Norm Peterson

Our defense was good enough to win. Their points: 2 came on a bonehead special teams play resulting in a safety. 7 came on a 40-yard scoop-and-score near the end of the first half with time running out. 7 came on a drive that should have ended with an interception. 7 were absolutely earned by an improbable, near-perfect, deep pass from their backup QB on a play that was very well defended. And another 7 were earned on a sustained drive where they moved the ball on the ground. That's 14 points that they truly earned. We ought to be able to win most games when we hold an opponent to 14 points. Or even 21. The problems were our offense and special teams. Hard to believe that our special teams were worse than our offense, but that case could be made. At least a 4 point advantage to Illinois on our special teams miscues -- the safety and two missed PATs. Our punter averaged <35 yards on 5 punts. Theirs was >45 yards on six punts. That's >50 yards in field position over the course of the game. And then we can't run an offense. Tim Miles once said "either you do it or you don't know or you don't care." In the case of our offense, either we're inept at recruiting, inept at teaching, or we just have a bad scheme. Because, for whatever reason, it's just not working. And hasn't since Adrian's freshman campaign. I feel like Frost has to find six wins to keep his job. Four straight losing seasons can't be excused. Not something to be tolerated at this place. Six wins might not save his job, but fewer than 6 has to be the death knell or they just don't care. And finding six wins with this schedule just got tougher. Illinois was winnable. And we pissed it away.

That had been my impression, too. I think we've discussed this on here before.

Points are also based on longevity.

Have we offered? Are we going to?

But Bryce is still a 5-star.

Did you see Hunter’s ranking in the most recent Rivals 150? Biiiig drop. No longer a 5-star.

Someone needs to explain to him there are benefits in having your girlfriend close, but not *too* close.

This has now changed. Ramel is now the unranked recruit; Schtolzberg is now the #126 player in Rivals 150 for 2022. Sorry to have to be the one to share the news. Don't shoot the messenger.

Unless I'm missing something, I don't see Ramel's name in the Rivals 150 for 2022 any longer. Looks like he and Jasen Green have both dropped out. Jason has gone down 22 spots at his position and Ramel has dropped 38 spots at his position, per Rivals. That's what summer does. And I think Ramel was dealing with some injuries this summer, so he didn't show as much. But this is when Rivals and other scouting services get to compare kids with other players and make their assessments. Seems like there's less movement following the scholastic season than the summer circuit.

I have a plan to go cough in the vicinity of some Ohio State players.

But now you have your foot in the door.

Every year, on the anniversary of our first NCAA tourney win, we will all raise a glass in your memory.

Alright. I'm OK with you trying. I mean, whatever it takes, right? We'll miss you, but if it works ...

Live at least until we get that first NCAA W. After that, y'know, do whatever. But don't just croak when we get the 5-star kids. At least wait until they grab that monkey on our backs and throw it into the cheap seats.

Nah. Nothing available at the time that I thought was an improvement over what I already have. Maybe next year.

Watching schools like ISU, KSU, OSU -- old Big 8 mates of ours who snubbed us on crucial Big 12 votes to throw in with Texas -- swinging in the breeze right now brings me a certain satisfaction. Lyrics to Lovin' Touchin' Squeezin' by Journey - YouTube

Average would be a huge improvement.

My only hope in this seat yourself process is that the people who are left ahead of me already have better seats than the ones that are open. It's probably not going to happen, sadly.

Being worst in turnover margin is a bad deal and definitely a point of emphasis. But our rebounding margin is worse than our turnover margin in terms of gaining or losing opportunities to take shots. If we think we can get by being a bad rebounding team by just shooting better, that might be a mistake. Taking better care of the ball has to be a point of emphasis, but not getting beaten so badly on the glass has to be a consideration as well.

Yeah, we sucked last year. But shooting wasn't the problem. In conference games only, we ranked 10th in FG% and 7th in opposing FG% among league teams. In terms of 3-pt shooting, we were 6th in the conference at 34.2% from long range. And we were 2nd best in the league against the 3, giving up 31.3%. Enough of the good stuff. OK, if we're roughly middle of the pack in terms of our own shooting and among the better teams in the league in FG% defense ... HOW ON EARTH DID WE COME IN DEAD LAST IN SCORING MARGIN? We were far and away the worst team in the league in scoring margin, being outscored by an average of 10.2 ppg. Second worst was Northwestern at -6.8 ppg. HOW? Well, if you figure that every possession is worth about a point (that's roughly the average -- some teams do a little better, some a little worse), you start to see a picture come together. We were worst in the league in both turnovers and turnover margin, giving up an average of 14.4 turnovers in league games with a league-worst turnover margin of -2.32 per game. We were 2nd worst in the league in rebounding, being outrebounded by our opponents by an average of 5.4 rebounds extra possessions per game. And we were dead-last in the league in FT% and probably also worst in missing the front ends of 1+1s (although I don't know if anyone charts that stat), which means that every possession that ended in foul shots was more likely to be an empty possession for us than for any other league team. Now, the good news is that two of our top 3 rebounders along with our best offensive rebounder have all left the team, so ... Wait wut?

Who are you calling "short"? Heh heh

Without Chris Cresswell, we lose to KU.

I remember having an argument with someone on this board (probably one or two iterations before the current board) about whether Paul Velander was a good shooter or not. At roughly around 38-39% from beyond the arc. I remember who it was but I'm not going to call him out because I've said stupid things too. But I just couldn't believe he was saying 38-39% was mediocre at best. And then he modified and said for your guy who's a shooting specialist. The only reason I bring it up is thinking about how rare guys 40% or better have been. Sure, he wasn't as good as Conklin or Cochran. And those guys were still within recent memory at the time. But in the dozen or so years since, we'd have just about killed for a walk-on shooting guard who could come in and hit at such a clip.

"High six-figure offer." Whoa. That's some serious dough he turned down.

That sounds good, but he still has to be able to play defense.