Spain trip

RamblinRed

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I'm glad to see Phillips has started with 2 good games in a row. Hope this is a sign that he is going to be the player I thought he was going to be last year, not the player he was. First, I always like to root for the SR to have good SR years, as it is their last chance for most of them to really play and enjoy it.

Second, having a big, athletic guard who can hit some threes, play really good defense and be a secondary ball handler is always a good thing. If Phillips has a strong SR year than the waiver decision on Parham is not quite as important and if Parham does get the waiver would make us really deep at the guard spot.
 

lv20gt

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Can a team play up-tempo with a short rotation? He also has shown the tendency to over-play key guys, particularly failing to rest Lammers and Alvarado properly.

Saying he failed to rest Lammers and Alvarado properly is weird considering there were no good options to rest them with, especially Lammers. Lammers there was nobody on the team that came close to doing what he did on either side of the ball. For Jose, last year we at least had bodies to replace him, and have Devoe play the point, but the options were Alston and Phillips, both of which would have been a step down especially since we weren't really getting anything from the 3 spot.

As far playing up tempo. Yes, the ULM teams with Gathers and Kimble, the 93-94 Arakansas team that ran the 40 minutes of hell, and even our own Lethal weapon 3 are all teams that were up tempo with relatively short benches (Arkansas less so but even then they only really played 8 or 9). Furthermore, up tempo doesn't mean you have to go full blast all game every game. You can push the tempo on offense trying to catch the other team off guard and then slow it down if they get back in time. You can have short spurts of full court press D and then back out of it once they seem to adjust. It's also easier to go a short rotation and push tempo when you have players that can play multiple positions. For instance a line up of Jose, Devoe, Usher, Moses, Banks, with back ups Parham, Moore, and Cole could reasonably play up tempo due to Moses being able to slide to the 5, Usher being able to slide to the 4, and the trio of Jose, Devoe, and Parham being able to basically play in any combination of two of the 3. Lastly playing with a short bench doesn't have to be playing with the same 7 or 8 guys every single game. For instance maybe there is a game where we like the match up Sjolund gives us and so play him more than Cole.

Now I doubt we go that shallow a bench but you don't need 10 guys to play up tempo.
 

MtnWasp

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Saying he failed to rest Lammers and Alvarado properly is weird considering there were no good options to rest them with, especially Lammers. Lammers there was nobody on the team that came close to doing what he did on either side of the ball. For Jose, last year we at least had bodies to replace him, and have Devoe play the point, but the options were Alston and Phillips, both of which would have been a step down especially since we weren't really getting anything from the 3 spot.
There is a balance to be reached between the drop-off with an inferior sub and the drop-off from a guy playing gassed (or hurt). In the case of Lammers especially, there was carry-over in games with less than three days rest, especially noticeable in his fine Junior season.

Even though it is easy to say that Lammers could do more than Gueye, that is not really the question. The question is whether 30 minutes of Lammers and 10 minutes of Gueye would have yielded better net production, especially at crucial times, than 40 minutes of Lammers?

Pastner himself has admitted to maybe not managing the minutes optimally. So, maybe not so weird. If we significantly raise the number of possessions per game, the issue becomes more acute.
 

AE 87

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So, SjoNuff followed a 16 point game with 1 pt. Was that from lack of minutes or did he miss a lot of shots?
 

lv20gt

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Even though it is easy to say that Lammers could do more than Gueye, that is not really the question. The question is whether 30 minutes of Lammers and 10 minutes of Gueye would have yielded better net production, especially at crucial times, than 40 minutes of Lammers?

It's weird for his junior year because we so overperformed expectations that the idea that he failed to manage minutes well is absurd. Yes, there were issues with Lammers playing too much. That was because we didn't have a good way to replace him. We could have put in a sophomore Gueye who wasn't ready to play, and we'd be significantly worse defensively, and hurt offensively because we ran our offense through Lammers due to having a really bad point guard situation.

His senior year we had Jose so we no longer had to rely on Lammers as much to run our offense, but we lost Q which meant if we replaced Ben with Gueye, it meant replacing Gueye at the 4 with a freshman Wright or Cole. Or if you try to slide Okogie down to the 4, then you have to go with Alston at the 3 which was terrible. So it wouldn't really have been replacing Lammers with Gueye. It'd have been replacing Lammers with Alston or Wright. And that's why it's weird to say he failed to rest him properly.

Either way, saying he failed to rest Ben properly is acting like there was some obvious solution that he just refused to do. There wasn't. It was a situation where we either had to play our best players and risk them running out of gas, or sit them and risk losing games right then because we didn't have good replacements.
 

YlJacket

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He should have rested Lammers more regardless of the options. Finding minutes you can steal is one of the things that makes a good coach. The biggest thing with Lammers is he made a bet that Lammers could play though his injury and that one blew up on him. Not the end of the world but I would quibble with him on that one. Even last year with the big 3, I would like to see him find minutes to sit folks. If for no other reason that guys that know they are playing 38 minutes play like they have to make it through 38 minutes and will take minutes off on their own anyway.

Doesn't mean you have to go 9 or 10 deep to play fast on offense. And number of possessions is really a secondary issue. The primary issue is that defense takes at least 2X the amount of energy as offense - and if you are trying to play pressure D then it is 3X or more. One advantage of our zone is that we are not really playing a pressure D and aren't chasing guys through picks all over the court. So theoretically we wouldn't have to go more than 8 deep and still be able to play at a faster tempo than we have. But in order to really play faster on the offensive end we are going to have to improve our defensive rebounding and causing turnovers. We were negative in both rebounding margin and turnover margin. Or if you want to look at advanced stats we were number 279 in the country in defensive rebounding percentage. You have to rebound the ball or create a live ball turnover to consistently be able to get out and run - and we sucked at both.

CJP has said he doesn't want to play zone as much as he did last year. If we play more man (which is generally better at defensive rebounding) but have to expend more energy doing it then we likely will have to play deeper into the roster than we did last year - especially if we try to also run on offense. That seems to be where CJP wants to head. Whether he follows through or reverts back to 6 man Josh is TBD.
 

lv20gt

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He should have rested Lammers more regardless of the options. Finding minutes you can steal is one of the things that makes a good coach.

There aren't always minutes to steal even for the best coaches. The reason lammers played so much was because of the poor roster composition caused by the recruiting of the previous staff not because of a failure by Pastner to magically find minutes when there weren't any.
 

LibertyTurns

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There aren't always minutes to steal even for the best coaches. The reason lammers played so much was because of the poor roster composition caused by the recruiting of the previous staff not because of a failure by Pastner to magically find minutes when there weren't any.
What year does CJP start being totally responsible for the basketball program, this year or next year or other?
 

dtm1997

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What year does CJP start being totally responsible for the basketball program, this year or next year or other?

I think it's this year. The roster is 100% his.

He's saying it's a tourney team if they stay healthy. Staying healthy is a massive, but kinda reasonable caveat, so that's a pretty bold statement by him compared to other years.

If I recall correctly, BG would've had a tourney team in year 3, if Robert Carter had stayed healthy.
 

OlaJacket

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I still haven't totally given up on Pastnerd but if he can't at least get us to the NIT he needs to go. He still can't find a big man. Will Moses and Cole be our 5's next year? Kinda scary. Maybe they can stick Usher at the 5. He's got the body to bang.
 

AUFC

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I don’t understand all this panic about another big man. VT had no one over 6’ 7” last year and made the tournament and got Buzz a job. College game has changed a lot. Even within ACC it can be done.
Does the name Kerry Blackshear ring a bell to you? Not only over 6'7 but also a more talented C than anyone we've had in my days of being a Georgia Tech fan, at least.
 

Peacone36

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Does the name Kerry Blackshear ring a bell to you? Not only over 6'7 but also a more talented C than anyone we've had in my days of being a Georgia Tech fan, at least.

Hes good....but I think id take Vanilla Godzilla ahead of him.

Plus, any opportunity to say that outstanding nickname is an opportunity i am going to seize.
 

bos

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I still haven't totally given up on Pastnerd but if he can't at least get us to the NIT he needs to go. He still can't find a big man. Will Moses and Cole be our 5's next year? Kinda scary. Maybe they can stick Usher at the 5. He's got the body to bang.

I think Moses will be the 5 next year with his length and Usher at the 4. Evan and Didenko will backup along with a newcomer.
 
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