Hot Seat

[colhusker]

My frustration is it appears to be a wash, rinse, repeat.  We don't box out, hell I am not even sure Bryce knows where he man is after the shot goes up.  We have two guys that for the most part play given and go offense, give me the ball and go to hell. We don't cover the three and other teams knock them down.  We get told we have a team full of great three point shooters and yet we have put up enough wide open bricks to add an addition to PBA.  Won't even mention having that guy that forces shots as opposed to running the offense.  SSDY to this point.  UGH

 

Hot seat?  No, but the warmers should be turned on is this year doesn't get better.

[HuscurAdam]

No.  This isn't even worthy of conversation at this point. 

[huskerbaseball13]

21 hours ago, GoBigFred said:

Iowa State is 8-0 and ranked #19 under first-year head coach TJ Otzelberger.

 

Minnesota is 7-0 and receiving votes under first-year head coach Ben Johnson.

 

I don’t believe either one has spent so much as a day coaching on an NBA staff.

 

Both teams were also terrible last year. 
 

Oh well I guess. Maybe next year. Or the year after that.

Let’s revisit at years end. I could be wrong but I expect both teams to finish near the bottom of their respective league. 

[Coaches kid]

On 12/5/2021 at 9:39 PM, basketballjones said:

No. I've been highly critical of Hoiberg et al this year. But no. You absolutely have to take these things into consideration:

1. No one was returning from Miles's last team. And the recruiting class he was bringing in was hot trash. Hoiberg had to literally round up whoever he could find to have a team. 
2. Last year wasn't just a "covid year" for us. It was a disaster. I really think last year's team was significantly better than what we saw. Also, he kept dudes fighting and playing all year, regardless of the record. 

3. To me, this truly is year 1. Year 1.5 at best. 

I also think we're pivoting. Zigging while others are zagging. Hoiberg and crew were on the cutting edge with transfers. But now that everyone is doing it and it's way weirder, I like the traditional guys they're bringing in. Lawrence, Dawson, and Lloyd are all supposedly just super solid players that fit well with Wilhelm, McPherson, Oleg, and Tominaga (Bryce and Trey are gone don't even try to think about them here next year. Won't happen). And, supposedly, Blaise Keita is maybe the best big available out there. Let's give this time. 

I am in agreement with these sentiments. My biggest disappointment has been that it doesn't seem this year's team is cohesive as a unit. I haven't seen collective buy-in to doing the things which translate into wins - like playing hard on every possession, especially on the defensive end, playing under control (for goodness sake, you should have learned how to jump stop in 2nd grade) sloppy passes (John Beilein used to stop practice if a pass wasn't made to the right location of the pass recipient), failure to get 50/50 balls, and a collective will to get defensive stops or find a way to score at critical junctions of a game. 

 

No doubt Fred and crew are attempting to get the team to do these things. Great coaches impose their will on their teams. Calipari, Self, Jay Wright, etc., have shown the ability to take great individual players and mold them into great teams. They develop guys with a killer edge. The guys recruited to those schools all want to get to the NBA, but their coaches demand they do things the right way for the good of the team. Granted, we don't have the talent of those teams, but we have more individual talent here now than we've had since the Nee days. The frustration is that we seem have a bunch of individuals who haven't bought in to their roles or the team concept. I am waiting for that breakthrough. I do like the pieces we have in the non-Bryce freshman along with Tominaga. I am preparing to remain, at least for the time being, where all die-hard Husker fans have found themselves - in one of Dante's circles of hell. 

[basketballjones]

1 minute ago, Coaches kid said:

I am in agreement with these sentiments. My biggest disappointment has been that it doesn't seem this year's team is cohesive as a unit. I haven't seen collective buy-in to doing the things which translate into wins - like playing hard on every possession, especially on the defensive end, playing under control (for goodness sake, you should have learned how to jump stop in 2nd grade) sloppy passes (John Beilein used to stop practice if a pass wasn't made to the right location of the pass recipient), failure to get 50/50 balls, and a collective will to get defensive stops or find a way to score at critical junctions of a game. 

 

Oh, trust me. I'm right there with you. 

[demone]

I have not jumped off the FH bandwagon just yet - but I am much closer to doing so than I was at the beginning of the season. 

 

I've made my stance clear in other posts. I won't continue to watch teams where one or two players are going to do their very best to make sure the ball has air in it every chance they get - even if they stuff the stat sheet. Unless those players are exceptionally good, that approach leads to more losses than wins and that can't be argued. And, selfishly, it is not entertaining to watch for old, curmudgeonly traditionalists like me.

 

The risk with continually turning over the roster has always been getting the chemistry right. It is a critical factor and difficult in the best of times. To this point in the season, the chemistry is not close to what it needs to be on this team and the evidence would suggest it won't happen soon enough (if at all).

 

I hope I'm wrong on the last point, I truly do. I would love nothing more than to watch a good, quality basketball TEAM have success at Nebraska. 

 

 

[tcp]

lol let's face it, no chance of this one dying just yet. I figure I'll just dust it off in anticipation of the post game rush after this travesty. 

 

 

[HuskerFever]

I'm just glad an athletic director makes these decisions and not a post game online message board.

[thrasher31]

16 minutes ago, HuskerFever said:

I'm just glad an athletic director makes these decisions and not a post game online message board.

Which is why I never entertain if a coach should go or not. Not my decision. Waste of energy. 

 

I'll criticize him. Sure. 

[jimmykc]

Well, I've just finished all the new threads this morning and have readjusted my expectations for this year. I just want to see us beat K-State and Kenesaw State and see us pull off a couple of upsets in the league. Everyone have a happy "Vents"-day.

[cornfed24-7]

1 hour ago, jimmykc said:

Well, I've just finished all the new threads this morning and have readjusted my expectations for this year. I just want to see us beat K-State and Kenesaw State and see us pull off a couple of upsets in the league. Everyone have a happy "Vents"-day.

This is how I see this season playing out

[kleitus]

We've got until the middle of next year before this is even a question.

 

Maybe Bryce jumps pro.  Maybe not.

 

Keita will help.  A lot.

 

Getting a year older will help.  A lot.  This team is stupidly young outside of 2 or 3 players.  And frankly verge might be addition by subtraction.

 

Getting a distributor that plays defense is likely our biggest step forward.

Edited December 9, 2021 by kleitus

[Husker Hoops Penitent]

Linus Van Pelt says, wait until next year!

[GoBigRed]

1 hour ago, kleitus said:

We've got until the middle of next year before this is even a question.

 

Maybe Bryce jumps pro.  Maybe not.

 

Keita will help.  A lot.

 

Getting a year older will help.  A lot.  This team is stupidly young outside of 2 or 3 players.  And frankly verge might be addition by subtraction.

 

Getting a distributor that plays defense is likely our biggest step forward.

Bryce won’t be here next year. I don’t know where he’ll be, but he and Trey won’t be here. 
 

We always talk about getting a year older. And then players leave or get asked to leave, we bring in new young players, and just like that we’re young again with a bunch of fresh faces. 
 

Right now the only scholarship Fr/So I can confidently say will return next year are Wilhelm and Tominaga. Everyone else I could see a scenario where they don’t want to come back (lack of playing time, closer to home, weather, don’t want to wait around and develop, hate losing, etc.) That’s just how it is nowadays. 

Edited December 9, 2021 by GoBigFred

[The Polish Rifle]

I looked back on Hoiberg’s firing with the Bulls to see what things were discussed. The GM said in multiple interviews that low effort and low energy was the reason he made the move. Fans echoed the same thoughts. My worry is this seems to be a trend across multiple jobs and separate sets of players. 

[hskr4life]

2 hours ago, kleitus said:

We've got until the middle of next year before this is even a question.

 

Maybe Bryce jumps pro.  Maybe not.

 

Keita will help.  A lot.

 

Getting a year older will help.  A lot.  This team is stupidly young outside of 2 or 3 players.  And frankly verge might be addition by subtraction.

 

Getting a distributor that plays defense is likely our biggest step forward.

Problem is— to get older/more cohesive... you need players to stick around.

 

We can easily get older by recruiting Jucos or senior transfers.  What we lock is cohesiveness.

[kleitus]

3 hours ago, hskr4life said:

Problem is— to get older/more cohesive... you need players to stick around.

 

We can easily get older by recruiting Jucos or senior transfers.  What we lock is cohesiveness.

 

What we lack is a core... which includes cohesiveness.

 

We can build around keisei and Breidenbach and keita and one of andre/oleg.  Keon you can see the talent if he sticks around. 

 

None of this includes Bryce.

 

That's 5, maybe 6 guys who in 2 years could be pretty good together and the rest is a matter of filling in blanks.  Odds are you can likely keep 4 of those 6 so you only need 4 more guys over 2 classes for an 8 man rotation.

 

You're going to know by the middle of next year whether that's worth waiting out or not.

[demone]

9 hours ago, The Polish Rifle said:

I looked back on Hoiberg’s firing with the Bulls to see what things were discussed. The GM said in multiple interviews that low effort and low energy was the reason he made the move. Fans echoed the same thoughts. My worry is this seems to be a trend across multiple jobs and separate sets of players. 

You have touched on something that I haven’t been able to crystallize in my mind just yet. I did not follow his ISU days closely and I didn’t watch the Bulls at all. Did his NBA experience fundamentally change the man? Not only make him robotic in how he deals with players but skew him so far toward the NBA hero ball mentality that he now actually coaches to it?

[jimmychitwood]

19 hours ago, demone said:

You have touched on something that I haven’t been able to crystallize in my mind just yet. I did not follow his ISU days closely and I didn’t watch the Bulls at all. Did his NBA experience fundamentally change the man? Not only make him robotic in how he deals with players but skew him so far toward the NBA hero ball mentality that he now actually coaches to it?

Last season really dispersed that idea. After the Covid stoppage and Teddy dismissal, that team played exactly how he would have wanted it, even if it was every other day. Trey getting hurt completely destroyed this team. He was the only leader that can be there on and off the court.

 

 I’m actually encouraged that we are trending towards having up to 4 bigs that can play with shooters around them for the next couple of years. An inside threat will really help 3 point percentages.

[Ron Mexico]

On 12/8/2021 at 6:08 PM, kleitus said:

We've got until the middle of next year before this is even a question.

 

Maybe Bryce jumps pro.  Maybe not.

 

Keita will help.  A lot.

 

Getting a year older will help.  A lot.  This team is stupidly young outside of 2 or 3 players.  And frankly verge might be addition by subtraction.

 

Getting a distributor that plays defense is likely our biggest step forward.

ahh yes, the every elusive distributor. 

[FredsSlacks]

idk. a lot will depend how we finish this season. 

 

ik things look bad, but we could have easily won the western il and nc state game and be 7-3 right now.

 

 

[Ron Mexico]

On 12/7/2021 at 12:04 PM, demone said:

 

 

I've made my stance clear in other posts. I won't continue to watch teams where one or two players are going to do their very best to make sure the ball has air in it every chance they get - even if they stuff the stat sheet. Unless those players are exceptionally good, that approach leads to more losses than wins and that can't be argued. And, selfishly, it is not entertaining to watch for old, curmudgeonly traditionalists like me.

 

 

 

Please stop doing this. Stop putting the blame on players. I'm all about players having accountability when it is warranted. These guys are coached to play this way, or haven't you been paying attention this season. Putting any sort of blame on Verge is just wrong. He's the best scoring pg we've had a Nebraska since Lue. He passes the ball to his teammates a lot in the 1st half and they jacked up +17 3's only making 2 or 3 of them. At least he was trying to get to the rim. Most of his shots where contested because no one on this team sets a decent screen. Still he managed to go 12/21 most of that in 2nd half.  

 

Every shot Lat took was a 3. 4 of 9 shots by Bryce where 3. Derek had 2 shot attempts. This all is by design. This is what they do in practice. This is what Fred wants. If he didn't want this he would have sat some guys on the bench.

 

Re-watch the game and pay attention to Verge.

[demone]

7 hours ago, Ron Mexico said:

Please stop doing this. Stop putting the blame on players. I'm all about players having accountability when it is warranted. These guys are coached to play this way, or haven't you been paying attention this season. Putting any sort of blame on Verge is just wrong. He's the best scoring pg we've had a Nebraska since Lue. He passes the ball to his teammates a lot in the 1st half and they jacked up +17 3's only making 2 or 3 of them. At least he was trying to get to the rim. Most of his shots where contested because no one on this team sets a decent screen. Still he managed to go 12/21 most of that in 2nd half.  

 

Every shot Lat took was a 3. 4 of 9 shots by Bryce where 3. Derek had 2 shot attempts. This all is by design. This is what they do in practice. This is what Fred wants. If he didn't want this he would have sat some guys on the bench.

 

Re-watch the game and pay attention to Verge.

I appreciate your points and yes, I've watched every game to this point in the season. You see it a bit differently than I do and that's fine. 

 

For the record, I'm blaming players and coaches. Just my opinion but I believe the pattern was set in the first few games of the season and it quickly embedded in the psyche of the shooters.

 

I do think Verge has gotten better in the past couple of games - this is not an attack on him specifically at this point. If this is the offense the coaching staff wants, it's not an offense I will invest time watching.

[Husker Hoops Penitent]

The players know, just as any veteran NU fans know there is no hope this season. The body language is obvious. This program is shit, as are the coaches. Ridiculous for a program to  pay a coaching staff to finish last each year. I guess Hoiberg will leave NU just as his grandfather did- never having a winning season.

 

Next coach should be paid whatever the state minimum requires, that way the university can pass the savings on to the fans. The game should be secondary. There should be clowns and circus performers as well as bounce-houses and food booths everywhere. Make it fun. Who cares who wins (we know anyway!).

[hskr4life]

While I may criticize on a game by game basis, I’m not ready to write off an entire season/staff just yet.  Sure, the thoughts are there, but remember.

 

9-9.  9-9 was our record prior to catching lightning in a bottle and making the only NCAA tournament run of my lifetime.  We had lost to UMASS, UAB, Creighton, and were 1-5 in Big 10 play.  However improbable it is, there is always that chance to turn it around.