Game#12 vs Delaware

[stuball888]

On paper we should have Allen and Carr were coming off injuries but it looked like 4 of our players were playing hobbled . I think one of delawares players were a walkon and they still blew us out.

[fiftiespride]

Probably like most of us I share Politos feelings. What struck me was we were in the bonus and they had 2 key players with 4 fouls with quite a bit of time left. For the most part we seemed to hoist threes and not even try to capitalize.

[EvanJ]

it looked like 4 of our players were playing hobbled.

If so, we only used three players who were fully healthy.

The two bench players did not score in 21 minutes, and that was with Coburn fouling out with 3:43 left. We didn't use Schutte or Green.

We had 5 assists on 20 made field goals. It was our fewest assists since we had 4 on 30 field goals in an 80-77 win at Drexel on February 28, 2019. We had 7 assists in the previous game, and it was our first streak of consecutive games with 7 or fewer assists since February 18 and 20, 2013, and we went 7-25 that season.

Dylan Painter became the first player from 2010-2011 to the present to have at least 19 rebounds against us. The previous high was 18, which was done twice by Delaware's Jamelle Hagins. Nobody has had exactly 17 rebounds against us during that time. Six players combined to have exactly 16 rebounds against us seven times including W&M's Mekhel Harvey this season Painter made it the 30th time from 2010-2011 to the present that a player had at least 18 points, at least 19 rebounds, and at least 5 turnovers. The only previous CAA player to do that was UNCW's Devontae Cacok, so Gustys never did that.

[ZMAN3]

There's just not enough "O" - only 2 legit 3 pt shooters - if one is off we are dead in the water. 2nd half of G1 (excluding OT) vs NU - 22 pts followed by a pair of 56's not going to get it done. As pointed out here Ray and Coburn are basically spot up 3 pt shooters - neither much off the bounce. Last year with 4 from "deep" someone was always on - this year with only 2 - and neither shooting that great - big trouble - and I don't see where they can go to get those needed points

[Polito]

Welp... that was an equally disheartening post game from Farrelly. Nothing wrong with it, just the sad state of affairs right now. I don't think this team has bought into their cause yet as a collective, they are nowhere near ready for what it takes to defend a crown and win a championship, and I don't think the staff has any answers at this point in time.

No denying at this point that this team literally can't shoot, nearly to a man, and they aren't going to magically start doing so.

This was an inexcusable ass kicking. 3 game losing streak, and they've looked increasingly terrible doing so. Regressing instead of progressing, on both sides of the ball, regardless of the 1-2 nice individual performances each game. Going backwards big time. I'm not on the cancel the season side just yet lol but if they lose again Sunday and get swept twice in a row, it will be hard to argue against that.

[HUSID74]

No ball movement and it was our worst game of the year. We get blown out by an understaffed Hen team. We got 5 assists all game. 5

Stu we had less players than the so-called undermanned team. No Green, Schutte, Bethea, Silverio...whats going on????

[triplec2195]

We know about Omar and Zion but what about Schutte and Green? I thought Mike had alluded to the fact that we were banged up. Thought I heard that in one of his pressers. We give Masic minutes and get very little but Coburn needs to score more then 7 points. So reliant on Ray and Coburn. Even though we’re not getting a lot of points from Cramer he contributes in strong rebounding and also blocked shots.

[Polito]

True, HU is undermanned as well, although Zion hasn't been there all year, and Silverio was unfortunately largely a negative when in. No Green and Schutte hurt though to help out... and it sounded like they'll be without them all again on Sunday too from the way Mike referenced it.

Agree with Z, it's getting scary. I think that's exactly what has the staff stumped, no way they imagined this team as a whole literally not being able to shoot the basketball this deep into the season. That makes strong D all game vital, BUT you're not gonna shut teams out, you HAVE to score the basketball!

Without reliable points, HU has become remarkably easy to beat: be pesky on D, they'll turn it over left and right, play them soft at the arc because none of them can shoot, and focus on giving Kante hell to limit their best attribute. Do that, and take advantage of the holes the zone will give you to grab just a couple more buckets, and that's game. You don't even need to be that good to do the above, an average D1 team can do that, and that's what we just saw.

What's really hurting is just how many mistakes the 3 upper class men are making - besides being extremely inconsistent (or consistently a question mark lol), they make a lot of poor plays, bad decisions, errant passes, and even display shaky ball handling. They still don't seem ready to bear the weight and be 'the' focus, and it's been a detriment thus far. Have to be able to depend on your seasoned stars to carry the load for the youth, but they aren't doing that right now.

For a team that has played and practiced more than most of the CAA, never had to deal with a shutdown, they look behind the others who have. And it isn't just their youth, others have the same. Not sure how they fix this, but the staff needs to come up with something fast or this season will quickly get out of control.

[Wags]

They should be getting Kante more touches and playing inside out. Forget what we've been told or what some hoped for - this is not a reliable perimeter shooting team (yes, at times, but not on a consistent basis). But can it still contend in the CAA? Yes.

Kante is making 56% of his shots. Doesn't matter that they're near the hoop. Efficiency is efficiency and it's better than missing jumpers. Feed him down low. He's normally good for about 5/10, 6/11 and is a walking double-double. That's a strength vs. the rest of the CAA. Use it. Get him more touches and let him be 8/14 or 9/16, and get a little more offense that way instead of letting others brick missed jumper after missed jumper. That will also open things up more for others to maybe make it a little easier for them on the perimeter to get those percentages up a bit.

Coburn also needs to attack and get to the line. He cannot be passive. This team will not score enough if he is. He went to the line the most in his two biggest scoring games this season (career-highs) -- 13/17 FT when he scored 28 against Iona and 14/16 when he matched the 28 against Monmouth. He was 9/9 at the line in HU's last win (vs. W&M) but just 4/4 in an OT loss vs NU, 2/2 in the next loss vs NU and 4/6 in Friday's loss at Delaware. He needs to be at the line double-digit times every game, especially in the games when he's off from the floor.

Those two things, and Ray being a little better with the shot selection, will help them find a little more offense.

Mihalich always says the game honors toughness and says that people tend to only think of that in terms of D, rebounding and going after 50/50 balls. While those are all true, he says that it includes toughness on offense - valuing possessions, playing together, sharing the ball, passing up good shots for even better ones. They're not doing any of that on a consistent basis. They have Kante as a strength, they have Coburn's ability to get to the line a lot. Use those and play off of those to improve all of the other areas so they can get closer to 70 pts or more instead of being held to 56. And in the meantime, know what you are and accept it. Know that you're not the lights out shooting team that you thought you were or that some expected you to be. Look at the data and the track record. And play DEFENSE, take care of the ball, force TOs to help defense turn into offense, and scrap and fight for 40 minutes, all to make up for the lack of good shooting on a consistent enough basis. And start bringing that immediately so Delaware sees a different team tomorrow than it saw on Friday.

[EvanJ]

Coburn also needs to attack and get to the line. He cannot be passive. This team will not score enough if he is. He went to the line the most in his two biggest scoring games this season (career-highs) -- 13/17 FT when he scored 28 against Iona and 14/16 when he matched the 28 against Monmouth. He was 9/9 at the line in HU's last win (vs. W&M) but just 4/4 in an OT loss vs NU, 2/2 in the next loss vs NU and 4/6 in Friday's loss at Delaware. He needs to be at the line double-digit times every game, especially in the games when he's off from the floor.

You can't expect anybody to get to the line double-digit times. Last season Pemberton led us with 4.44 free throw attempts per game. The top two free throw attempts in a season in CAA history were by David Robinson. He had 331 in 1985-1986, which was 9.46 per game. The next season he had fewer attempts in fewer games and averaged 9.91. The most in a season while we were in the CAA was 293 by Towson's Jerrelle Benimon in 2013-2014. He played 36 games and averaged 8.14. None of the top ten in CAA history are by us. When JWF was a senior, he averaged 5.89, and Pemberton led us with 6.18. When Jenkins was a senior, he averaged 6.70.