Article Men's Basketball: Lamar Cardinals Preview

Men's Basketball: Lamar Cardinals Preview

Sophomore PG Jose Alvarado returns healthy to start the year.

Coach Pastner and the Jackets kick of year three with a home opener against Lamar this week. Here is what you can expect.

The Georgia Tech men’s basketball team opens the season on Friday, November 9th at home against Lamar. The Jackets come into the 2018-19 with a lot of question marks that will be answered soon enough. Let’s just take it one game at a time. First, let’s take a look at Lamar.

The Lamar Cardinals are a Southland Conference program. For those of you who are not familiar with that conference, it’s the one that Stephen F. Austin blows through each season. They are led by sixth year head coach Tic Price who has coached New Orleans, Memphis and McNeese State as well. He has a career record of 232-189. Last season he led Lamar to a 19-14 record overall, 11-7 in conference play.

Similar to Georgia Tech, Lamar has a lot of question marks this season. They lost 5 of their top 7 scorers from and 58% of their offensive production. Nick Garth and Josh Nzeakor both return however. Garth, a 5’11 guard, who averaged 13.6 points, 2.3 rebounds and 1.6 assists per game last season. He shot 37.8% from deep and has made 238 triples in his career. Nzeakor is an undersized front court player, standing 6’6 and 207 pounds, but averaged 12.5 points and 7.5 rebounds per game in 17-18.

The Cardinals welcome a quartet of JUCO transfers this season, the best of which seems to be Edwin Jeudy. Jeudy is a  6’7 forward who averaged a double double at Gillette last season logging 13.3 points and 10.5 rebounds per game. Christian Barrett, another undersized JUCO forward, averaged 10.6 and 9.1 at Jacksonville. He is 6’6 and effective on the offensive glass, but I am not sure that will translate at the NCAA level. Vince Holmes is another incoming JUCO who has good size at the guard spot, but isn’t much of a shooter. Brandon Battle is a physical specimen at 6’7 playing the three, but doesn’t provide much floor stretching ability.

All in all, this is a favorable match-up for the Yellow Jackets. This should provide the guys an opportunity to get off to a good start on the season as they should physically and athletically dominate this Lamar team. This is the type of game where you could see Moses Wright be dominant as he often was against lesser opponents last season.

What I am really interested to see here is how freshman Michael Devoe plays after sitting out most of the preseason with a toe injury. Other interests include how Jose Alvarado and Curtis Haywood III are recovering from injuries.

I would also like to see senior AD Gueye impose his will on offense. I wouldn’t mind seeing him be a black hole in this game. That move over the left shoulder was automatic at one point last season and he should go back to that well early and often this year. He needs to establish himself as an offensive threat early this season.

As we learned in 2017-18, no victory is guaranteed, but the Jackets should be able to outclass the Cardinals in this contest. Anything other than a convincing victory may raise questions about Coach Josh Pastner’s effectiveness, especially after the departure of Coach Tavaras Hardy in the offseason.

 

[RamblinRed]

I can't use situational stats to bolster my point, what type of world are we coming to

I actually think Wasp has probably the best take on Cole vs Wright. It just feels like they trust Cole a little more right now but i still see alot of long term potential in both.

i also think we will see more changes game to game than in the past as Pastner mentioned that having more 'postionless' type players gives us more flexibility in trying to create match up issues for opponents.
I expect we will see 3 guys that will play 30+ min if they stay out of foul trouble - Jose, Devoe and AD.
I think Cole, Wright, Philips, Curtis, Alston could all see 20+ min or more on any given night depending upon matchups and hot hands.
Moore and Sjolund are more difficult to predict, but will likely see games where they are hot or provide a matchup issue where they play significant min and other nights where they might not see the floor at all.
Syl just looks like an 8 mpg backup.

By transition I mean both changing our offensive philosophy from the last 2 years and also working to get all these young players (we only have 4 Jr and Sr) the chance to get some playing time and improve and maybe have the light come on for one or two of them.

 

[RamblinRed]

I'm hoping we can somehow get to 10-3 in our OOC though 9-4 feels likely and 8-5 wouldn't be shocking.

We have 8 home games where we will be solid favs, hopefully we won't lose any of them, but it wouldn't shock me if we lose one somewhere along the way.

We have five games where we will be considered anything from a pick'em to a huge underdog. Got to get at least 2 of those, only 1 is at home - UGA. The others are
@TN
@NW
@Ark
neutral against St. Johns - who is going to be pushing hard to have an NCAA year with the return of Ponds and Heron getting immediate eligibility after transferring from Auburn.

Get 2 of those 5 and i'm pretty happy. 3 and i'm really happy. None and i'm really disappointed.

ACC didn't do us a ton of favors in our scheduling. GT is expected to be near the bottom but we only have one game each with the other teams that are largely considered in the same tier - Pitt, Wake and BC - though all are at home. On the flip side we only get the top tier teams once. Our doubles are with mostly middle tier teams - VT, Clemson, FSU, ND.

 

[orientalnc]

Fortunately, VT may not be as strong as predicted.

 

[H-Wade]

not sure I would definitely need to see Devoe before making a decision. But just shooting in the dark I would say the current Freshman class just because I think Sjolund is going to be insane once Dan Gilbert gets a hold of him this off season. Pastner really is moving in the right direction... I'll give him another year before jumping off the wagon.

Dan Gilbert is getting a hold of Sjolund? The Cavs are drafting him after only 1 season?

 

[der-k]

Quick note on comparing Cole and Wright's stats from last year - a higher percentage of Wright's minutes (in particular, his more successful minutes) were against non-conference (read: lower quality) competition. In conference, they had near identical rebounding averages (and, to my eye, Cole was slightly better at boxing out - I haven't seen any QoC adjusted +/- numbers for them though), Cole had more assists and less turnovers, hit more shots despite taking less of them, and so on. He was clearly better. (Neither was great - Cole was an adequate low usage fill in, but interesting ... Wright was, to be blunt, an athletic trainwreck in conference play ... shooting 25% from the field - and putting up subpar rebounding numbers (as did Cole) - and having twice as many turnovers as assists - and still posting the third highest usage rate on the team (behind Okogie and Tadric - yes, higher than JA and the ghost of Ben Lammers) ... oh man, I'd forgotten how frankly out of place he was and now I'm sad. I like this kid!)

Best thing for Moses at this point is to build up confidence against second units which are maybe a bit less experienced and bulky. (I say this without seeing the progress any of these guys have made over the summer, outside of one game against a hopeless overmatched FIT team.)

 

[lv20gt]

Quick note on comparing Cole and Wright's stats from last year - a higher percentage of Wright's minutes (in particular, his more successful minutes) were against non-conference (read: lower quality) competition. In conference, they had near identical rebounding averages (and, to my eye, Cole was slightly better at boxing out - I haven't seen any QoC adjusted +/- numbers for them though), Cole had more assists and less turnovers, hit more shots despite taking less of them, and so on. He was clearly better.

Clearly better... offensively. There is another side of the ball that gets ignored far too often.

 

[MiracleWhips]

Dan Gilbert is getting a hold of Sjolund? The Cavs are drafting him after only 1 season?

Lmao My bad man, meant dan Taylor

 

[der-k]

lv20gt - that's fair and I'm kind of a stickler for defense, where Wright's ceiling is clearly higher. But the gap between them on offense last year was massive.

edit - In conference play, Wright had more turnovers+fouls (36) or missed field goal attempts (also 36) than points (34) or rebounds (33).

 

[MtnWasp]

I think there is little benefit in trying to use last season to try to project the relative merits of either Cole or Wright. Last season demonstrated little except that both players had potential but that both were deep projects to become above average ACC players.

Their relative merits as players have as yet to shake out as neither is close to being a finished product. The scrimmage was just a single data point and may or may not be representative of where each player stands on a broader view. If I were to guess, Pastner will give them both minutes in the pre-conference games to see if either one projects to be a serviceable ACC Forward. But I could just as easily envision the minutes allocated between them ebb and flow for more than this season because the point is to develop them both, and not simply to name one a starter.

But, we'll see. It is one of the intriguing stories going into the season.

 

[mstranahan]

One thing I'm going to watch early on is AD's FG%. Last year he was slightly under 50% on 2FG (69-141). Playing more exclusively in the post (no Lammers), I would expect him to shoot closer to 60%. If he can do that reliably, it will force defense to play him more honestly, which should open up better looks for the perimeter guys

 

[slugboy]

I'm not sure how I feel about "positionless" basketball. I'm not sure if it's something that Pastner was aiming at, or if it's the situation we find ourselves in without strong/medium post players like Lammers was. A lot of y'all are better at keeping an eye on the game than I am, so if I'm unreasonable, then I understand.
I think we've had a shot at getting a good post player and haven't gone in that direction, which makes me give a little more credit that this is intentional. I'd still feel better with a great or really good center.
I guess I'll know better in late December.

 

[jbix80]

I'm not sure how I feel about "positionless" basketball. I'm not sure if it's something that Pastner was aiming at, or if it's the situation we find ourselves in without strong/medium post players like Lammers was. A lot of y'all are better at keeping an eye on the game than I am, so if I'm unreasonable, then I understand.
I think we've had a shot at getting a good post player and haven't gone in that direction, which makes me give a little more credit that this is intentional. I'd still feel better with a great or really good center.
I guess I'll know better in late December.

It seems like the game is really changing and moving toward that direction. Maybe it’s the Golden State Warriors fault. Kids like the three point shot and the run and gun game, which means everyone needs to be able to do those things.

 

[GT11]

Three point shot was the worst change in college BB

 

[dtm1997]

 

[MiracleWhips]

Kristian could definitely benefit from the red shirt

 

[AE 87]

Okay, we're going into our third season, and there's one question that still hasn't been answered ...


Toup?

 

[AE 87]

Lamar played last night. The replay is available on ESPN app. I hope to watch it later today or tomorrow.

 

[MWBATL]

Lamar played last night. The replay is available on ESPN app. I hope to watch it later today or tomorrow.

Bright spots for us....Lamar only shot 50% on their free throws (13-26) and had 24 Turnovers (they forced 19) against an NAIA foe.

 

[alagold]

It would be a HUGE surprise if this team became close to a good team overall.It seems we have SO many questions and so few real answers.It is concerning that even vs that weak competition the Off without JA was lost a lot. We have limited inside scoring so it is live or die on the outside.So we get few FTs but could we even hit those.?
On shooting,Devoe was out but Curtis showed little.The rest erratic .Even if our def out is ok .rebounding looks to be a problem vs big teams esp if AD continues to foul.
It is hard to lose your 3 best offensive options for any NORMAL.team (see dook) and he good on Offense so we need TOs turning into pts -a LOT..also--Maybe if we get Banks ,the rebs /stops will come.

 

[Connell62]

It would be a HUGE surprise if this team became close to a good team overall.It seems we have SO many questions and so few real answers.It is concerning that even vs that weak competition the Off without JA was lost a lot. We have limited inside scoring so it is live or die on the outside.So we get few FTs but could we even hit those.?
On shooting,Devoe was out but Curtis showed little.The rest erratic .Even if our def out is ok .rebounding looks to be a problem vs big teams esp if AD continues to foul.
It is hard to lose your 3 best offensive options for any NORMAL.team (see dook) and he good on Offense so we need TOs turning into pts -a LOT..also--Maybe if we get Banks ,the rebs /stops will come.

I hear what you’re saying, but we won by 50+ and Jose didn’t play the last 10-15 mins. Coach has been saying that he really likes our team. Who knows, maybe we surprise some people.