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Post by 00hmh on Jun 9, 2021 18:41:06 GMT -6
IMO, we have talent coming in. We have a better coaching bench. The issue is how well will all the new talent blend with the old to form a good team. I plan on relooking at all the new and returning talent and give a projection. Imagining how things could work out is fun. It's what fans do.
I am sticking to my idea that we will be not be able to do that until we see the team play and practice. I have toyed with possible scenarios. It's just too much speculation though.
It's not just about the unknown of new players. As much as we miss the players leaving and their production, there is always a little addition by subtraction. There are things I will not miss about every player leaving. Except maybe Hazen.
Returning players will be a year older, nearly every returning player has room to improve. So on top of everything a lot of that is off season work, which we have no information on.
Last years off season was not a good one. Hazen was a guy who came in ready to play, performed steadily and reliably, KJ was better, but still can't shoot...Thomas inconsistent. They were the bright spots...not very.
Hendricks especially was disappointing. Ish did not improve. Jones failed to recover. Bumbalough lost his shot somewhere in New Castle... We end up with Coleman injured for half the season after a decent summer.
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Post by rmcalhoun on Jun 9, 2021 20:19:27 GMT -6
Almost by definition middling is where most teams end up, especially true for a team team with this much uncertainty. EXCEPT. There are those very best coaches who seem to always get more out of players than anyone else. You don't see those (not for long anyway) in the MAC. The development of talent and fitting it together, motivation of players, is often hard to separate from simply getting a load of talent, or getting coachable talent. Or having the star player who can carry a team. Even great scouting, preparation, planning are not going to help if you don't get effort and focus by the players. You often need competition for PT to get that. We certainly lacked that last year as we too often barely had enough players to practice without walk-ons and Botts. I thought about this and thought maybe you were right then I thought well let's check the only thing we know for sure the numbers. I realized then I was wrong we are not middling we are worse. Six of 10 teams have reached the MAC championship Game but not us we are down there with NIU Eastern and Miami. You know in the toilet bowl division.. The bottom feeders, Carp sucking shit. You can go back further if you like but it only gets worse but that can't be blamed on our current situation.
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Post by mattg on Jun 9, 2021 20:33:42 GMT -6
EXCEPT. There are those very best coaches who seem to always get more out of players than anyone else. You don't see those (not for long anyway) in the MAC. Yeah Dambrot was only in the MAC 15 years. I wonder if he stayed there for so long because of his close connection with LeBron? He coached LeBron in high school I think? I heard they were still pretty close even when LeBron was with the Cavs. Sounds like a solid bond there that might have made him feel very comfortable.
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Post by 00hmh on Jun 9, 2021 21:54:54 GMT -6
Almost by definition middling is where most teams end up... I thought about this and thought maybe you were right then I thought well let's check the only thing we know for sure the numbers. I realized then I was wrong we are not middling we are worse. Six of 10 team... Here I was talking how teams fare after a lot of turnover. Usually not well...middling would be good. You certainly don't usually lose this much talent and get to championships. Not sure why you mention it, which is a different topic. 3 teams have been there consistently in the last 10 years, multiple times, making 2/3 of 20 championship game appearances, 3 more getting there at all, 2 just once I think. Out of 12 MAC teams. Not 10 of course. I posted this somewhere else about what commitment we need to be in the top 3 in the future. But of those 3 top teams I doubt any lost as much talent as we have this year and made it. Top programs do not generally crash to the bottom, with normal turnover, they'll have a lot of tested talent on that roster returning. Depending on whether Jones plays and counts as a returnee we may see completely new players fill that void. That is unusual, certainly one reason why it's hard to say whether we'll be any good, or terrible.
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Post by rmcalhoun on Jun 9, 2021 22:14:40 GMT -6
I mention championships because that's really all that matters its the only way into the ncaa tournament.
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Post by 00hmh on Jun 9, 2021 22:42:13 GMT -6
I mention championships because that's really all that matters its the only way into the ncaa tournament. I'm missing what it has to do with the starting lineup discussion.
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Post by nazcard on Jun 9, 2021 23:57:32 GMT -6
Considering the significant losses from transfers, etc. coupled with the additions of incoming transfers, it seems like a reasonable discussion regarding the upcoming season. All things considered equally it would appear the transfer losses and incoming bodies will seemingly be somewhat of a wash, from a talent standpoint; in other words, next year's roster should be talentwise, similar to what would have been in place without the transfers. Coaching staff probably likewise.
The problem is that the conference as a whole didn't remain static; in otherwords, while other conference programs had losses, their gains were significant. A few weeks back a publication evaluated all Div. I programs, considering who prospered most by the 'covid' transfer portal; the MAC program rated most 'prosperous' was BG. In recent years, Whitford has been able to get easy wins from the weak opponents in the now defunct MAC West; the head coaching changes at NIU, EMU, and CMU will probably change that quickly. Barbee, the new HC at CMU, coming in as late as he did brought in some excellent recruits and transfers. And Kent picked up a couple of highly rated SEC a couple days ago.
The best programs going into the upcoming season still appear to be OU, BG, and Buffalo.
As an aside, the incoming Freshman Jihad has a brother who transferred from Oakland Univ.; he has committed to EMU.
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Post by rmcalhoun on Jun 10, 2021 0:35:27 GMT -6
I mention championships because that's really all that matters its the only way into the ncaa tournament. I'm missing what it has to do with the starting lineup discussion. Seems like that was lost about a page and a half ago. But since you asked What ever line up combo we use it again will not be good enough to Win or even play in a Mac championship.
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Post by williamtsherman on Jun 10, 2021 5:30:08 GMT -6
I mention championships because that's really all that matters its the only way into the ncaa tournament. I'm missing what it has to do with the starting lineup discussion. Where BSU is concerned? Nothing. Nothing at all.
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Post by williamtsherman on Jun 10, 2021 5:31:57 GMT -6
Considering the significant losses from transfers, etc. coupled with the additions of incoming transfers, it seems like a reasonable discussion regarding the upcoming season. All things considered equally it would appear the transfer losses and incoming bodies will seemingly be somewhat of a wash, from a talent standpoint; in other words, next year's roster should be talentwise, similar to what would have been in place without the transfers. Coaching staff probably likewise. The problem is that the conference as a whole didn't remain static; in otherwords, while other conference programs had losses, their gains were significant. A few weeks back a publication evaluated all Div. I programs, considering who prospered most by the 'covid' transfer portal; the MAC program rated most 'prosperous' was BG. In recent years, Whitford has been able to get easy wins from the weak opponents in the now defunct MAC West; the head coaching changes at NIU, EMU, and CMU will probably change that quickly. Barbee, the new HC at CMU, coming in as late as he did brought in some excellent recruits and transfers. And Kent picked up a couple of highly rated SEC a couple days ago. The best programs going into the upcoming season still appear to be OU, BG, and Buffalo. As an aside, the incoming Freshman Jihad has a brother who transferred from Oakland Univ.; he has committed to EMU. Do you happen to have a link to the covid transfer prosperity analysis you mentioned? Seems like I saw that the MAC west may be revived post-covid? Does anyone know?
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Post by 00hmh on Jun 10, 2021 6:06:29 GMT -6
I'm missing what it has to do with the starting lineup discussion. Seems like that was lost about a page and a half ago. But since you asked What ever line up combo we use it again will not be good enough to Win or even play in a Mac championship. That would be an extraordinary result this year. I'm sticking with how good or bad we are is not clear until I see practice. Too many unknowns. Top 3 is a tall order. The consensus has been we are a disaster this year. Either result possible I suppose.
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Post by 00hmh on Jun 10, 2021 6:21:36 GMT -6
All things considered equally it would appear the transfer losses and incoming bodies will seemingly be somewhat of a wash, from a talent standpoint; in other words, next year's roster should be talentwise, similar to what would have been in place without the transfers. Coaching staff probably likewise. The problem is that the conference as a whole didn't remain static; in other words, while other conference programs had losses, their gains were significant... All good points. We added some size but look like we're playing relatively small, athletic, similar to what we might have been with everybody healthy last year. In the best case, better. Same potential strengths and weaknesses. Recent additions since start of the thread brighten prospects some.
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Post by sweep on Jun 10, 2021 7:55:03 GMT -6
All things considered equally it would appear the transfer losses and incoming bodies will seemingly be somewhat of a wash, from a talent standpoint; in other words, next year's roster should be talentwise, similar to what would have been in place without the transfers. Coaching staff probably likewise. The problem is that the conference as a whole didn't remain static; in other words, while other conference programs had losses, their gains were significant... Recent additions since start of the thread brighten prospects some. I guess we now have someone in a uniform, but I don't see any probable break-out talent.
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Post by sag on Jun 10, 2021 8:39:39 GMT -6
Bowling Green loses Turner and gets a couple of guys from Binghamton and Samford (combined for 10 wins) and guys from ODU, Kent, and Evansville. They definitely could be good, but hard to say significantly better than anyone else...
And if you look at Kent's "highly rated" SEC transfers favorably, then the same has to be true for any SEC guys coming into the MAC, including ones we've gotten. They're coming to the MAC because things weren't going to pan out for them at this point for them in that conference. Unless they're leaving because of discipline (buffalo's guard a couple of years ago)-I could understand making arguments about those guys being difference makers.
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Post by 00hmh on Jun 10, 2021 9:57:31 GMT -6
Recent additions since start of the thread brighten prospects some. I guess we now have someone in a uniform, but I don't see any probable break-out talent. I agree. It is not likely we have a surprise all MAC player to replace Ish or Coleman.
We don't need one individual to be a breakout equal to either one of those losses above, completely, and we do have candidates to contribute and collectively make up offense, probably provide better D, hopefully we lost the turnovers those two had along with their scoring. We got hurt badly last year by turnovers, and that has to be a collective improvement.
I am more optimistic we can replace a role player in Hazen from among the newcomers or improvement by a returning player.
Cochran seems a good bet to replace KJ as a guy who can get to the basket and rebound. Jones seems the best chance to provide offense to replace some scoring, but any way we hack it, we need to find several players to redistribute scoring. Bumb and Thomas need to step up and provide a good part of that. Windham reputably is a shooter but showed little, and Tsoukas not likely to be a scorer, mostly an unknown quantity still.
Cochran, Pearson and Jacobs along with Sellers and Jihad do provide athletic ability, seems collectively superior in that regard to the lost players.
Similar to last year before we we found out we were without so much of our roster for long stretches that improvement MIGHT provide us athletic bench reserves to maintain defensive pressure and provide more consistent ability to keep a fast pace and score off defense. That just did not happen last year. We ended up playing too much half court. Totally dependent then on hot shooting, and I did not see that as a strength going in. Plus Being undersized hurts a lot then.
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