GT vs. FSU, Wednesday Jan 26 at 9pm

RamblinRed

Helluva Engineer
Featured Member
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5,901
This was the first game this year where the defense looked like the last couple of seasons. Given how much zone we played staff must be getting more comfortable with the players understanding how to play the zone.

Having Howard back is important as well as he at least provides some resistance in the paint. Hopefully he can play a bigger role as he gets back to 100% health. He is a guy I think can be a 7 and 7 guy. HE had the highest +/- on the team last night (+18)

Sturdivant played his best game at PG all season imo 12 pts, 4 assts, 0 TO, 1 steal. Just very consistent. That is the sort of growth I am hoping to see from last season,

I don't want anyone to misinterpret this statement but Deebo reminds me of a mini-Dennis Scott, He has a similar build and game. He's not that level of player obviously but style wise he reminds me of him somewhat.

Hopefully Devoe at some point will start to revert back to the mean with his 3-pt shooting. In ACC Games he is shooting only 25% from 3's - by far the worst of our 4 primary 3-pt shooters (Usher 34.4%, Sturdivant 38.9%, and Deebo 38.7% - fwiw Maxwell due to his BC performance is 4th on the team in 3FGM in ACC Games with 8 - shooting 42.1% - we could really use him getting healthy).

Sturdivant is obviously the better pick for starting PG right now and he and Smith basically split the PG position (25.6 min and 15.6 min). Sturdivant's ability to make 3-pt shots and take care of the ball (14:6 ratio in ACC play vs Smith's 13:14). It does lead to the thought though that next year you could potentially play them more together with Sturdivant as the shooter and Smith as the driver.

I'm still excited about our future guards with Sturdivant, Smith, Coleman, Maxwell (please get healthy) and Kelly. But we will need something in the frontcourt badly.

Hopefully this is a start of something good and not a one off good game.
 

wrmathis

Ramblin' Wreck
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972
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Bonaire GA
FSU got the chop from the KC Chiefs. I remember the Braves getting it from FSU during the Worst to First run. Deion was not part of that team. It's annoying as hell, and I'm a huge Braves fan.
but deion was part of that team "Sanders later signed with the Atlanta Braves for the 1991 MLB season. On July 31, Sanders hit a key three-run homer to spark a comeback win against the Pittsburgh Pirates during the Braves' run to the National League West Division title."


he just left the team later and didn't play in the playoffs. but he was part of the team and probably would have gotten a WS Ring if they one the WS that year
 

Jazzchaz

Jolly Good Fellow
Messages
138
FSU got the chop from the KC Chiefs. I remember the Braves getting it from FSU during the Worst to First run. Deion was not part of that team. It's annoying as hell, and I'm a huge Braves fan.
Deion's first year was indeed during the 1991 season. A group of FSU fans sat in the outfield behind Sanders and would stand up and chant and chop after he made a good play or got a hit. The announcers would crow about it and the Deion fans would be shown on the news that evening.
The Braves were winning so it spread pretty quickly after that. There was a rush by merchandise hawkers to sell any type of tomahawk then they settled on the foam ones.
But back to last night's game. It was most visiting fans I've seen(or rather heard), at a game this year. It was also the first time there were enough students that they spilled over from the sidelines to behind the band.
 

YlJacket

Helluva Engineer
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3,273
Last night we finally got the team I believe Pastner thought he would have this year. He played his older guys with a big boost from Deebo and a sprinkle of Devion. The focus was on the defensive end. And for whatever reason, they played with an energy they haven’t played with this year. All the energy stats were in favor of GT – steals, turnovers, and even fast break points.

When you are a smaller team (whether Howard plays or not), you don’t defend FSU’s bigs at the rim, you defend them with energy and aggressiveness on the perimeter to keep them from throwing the ball inside. We did that really well last night. That was the change in energy level. Good to see them play like that – a lot more fun to watch than say against Wake Forest.

When we did play man last night, we rarely switched Howard on the perimeter. I remember once or twice but we generally kept him in the paint.

I was also glad to see us run something besides the modified Princeton set. We ran about half the game without Howard at the elbow. Even ran Howard on some high ball screens. It really opened the offense up and was IMHO a big reason why we were a lot better with the dribble penetration and kickouts. Even when we ran the Princeton set, it was crisper than it has been and didn’t focus on getting the ball to Howard at all costs. I think keeping the ball in the guards hands helped keep our TOs low.

Hope Pastner keeps the visor in the closet.

Usher is so much fun to watch. You wish everyone had his unbridled energy and enthusiasm. He was everywhere last night.

I expect we will see much the same short bench the rest of the season. That is really Pastner's MO and I expect he found what he wanted last night.
 

gtgaas

Georgia Tech Fan
Messages
47
This was the first game this year where the defense looked like the last couple of seasons. Given how much zone we played staff must be getting more comfortable with the players understanding how to play the zone.

Having Howard back is important as well as he at least provides some resistance in the paint. Hopefully he can play a bigger role as he gets back to 100% health. He is a guy I think can be a 7 and 7 guy. HE had the highest +/- on the team last night (+18)

Sturdivant played his best game at PG all season imo 12 pts, 4 assts, 0 TO, 1 steal. Just very consistent. That is the sort of growth I am hoping to see from last season,

I don't want anyone to misinterpret this statement but Deebo reminds me of a mini-Dennis Scott, He has a similar build and game. He's not that level of player obviously but style wise he reminds me of him somewhat.

Hopefully Devoe at some point will start to revert back to the mean with his 3-pt shooting. In ACC Games he is shooting only 25% from 3's - by far the worst of our 4 primary 3-pt shooters (Usher 34.4%, Sturdivant 38.9%, and Deebo 38.7% - fwiw Maxwell due to his BC performance is 4th on the team in 3FGM in ACC Games with 8 - shooting 42.1% - we could really use him getting healthy).

Sturdivant is obviously the better pick for starting PG right now and he and Smith basically split the PG position (25.6 min and 15.6 min). Sturdivant's ability to make 3-pt shots and take care of the ball (14:6 ratio in ACC play vs Smith's 13:14). It does lead to the thought though that next year you could potentially play them more together with Sturdivant as the shooter and Smith as the driver.

I'm still excited about our future guards with Sturdivant, Smith, Coleman, Maxwell (please get healthy) and Kelly. But we will need something in the frontcourt badly.

Hopefully this is a start of something good and not a one off good game.
Hey RR, its good to see you post. I am curious what you think of Saba (maybe not this year but in the future)?
 

forensicbuzz

21st Century Throwback Dad
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9,089
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North Shore, Chicago
but deion was part of that team "Sanders later signed with the Atlanta Braves for the 1991 MLB season. On July 31, Sanders hit a key three-run homer to spark a comeback win against the Pittsburgh Pirates during the Braves' run to the National League West Division title."


he just left the team later and didn't play in the playoffs. but he was part of the team and probably would have gotten a WS Ring if they one the WS that year
I thought he came in the following year. My bad.
 

JDjacket

Ramblin' Wreck
Messages
635
This doesn't make sense. The league records are how you rank the teams in the league, not the overall record. Miami at 7-2 is leading the ACC. Duke and FSU are tied for 2nd at 6-2. at 2-6, we're only ahead of VT. All this being said, it's still early. I think we're 8 games into an 18 or 20 game ACC schedule. Lots of time for lots of movement.

I think like 8 of our remaining games are vs the other teams in the bottom half of the ACC right now.

Miami twice, ND, and UVA

the remaining games are clemson and below. Hopefully we can finish the season strong and make it to .500 in the ACC after the rough start vs what are shaping up to be the top half teams.
 

Golden Tornadoes

Ramblin' Wreck
Messages
837
Last night we finally got the team I believe Pastner thought he would have this year. He played his older guys with a big boost from Deebo and a sprinkle of Devion. The focus was on the defensive end. And for whatever reason, they played with an energy they haven’t played with this year. All the energy stats were in favor of GT – steals, turnovers, and even fast break points.

When you are a smaller team (whether Howard plays or not), you don’t defend FSU’s bigs at the rim, you defend them with energy and aggressiveness on the perimeter to keep them from throwing the ball inside. We did that really well last night. That was the change in energy level. Good to see them play like that – a lot more fun to watch than say against Wake Forest.

When we did play man last night, we rarely switched Howard on the perimeter. I remember once or twice but we generally kept him in the paint.

I was also glad to see us run something besides the modified Princeton set. We ran about half the game without Howard at the elbow. Even ran Howard on some high ball screens. It really opened the offense up and was IMHO a big reason why we were a lot better with the dribble penetration and kickouts. Even when we ran the Princeton set, it was crisper than it has been and didn’t focus on getting the ball to Howard at all costs. I think keeping the ball in the guards hands helped keep our TOs low.

Hope Pastner keeps the visor in the closet.

Usher is so much fun to watch. You wish everyone had his unbridled energy and enthusiasm. He was everywhere last night.

I expect we will see much the same short bench the rest of the season. That is really Pastner's MO and I expect he found what he wanted last night.
From what I saw last night, we actually switched him off a good bit, at least in the second half. I remember thinking to myself that he was doing a really good job cutting off the drive when he was the primary defender on a guard. Now granted we would usually rotate pretty quickly to get him back down low, but he held his own when switched.

I love watching CJP coach when he is in the zone. I love his enthusiasm, and it is so infectious to the players. He really was in a groove last night and made a great decision to switch back to man after F$U hit a few threes in a row to cut our lead down to 5. It seemed to throw them off enough for us to get a couple of stops and then rev the zone back up to closeout the game. After Sturdy snatched that poor kid's ankles and Ush got the steal, I wanted Devoe's three to land so badly just so the roof would explode. All in all, a great game and great energy. The zone will work when you've got someone like Usher showing relentless energy on defense to disrupt anything the offense is trying to do. BIG props to him for a beautiful exhibition of basketball last night. Let's start rolling a win streak now!
 

senoiajacket

Helluva Engineer
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1,141
I wonder if Josh is going to slip back into the smaller rotation. No saba, meka, kelly, nor maxwell.
This seems like a tradeoff and a discussion that has gone on in the football forum before.

This season will take a miracle for us to "recover" (defined as making some sort of tournament). Do you play the lineup that gives you the best chance to win, or do you have an eye towards next year and try to get time & develop the young'uns? My guess is there is a balance there somewhere.

If we go completely small with no Saba, Meka, Kelly or Maxwell ...... I shudder to think what next year might looks like..
 

YlJacket

Helluva Engineer
Messages
3,273
From what I saw last night, we actually switched him off a good bit, at least in the second half. I remember thinking to myself that he was doing a really good job cutting off the drive when he was the primary defender on a guard. Now granted we would usually rotate pretty quickly to get him back down low, but he held his own when switched.
Might be a bit of syntax. I saw him what I call hedging a good bit to cut off the ball but then returning back to the big with the original defender usually picking up the ball. I think that is what you are saying. What I didn't see was him jumping the ball screen to fully switch on the guard like we did at UNC and then have the guard try to stay with the big.
 

GTbball2016

Helluva Engineer
Messages
1,108
Am I the only one that noticed Smith was flirting with a backcourt violation a handful of times when he ran the offense? He kept backing up and definitely was over the line once, but they missed it. Refs also missed FSU player being about a foot out of bounds when he caught a baseline pass, but he missed the layup. In all though, refs definitely were good for us, as GT shot a ton of FT on contested drives.
 

GTbball2016

Helluva Engineer
Messages
1,108
Might be a bit of syntax. I saw him what I call hedging a good bit to cut off the ball but then returning back to the big with the original defender usually picking up the ball. I think that is what you are saying. What I didn't see was him jumping the ball screen to fully switch on the guard like we did at UNC and then have the guard try to stay with the big.
It also seemed like Kyle was significantly more active on defense. Maybe it’s because FSU doesn’t have dynamic guards, but he was flying out to the perimeter all game. Howard is a bad matchup against Miami with their guard-oriented, perimeter approach.
 

YlJacket

Helluva Engineer
Messages
3,273
It also seemed like Kyle was significantly more active on defense. Maybe it’s because FSU doesn’t have dynamic guards, but he was flying out to the perimeter all game. Howard is a bad matchup against Miami with their guard-oriented, perimeter approach.
Whether he switches on a guard or tries to stay with Waardenburg on the perimeter - not sure there is a good matchup for Howard in that game. Bet we see a ton of zone or just go with Usher. But that is a problem for tomorrow. :cool:
 
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