Tip Off Tomorrow Miami of Ohio

[gte447f]

This one hurts even if this is how we start every season under Pastner. Devoe was on fire in the first half. They must have made some adjustments to take him out of the second half. We needed more out of Usher and the point guards. Except for a couple of ugly misses around the basket, Howard was solid, especially down the stretch. Moore has been a liability in the exhibition and in this game. He did make one really pretty spin move on a fast break layup in the first half, but his outside shots were horribly off the mark. Coleman plays calmly for a freshman. I hope he can develop quickly.

 

[JacketOff]

Can’t wait for this team to make its obligatory run in January and February only to be shut out or given a crappy seed in the NCAAT because of sh*tty November losses like this. Rinse and repeat at this point. Can’t wait to see what injury or Covid positive or young roster that gets used as the excuse if we lose another mid major OOC game, or heaven forbid to a UGA team who’s pegged to finish damn near last in the SEC.

 

[GTbball2016]

Can’t wait for this team to make its obligatory run in January and February only to be shut out or given a crappy seed in the NCAAT because of sh*tty November losses like this. Rinse and repeat at this point. Can’t wait to see what injury or Covid positive or young roster that gets used as the excuse if we lose another mid major OOC game, or heaven forbid to a UGA team who’s pegged to finish damn near last in the SEC.

I’m already sick of the “we lost the ACC POY and DPOY” excuse. It’s not like either player left the program early. Hell, he should consider himself lucky Usher returned.

 

[MWBATL]

Pastner continues to underperform against early season non P-5 teams, and it continues to frustrate the hades out of me. You CANNOT be thought of as an excellent program with losses like this every season!

 

[RyanS12]

Terrible loss. Regardless Jose and Moses being gone there’s no excuse. I’ve seen talk about them being an experienced, veteran team. They were a .500 MAC squad. We’re the experienced, veteran defending ACCT champions. There’s no reason to lose a game like this. It’s inexcusable for Pastner to have this continually happening! We got our played and out coached. Our offensive sets looked like ****. Dribble around until we probe the paint, to pick up the dribble, pivot around and throw the ball out for a terrible shot, that no one can make beside Mike. Hell, guys looked shocked when they get an open look in the paint!
Our offense feels like watching our football team on 3rd down. It only works when the opponent screws up their assignments….

Friday will tell us a lot about the mental makeup of this team. We better blow them out. God help Pastner if we lose….

 

[Sean311]

Just watched the condensed game. We’ll be fine. That kid on Ohio played out of his mind and we lost on the last possession. It’s college bball a lot of parody these days. I think we look good though. Expect a good season and for this to be an outlier.

 

[Fatmike91]

We’ve relied on Jose to initiate the offense for years now. When he came out of the game on limited minutes you saw us look really disjointed. We saw that same disjointed look last night at the end of the game and it shouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone if you were paying attention. I believe we can get that figured out as the players learn their roles and gel.

Jose routinely shut down the other team’s best player. He could guard the 1/2/3 spot and sometimes the 4…

For the first time in years, we saw a Tech team last night that can’t guard the 1 spot. That’s a major problem and I don’t see an easy fix.

We simply couldn’t defend #2.

/

 

[SandySpringsJacket]

Pastner continues to underperform against early season non P-5 teams, and it continues to frustrate the hades out of me. You CANNOT be thought of as an excellent program with losses like this every season!

I saw Pastner speak before the season at the GT Lunch Bunch and asked him about his annual poor performance against non-conference teams early in the season and how it always hurts them a when the NCAA rolls around. he acknowledged it and said they were going to address that this year and focus on practicing hard early and winning those games. He also added that the non-power teams are more on par with the big programs every year. Well, more of the same it looks like.

 

[awbuzz]

I saw Pastner speak before the season at the GT Lunch Bunch and asked him about his annual poor performance against non-conference teams early in the season and how it always hurts them a when the NCAA rolls around. he acknowledged it and said they were going to address that this year and focus on practicing hard early and winning those games. He also added that the non-power teams are more on par with the big programs every year. Well, more of the same it looks like.

Appears that they didn't practice hard enough...

Truly disappointed last night after about the midway point in the 1st half. Poor offensive execution and limited defensive rotation.

 

[lv20gt]

For the first time in years, we saw a Tech team last night that can’t guard the 1 spot. That’s a major problem and I don’t see an easy fix.

I don't agree. Don't get me wrong, Lairy certainly won the match up but overall though he was 9-19 and 3 - 9 from 3. A good game for sure, but not getting whatever he wanted whenever he wanted and a fair amount of his shots were tough shots. As good a defender as Jose was there were times the same thing happened to him. It will happen to even the best defenders some of the time because ultimately defense is usually more about making things hard rather than outright stopping. But sometimes guys make hard shots. The thing Smith needs to learn is to not let his speed get him out of position as that was usually what allowed Lairy to get some of his better looks. Guys with his level of quickness often are used to being able to rely on it to recover after getting out of position. Some of the time he'll be able to do it at this level. Some of the time he won't. He'll learn when he can't as he gets more experience.

 

[D-man44]

For a smart group Georgia Tech fans are so dilutional. Yes losing the ACC PoY and DPoY are perfectly fine excuses for starting off slow. GT was picked 10th in the ACC for this very reason and IK most of you only watch GT basketball but this is far more common than you think.

 

[slugboy]

We do seem to take a long time to warm up and gel as a team. I half-seriously wonder** if we schedule Baylor and Gonzaga and Kentucky to start our season so we at least get reps against great teams.

**maybe the coffee hasn't kicked in

 

[Golden Tornadoes]

We do seem to take a long time to warm up and gel as a team. I half-seriously wonder** if we schedule Baylor and Gonzaga and Kentucky to start our season so we at least get reps against great teams.

**maybe the coffee hasn't kicked in

I mean, if we are going to lose our early season games, might as well make them against big name opponents.

 

[Connell62]

Devoe played great overall but needs to be more assertive at times.
Howard also played great. Double double. Still room for improvement but good showing from him.
Saw flashes from both Deebo and Smith to be excited for but overall they got taken advantage of by their (Miami's) experience.
We need Usher and Moore to be better on the offensive end. They make 3 of their 9 threes and we're fine. Can't have an 0fer though.
Smith in general will be a great defender for us, but his speed was a bit of a liability at times. I expect that to get better with experience though. Was also a tough draw for him tonight.

One thing I really hope is the miserable sacks stay on teh football board and don't infest this one. Of course probably won't happen. Look forward to them disappearing when we start to put things together again.

LOL...I told ya'll it wouldn't take but one loss while we were trying to find our way for them to show up again. Heck, some never even left!!

Agree with you 100%, we got all we could have hoped for from Rodney. He really turned it up down the stretch, and I think that he only gets better as the season goes on.

I thought not having Bubba's experience on the floor really hurt us last night. As you mentioned, MOH had experience all over the floor while we are still fitting pieces together.

#2 (Lairy) probably has a lot tougher time with Bubba guarding him. He would have been on the floor to help us get better shots at the end as well.

IMO, we must have more offense from the PG spot. We need DS and KS to be better 3-11. They need to be penetrating and getting lay-up's. Too many jumpers from them last night.

Finally, you are absolutely right, Usher and Khalid MUST be better offensively. Otherwise, we will struggle to score until our young guys grow up. Thought Usher should have gotten the basket more often.

Unfortunately, I've pretty much come to the realization that Khalid just isn't an offensive threat. He will flash occasionally, but we cannot rely on his offensive production.

While I thought we would do enough to win this game, I also said I wouldn't be surprised if we got shocked. It's going to take us a few games for all the new pieces to gel.

That said, it was far from a terrible game. Credit to MOH for hanging in and winning it late.

Everyone needs to calm down and back away from the ledge.

 

[Connell62]

Did you show up to this game? Because I was there in person and the students were very loud and we were cheering as much as we could. The student section was fairly packed, especially for a Tuesday night game during a busy week for students, and we even incorporated a new dedicated Students Bball section that was yelling all game. Trying to blame the students for not being passionate is not a good look, because I can tell you GT students do show up and support their team as much as possible.

Exactly.. The students showed up, season ticket holders did not. In fact, if it had not been for the students, it would have been a morgue.

I'm not sure if it was COVID fears or what, but our fan base laid a big turd last night. First game in a season and it is 35-40 capacity???

That's just **** IMO. Very disappointed to say the least.

 

[Connell62]

Just got back from the game. I'll never use the C word on any of our student athletes, so here's how I'll put it: Jordan Usher single handedly gave this game away. From the opening tipoff to his 2 incredibly boneheaded shots in the last 2 minutes, when all he had to do was bring the ball out and we win, he was unbelievably awful. When I sober up in the morning I'll post more comprehensive thoughts, but Jordan Usher lost us this game. Full Stop

Yeah, I wasn't impressed with is fadeaway there at the end. Go to the rack and get fouled!

 

[tbglover]

This one hurts even if this is how we start every season under Pastner. Devoe was on fire in the first half. They must have made some adjustments to take him out of the second half. We needed more out of Usher and the point guards. Except for a couple of ugly misses around the basket, Howard was solid, especially down the stretch. Moore has been a liability in the exhibition and in this game. He did make one really pretty spin move on a fast break layup in the first half, but his outside shots were horribly off the mark. Coleman plays calmly for a freshman. I hope he can develop quickly.

Somehow Moore's shot has regressed from last year.

Terrible loss. Regardless Jose and Moses being gone there’s no excuse. I’ve seen talk about them being an experienced, veteran team. They were a .500 MAC squad. We’re the experienced, veteran defending ACCT champions. There’s no reason to lose a game like this. It’s inexcusable for Pastner to have this continually happening! We got our played and out coached. Our offensive sets looked like ****. Dribble around until we probe the paint, to pick up the dribble, pivot around and throw the ball out for a terrible shot, that no one can make beside Mike. Hell, guys looked shocked when they get an open look in the paint!
Our offense feels like watching our football team on 3rd down. It only works when the opponent screws up their assignments….

Friday will tell us a lot about the mental makeup of this team. We better blow them out. God help Pastner if we lose….

Except we're not experienced. There are 3 guys on this team currently playing with experience(Devoe, Usher,Moore). Everyone else is young and inexperienced. I agree about the offense in terms of not creating space to drive which would be great for Smith in particular or running guys off screens like they did.
I expect the team to get better as the season goes and they were in position to win last night. But the inability to close out the team needs to be rectified

 

[YJAlleyCat]

I wasn't happy with the result last night, but it was great to be back in McCamish in person. And the post-game presser with CJP was a breath of fresh air after all the ones from CGC of late. CJP acknowledged his own mistakes in the game and promised to fix things. It is nice to have a coach take responsibility and not just blab about how elite we are.

 

[OG-T]

IF DeVoe would have been off last night we lose by double figures at home against MOH, sheesh. True, their guys could have been off and we win by 10, but that more GT guys didn’t show out for home opener is perplexing. I though Ush would lift team with verbal presence but when he’s mediocre he seems to shell up or kind of pout. He’s a great player and hope even when his play struggles, his leadership doesn’t. Jose’s energy already noticeably missing. DeVoe is naturally low key, Moore doesn’t have clout, and other guys don’t know roles yet. Ush is really the only hope we have to keep the fire lit through highs and lows.

 

[lv20gt]

There are two avenues to look at this through. The first is as a resume point. To that end this is likely a Q3 loss which is not a good way to start the year. It probably won't be a Q4 loss unless injuries derail Miami OH as they should be better than last year. It would be pretty hard for it to be a Q2 loss unless MOH takes a big leap forward which is possible with what they return but unlikely IMO. In that lens this loss is important. It puts us in a hole to fight out of from the get go. Again.

The other way to look at it is more from the quality of the team and how it played and how that projects going forward. That is things like did we struggle with things that were unexpected or things we might think could be fixed? To that end I think it was a mixed bag but nothing to be alarmed at from just one data point.

Rebounding was a concern. Howard with 13 and Ush with 9 are good signs. In general I though Usher's approach to rebounding was better yesterday than last year and that could help. Just one data point and doesn't mean it won't still be an issue but it was a good sign.

Another positive was Devoe. With losing Jose and Moses we need Mike to be that first team all ACC level guy and he looked the part. I think he'll need to be more assertive than he was at times and in particular we need to focus on him more and not settle as much but overall his play bodes well if we can get some improvement from what we saw from the young guys.

There was concern with production from the 5 spot. Rodney and Saba combined for 12 points on 6 of 8 shooting and 17 rebs. Again, one data point but a good sign, especially since I would expect improvement as they get more used to playing time in games

There was concern with offense out of Moore. He had a couple nice plays turning defense into offense and his first couple of threes looked good even though they didn't go in. However they didn't go in and overall he didn't show any real improvement on that end. Again, just one data point but he's fighting against an established trend so I would have liked to see more shot making.

There was concern how long it would take some of the young guys to gel. Smith and Coleman both showed flashes of things to be excited about but both had rough nights overall. This one wasn't likely going to really be known after one game in either direction. That is more just a matter of waiting until it clicks whether that is in the OOC, sometime in ACC play, or after the year (hopefully not this).

Overall there wasn't anything too unexpected. Ush didn't have his best night which hurt. Not having Bubba hurt. But the rest were issues that were expected and it was just a matter of to what extent and if it would cost us. The question now is how many of those will be trends vs how many will be improved on. No way of telling now though.