Today is EXACTLY what I felt the Basketball team needed:

[CaneDaddy]

Michael Casagrande ‏@ByCasagrande Reggie Johnson: It's never good to lose.

 

[CaneDaddy]

Larkin:
"In warmups, you could see it," he said. "Some of the people on the team were going slow in warm ups and not getting ready for the game. You could just see it tonight. I had a bad feeling coming into warmups because everybody was going slow. I was trying to get people to go faster and stuff. I wasn't even going full speed like I should have. I should have set the example and I didn't do that.

"Overall, we weren't prepared for the game."

 

[Notsince1985]

Larkin:
"In warmups, you could see it," he said. "Some of the people on the team were going slow in warm ups and not getting ready for the game. You could just see it tonight. I had a bad feeling coming into warmups because everybody was going slow. I was trying to get people to go faster and stuff. I wasn't even going full speed like I should have. I should have set the example and I didn't do that.

"Overall, we weren't prepared for the game."

If that's true, and not just an excuse for the loss, that's baffling, puzzling, and downright scary. This team should know after the last 3 games, they can't just show up and win. How they come out flat is beyond me. Makes no sense.

 

[DCF in LA]

Coach L is going to have figure out something, because this is 4 games in a row of Larkin not looking like he knows what he's doing when they come out on the ballscreens.

Agreed. IMO, Shane has to become more aggressive and look to pick up the scoring slack EARLY in games. We've come out very slow in the first half for a couple weeks now, and it's imperative Coach L gets him to become more of a penetrator and shooter.


There's a few big problems we've having with the high screen right now- 1) the hedge by opposing bigs is stopping Shane in his tracks; 2) the screener is usually Julian or Reggie, neither of whom are perimeter shooters or particularly adept at swinging the ball to the opposite side of the floor to, presumably, open shooters. They also can't dribble well, which means they are stuck in no man's land and the offense grinds to a halt. So Shane really can't think about passing it off to either of them when the hedge comes over the screen, because he knows all of the above is true.


They use Kadji for that play as well, but then that pulls him away from the post, and as of right now, he's a better post scorer than anyone else, which is kind of hard to accept knowing what kind of player Reggie was in previous seasons.


It might be worth a try to make that high screen happen with TMJ or Rion, but with as poorly as they've been shooting, you're still taking a risk.


Ultimately, it's going to be up to Shane to split that hedge and penetrate for his own shot, and look to draw fouls. If he doesn't start doing this, we'll have to ditch that play entirely, which isn't realistic since it's pretty much our staple play.

 

[DCF in LA]

Larkin:
"In warmups, you could see it," he said. "Some of the people on the team were going slow in warm ups and not getting ready for the game. You could just see it tonight. I had a bad feeling coming into warmups because everybody was going slow. I was trying to get people to go faster and stuff. I wasn't even going full speed like I should have. I should have set the example and I didn't do that.

"Overall, we weren't prepared for the game."

If that's true, and not just an excuse for the loss, that's baffling, puzzling, and downright scary. This team should know after the last 3 games, they can't just show up and win. How they come out flat is beyond me. Makes no sense.

It's the sign of a team that does not know how to manage expectations. It's easy to get up for the UNCs and Dukes of the world when you've always been the underdog, but now we're the ones being sought for that signature win.


Honestly, I think everybody is overreacting A LOT to this loss. Look at all the other top teams in the ACC and every single one of them has head-scratching losses. Is Duke really 27 points worse than we are? NC State lost to Maryland and this same Wake team. What does it mean? It means... sometimes, you just lose. Get over it and move on.

 

[caneworld]

THey need to start hitting from downtown.
We need to go on the run and not walk it up the court.

 

[Notsince1985]

We were able to get up for lesser opponents earlier in the year, like blasting FSU by 24 the game after beating Duke, or beating BC by 22 after the NC State win.

 

[4Canes]

Larkin:
"In warmups, you could see it," he said. "Some of the people on the team were going slow in warm ups and not getting ready for the game. You could just see it tonight. I had a bad feeling coming into warmups because everybody was going slow. I was trying to get people to go faster and stuff. I wasn't even going full speed like I should have. I should have set the example and I didn't do that.

"Overall, we weren't prepared for the game."

If that's true, and not just an excuse for the loss, that's baffling, puzzling, and downright scary. This team should know after the last 3 games, they can't just show up and win. How they come out flat is beyond me. Makes no sense.

It's the sign of a team that does not know how to manage expectations. It's easy to get up for the UNCs and Dukes of the world when you've always been the underdog, but now we're the ones being sought for that signature win.


Honestly, I think everybody is overreacting A LOT to this loss. Look at all the other top teams in the ACC and every single one of them has head-scratching losses. Is Duke really 27 points worse than we are? NC State lost to Maryland and this same Wake team. What does it mean? It means... sometimes, you just lose. Get over it and move on.

I respect your basketball knowledge, but the troubling part is this is four games in a row of mediocre play.
For the casual BB fan, like me, it looks to be trouble.

 

[DCF in LA]

We were able to get up for lesser opponents earlier in the year, like blasting FSU by 24 the game after beating Duke, or beating BC by 22 after the NC State win.

Momentum falls off after a certain point, right? Back then, we were all riding the emotional high of trying to get this program to a place it has never been before.

Ok, well, here we are. Now what? I think that's what's going on in their heads. "Now what?" And that is a hard thing to comprehend when you've never had it before. We look like a team looking for an answer, so hopefully we can find it in the next few weeks and make a great run when it really counts.

 

[CaneDaddy]

Coach L is going to have figure out something, because this is 4 games in a row of Larkin not looking like he knows what he's doing when they come out on the ballscreens.

Agreed. IMO, Shane has to become more aggressive and look to pick up the scoring slack EARLY in games. We've come out very slow in the first half for a couple weeks now, and it's imperative Coach L gets him to become more of a penetrator and shooter.


There's a few big problems we've having with the high screen right now- 1) the hedge by opposing bigs is stopping Shane in his tracks; 2) the screener is usually Julian or Reggie, neither of whom are perimeter shooters or particularly adept at swinging the ball to the opposite side of the floor to, presumably, open shooters. They also can't dribble well, which means they are stuck in no man's land and the offense grinds to a halt. So Shane really can't think about passing it off to either of them when the hedge comes over the screen, because he knows all of the above is true.


They use Kadji for that play as well, but then that pulls him away from the post, and as of right now, he's a better post scorer than anyone else, which is kind of hard to accept knowing what kind of player Reggie was in previous seasons.


It might be worth a try to make that high screen happen with TMJ or Rion, but with as poorly as they've been shooting, you're still taking a risk.


Ultimately, it's going to be up to Shane to split that hedge and penetrate for his own shot, and look to draw fouls. If he doesn't start doing this, we'll have to ditch that play entirely, which isn't realistic since it's pretty much our staple play.

Its not black or white for me. I said the team will be fine and will do special things. However, I dont understand how anyone can say we NEEDED to lose and that this team needed this loss to refocus. With everything to play for, you dont need a loss to focus and if you do, then something is wrong.

I find it funny that as soon as we lose people say that we are not as talented as we think or we have a lot of flaws. And yet, when I try to point out some of those flaws I am cursed off this board.

Its also comical to me that you guys are so quick to call someone's fandom into question because they have a different opinion.

 

[SFbayCane]

Larkin:
"In warmups, you could see it," he said. "Some of the people on the team were going slow in warm ups and not getting ready for the game. You could just see it tonight. I had a bad feeling coming into warmups because everybody was going slow. I was trying to get people to go faster and stuff. I wasn't even going full speed like I should have. I should have set the example and I didn't do that.

"Overall, we weren't prepared for the game."

If that's true, and not just an excuse for the loss, that's baffling, puzzling, and downright scary. This team should know after the last 3 games, they can't just show up and win. How they come out flat is beyond me. Makes no sense.

IMO this is a perfect example. For a team that has never had much success in the past, a winning streak like this one will likely have this type of effect. My take is that its good to get this loss out of the way now. It gives the team time to reflect and refocus.

 

[CaneInControl]

btw for those saying you have to go undefeated, st joseph had 1 loss when jameer was there and they didnt make a title game appearance. UK ran through the reg season but also had two top 5 picks on their roster

Last year? UK lost to Indiana in December then didn't lost until the $EC Championship game to Vandy. Hoping this team regains focus, or else we're screwed.

 

[deleted3746]

Although that was a ****** performance, this team is still exceeding expectations. Who here thought this team would be in 1st place at this point? I sure as **** didnt.

 

[hoops156]

everyone is going crazy over this. the loss sucks but all the top teams have some bad losses. UF got blown out by Arkansas, Indiana lost to Illinois, Duke lost to Maryland, NCSU lost to Wake. **** happens. This team get destroyed and a loss like this was coming. Wake hit their shots unlike Clemson and their lead grew. we made mistakes and just got outworked and didnt match their energy. its regular season basketball people. relax, we were never gonna go Undefeated in the conference regardless of what our schedule looked like bc any team can just have a night where everything goes in. we couldnt get anything going on offense and honestly if we didnt hit those two threes right before halftime, it wouldve been much worse.

 

[Notsince1985]

I'm not that upset because of today's loss. I'm upset because we've played 4 bad games in a row.

 

[RaiseCane]

Coach L is going to have figure out something, because this is 4 games in a row of Larkin not looking like he knows what he's doing when they come out on the ballscreens.

Agreed. IMO, Shane has to become more aggressive and look to pick up the scoring slack EARLY in games. We've come out very slow in the first half for a couple weeks now, and it's imperative Coach L gets him to become more of a penetrator and shooter.


There's a few big problems we've having with the high screen right now- 1) the hedge by opposing bigs is stopping Shane in his tracks; 2) the screener is usually Julian or Reggie, neither of whom are perimeter shooters or particularly adept at swinging the ball to the opposite side of the floor to, presumably, open shooters. They also can't dribble well, which means they are stuck in no man's land and the offense grinds to a halt. So Shane really can't think about passing it off to either of them when the hedge comes over the screen, because he knows all of the above is true.


They use Kadji for that play as well, but then that pulls him away from the post, and as of right now, he's a better post scorer than anyone else, which is kind of hard to accept knowing what kind of player Reggie was in previous seasons.


It might be worth a try to make that high screen happen with TMJ or Rion, but with as poorly as they've been shooting, you're still taking a risk.


Ultimately, it's going to be up to Shane to split that hedge and penetrate for his own shot, and look to draw fouls. If he doesn't start doing this, we'll have to ditch that play entirely, which isn't realistic since it's pretty much our staple play.

Agree with this completely. I think that when we use RJ or JG to screen, teams have figured out that those guys can't dribble and aren't a thread to shoot, so their guy can hedge without consequence. I think using KK there gives us much better options and keeps the other big close to the basket. I also think that using a shooter as the screener is a very good idea and may open up the screener for an open shot at the top of the key. We also may have to run the screen and roll starting at the wing towards the center of the floor, making it harder for the big to hedge or trap.

Whatever we do, we need to adjust. As I said in another thread, since teams have figured out how to slow down Shane, our entire offense has bogged down.

 

[CaneDaddy]

The only problem with bringing out shooters for the screen (TMJ/Brown) is that there man will just switch to Larkin. This can be good for Larkin to create a mismatch but it will be tougher against teams like Duke and UNC who have quick wing players that play great man to man defense. I do agree with the screen starting near the edge.

 

[DCF in LA]

Can anyone mail some Caridad Del Cobre holy water to Garrius Adams? We could sure use some dribble penetration from a swing guard right about now.

 

[CaneDaddy]

Can anyone mail some Caridad Del Cobre holy water to Garrius Adams? We could sure use some dribble penetration from a swing guard right about now.

Lulz. He confirmed on his Twitter account he was red-shirting this year.

 

[CaneInControl]

Not that it really matters right now. But, Lunardi now has the Turds replacing us as a 1 seed after our loss.