The Official Beat the Temple Owls in Philly Thread

[theyaintwantit]

Hope you got a cheesesteak for your trouble. VCUs defense has been good, but it looks amazing holding down crap opponents. Battle is one of the best scorers in the country. Dunn is better than anyone in the A10. They played well, and it created some opportunities for their other guys. It was the best game Temple has played this year. VCU will not see another 1-2 punch like that the rest of the year.

VCUs defense will probably stifle most of the A10, and be rated highly. But good offense will trump good defense.

I did eat a cheesesteak and I'd agree that Temple has quality scorers.

There are some bad-to-mediocre teams in the A10 so I'd agree that our defense can stifle most of the A10. Thus far, SLU is the only A10 team that has DEFINITELY looked better than VCU. You can argue other teams would be the 2nd best team thus far (perhaps UMass), but overall it's a crapshoot and the non-games in December should make things clearer. I do agree that good offense will trump good defense. There aren't a ton of good offenses in the A10, but if we can't score than we are bound to drop one.

 

[share the ball]

since movement through the portal has accelerated, VCU has seen average number of ins and outs
I have a hard time identifying a transfer out (during the last 3 years) that was really a major loss (MSS was the one that had a meaningful/important role with VCU

the four that left in 22 and how they are doing so far
Ward has stepped up to a better program but his playing time and impact is minimal
Tshonis (sp) is doing well at a lesser program Long Beach state - getting about 22 minutes of run and scoring 12/game (surprisingly his 3pt FG% is terrible so far 24% vs 36% at VCU
MBJ is basically doing about twice as good as what he did at VCU though at a lesser program UNCG (shooting around 58% from floor)
Jimmy Nichols is playing nearly 18 minutes a game at Coastal Carolina , scoring around 7 ppg and 4 rpg - clearly a lesser program and his numbers are about 4X that at VCU but not that far from his last year at Providence

not sure how I would grade them other than I would have liked MBJ to be here still, though I doubt MR would play him anywhere near the minutes at UNCG

as far as the transfers in - right now the winner to date is Brandon Johns but another meaningful measure is the other 2 are avg nearly 20 minutes of run each (though zeb #s inflated with absence of Ace for those 4 games and Shriver seems to be shooting himself out of minutes recently)

it doesn't bother me that we are losing 2 or 3 on avg and picking up similar amounts in portal if we can replicate the success of the 3 we got in 22 juxtaposed versus the 4 we lost in 22

like a few others here I think the portal is here to stay and actually helps players find the right level that they can contribute meaningfully
3 of 4 that left in 22 are playing more and succeeding and the one we got are succeeding (at least the Michigan duo versus the prior situation

what VCU doesn't want to happen in the portal was what occurred at St Bona where their two best returning players left Bonnies to go to ISU
if that occurs at VCU then their are serious program issues occurring behind the scenes

 

[TampaKAP]

I know the A10 has not met expectations so far this year outside of SLU. I am curious why some appear to be ok jsut being better than or equal two the rest of the A10. The standard should be the standard right? You should compete against yourself and not use others short comings as the measuring stick

 

[AlienAiden]

I know the A10 has not met expectations so far this year outside of SLU. I am curious why some appear to be ok jsut being better than or equal two the rest of the A10. The standard should be the standard right? You should compete against yourself and not use others short comings as the measuring stick

I can speak for myself and I am not. We are talking about the season so that is what we are talking about. We have to evaluate the team against competition season by season and that is the discussion right now.

 

[duncanlamb]

You are wrong, look back at the tape and you will see him make a real nice move with his back to the basket along the baseline. Admittedly, it was the first time I have seen him do it successfully. What I hate is when he wheels around and takes a fade away in the paint. No one should do that except pros like the center from Houston in the 90s’.

I stand corrected. The first time in 8 games. He did it once which is an encouraging sign.

 

[theyaintwantit]

I know the A10 has not met expectations so far this year outside of SLU. I am curious why some appear to be ok jsut being better than or equal two the rest of the A10. The standard should be the standard right? You should compete against yourself and not use others short comings as the measuring stick

I don't like that we are ranked 116 in the NET and 101 in KP as of December 5th. I wish we were better and my hope is that we can win our final 5 OOC games and potentially be ranked in the Top 80 of both metrics prior to A10 play.

At the same time, I find SLU to be the only A10 team that is DEFINITELY better than VCU thus far. So in that sense, I think it is fair to compare VCU to the rest of the A10.

Neither of these opinions need to be mutually exclusive.

 

[AHEF]

Would someone please create an "Opinion on Coach Rhoades" thread?

 

[theyaintwantit]

Would someone please create an "Opinion on Coach Rhoades" thread?

Why create a new thread when every thread already features that option?

 

[AHEF]

Why create a new thread when every thread already features that option?

To avoid seeing the same "Discussions" in every game thread.

 

[RowdyPkunk]

To avoid seeing the same "Discussions" in every game thread.

except its probably going to happen regardless. Because anytime someone has a question or concern about a move being made / not made, or time out usage or anything else that could pop up during a game..... it's going to pop up anyway. So a new thread to try & move MR discussions to a central location probably won't help as much as you think.

I do get what you were trying to do though.

 

[VCU Heel]

To avoid seeing the same "Discussions" in every game thread.

We get to hear about people’s problems with Ed in every thread. Why not the same for Mike?

 

[RamJamFan]

I know the A10 has not met expectations so far this year outside of SLU. I am curious why some appear to be ok jsut being better than or equal two the rest of the A10. The standard should be the standard right? You should compete against yourself and not use others short comings as the measuring stick

Exactly. We need to approach our expectations like a golfer: don’t play down or up to one day’s opponent. Bring your best game and stay focused on each moment. Right now I fear our team will look back at the last several bad tee shots and lose focus on playing VCU bb and hammering teams next 5 home games. If we are going to schedule poor to average OOC teams we must hammer them. A win-by-5 in closing minutes is a NET waste. We must start to look like an NCAA tournament team soon. If that’s not our expectations what are we doing?

 

[Mr X]

Exactly. We need to approach our expectations like a golfer: don’t play down or up to one day’s opponent. Bring your best game and stay focused on each moment. Right now I fear our team will look back at the last several bad tee shots and lose focus on playing VCU bb and hammering teams next 5 home games. If we are going to schedule poor to average OOC teams we must hammer them. A win-by-5 in closing minutes is a NET waste. We must start to look like an NCAA tournament team soon. If that’s not our expectations what are we doing?

Can we pull the academics card like they do over in Henrico?