MBB Game 11 @Norfolk State Dec. 9 (Mon) 7 PM

[Cards]

Yeah love the D this team is playing so far and the biggest surprises have been Sanders who seems to have lost his shot and minutes and Robinson's play. There have been times that I have been totally disgusted with Robinson's game but seeing is believing and he could emerge as the X factor on this team. Speedy said in the post presser that he's hitting the gym hard and it has paid dividends. All positive right now. Nice win.

Agree Triplec - was not a KJ fan last year, but probably should have cut the then freshman some more slack. His numbers this year don't lie - he clearly has become an offensive force. I'd have to say that he is playing well and been quite the 6th man. If I had to pick one thing I'd like to see is him do a little more playmaking and setup for others. I know he sometimes fills the PG spot on the floor, and that is where he still needs some work (again, I should probably cut him some slack). There's no denying that the last few games he has been a very positive force.

Any word on Gadsden? Anyone heard inside info re Sanders (nursing injury, just a bad start, others)????

[Captain]

Factor in no Gadsden and virtually no Sanders and playing a tough home team and this game had trouble written all over it.
We need an engaged Sanders or he will find himself being phased out. Remember Dubar had games where he was invisible too but this team may have more options to go to than Dubar’s teams.
The three guard lineup that we talked about may have Robinson as a principal.
He is emerging like JWF did in his sophomore year. Maybe he is a more natural off guard.

[triplec2195]

Yeah Captain the more I see Robinson I believe he's a shooting guard not a playmaker. He runs into trouble when he has to deal with the press as well.

[triplec2195]

Some video of this game but predominantly NS highlights. https://youtu.be/pmOeF3oMYWs?si=3VgNanmc2uO1r7a8

[Wags]

Lookin forward to Temple, a win at home will give us an excellent OOC start.

Should be fun. Hope it's a good crowd. The noon start is nice and early, leaving the rest of Sunday for people from about 2 pm, on. There's nothing competing at that time (the Giants and Jets are both done for the year and the Knicks aren't playing that day, neither is St. John's). Temple is a very recognizable name. So, although we can never count on people showing up, there are a lot of good reasons for them to. I hope the game is being advertised in Newsday (people still read that, right?) and elsewhere.

I also hope if they get that one, their momentum isn't slowed by the two-week layoff before the next one at Quinnipiac, but they can't do anything about that.

They'll be favorites at Quinnipiac and should get that one. If they do and if they beat Temple, they really will have done what they had to do throughout the OOC slate except for the very narrow two-point loss to Tarleton State. No one expected wins at Florida State and Houston, so to find wins in all of the rest (even if a few of them were very close and could've gone either way) would be a great job, OOC. Hopefully they can finish that off strongly in the next two and roll into CAA play after that.

[EvanJ]

Yeah Captain the more I see Robinson I believe he's a shooting guard not a playmaker. He runs into trouble when he has to deal with the press as well.

Davis averages 4.1 assists, and Aranguren averages 3.9, so we don't need many from Robinson. Some teams don't have anybody average 3 assists, and we consistently have multiple players do that:

2023-2024: Jaquan Carlos had 6.3, and Tyler Thomas had 3.3

2022-2023: Carlos had 4.8, and Aaron Estrada had 4.3

2021-2022: Estrada had exactly 5, and Zach Cooks had exactly 3. Cooks missed 6 games and averaged more assists than Caleb Burgess, who had 1 more assist in 5 more games. In order to play in 75 percent of games to qualify, he could have missed 8 games.

2020-2021: Burgess had 5.6, and Jalen Ray had 3.3

2019-2020: Desure Buie averaged 5.9, and Eli Pemberton was second with 1.9, so we did not have two players average 3.

I see schools in top conferences have two or three players average over 3 assists, but I wonder how many mid-majors have had at least two players average at least 3 assists in the last four complete seasons and so far this season.

Some video of this game but predominantly NS highlights. https://youtu.be/pmOeF3oMYWs?si=3VgNanmc2uO1r7a8

YouTube's right side of the page linked to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKnx94_q9Kw which is highlights from another TV channel, and showed more of our baskets.

I wonder how many bench players lead their team in threes made like Robinson does.

[HU87]

We reclaimed the CAA's best defense on KenPom.

They're going to have a great chance, maybe even be the favorites, to cut the nets in DC if this continues into March. Like 2020, they'll go as far as their defense takes them.

Great to see! I also love that not only are we a very strong defensive team right now, but also per KenPom, we're doing against an even stronger defensive rated non-conference SOS-- 24th in the country!

So while our PPG and output are definitely lower than years past, I'm really encouraged that our defense is performing at such a high level against good competition, and that our offense will have much easier defenses to go up against in the CAA this year than the elite run of teams we're playing in OOC play.

[dutchPride86]

Be the first to admit did not see this kind of leap coming from KiJan at all. Sounds like the kid has really put the work in, kudos to him then and lord knows we need all the offensive help we can get with this group. If Sanders doesn't pick his game up dramatically then Speedy should keep giving those minutes to KiJan going forward like it seems he did here.

Also, wonder if Speedy would consider keeping German in the starting lineup over Gadsden going forward based off how they played offensively last night. Wish we could have seen it to judge how much was better Hofstra offensive execution vs Norfolk St just not being close to the caliber opponent on the defensive end than we've been playing so far.

The one box score stat that's still alarming to me though: 15 turnovers to 14 assists, and -8 in pts off turnovers. Just not getting any better there

[EvanJ]

Aranguren and Davis have good assist-to-turnovers ratios, but Graham and Sunday combined for 5 assists and 29 turnovers. You don't expect many assists from forwards, but it's still hard for a starting forward to have 1 assist in 11 games like Graham has. Last season Jacco Fritz had 57 assists and 44 turnovers, so our ratio by forwards was much better. In 2022-2023, Nelson Boachie-Yiadom had 60 assists and 36 turnovers