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(4)Miami vs. (1)Duke 7PM EST ESPN ACC Tournament Semifinals

Canedude08 said:
L did fail in that area, I always wondered what Sam could have been had he been allowed to do the things he's actually good at. Dude shot 40% from deep this year, imagine if he didn't get pounded on for years, due to him having to play inside.
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We didn’t need a play making big. All we needed was someone who could come in for 15 minutes a game and defend the paint and grab some boards to spare Sam .
 
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Y'all keep saying he's playing out of position. He's not a wing player. Sam is a 4. Granted, a face up 4 but one who should be able to play inside and out. No one's asking him to be a post up player, but he should definitely be able to rebound and defend inside. He's 6'10"! We gotta stop making excuses. At some point, players gotta do better.
 
Gables Canes said:
Admirable effort tonight. Some really questionable decisions of late though. Kam was on fire. Why did we suddenly go away from him? I wasn’t wild about fouling so quickly when down 3 with 45 seconds to go. Set a trap and try to get a steal before committing a foul. Moore chucking a 3 when down by just 4 with 15 seconds left instead of going for a quick 2. Sam not grabbing the missed FT rebound with TWO HANDS. Oh well, when you play this many close games, they’re not all going to go your way.

That might’ve been the worst game of Wong’s career. Not only was he 1/11, he had 2 boards and 0 assists and had a bunch of shots blocked. Looking more and more like he’ll have to come back for his senior season.

Kam and Miller were great tonight. Sam had 7 assists and a few nice blocks, but he was super passive on the glass. Moore had 8 assists and generally played well but forced a few shots late. Our bench was abysmal, especially Wooga. Our freshmen guards have been really disappointing.
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Excellent take. I think however Walker was decent off the bench in the way too few minutes given... considering how off Wong was most of the game, and how over classed Sam was most of the night. (yes, he made a few nice contributions and even sparkled on a few occasions... but 0 for 2 FT and 3 total rebounds for our so-called Big/Forward aint gonna cut it. I grant you he is (usually) the best we got up there and is put in difficult situations, but a strong game from Sam tonight and we would be talking FINALS.) Of course even an average game from Wong tonite we would be as well.

Walker needs to develop, wish he was given more playing time when he made some sloppy errors early on and was almost perma-benched at times. He brings energy and fluidity... we almost had a late comeback because he was instrumental in the aggressive defending near the end, when he saw floor time. When you say Sam was "super passive off the glass" (and I would add in several other areas) its just a nice way of saying his performance is "soft", and we know what reactions using that word brings to the Sam-lovers. It may be due to being over-matched, bullied, frustrated, or whatever you want to attribute it to and still love Sam (as we all do) for his efforts and contribution. His performance though was lacking yet again, and not a minor reason for the final result.
 
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King of Allapattah said:
Y'all keep saying he's playing out of position. He's not a wing player. Sam is a 4. Granted, a face up 4 but one who should be able to play inside and out. No one's asking him to be a post up player, but he should definitely be able to rebound and defend inside. He's 6'10"! We gotta stop making excuses. At some point, players gotta do better.
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Mostly agree, but we have him playing the 5.
 
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jkdood said:
Excellent take. I think however Walker was decent off the bench in the way too few minutes given... considering how off Wong was most of the game, and how over classed Sam was most of the night. (yes, he made a few nice contributions and even sparkled on a few occasions... but 0 for 2 FT and 3 total rebounds for our so-called Big/Forward aint gonna cut it. I grant you he is (usually) the best we got up there and is put in difficult situations, but a strong game from Sam tonight and we would be talking FINALS.) Of course even an average game from Wong tonite we would be as well.

Walker needs to develop, wish he was given more playing time when he made some sloppy errors early on and was almost perma-benched at times. He brings energy and fluidity... we almost had a late comeback because he was instrumental in the aggressive defending near the end, when he saw floor time. When you say Sam was "super passive off the glass" (and I would add in several other areas) its just a nice way of saying his performance is "soft", and we know what reactions using that word brings to the Sam-lovers. It may be due to being over-matched, bullied, frustrated, or whatever you want to attribute it to and still love Sam (as we all do) for his efforts and contribution. His performance though was lacking yet again, and not a minor reason for the final result.
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L’s leash has always been incredibly short with Walker. Shorter than it is than with any other player I can remember. No idea why.
 
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Gables Canes said:
Mostly agree, but we have him playing the 5.
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The 4 and 5 spot in today's game is pretty much interchangeable. Anywhere you look you've got 4 and 5's manning the paint and knocking down trey balls. There's no reason whatsoever why we should be trying to pigeon-hole Sam into 1 particular role or position. It's not too much to ask a 6'10 guy at the collegiate level to rebound and defend the post. Not like he's being asked to defend 7 footers on a nightly basis. All I'm saying at 6'10, you should be able to rebound and block some shots. I don't think I've ever complained about his offensive output. Not asking to throw the ball down into the post as if he were Hakeem or Shaq. Larranaga just needs him to run the floor, rebound and contest shots. Everything else is gravy.
 
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Gables Canes said:
We didn’t need a play making big. All we needed was someone who could come in for 15 minutes a game and defend the paint and grab some boards to spare Sam .
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Careful. You’re implying a big roster management misstep. Whether through player development or lack of addressing it via transfer, would be the responsibility of the head coach and his staff. If this is your belief, it is obviously a vicious and savage attack on Coach L that will haunt his family for generations and the Coach L battalion will come for your head. You know very well they don’t allow you to support a coach and program while also critiquing areas that could see some improvement. It will be praise and only praise for supreme leader Larranaga
 
OriginalGatorHater said:
People seem to forget that Duke is a very very good team. They beat Gonzaga. IIRC the only ooc loss they have is against Ohio state, which is a bad loss, but its just one bad loss.
With better free throw shooting we win that game. We can make a pretty deep run in the tourney.
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Duke is very good. No shame in that game last night. Except Wong. Ugh… Depending on what your definition of “deep tourney run” is, I gotta disagree. Only because a one and done style tournament doesn’t allow for any slip ups. We haven’t won more than 3 in a row since early January and the couple of 3 game winning streaks were against pretty poor competition. We’ve had some great performances followed by a couple clunkers. Which is to be expected from a talented but limited team. Can’t have that in the tourney. Based on the fact that most projections would have us playing a 1 or 2 seed in the 2nd round, I think 1 win and competitive 2nd round would be a good showing for this team.
 
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