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Bradley
Nov 10, 2015 7:05:56 GMT -6
Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2015 7:05:56 GMT -6
Not that you can extract a lot about Bradley from these scores:
Butler 106 St Joseph (IN) 66
Bradley 84 St. Joseph (IN) 65
Bradley 276 on KenPom Preseason Rankings
St Joseph is picked to finish 8th in their D II conference.
The KenPom ranking appears to be in line with reality, Bradley is far from an offensive juggernaut and is picked to finish last in the Mo Valley.
This game should be a fairly good indicator of Ball States supposed improvement. Former Richmond H.S. point guard and Ball State prospect Joel Okafor is a Bradley Freshman and is expected to see a lot of playing time.
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Bradley
Nov 10, 2015 7:58:30 GMT -6
Post by BSU Card Fan in AZ on Nov 10, 2015 7:58:30 GMT -6
Early games, particularly the first game aren't usually real indicators. Gives you a baseline and points out areas to work on.
I hope the Cards win, but won't be concerned either way with the result.
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Bradley
Nov 10, 2015 8:44:16 GMT -6
Post by Deleted on Nov 10, 2015 8:44:16 GMT -6
Early games, particularly the first game aren't usually real indicators. Gives you a baseline and points out areas to work on. I hope the Cards win, but won't be concerned either way with the result. Ball State hardly has a recent demonstrated history of in season improvement.
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Bradley
Nov 10, 2015 15:54:50 GMT -6
jam likes this
Post by BSU Card Fan in AZ on Nov 10, 2015 15:54:50 GMT -6
Early games, particularly the first game aren't usually real indicators. Gives you a baseline and points out areas to work on. I hope the Cards win, but won't be concerned either way with the result. Ball State hardly has a recent demonstrated history of in season improvement. I have an idea. Why don't we let the season play out or at least start. I know you are really pulling for a lousy year so you can tell us all "I told you so" but I would rather wait and see how this team and staff develop first.
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Bradley
Nov 10, 2015 16:33:29 GMT -6
Post by thebsukid on Nov 10, 2015 16:33:29 GMT -6
Yes Tiward...agree...can we even start the year with some optimism.
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Bradley
Nov 10, 2015 17:35:24 GMT -6
Post by lmills72 on Nov 10, 2015 17:35:24 GMT -6
I certainly am entering the season as an optimist, and I don't think a loss on the road in the first game is reason for panic, but I will say it will reduce my level of optimism.
There are a lot of new pieces coming together here so it might take a bit, but this is an experienced team and they've had more time than usual to figure it out with the Bahamas trip.
Face it, this is team we are supposed to beat.
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Bradley
Nov 10, 2015 17:45:31 GMT -6
Post by 00hmh on Nov 10, 2015 17:45:31 GMT -6
Any road win, first game, young team, even against a relatively weak team, is a good win.
A loss, unless it was some kind of blow out, is not reason to panic. A solid win would be good news.
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Bradley
Nov 10, 2015 18:16:27 GMT -6
Post by lmills72 on Nov 10, 2015 18:16:27 GMT -6
Any road win, first game, young team, even against a relatively weak team, is a good win. A loss, unless it was some kind of blow out, is not reason to panic. A solid win would be good news. There you go again. It's not a "young" team, unless you're comparing them to a group of senior citizens.
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Bradley
Nov 10, 2015 19:21:23 GMT -6
Post by 00hmh on Nov 10, 2015 19:21:23 GMT -6
Any road win, first game, young team, even against a relatively weak team, is a good win. A loss, unless it was some kind of blow out, is not reason to panic. A solid win would be good news. There you go again. It's not a "young" team, unless you're comparing them to a group of senior citizens. OK. It's not like we are starting 5 underclassmen, I agree. Although. Some are predicting lineups here and 5 are named who might be starters. That's a little sign of youth. I sure don't think we can call ourselves a seasoned team where experience is a strength. Half our roster spots are underclassmen. We have no seniors who are "stars." Maybe only one starter. Our two returning leading scorers are sophs. Senior led teams with experience are usually the better teams in the MAC. We don't fit that description, and we have a lot of players playing in their first game in a Ball State uniform. If young is the wrong word, it isn't a terrible word choice.
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Bradley
Nov 10, 2015 21:29:56 GMT -6
Post by lmills72 on Nov 10, 2015 21:29:56 GMT -6
There you go again. It's not a "young" team, unless you're comparing them to a group of senior citizens. OK. It's not like we are starting 5 underclassmen, I agree. Although. Some are predicting lineups here and 5 are named who might be starters. That's a little sign of youth. I sure don't think we can call ourselves a seasoned team where experience is a strength. Half our roster spots are underclassmen. We have no seniors who are "stars." Maybe only one starter. Our two returning leading scorers are sophs. Senior led teams with experience are usually the better teams in the MAC. We don't fit that description, and we have a lot of players playing in their first game in a Ball State uniform. If young is the wrong word, it isn't a terrible word choice. I'm not sure what your definition of "underclassman" is, but I think the widely accepted definition is a freshman or sophomore. By that definition, we have just five on the roster (BTW, I'm not counting players who won't play [Persons] and non-scholarship players [Thompson, Belcaster and Mallory]). That's hardly half the roster, nor do I think anyone suggested Kiapway should start and The Kid is adamant that Teague might be red-shirted, which would lean the scale even more heavily to the "experienced" side. But even if Teague does play, our roster is dominated by juniors and seniors (four seniors/grad students and three juniors [although Weber will be in his fourth year of school]). In reality, even our sophomores (including Tyler) got much more court time as freshmen than the average first-year player, so there's experience there although it might not show in age. I understand the argument that this team hasn't played much together, but when the coaching staff decides to build a roster with JUCOs, transfers and grad students, the team will NEVER have much time together. I believe viewing this as a "young" team implies acceptable excuses for unsatisfactory performance, and I just don't think that's warranted this year.
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Bradley
Nov 11, 2015 6:55:38 GMT -6
Post by Deleted on Nov 11, 2015 6:55:38 GMT -6
Ball State hardly has a recent demonstrated history of in season improvement. I have an idea. Why don't we let the season play out or at least start. I know you are really pulling for a lousy year so you can tell us all "I told you so" but I would rather wait and see how this team and staff develop first. No I am hoping I eat my words and apologize to the board in February. I want BSU to win just like the rest of you, however I believe the fastest path is unfortunately going to be a coaching change.
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Bradley
Nov 11, 2015 7:01:23 GMT -6
Post by williamtsherman on Nov 11, 2015 7:01:23 GMT -6
Don't bother Mills. Once people get this "young team" idea in their head, it never leaves. One year during the Taylor era, some people got on the "young team" kick. I demonstrated through counting players, starters and class standing that the team wasn't young at all, but was significantly older than MAC average. That didn't make a bit of difference and the "young team" thing would come out on the board like clockwork after any loss. I guarantee the same thing will happen this year.
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Bradley
Nov 11, 2015 7:11:46 GMT -6
Post by williamtsherman on Nov 11, 2015 7:11:46 GMT -6
Bradley is probably pretty bad, with a 270 preseason ranking, but they are only the 8th worst team on our pre-conf schedule. Losing to them would be depressing, and say bad things about this years team, but it would not rule out a 12 to 14 win season.
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Bradley
Nov 11, 2015 8:39:10 GMT -6
Post by 00hmh on Nov 11, 2015 8:39:10 GMT -6
OK. It's not like we are starting 5 underclassmen, I agree.....If young is the wrong word, it isn't a terrible word choice. I'm not sure what your definition of "underclassman" is.... But even if Teague does play, our roster is dominated by juniors and seniors (four seniors/grad students and three juniors [although Weber will be in his fourth year of school]). Yes only 4 freshmen are mentioned as starters. My bad. Yet. As I said in my response above, we are hardly an experienced team led by seasoned MAC players by any count, even if we agree we aren't young, I have to ask you to also think about the claim you make as being "dominated" by upperclassmen. After all, on this roster you say is "dominated by upperclassmen" only Davis is a consensus starter from the 4 seniors and grad student contingent, and Davis may be a junior eligible when it said and done. Weber and Franko from the Junior class may be considered consensus starters. Franko is probably underestimated and even disparaged by some as lacking. Adding in Wells, Bo, there are only 5 upperclassmen named as possible starters. So that domination is only a 5-4 "domination" by your count, and I think you have to stretch more the other way to say we are an upperclassmen dominated team. When it comes to this domination and experience, you don't want to count Persons (who is on the roster after all) but apparently do count Gill, Rocco, and Smith to get to "domination." You want to trumpet the experience of our sophomores, and discount youth factor on that count, but only Sellers played starters minutes for the entire year, last year. Gill started one game, Rocco, who is not as likely to play much this year and Smith who is an unknown quantity don't strike me as dominating at all. List the most talented players on the roster, or the roster players with talent to start as regulars on a typical MAC team over their career, and I find 4 players, Teague, Moses, Sellers, Tyler and Persons on that list. Of our upperclassmen I don't see 4 names. Excepting Weber and Davis, the upperclassmen you term dominating were not considered all that likely to be solid starters when recruited. So "young" may not as I said before be the best word. But, inexperienced and lacking upperclassman talent and leadership is I think the case. So, although I may have misspoke, let's not overreact and say we are a seasoned team either.
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Bradley
Nov 11, 2015 8:47:55 GMT -6
Post by 00hmh on Nov 11, 2015 8:47:55 GMT -6
I understand the argument that this team hasn't played much together, but when the coaching staff decides to build a roster with JUCOs, transfers and grad students, the team will NEVER have much time together. I believe viewing this as a "young" team implies acceptable excuses for unsatisfactory performance, and I just don't think that's warranted this year. This is not about excuses, at all, it is however undeniably a factor in looking at how we expect the team to play. We will not be a top MAC team this year in all likelihood. A great deal of the reason for that will be a senior class that is not strong in relative terms to most of the better teams in the league, and because so many of our most talented players are freshmen and sophomores and lack experience. We have recruited well enough to be getting close in overall talent to the MAC norm (not true when Whitford came in) but having talented and experienced seniors is awfully important in making up a top MAC team. As to "choosing to build a roster, I am not sure what you expect a coach to do when he needs experience and talent and has a chance to get good transfers. We have two JUCO recruits, both addressing needs. That is hardly extreme. I am optimistic Smith as a JUCO, Weber and Wells as transfers do help in fill in for lack of upperclassman talent and experience, and will be factors in makings us much better this year than last. Bottom line here is I don't see how you cannot expect this team to be better in the next couple of years where players Whitford has coached for a couple of years and who he has recruited become mature. Youth is a factor in the present and the best thing about underclassmen who have talent is that they do become juniors and seniors eventually.
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