Norm Peterson

John probably wouldn't come here but Jim might.

There are obviously more than 3 elements that go into determining whether a given basketball program is successful or not. Some of those elements the coaches have control over; some of them they don't. But I don't think success is random. I don't think some coaches just get lucky or unlucky and produce sustained success or failure on the basis of good or bad fortune. I'm going to look at 3 elements that I think coaches have control over that I think matter for the success of a program and then I'd appreciate people's thoughts on the current regime and past regimes as to each of those elements. 1. Scheme. This is more than just philosophy. It's philosophy plus the systematic way in which the philosophy is implemented. You might call it Xs and Os, but it involves each coach's unique approach to Xs and Os based on their philosophy. Questions to consider include: Do we have one? Is it workable? 2. Teaching and motivating. I suppose you could also call this "coaching." It's one thing to have a scheme or a well-defined philosophy of how you think things should work. But the teaching of that philosophy so that the players understand their role is what turns what players see in the film room into a product on the floor. And the motivating part is what gets players to buy-in to their role and also perform their best when they face adversity. 3. Recruiting. How well do coaches fill their roster with players suited to the scheme that they want to run? Some players are more suited to one coach's scheme than another's. You might have good players who just aren't a fit for a particular system. So it's not just a matter of getting good players. It's a matter of getting good players who are also a good fit. Questions to consider include: Is the coach getting adequate talent? Is the talent suited to the scheme? When it comes to having an articulable scheme, teaching that scheme, and recruiting to that scheme, I'm curious how people would evaluate our current and last several coaches. You might rank each attribute on a 1-10 scale where 1 is horrible and 10 is elite. OK, have at it.

So, it's your fault. OK. Glad we finally figured that one out.

Is TJ Otzelberger an NBA coach?

Don't get ahead of yourselves. I don't for a moment think we're as good at Illinois at this point. I do think we're headed in the right direction and we're much better than we were against Creighton, which was one of the more dysfunctional performances I've seen by a Husker hoops team maybe ever? Right now, we're better than terrible and the trend line is upward, so I'm happy about that.

Rothstein's comments about Illinois after beating Notre Dame last night are apropos to what we're gradually seeing develop here.

Have you seen Minnesota play? If we played them tomorrow, they'd embarrass us. I mean, yeah, it's early and who have they played and all, but I still have eyes and my eyes tell me that Minnesota fans are watching a better brand of basketball right now than Husker fans.

Do they know the way to San Jose?

I get the people giving Alonzo Verge props. Yeah, he's dishing dimes (mostly to Walker.) And he's getting to the rim with some success. But everyone else just stands around and watches him dribble. When he's out of the game and, say, Webster comes in, they actually pass the ball to create open shots. Remember everyone complaining last year about how the ball would stop in Teddy Allen's hands? Remember how people said Teddy would have fit better in Tim Miles' offense than in the Hoiberg offense? Remember @basketballjones saying that Teddy would never be a star player on a good team? Verge can sometimes get to the rim 1-on-5. And he can often make acrobatic, circus shots at the rim that go in. He's been fairly effective the last two games at dropping the ball off for Walker, who's been really good at taking advantage of it. But he CANNOT score enough to win the game by himself and he does a poor job of getting his teammates involved in the offense. And then you talk about the almost indifference on defense. I don't know. I'm not as high on Verge as some of y'all.

Yeah, this rebounding thing isn't about philosophy, giving up rebounds to get something else. My lying eyes tell me we're getting out-muscled inside on the defensive end. Forget the offensive end where we don't crash the boards at all and run back to get on D as soon as the shot leaves the shooter's hand. I'm talking about continuously giving up inside position on the defensive end and giving the other team extra shot opportunities almost every possession (except the ones where they make the first attempt). Don't feed me that bullshit about it just being a style of play that we adopted on purpose.

Just for some perspective, as if anyone needed any, we are currently struggling at home against the #324 team in the Ken Pom rankings.

Doc never lost to Creighton in Lincoln.

I have to stick up for Doc here. As many of you know, when Doc was head coach, I used to attend a lot of the practices that were open to the public. When it was his team and he was calling the shots, he preached and coached and taught and instilled that you go over the top of all ball screens so that you don't give up open threes. It's why he also drilled his bigs on the importance of hedging screens and recovering. I recall Doc teams that were under-talented. I recall Doc teams that weren't great. But I don't recall Doc teams that looked like discombobulated shit on the regular. I don't think this is on Doc.

I used to give people crap for leaving games early. I left a couple of football games at halftime during the Callahan era because I just couldn't stand to see us throttled on our home field by teams we used to boat race. When we got down by 15 in the first half last night, I almost walked out. If bad basketball is on the floor, I'm not going to object to people leaving early anymore.

Eduardo runs the floor really fast. He's a rim-running rim protector. Sometime back, someone else suggested Eduardo to start as more of a traditional 5 alongside Walker as sort of your traditional 4. And then you have Breidenbach and Lat as depth for the bigs. I'd like to see what our rebounding looks like if we do that. It's a tradeoff to not have a 3-pt shooter at the stretch 4 position, but Lat is 0-4 on the season from deep, so it's not like we'd really be sacrificing much. Probably won't happen, but it would be worth contemplating.

My feeling is you have a few big egos on this team and they each wanted to get theirs in that first real game. And, as a result, the team stunk it up and lost to an inferior opponent on our home floor. Game 2, there were still a few issues with that, but it was decidedly less. And I got the impression these guys were figuring out: a) it's a long season and there will be plenty of opportunities to be THE MAN; and b) losing sucks. So, I'm hopeful we'll see the boys dig down and try to return to the form that had them boat race Colorado and go up by 27. It'd be nice to do that to another CU team.

I will come right out and say it was better than the first game. It appears to me these guys are beginning to realize it's a long season and everyone is going to have opportunities to take and make shots and that you don't need to get all of your shots for the season in the first two games. That realization should hopefully help them buckle down and pass the ball around on Tuesday. Gotta get the defense moving. Shooters don't get open if the defense just needs to guard one guy dribbling.

Someone else is going to need some time ... Stats Season Averages SEASON TEAM 2021-22 GONZ GP GS MIN FG FG% 3PT 3P% FT FT% OR DR REB AST BLK STL PF TO PTS 2 0 8.5 2.0-4.5 44.4 0.0-0.5 0.0 0.5-0.5 100.0 0.0 1.0 1.0 0.0 0.0 1.5 1.0 0.0 4.5

Good news: Bryce was 4-7 from deep, including some NBA-range bombs Bad news: The rest of the team was 0-15.

I'm going to assume Lat Mayen is injured still. Slowed by back spasms or whatever. But 18 minutes and not a single rebound? 0-4 from 3, OK, 1st game jitters for him. But not a single board? Not one? In 18 minutes? Dude is 6'9. But here's some good news: Last year, Derrick Walker was an atrocious 45.5% from the FT line. Eduardo Andre was right behind him at 45%. Last night, they were a combined 80% on 10 attempts. In fact, Derrick has only missed 1 FT on the season and he's currently at 83.3% from the line. That's a very welcome improvement. Trey McGowens, however, is still lagging in the FT department at a frigid 58.3%. That must get better.

Thought I'd throw this out there: 2021-22 NEB GP GS MIN FG FG% 3PT 3P% FT FT% OR DR REB AST BLK STL PF TO PTS 2 2 37.5 8.0-15.5 51.6 2.5-6.5 38.5 8.5-10.5 81.0 0.5 5.0 5.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 1.5 1.5 27.0

Bump to get this Mike Schaefer tweet back up. And now this: 2021-22 NEB GP GS MIN FG FG% 3PT 3P% FT FT% OR DR REB AST BLK STL PF TO PTS 2 2 37.5 8.0-15.5 51.6 2.5-6.5 38.5 8.5-10.5 81.0 0.5 5.0 5.5 0.5 0.5 0.5 1.5 1.5 27.0

Appreciate your thoughts, but just to add context: I'm not trying to label anyone. I wish I didn't have to. But I saw what I saw. And I haven't seen that kind of open hostility between two people since Vincent Gambini put Mona Lisa Vito on the witness stand.

Let's go Brandon!!!

I've seen Husker teams in a discombobulated funk before. But last night was unique. I don't ever recall two guys just out there doing their own thing all night long. I've seen pickup games at the rec that had more teamwork and less hero-ball than we saw last night. It was disgusting. If this happens all year long, I won't renew my tickets. I'm not gonna shell out my hard-earned money to watch shitty basketball for the rest of my life. It's one thing to lose. It's another thing to play like that. And that was an embarrassment. It was an embarrassment even if we had pulled out a win. A win would not have mollified me. Even if we'd won, I'd still be pissed. And Fred better get this situation under control, because there are a couple of players on the team who cannot co-exist with each other right now.