle at least once every minute.
I really liked the fact that D’Angelo was constantly getting himself to the line. HOWEVER, he must convert a better % of his free throw attempts.
We seem to have some quality depth at several positions, PG, PF, SF. We should only get deeper when Bennett finally, finally sees the floor in a Niner uniform. It looks as if we have alot of big bodies to throw at the likes of a Mensa-Bonsu or Steven Smith. Courtney Williams and Nance look to have more skill than Coleman, but all are tough rebounders.
I liked Jerell Jamison’s play. He always seemed to be around the ball on the defensive end. I want to see him rebound against taller, more physical players.
I wouldn’t give much credence to the way the game was officiated. The refs have just been through clinics where the contact and other points of emphasis (see the 5 palming calls) were drilled into their head repeatedly. My guess is the number of foul calls will reduce dramatically when the games actually count.
Jerrell Lewis feeding Withers was sweet music, but since no one else said it, he got smoked by a couple of the Pfeiffer guards (and so did Lee & Mitch) on D.
One thing that bothers me is that we look like 10 random guys playing pickup ball. Especially in the first half, no one looked comfortable or organized and the passing was just awful. It only got better for short stretches between specific tandems. Lutz has to find a rotation and stick to it. I dont envy him, we have a lot of superior athletes, but I’m not sure how many players we have.
EJ is really struggling. I suspect he’s hurt.
Some of the Plavich bashers are gonna be missing him before the year is over. We dont appear to be able to shoot. I think PI is right about how other teams will play us. Pfeiffer had all freaking 5 guys in the lane everytime Curtis touched the ball in the first half.
BTW, i wanna see a short range game from DA. I didnt see it. He has one “play” that he can score on - the one where he releases early downcourt and we cherry pick. Otherwise, he was completely ineffective.
I’m not too worried about the shooting, I think shooting is something that takes some rythym and our guys clearly aren’t ready for live game action. I payed more attention to little things like hustle, defense and rebounding. The first half told me that this team can win ugly. We couldn’t buy a bucket but our defense was air tight. This team is miles better defensively than with Plavich and Iti. Even without Eddie. Plus we have 5 guys who can hawk down rebounds. It was really good seeing DA get a couple of boards and steals. Those are the things we need him to pick up. I also was EXTREMELY impressed by Jerrell Lewis. Not to be overlooked is that he is a freshman. While he probably won’t ever be a great defender, he can pass the rock and push tempo without getting out of control. Good to see that Curt was working on the inside most of the games. That’s reassuring.
Basically we did mostly everything well except shoot and protect the basketball. Those are typically two things that teams don’t do well in exhibitions. And Pfeiffer was scrappy and physical. Not a pushover exhibition team that plays 0 defense.
[QUOTE=ninerID;137484]alumni section sucks. I feel old now as i was the only one clapping and the only one with the picks up during free throws. QUOTE]
Hey I was in the alumni section and standing for most of the first half, until the refs killed all my spirits with foul/foul/foul/foul. That and people kept saying I was too excited over an exhibition game. Join me in 216 if you can. We’ll stand, chant, clap and do all that good stuff like we were students.
Jerrell Lewis (much better than advertised) - nobody talked about this kid and he may have the best court vision of all of our guards. Shooting is suspect and ballhandling (careless a few times) needs to get more consistent.
Jerrell Jamison (much better than expected) - Best weak side help defender on the team. Quick feet, quick hands, shot blocker, rebounder. Can’t shoot that well though.
Courtney Williams (as expected) - great rebounder - tough
Good Crowd turnout for an Exhibition Game
Bad:
Turnovers - 27
Free Throw Shooting - 23-43 = 53%
DA’s jump shooting. 7-14 and all 7 were layups (0-5 from 3)
Nance & EJ were disappointing (from what I would have expected) except for a few spurts
Our half court offense…we still don’t have one
Pfieffer out hustled us and played harder than us most of the night…we just had more size/athleticism
Ugly:
Refs: 62 Total fouls called + 2 Techs!!!
OUR JUMP SHOOTING IS GOD AWFUL!!!
For those of you who hate watching us shoot a lot of 3’s…don’t worry…we don’t have ANYBODY that can shoot.
Seriously…somebody tell me if I’m wrong. I remember 3 made jumpshots ALL GAME (Leemire made 1 3ptr, Mitch made a 12ft fade away and Nance made a 16ft jumper).
ALL GAME!!!
We made 3 jumpers and a buttload of layups and half of our free throws.
This may be the worst jump shooting team we have EVER had. Granted…it is but 1 game…but I have never seen that bad of a shooting performance in any game by a Niner squad since starting school here in 1990. Seriously.
BTW, i wanna see a short range game from DA. I didnt see it. He has one “play” that he can score on - the one where he releases early downcourt and we cherry pick. Otherwise, he was completely ineffective.[/QUOTE]
Alexander never looked comfortable shooting maybe because of the defensive pressure that ate at our team all night. Don’t doubt his shot though look for him to be our one big time shooter. He always finds a way to be where he needs to be at the right times which puts points on the board even on poor shooting performances like tonight.
for future reference…the B*$$ $$#$ chant was extremely untasteful. You should have seen the look on some of the alumni’s faces. I’m glad i can’t curse at games.
We’ve got a lot of big bodies that have no hands, however if they had good hands to go along with the rest of the package they wouldn’t be playing here.
Too many dropped passes and too much sloppy ball handling from all the foward positions.
The strength of this team will have to be rebounding and defense and then hope Withers doesn’t get into foul trouble.
FT shooting has got to be killing Bobby. He looked miserable and frustrated every time we were at the line. As physical as it looks like we are going to play, we better get better at the FT line quick.