MUScoop

I decided to wait until the next day to let the emotion of the loss wear off a bit. 

Note, this is for the entire season.  I will start another poll for Buzz next.

Why are we not using the Marquette grading system?

I feel for Lazar, he's going to have one long summer, but over all I think these Warriors overachieved this year.  One heartbreaking, and team changing, injury derailed any momentum we had late in the season.  That's the shame.

Quote from: MURFC on March 23, 2009, 08:04:10 AM
Why are we not using the Marquette grading system?

Hilarious.  I agree. AB.

I can't understand how anyone can think this team overachieved

With the talent this team had (starting 4 potential NBA players) they won exactly one postseason game in 2009 against an 11 seed. 

Every good team has to deal with injuries (e.g., UConn's Dyson); good teams succeed despite them.

Arguably the best single recruiting team in MU history collectively won 3 postseason games.  That's classic underachievement in my book.

They were an entertaining feel-good team, but objectively they never fulfilled their potential.

Quote from: 3Mer on March 23, 2009, 09:20:20 AM
I can't understand how anyone can think this team overachieved

With the talent this team had (starting 4 potential NBA players) they won exactly one postseason game in 2009 against an 11 seed. 

Every good team has to deal with injuries (e.g., UConn's Dyson); good teams succeed despite them.

Arguably the best single recruiting team in MU history collectively won 3 postseason games.  That's classic underachievement in my book.

They were an entertaining feel-good team, but objectively they never fulfilled their potential.

Individually, they fulfilled their potential.  Problem is that this isn't an individual game.  Much of the failure rests not on their shoulders, but on the shoulders of the coaches that didn't bring in another decent recruiting class either before or after them. 

Think about it for a second.  Outside of their class, who would you really say was a good player that they got to play with.  Novak when they were freshman, and Hayward since then for sure.  But that's pretty much it.  The recruiting classes of 2003, 2004, 2006, 2007 and 2008 didn't bring much to the table for them to work with and in some cases were among the worst in school history.

You can make deep runs with 3 talented players if they are four players of varying skills.  You can't do it with three perimeter players that struggle with outside shots.  But they never got the supporting cast needed to achieve more success.  And that leads some to the thinking that they may have overachieved given the lack talent around them. 

Quote from: 3Mer on March 23, 2009, 09:20:20 AM
I can't understand how anyone can think this team overachieved

With the talent this team had (starting 4 potential NBA players) they won exactly one postseason game in 2009 against an 11 seed. 

Every good team has to deal with injuries (e.g., UConn's Dyson); good teams succeed despite them.

Arguably the best single recruiting team in MU history collectively won 3 postseason games.  That's classic underachievement in my book.

They were an entertaining feel-good team, but objectively they never fulfilled their potential.

Where was MU picked to finish in the BEast by the Coach's this season?  Until DJ's injury, they overachieved this season.  The 3 Amigo's are probably in the top 5 all time MU recruiting classes, they never played with a dominating forward (as good as Lazar is, he isn't dominating yet).

The 3 Amigo's took a team littered with injuries (Otule, Fulce, Cubes) and missing pieces (no dominating forward or center), and carried it all season, until DJ broke his foot.

Edit:   Well said bma, you nailed it.

Has to be an "A".  With all that has happened injury/transfer-wise and the lack of any quality interior players of any significant size, this team probably reached its potential playing with great heart.

Quote from: 3Mer on March 23, 2009, 09:20:20 AM
I can't understand how anyone can think this team overachieved

With the talent this team had (starting 4 potential NBA players) they won exactly one postseason game in 2009 against an 11 seed. 

Every good team has to deal with injuries (e.g., UConn's Dyson); good teams succeed despite them.

Arguably the best single recruiting team in MU history collectively won 3 postseason games.  That's classic underachievement in my book.

They were an entertaining feel-good team, but objectively they never fulfilled their potential.

Agreed.  None of us would have been happy with not making the sweet 16 at the beginning of the year (some referred to that possibility as a "failure").  At no point over the past few years did anyone see these players winning a total of two tournament games.  As far as this year, I can't give an A to a team that choked away far too many games and whose only impressive win was against a team that was far from peaking and was later offset by two losses to the same team.  Lack of an interior player, sure, but I hardly felt as if this team reached its ceiling solely because of it.

Quote from: chapman on March 23, 2009, 10:44:39 AM
Agreed.  None of us would have been happy with not making the sweet 16 at the beginning of the year (some referred to that possibility as a "failure"). 

You need to go back an read the projections for the year again.  There were people that thought the team would struggle to make the tournament at all who would have killed for a 2nd round loss.

We finished 23-8.  Here were the MUScoop pre-season predictions. 

For regular season only (not BET or NCAA), over 60% of the predictions thought Marquette would get 24 wins or more.  Over 40% of Scoop fans thought Marquette would get to 25 wins or more.

http://www.muscoop.com/index.php?topic=9867.0 (http://www.muscoop.com/index.php?topic=9867.0)

Quote from: Henry Sugar on March 23, 2009, 11:58:38 AM
We finished 23-8.  Here were the MUScoop pre-season predictions. 

For regular season only (not BET or NCAA), over 60% of the predictions thought Marquette would get 24 wins or more.  Over 40% of Scoop fans thought Marquette would get to 25 wins or more.

http://www.muscoop.com/index.php?topic=9867.0 (http://www.muscoop.com/index.php?topic=9867.0)

Of course, those predictions did not factor in injuries.

Quote from: Nukem2 on March 23, 2009, 12:00:20 PM
Of course, those predictions did not factor in injuries.

Of course.  Let me be clear that my post was not an attempt to insinuate that the team did not perform up to expectations.  Nor was it an attempt to say that the team did perform up to expectations.  James' injury changed everything.

The point was that the Scoop fanbase had some high pre-season expectations.

What a bunch of cr@p.  The nation expected a whole lot more of MU in the preseason: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/rankings?seasonYear=2009&weekNumber=1&seasonType=2

How is one Tourney victory against an unheralded WAC team an "achievement?"

Being a fan doesn't require rationalization.

Quote from: Henry Sugar on March 23, 2009, 12:00:52 PM
Of course.  Let me be clear that my post was not an attempt to insinuate that the team did not perform up to expectations.  James' injury changed everything.

The point was that the Scoop fanbase had some high expectations.

Hardly.  Most of the people voted for a B.  I voted for a C.  They should have done more.

I gave him a B, though it would have probably been a B+ (or AB) if that option was there.


I don't know how people could give him a D or an F, but everyone has their opinions.

Quote from: The Wizard of West Salem on March 23, 2009, 01:47:29 PM
Hardly.  Most of the people voted for a B.  I voted for a C.  They should have done more.

There's a disconnect here between the pre-season expectations and the post-season evaluation.  I was pointing out what the pre-season expectations were in the "official MUScoop Prediction thread", mostly because of bma's response.

I give the season a B, because I expected the team to be worse (22-9, 11-7) than they were.  For the record, though, I'm almost never happy when I earn a B in school.

I gave the season a B. But in a way, you could say "incomplete" because our real team didn't finish the season. Without the catastrophic injury to DJ, it sure would have been interesting to see how MU would have fared over the last several weeks. Very good chance we would still be playing.

Quote from: 3Mer on March 23, 2009, 01:31:09 PM
What a bunch of cr@p.  The nation expected a whole lot more of MU in the preseason: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/rankings?seasonYear=2009&weekNumber=1&seasonType=2

How is one Tourney victory against an unheralded WAC team an "achievement?"

Being a fan doesn't require rationalization.

Pre-Season Rank = #17, Week 12 = #8

We all know what the DJ's injury did to that, so before the injury were they not overachieving?  After the injury, they just didn't have the bodies to compete.  The team never gave up, never surrendered and were in all but one game - when they could have easily folded.

During preseason, we also expected to have Mbakwe, Fulce, and Otule available to play.  Even having 2 of those 3 has to be worth a couple game, right?

Call me crazy, but this year was just as fun as '03. Yeah we didnt make the final 4 or anything like that, but how f'n awesome was this year? I mean seriously.

Even when we were alone at the top of the BE we got no cred. zero respect.

Like many teams, we were ALWAYS an injury away ALL SEASON, and sadly it happened. This team will always have a special place in my heart of hearts, probably because trio's like this come around maybe once a long while.
-This was the best conference EVER this year people (yes ever...just ask ND and G-Town what this schedule does to a team full of talent).

sorry for rambling, still reeling from yesterday...gave this team a B. hell of a year.

Quote from: lurch91 on March 23, 2009, 03:38:10 PM
Pre-Season Rank = #17, Week 12 = #8

We all know what the DJ's injury did to that, so before the injury were they not overachieving?  After the injury, they just didn't have the bodies to compete.  The team never gave up, never surrendered and were in all but one game - when they could have easily folded.

Depends, polling is based on what have you done lately and who loses in front of you.  Up to that point, we hadn't played anyone really either.  So the real question, without DJ's injury, how many of those final 4 games would we have won?  I don't know, I'm just asking.

I justified an "A" because it was the most exciting season we have had a the BC.

Quote from: jaygall31 on March 23, 2009, 04:03:58 PM
Call me crazy, but this year was just as fun as '03. Yeah we didnt make the final 4 or anything like that, but how f'n awesome was this year? I mean seriously.

Even when we were alone at the top of the BE we got no cred. zero respect.

Well...it turns out there was a pretty good reason we didn't get the respect we thought we deserved.

I gave them a B for the season they played on the court.
But if I included some other things:

Recruiting season: A
New coach game performance: BC
New coach player development: B
Hope for the future:AB
Hope for next year: BC

Whoever put F better have had teal in mind.

I gave them a B. They played well without James and they deserve a lot of credit for that. However, having said that the reality is that they gave away the game in their last three losses. They had late leads against Syracuse, Villanova and Missouri. Managed to hold on against Utah St. Their comeback's against Villanova and Missouri were absolutely amazing. Maybe the comebacks took too much out of them to hold on to the games. Lazer stepping over the line did not cost us that game. Remember he got the offensive rebound and put it back for a three point play that gaves us the four point lead. Then Aker fouled giving Missouri free throws. Then we get a shot clock violation. McNeal makes only one of two free throws and Matthews makes only one of two free throws. None of these events are Buzz's fault, the team failed to execute down the stretch. What I think Buzz did wrong this season was not utilize more of his bench. I think Fulce would have been a valuable player against Missouri, if he would have been given playing time as the season went on. The only game he really played in was Providence and he did okay in that game. It is dissappointing that he was not given a chance after that.