James and Chism Co-MVP's In TN's Win

[MUfan12]

The amount of disrespect DJ gets is unbelievable.   He has extraordinary skills and has personally won a number of games for MU, ON TOP OF being a damn fine student athlete and ambassador in the public eye.

Agreed.

But I'd be willing to bet these were the same people who wanted to trade Favre in his prime because Hasselbeck was a more accurate passer.

[Badgerhater920]

I do love Nic and all the things he's done for this program over the past 4 years - that being said, a 4 year-starter should not be making the terrible mistakes he made in a game of such magnitude, or in any game. I don't think it's out of line to point that out.

[CTWarrior]

MU_hilltopper---I would rather a four year starting point guard left here with 100 wins, a FF and 2 Sweet 16 apearances. Leaving here as all-time scorer with the worst shooting % of anyone in the top 5 does not impress me. Back in the day when SR. left they gave the team's accomplishments on Sr. night. DJ is not an all-time great by any means.

This kind of stuff infuriates me.  I know we have only one NCAA tournament win so far in DJ's tenure, but I think the fact that he hasn't played with one single good interior player in four years has a lot to do with that.  

You think if James played at Duke instead of Paulus both he and they might have a few more NCAA tournament wins?  I do.  In four years, this guy has had only one good player with a complementary skill set (Novak) to play with.  Imagine this guy driving to the hoop with the defense worried about whether he was going to take it to the rim, kick out to the dead-eye three point shooter or dump it off to the talented big guy.  Now they just have to make sure he doeesn't take it to the rim.  It's not his fault that he hasn't been surrounded with more of the complementary style players that would make him more effective.

[4everwarriors]

My question is, how good would Marquette be if Dom had jumped to the draft after his freshman season?  Not very, maybe a mid tier BE team, at best. Who would be running the point?  Acker or Cubes?  I think some of the mistakes that happen can be partially attributed to what all of these players are having to compensate for.  I am guessing we will see teams pack the lane all season because we don't have a legitimate threat from outside or a solid post presence.  This hurts the style of play that both Dom and Jerel excel at.


IMO... 

Don't look now but this year's team is no better than mid-tier in the Big East. Expect no better than .500 in conference.

[bradforster]

It's nice to see this topic has inspired such vigor.  I agree with some aspects of the many responses on here, but great players have the ability to adapt to their surroundings.  Knowing Marquette has a chasm in the post the size of some continents, James should be a far better shooter than he is at this point in his career.  The lack of presence down low should have inspired him to work on other aspects of his game, and I don't think he's made strides in those areas.  He was a better shooter his freshman year than he is now.   Is that not disconcerting to anyone?  And how do you explain his failure from the free throw line?  Your starting point guard shouldn't entice people to institute the "Hack a Shaq".  That's exactly what could happen with Marquette in tight contests down the road.  I agree James would be better with a more capable surrounding cast, but who wouldn't?  He has not stepped up to the challenge of improving his overall game and to me, that's a disappointment.  Jerel, Wesley, and Lazar have each made strides since arriving at MU.  I don't believe James has progressed much, if at all, since his initial season.  

[CTWarrior]

I think people forget that shooting, like the ability to run and jump, is a talent.  DJ is not a talented shooter.  For years Shaq worked like crazy on his FT shooting and he still stinks.  A lot of people say Bill Russell was the greatest player ever and he was a god-awful FT shooter as was Wilt Chamberlain as are a bunch of other guys who make a living playing basketball.  They just didn't have that particular talent.  But while DJ is not a great or even good shooter, but he is a tremendous ball handler and passer and defender.  You wouldn't expect Tim Duncan to become a great ball handler because a team he played on lacked guards, would you?  I promise you, I was a solid high school player who played sports constantly growing up, but I could practice 12 hours a day for ten years and would never be able to shoot like Steve Novak or Travis Diener, because it just isn't in me (or 99% of the population, I would guess)

Bottom line is that DJ is never the reason why we lose games.  We lose games because even when our 3 starting guards outscore a quality opponents starting guards 48-17 like we did against Tennessee, we still can lose by 12 because our interior people are dominated in unfathomable ways.  I guess if DJ could shoot better we might have outscored Tennesee's guards 61-17 and eeked out a one point victory.

[mu_hilltopper]

We lose games because even when our 3 starting guards outscore a quality opponents starting guards 48-17 like we did against Tennessee, we still can lose by 12 because our interior people are dominated in unfathomable ways.  I guess if DJ could shoot better we might have outscored Tennesee's guards 61-17 and eeked out a one point victory.

Game, set, match.

[jmayer1]

Don't look now but this year's team is no better than mid-tier in the Big East. Expect no better than .500 in conference.

Invariably there are posts like this every year at points and invariably MU finished in the top 4-6 of the Big East and makes the tournement.  I will not be worried about this team until we lost a conference game or two we have no business losing.

On the topic of DJ, expectations were really, really high after his freshman year and although he has not quite lived up to some of those, the kid is a damn good point-guard and MU was very lucky to have him for 4 years.  He has led MU to (more than likely) 4 straight NCAAs, something I don't think many people expected when he set foot on campus.