Chuck Taylor

I've watched Marquette play Illinois and Wisky with multiple freshmen on the floor and they play GATA defense because Shaka Smart makes them. Coaches at every level whine that the kids weren't taught "the fundamentals" at the lower level. It's BS. It's a copout because they want to spend their time putting in their "genius" schemes instead of running drills. Wilcher played at Xavier, which is a defense-first team. So his defensive problems aren't because he played AAU ball.

Please don't blame the AAU system for this. Players have never been more ready to play than they are now, but they need to be coached. Any number of schools seem to be able to run an offense, pre-game drills, all of it. All of the blame lies with this coaching staff.

Message boards, where your stupidity lives forever in past posts.

Great post. For all the offseason talk about how this was our most "talented" team ever, none of these guys would start for another Big Ten team. Bryce maybe, if the coach thought he could do something with him that Fred can't. Trey, if healthy, might for a couple of bottom feeders. Most of them wouldn't even be role players on the good Big Ten teams.

If nothing else, this game will give the board a chance to get away from debates over who was the best losing coach and the worse bad player.

fwiw, USA Today doesn't publish on weekends, so the soonest this supposed story would run would be Monday morning. I guess they'd break it online if it were important, but this isn't important to anyone outside of Nebraska.

Fred's issues at ISU involved impermissible contacts by assistants, and he (and McDermott before him) were not accused of wrongdoing. The issues also involved football and other sports. Fred turned in a grad assistant who was not supposed to be attending an AAU event that Fred was at watching Jack play. So I think Fred's reputation was good when he was hired, and I'd prefer to believe it will be when this is over. https://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/9157765/iowa-state-cyclones-say-ncaa-case-started-men-basketball-aide As for Matt A, an acquaintance (a bluebird fan) said when he was hired that he had a sketchy reputation while at St. John's. I've often thought of that when we were bringing in top-level kids but never brought it up before. However, his name seems to be coming up with this current stuff.

We'll fool them by not passing!

Not sure that many 17-year-olds are all that devoted as fans, considering what NU hoops has been in their lifetimes. Also, how many Nebraska kids have succeeded in their lifetimes? I'm a BIG proponent of having Nebraska kids on the roster, but it's an uphill battle to get the good ones after the neglect of the last 15 years.

They won at Wichita State. They also beat UNO by 15, if we're looking for a measuring stick.

Rollercoaster of indifference, say what? .... Ignore if you're under 60.

I could see us winning this one and losing to Kennesaw.

KenPom ratings the last three years: 162, 109, 127 (current). Not sure why I looked that up.

So he misses games against us and North Alabama. Got it.

I rewatched the game, officially qualifying as a glutton for punishment, and Padilla is correct. Verge initiated offense a number of times without just going straight to the basket. His teammates often shot as soon as the ball hit their hands. Sometimes they were open but sometimes not so much. So either they're selfish or the culture is to get yours because the ball won't come back. The teammates' haplessness eventually resulted in Verge going all-Verge, all the time. The defensive effort wasn't as bad as I thought the first time through. It was more a matter of going over/under on screens when they should have gone under/over and messed up rotations whenever Dickinson got the ball. Eventually, the lead got so big and Michigan got so hot that everything fell to pieces. Right now, I feel like maybe I overreacted to the game because of the score. Mich shot 46% on 3s, and we shot 14%. No wonder the score was lopsided. Yeah, I know we could have changed those percentages by playing better, but i kind of feel like this is still fixable. And no, I don't mean we're going to the tourney this year. But maybe we can beat K State and Kennesaw.

I think he talks to the press because he wants to show he's engaged, not because reporters are a bunch of fine fellows. If he didn't, then people would be asking what he's doing. He handled a tough job at UNO, and I think he'll do one here as well.

Bad food and long lines. That reminds me of the Yogiism "Their food is terrible and the portions are too small."

I've seen Jabari Smith a couple of times, plays like a 5-star one-and-done lottery pick. Maybe Bryce will be stoked to shut him down?

I went back through the game thread this morning. This is my favorite post. Time for player introductions:

But he'd need somebody to pass to him.

AD's biggest job is hiring and he (we thought) hit home runs with Frost and Fred. I never heard one person criticize either hire at the time. The athletic department dysfunction has been going on for years. It's been a cesspool ever since Byrne got hired, since TO wanted somebody else. Moos didn't do anything to solve it but he didn't create it either.

This would go in the old "Rock bottom" thread if I could find it: We're 192 in NET, and our only wins are Q4.

I don't agree that we're getting good looks. How many shots come off the second or (gasp!) third pass, with no dribbling in between? I think we have competent shooters, but they rush them too much just to get them off. NOBODY passes up a shot to get a better shot for a teammate. This is clown ball. You put Wilcher or a Kensei on a real TEAM and they'd drain them.

For 3 years we've been dribbling around a lot and throwing up terrible shots. I'm beginning to see a pattern ....