It's one game, but.....

[tower912]

Meh.  Actually kind of quiet for the day after the first loss.   A scoop tradition.

[onepost]

Oh boy...

The story around Kolek has literally no relevance to taking flyers on guys like Hamilton and Clark when you have a 15-man roster with redshirts to work with.

Also, the story around Kolek has absolutely nothing to do with Shaka's current views regarding transfers.  He  literally brought in multiple transfers that first season in order to be able to field a team.  Yet, despite not initally believing Tyler was a fit, Shaka listened to his staff, brought Tyler in and helped develop him into an All-American and NBA player. Then he did the same with Kam. 

The fact that you're somehow twisting this into a "gigantic, enormous" red flag is hilarious. Almost as hilarious as the "one recruit in 4 years" and judging Owens and Parham 3 games into their sophomore seasons nonsense. 

This has been a competitive roster annually in each of Shaka's 4-years yet you're peeing your pants because of a blowout in the 3rd game of the season.  We also have no idea if IU will actually be a "meh" team.   

Also, if don't see the level of talent improving with our younger guys, the incoming class,  and the other recruits Shaka is in on, you're simply not paying attention or being  willfully ignorant.

All of this has been with the caveat of it being early, maybe irrational, but backed by a running trend of multiple seasons. Again with Itejere, Clark, and Hamilton, of course you take fliers on guys: but we're RELYING on Hamilton and he's just not good. He's made evident improvements and he's still not very good is my point. Hopefully Sheek bucks that trend since he actually comes in with some pedigree.

I obviously see the improvement in caliber of HS recruit, but in my opinion a Nigel-Adrien immediately contributing frosh class should be the baseline rule and not the exception.

All to say. Shaka has had great success with transfers and Wojo's recruits (out of necessity), but much less success with his own. So it's annoying he's actively avoiding a path that has proven results. We need to be shown that he can have that and greater success with only his recruits if that's the route we are choosing to go.

[MuggsyB]

Bump for Muggsy. You counseling scoopers to be "calm and sensible" is hilarious.  And although I posted today, I did not need a day to sagely consider the matter or pontificate.

Perhaps it would serve you best to take a time-out and chillax.  There are a number of apps and videos that you can peruse to assuage your anxieties and find a relaxed state. 

[panda]

We can litigate the transfer issue until we're blue in the face, but the biggest litmus test for Shaka moving forward is how he tightens up his rotation after the next few games.

I'll be very concerned if we continue to see a healthy dose of the underachievers if they continue to disappoint.

[tower912]

Underachiever on Sunday is SOTG on Wednesday.

[Scoop Snoop]

Perhaps it would serve you best to take a time-out and chillax.  There are a number of apps and videos that you can peruse to assuage your anxieties and find a relaxed state. 

Classic example of projection Muggsy. Kudos! You're really good at that.

[brewcity77]

Ultimately, I think this really all comes down to getting blasted. If this was a competitive loss, there would still be complaining, but it wouldn't be at this level. Look at the breakdown by 10-minute periods of the game:


                   Q1    Q2    Q3    Q4     T
Indiana         24    32    22    22    100
Marquette    24    14    21    18    77

Ultimately, this game was a blowout because of Q2, which was the part of the game where Nigel James played just 17 seconds. We needed like 26 minutes of NJ and got 18. Hopefully this will help the staff figure out the rotations.

[tower912]

3 days prior, Sean was the man.

[Vander Blue Man Group]

All of this has been with the caveat of it being early, maybe irrational, but backed by a running trend of multiple seasons. Again with Itejere, Clark, and Hamilton, of course you take fliers on guys: but we're RELYING on Hamilton and he's just not good. He's made evident improvements and he's still not very good is my point. Hopefully Sheek bucks that trend since he actually comes in with some pedigree.

I obviously see the improvement in caliber of HS recruit, but in my opinion a Nigel-Adrien immediately contributing frosh class should be the baseline rule and not the exception.

All to say. Shaka has had great success with transfers and Wojo's recruits (out of necessity), but much less success with his own. So it's annoying he's actively avoiding a path that has proven results. We need to be shown that he can have that and greater success with only his recruits if that's the route we are choosing to go.

What trend? Does going from a 2 to a 7 seed constitute a trend? You mention multiple seasons but I don't see any trend over multiple seasons yet. What am I missing?

Also, using the portal is not a panacea. It's not without risk. How did it work out for IU and Kansas last season? There are just as many failures as successes.

You just can't assume it will bring proven results like you say. 

[DoctorV]

Ultimately, I think this really all comes down to getting blasted. If this was a competitive loss, there would still be complaining, but it wouldn't be at this level. Look at the breakdown by 10-minute periods of the game:


                   Q1    Q2    Q3    Q4     T
Indiana         24    32    22    22    100
Marquette    24    14    21    18    77

Ultimately, this game was a blowout because of Q2, which was the part of the game where Nigel James played just 17 seconds. We needed like 26 minutes of NJ and got 18. Hopefully this will help the staff figure out the rotations.

Nigel was excellent yesterday, and I agree that he needed more minutes and that his future is very bright.

That said, there will be many games where you can do the above exercise this year, using different players as the "negative" example with someone else as the "positive." It'll happen to Nigel too, where he has a brutal game and the team does better while he's off the court and SJ22 on it.
Just seems like the nature of a team with so many unknowns.

For that reason, I disagree with the sentiment that Shaka needs to shorten the rotation immediately and go with 6-7 guys. I just think that's short sighted because this years team, unlike those of the recent past, will need different stars on different nights. It will need Sean Jones to be much better to win some games and I just don't see it working any other way.
Ditto for Chase, Ben and so on and so forth.

Doesn't mean the Nigel can't pass him up in the rotation, but that's very tricky and I'm sure Shaka realizes that. He needs Sean Jones to be better, rather than glued to the bench,  and coach knows that.
He just has to somehow find the way to play the hot hand and win games while he figures out a way to help the ones that aren't the hot hand improve game in and game out. Tall task.

I will add a caveat to the above thought
I hate to disparage the kid because he's improved plenty and has worked his tail off, but I do think that Shaka needs to make the decision to limit the playing time of someone like Caedin if he doesn't see quick improvement. Just like he determined that Tre's minutes needed to be curbed last season, I think he needs to be quicker in determining that for other guys that seem to not have the talent level to hold up against the competition.
Give Ben more minutes if you have to, lean more on Parham when you can, and use someone like Hamilton for 10 solid effort and bully minutes or just go small and hope the athleticism makes up for it.

I don't think Sean Jones is in the same boat because we have seen him be fairly effective and hold his own before. If he improves and becomes that again he can give extremely valuable minutes, even if you have to go small and play him with NJ, Chase/Zaide, Parham, Gold.