Pitt - 1/6

Peacone36

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We have a better chance to beat them than we did against UNC.

The thing that may worry me the most is the positive from the last game. We played well

Can't remember the last time we played at a high level 2 straight games.
 

orientalnc

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We have a better chance to beat them than we did against UNC.

The thing that may worry me the most is the positive from the last game. We played well

Can't remember the last time we played at a high level 2 straight games.
I think it's more mental than physical. The last half of December, except for the VCU game, they seemed to be playing in slow motion. That changed against UNC. Hopefully the conference schedule has them more focused and energized. We need to be, because UVA comes to town this weekend.
 

Connell62

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I think it's more mental than physical. The last half of December, except for the VCU game, they seemed to be playing in slow motion. That changed against UNC. Hopefully the conference schedule has them more focused and energized. We need to be, because UVA comes to town this weekend.

We can say that they should be focused for every game, but I can tell you from personal experience that it is much easier to get up to play against UNC in front of a packed house than it is to play against SE Louisana in front of 1000 people.

Agreed with Peacone..if we come in and match our intensity levels from the prior game, and we execute offensively, I would be happy..even if we come up a little short. Personally, I think we match up well against Pitt..

Looking forward to our guys playing well tonight!
 

GT_B

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Seems like Pitt is very good on the boards, especially the offensive glass, which is usually our strength as well. Should be interested to see who wins the rebounding battle. I think we are going to need another big night from Smith knocking down some 3s to have a shot.
 

Connell62

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Seems like Pitt is very good on the boards, especially the offensive glass, which is usually our strength as well. Should be interested to see who wins the rebounding battle. I think we are going to need another big night from Smith knocking down some 3s to have a shot.

Thing that concerns me is now that Adam lit up UNC, other teams are going to start looking to take him away. With defenses locked in on Marcus & Adam on the perimeter, we are going to need someone else to step up and take some of burden off of them. It is fools gold to think that Adam or MGH will score 20 every night. If I am not mistaken, Adam shot 60% (6-10) from 3pt range - there will likely be a regression in this game.
 

GT_B

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Thing that concerns me is now that Adam lit up UNC, other teams are going to start looking to take him away. With defenses locked in on Marcus & Adam on the perimeter, we are going to need someone else to step up and take some of burden off of them. It is fools gold to think that Adam or MGH will score 20 every night. If I am not mistaken, Adam shot 60% (6-10) from 3pt range - there will likely be a regression in this game.

I agree, I think they will blanket Smith in conference play from here on out, but what we need to probably do is let MGH drive and kick the ball, try to take focus to him and get Smith some looks, but if they choose not to help on MGH, then he takes it to the hole and finishes or looks to dish to a post player for an easy basket.
 

orientalnc

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If their guards are over playing MGH and Adam on the perimeter, they won't be digging on the post. Jacobs and Mitchell should be happy about that.
 

McCamish Maniacs

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Thing that concerns me is now that Adam lit up UNC, other teams are going to start looking to take him away. With defenses locked in on Marcus & Adam on the perimeter, we are going to need someone else to step up and take some of burden off of them. It is fools gold to think that Adam or MGH will score 20 every night. If I am not mistaken, Adam shot 60% (6-10) from 3pt range - there will likely be a regression in this game.

Is this not exactly how we said Adam would have an impact on our team this season? Even when he's not scoring he's taking away attention from other players and he's spreading the floor. Last year the second anyone in the post touched the ball, it was an immediate double team. This year I've seen very few double teams

Like you said I do think we match up well with Pitt. It's going to be a great battle on the glass. The times we've struggled this year have been when the other team has had one player go off against us and we struggle to contain them, especially at letting an elite guard penetrate all game. Pitt doesn't really have a superstar and they're more of an overall good team. If we can just play solid defense all around I think we match up well. With young and Artis as their main offensive threats I wouldn't be surprised to see Lammers and White get big minutes tonight for their defense
 

McCamish Maniacs

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Thing that concerns me is now that Adam lit up UNC, other teams are going to start looking to take him away. With defenses locked in on Marcus & Adam on the perimeter, we are going to need someone else to step up and take some of burden off of them. It is fools gold to think that Adam or MGH will score 20 every night. If I am not mistaken, Adam shot 60% (6-10) from 3pt range - there will likely be a regression in this game.

Not to mention Adam doesn't care how closely you guard him ;)

 

Techster

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I think GT has more than one capable scorer outside of Adam. To me, Adam helps us beyond just his ability to make shots behind the arc. In fact, I think his reputation for being a great shooter helps our offense because he creates space for our perimeter players to feed the big fellas down low, and gives our perimeter players space to drive. Teams actually have to defend more of the court against us now instead of compressing space inside the arc. If MGH can be 3/4ths of the player he was against UNC, and our big guys can be a consistent scoring threat down low, I don't see why we can't beat Pitt.

Should be a nice physical matchup. Looking forward to watching this one.
 

Connell62

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Is this not exactly how we said Adam would have an impact on our team this season? Even when he's not scoring he's taking away attention from other players and he's spreading the floor. Last year the second anyone in the post touched the ball, it was an immediate double team. This year I've seen very few double teams

Like you said I do think we match up well with Pitt. It's going to be a great battle on the glass. The times we've struggled this year have been when the other team has had one player go off against us and we struggle to contain them, especially at letting an elite guard penetrate all game. Pitt doesn't really have a superstar and they're more of an overall good team. If we can just play solid defense all around I think we match up well. With young and Artis as their main offensive threats I wouldn't be surprised to see Lammers and White get big minutes tonight for their defense

My thoughts exactly..

His shooting really opens up the floor, but he is a good ball-handler as well. Without a doubt, he has been everything that we expected and more. Pitt has an excellent PG, and they're a very gritty team. I think that if we can tighten up the perimeter a bit, remain patient and run our sets as smoothly as we did against UNC, and we will stand an excellent shot at pulling the upset, but we literally have to value every position and ensure that are protecting the glass.
 

scotts

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It's another loss but at least we were competitive in this game. I'm glad we can score 84 points in a game but I was disappointed with our Defense. I thought that was CBG's specialty.
FT shooting was poor tonight - we missed way too many - especially the front end of two 1 and 1s.
Hopefully we play another competitive game against VA on SAT.
 
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