+/- Illinois (We Made the Sweet 16 Edition)

[Dan E. Dangerously]

We beat Hawaii. Lost to Indiana State and Arizona in that tournament.

My bad. I was thinking of the Indiana St. game.

 

[bigsonnyu]

Kadji was horrendous...I'm sorry but he is killing us right now. If we get an average game from him we win by 8-12.

KK and Reggie have been off the last 3 weeks.
I hope the light goes on or we are cooked next week.

Kenny has been off

Reggie has been disastrous

Problem with Reggie is that he never leaves his feet in an attempt to rebound or block a shot.... It's like he's in there just to jog around... Kill his minutes, unless he's in there wear someout with fouls.

I think Kenny will come around soon enough.

 

[edge3241]

Kadji was horrendous...I'm sorry but he is killing us right now. If we get an average game from him we win by 8-12.

He is killing us right now. HAHAHAHA. Please stop posting. He had an off night but those 6 straight points saved us and helped us win.

He was the key to the game last night. If he was able to punish them by hitting the open threes it would have killed their defense on how they were defending the pick n roll/pop. Don't even get me started on defense, that was really where he was atrocious...he wouldn't rotate over leaving wide open shooters and he was soft as **** getting killed on the glass and leading them to get many second chance shots.

The six straight points were great, but we aren't getting out of the sweet 16 unless he starts to play like the old kadji.

Duly noted but the kid aint killing us. Just hyperbole and kadji had a decent game of 10 and 8.

The defense held them to 59 and I will take that. Kadji didnt hurt us except for the FT. We must hit.

Please go back and watch the game. Kadji absolutely killed us on the boards. He was not boxing out and it lead to at least five big time offensive rebounds for illinois. Never an excuse for not boxing out.

 

[Consigliere]

Kadji was horrendous...I'm sorry but he is killing us right now. If we get an average game from him we win by 8-12.

He is killing us right now. HAHAHAHA. Please stop posting. He had an off night but those 6 straight points saved us and helped us win.

He was the key to the game last night. If he was able to punish them by hitting the open threes it would have killed their defense on how they were defending the pick n roll/pop. Don't even get me started on defense, that was really where he was atrocious...he wouldn't rotate over leaving wide open shooters and he was soft as **** getting killed on the glass and leading them to get many second chance shots.

The six straight points were great, but we aren't getting out of the sweet 16 unless he starts to play like the old kadji.

Duly noted but the kid aint killing us. Just hyperbole and kadji had a decent game of 10 and 8.

The defense held them to 59 and I will take that. Kadji didnt hurt us except for the FT. We must hit.

Please go back and watch the game. Kadji absolutely killed us on the boards. He was not boxing out and it lead to at least five big time offensive rebounds for illinois. Never an excuse for not boxing out.

I watched the game. He wasnt perfect and he wasnt close but he did a lot and was part of the reason we held them under 60 points.

He may have missed some box outs but it happens.

 

[DCF in LA]

Keep in mind that Kadji is not a true 4, he's a stretch 4. He tends to float to the wings on both ends and isn't the best natural defensive rebounder, but makes up for it a bit by being a good weak-side shot blocker. He has a different skill set than what you'd normally expect from a 6'11" guy.

The thing with last night's 4-guard line-up is that his defensive rebounding weaknesses get exposed without RJ or Gamble to eat up space. They are, positionally, far better interior players than Kadji, and without them on the court, there's more pressure on KK to act like a center when that's not his natural game. Coach L took a big risk in going with 4 guards for so long, but in the NCAAs you have to sometimes do things you don't normally do, to get a win.

 

[porterhouse77]

When we go small and use kadji as the only big we are going to have problems defensively. Gamble can at least protect the hoop and rebounds well, but kadji doesn't do either very well.

If kadji gets back to how he was playing we can beat anyone, but if he plays how he did on the defensive end and is unable to hit his threes than its going to be real tough to get any further.

 

[CaneInTheHouse]

For a huge plus was clutch free throw shooting. All year we worried our poor shooting at the line might cost us a game in the tournament, but when the chips were down we came through and iced the game.

We don't win if KK, DS, RB and SL don't knock down those last 8 FT. This and our tough D won this one.

 

[edge3241]

Agreed porterhouse. I thought we should of had gamble in with the other 4 guards. He balances out that lineup much better than kadji. Obvioulsy Coach L had his reason why he stuck with Kadji and I'll trust him with whatever he feels is best.

 

[Consigliere]

Agreed porterhouse. I thought we should of had gamble in with the other 4 guards. He balances out that lineup much better than kadji. Obvioulsy Coach L had his reason why he stuck with Kadji and I'll trust him with whatever he feels is best.

Do you not remember he was hurt when he stepped on Durand Scott's foot?

 

[Consigliere]

Michael Casagrande ‏@ByCasagrande 15h
Stat of note: Miami's 40.0 shooting percentage agaisnt Illinois was its lowest since losing by 15 at Wake on Feb. 23.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/...mi-win-over-illinois-20130325,0,1423084.story

 

[Southtampacane]

He looked hurt for a few seconds but ran down the court fine. And after getting taken out he clearly told Coach L that he could stay in. And they never took him in for treatment or had anyone even look at it. And they played him in the last 2 minutes.

I love the Coach, but the Illinois game was not his best effort. That 2nd half lineup with KK and 4 guards almost cost us the game.

Agreed porterhouse. I thought we should of had gamble in with the other 4 guards. He balances out that lineup much better than kadji. Obvioulsy Coach L had his reason why he stuck with Kadji and I'll trust him with whatever he feels is best.

Do you not remember he was hurt when he stepped on Durand Scott's foot?

 

[Consigliere]

He looked hurt for a few seconds but ran down the court fine. And after getting taken out he clearly told Coach L that he could stay in. And they never took him in for treatment or had anyone even look at it. And they played him in the last 2 minutes.

I love the Coach, but the Illinois game was not his best effort. That 2nd half lineup with KK and 4 guards almost cost us the game.

You are entitled to your opinion and don't need to worry about being on the other side of the coach. I think we have a coach who remembers the UNC game in the ACC Tourney finals, UNC went small and we went small. We end up separating and winning the game. The problem wasn't going small, the problem was we decided to have our worst shooting performance since Wake Forest.

As for the line-up losing us the game, Rion Brown dropped 21 and Larkin had 17. Did you want to take out Brown or Larkin (our entire offense)? Did you want to take out Scott, the ACC Defensive POY?

Illinois went small (or is small) and we tried to match them.

 

[edge3241]

He looked hurt for a few seconds but ran down the court fine. And after getting taken out he clearly told Coach L that he could stay in. And they never took him in for treatment or had anyone even look at it. And they played him in the last 2 minutes.

I love the Coach, but the Illinois game was not his best effort. That 2nd half lineup with KK and 4 guards almost cost us the game.

You are entitled to your opinion and don't need to worry about being on the other side of the coach. I think we have a coach who remembers the UNC game in the ACC Tourney finals, UNC went small and we went small. We end up separating and winning the game. The problem wasn't going small, the problem was we decided to have our worst shooting performance since Wake Forest.

As for the line-up losing us the game, Rion Brown dropped 21 and Larkin had 17. Did you want to take out Brown or Larkin (our entire offense)? Did you want to take out Scott, the ACC Defensive POY?

Illinois went small (or is small) and we tried to match them.

In the UNC game we went with the small lineup and gamble not kadji. I agreed that we needed to go small but my point was that I think we need Gamble in there instead of Kadji because of Gamble's rebounding and toughness. Again, this game isn't being coached by Frank Haith though Laranaga had a reason for Kadji being in there and I trust him with that decision. I did forget that Gamble got hurt so that may be the reason why but like southtampa said, it seemed gamble was fine. I bring this point up just for good conversation and debate.