Gamafn

Cazzie’s point above is the bottom line. The west coast schools have substantially raised the bar for competing near the top of the B1G. We have a chance to be as good or maybe even slightly better next year if everything falls right. But that’s just not a good enough trajectory for the top 4-5 any more.

Not sure the traditional position numbers mean much anymore, but if you mean play Hargrove as a small forward on a 3-player front line then I might agree. Would put arguably our 5 best players on the floor more often as well as improving rebounding. Two problems - only one front line sub and defensive matchups. Still need an athletic rim protector imo.

Agree that we’re not going to fully replace AM. But if Bozan (or someone else) can become a 10/8 post player and most everyone else improves we should be pretty good. Not many teams will have 4 bigs next year as good as Potts, Petrie, Hargrove and Bozan, assuming all 4 return and continue their improvement trajectories. AM has been pretty spectacular for most of the last month or two, but she’s still ‘only’ 16+/8 for the year and 14/9 for her career.

First, as a fairly frequent Amy critic, I want to say that her coaching during at least the last half of this season has been terrific. Almost everyone on the roster has noticeably improved, especially offensively. As I find myself thinking ahead to next year, IF: - everyone returns, - Bozan, Pietrie, Prince, Hargray, Nissley and Hake continue their upward improvement trajectory, - Potts and Weidner return to at least the contribution level they had when they went down, - Amy continues to push the 2025 buttons, and - the two new freshmen can contribute at somewhere near the level of the departed Moriarty and Rimdal, then I think we could be better next year even without bringing in another big. Of course, it’s unlikely that ALL these will happen, so I’d still like to see better defensive intensity and the addition of a rim protector with some athleticism. But there is considerable reason for optimism. Agree or disagree?

We just don’t play smart team D most of the time. UW killed us with back doors and drives to their right, especially Ladine. Defense 101 says ‘take away the right hand of a righty.’ Didn’t happen. Add in low energy D in the 2nd half and we’re blown out at home on senior day. We need a major infusion of quickness for next year, as well as a serviceable replacement for Markowski.

Generally good D against an offensively challenged opponent, but the key was 27 assists! Unlike a few other games where they tended to pass sloppily and just jack up threes, here their passing was crisp and open looks often resulted from paint touches first. Replicate this with <12 turnovers and we win on Sunday even without 16 3s.

We had two big runs, one in late 1st qtr and early 2nd fueled by offense (3 pt shooting), and the other last 2/3 of the 4th qtr and into ot fueled by (dare I say it!) defense. Kudos to: our early 3 pt shooting our late ft shooting and D BRITT! their poor ft shooting and coaching

Too much criticism against the team imo, and I’m often one of the team’s worst critics! Way too many bonehead turnovers and missed bunnies, but I’ve concluded that that’s just an unfortunate part of this team’s dna. Otoh defense wasn’t bad and offensive execution was somewhat improved. Rebounding was strong. And Amy wasn’t turnstyling subs, especially in the second half. Finally BP was outstanding! We can only hope she doesn’t burnout.

Agree recruiting bigger and quicker players is a must, but here are two other factors: hoops IQ and development. This current team doesn’t pass, anticipate or move their feet well. Not sure how much of that is coaching vs innate hoops IQ and lack of quickness, but it’s substandard. Betts from UCLA is 6’7”, but she wasn’t anything special as a 1st year player (6 pts and 3.5 rb). Her trajectory, i.e. development, has been remarkable. Compare that to AM, or for that matter to her predecessor Kate Cain, two 4-year center starters for Amy who have basically flatlined. That’s 8 years of minimal development in our posts.

Minnesota - ok it was 19! But the larger point imo is that this team still has quite a bit of potential even without Potts, but is generally underperforming. Of course losing Potts hurt, but other than Hake none of the veterans has played consistently well or noticeably elevated their games. Occasionally yes, consistently no.

This team must lead the country in unimpressive 20+ pt margin wins. Says something about their schedule to date. They will be exposed in the next three games unless the defensive effort and offensive efficiency show drastic improvements. Today I saw one player play consistently well - Hake.

Agree about resetting and touch. Watch the Iowa State post (Crooks) and there are a number of similarities - both all-stars, same height, long arms and stout, can’t jump and lacking quickness. AM rebounds better because Crooks is pretty immobile, but Crooks is a much better scorer because she has quicker post moves and positioning, better touch and they reset her a lot. Probably can’t coach touch but you can coach the rest.

Went from a game where everyone played well to a game where almost no one played well. How is that even possible?

I’m still not convinced we have top 1/3 B1G-quality depth, and I still don’t like Amy’s turnstile substitution patterns. But for today at least I’m obviously wrong! Ten players had double digit minutes, 11 scored and 7 hit 3s! Many solid performances, relatively few wtf moments, and even pretty good defense until mop up time. Kudos all around!

We all agree that Potts’ injury has left a big hole and that Amy is searching for the answer. I don’t think 4 guards is the answer for 2 reasons. First, we’re not a great rebounding team with 3 guards so we might get eaten up on the boards with 4 in the B1G. Second, we’re don’t seem to have 4 consistently productive guards. Prince is solid and Hake is a nice surprise, but no one else has stepped up thus far. I do like the idea of AM and Bozan together a lot, with Petrie rotating in. But Amy seems locked in to Bozan primarily as a replacement for AM, which unnecessarily limits her minutes.

Second straight game where AM was outplayed for the majority of the game not only by an opponent’s big but also by two of her own front court teammates. Yes she had a good 4th qtr and finished with a misleading double double, but her numbers thus far are not as good as last year and we’ve only played one decent team.

Inexplicable observations: -we didn’t play very well and won by 45! Ask yourself objectively, who was our player of the game? I can’t name one. Maybe Hake by default. - while the box score won’t show it, both Hargrave and Bozan outplayed AM for most of the game, again mostly by default because none played very well. Whoever coaches our bigs will be exposed when we play an Iowa team that still has at least two bigs better than ours (and yes I know we miss Potts and AM is an AA candidate).

Agree, and your last sentence was basically my point. Women didn’t.

The comparisons between the men’s and women’s games are eerily instructive. SAME: * played on same day on the (short) road in the same city * played good Creighton teams that likes to shoot 3s * both Husker teams are vulnerable defensively due to lack of overall quickness * both Husker teams score 74 points but shoot poorly from 3 DIFFERENT: * no Potts for Husker women - advantage CU * besides 3s, men had to defend one of the best big men in the country, while the CU women had no real inside threat - advantage NU * men win by 11 due to a suffocating team defense that overcame individual lack of quickness with tremendous effort and intensity, holding CU to 29% from 3, 33% overall and Kalbrenner to 4 pts * women lose by 6, allowing CU to shoot 45% and 47% Draw your own conclusions.

In simple terms we now need to replace 14.5 pts and 7.5 boards per game. Not easy but we have a roster that may be able to produce the points. The rebounds are more problematic. Even more problematic is the lost interior d. We will frequently need more than one effective big on the floor against B1G competition to avoid being dominated inside. If so, Petrie, Hargrove and/or Bozan are key, plus a better Markowski. For that reason I’m just not convinced that 4 guards will cut it. Plus I’m not sure who the 4 guards would be anyway. Moriarty, Hake and Weidner (post-ops) may have a few good games but there is still no evidence that they can deliver consistently.

Potts led the team in both scoring and rebounding as well as playing respectable defense against one of an opponent’s bigs. No one player can replace her. Thankfully we have other scorers but rebounding and interior d now become big question marks. Last night the team rebounded well and played generally solid d, but the caliber of opposition will soon ramp up significantly. Most B1G teams play two bigs so Petrie and Hargrove will be keys going forward. And the other largely unspoken factor is the play of Markowski, which has to get much better.

The bad (or pessimistic if you prefer): Neither team played much good defense. We won’t be able to simply outscore most good teams. Knee brace or not, I remain sadly pessimistic about AW’s ability to contribute significantly. Hope I’m wrong. The good: 20 3s from 9 players is insane! Obviously some of it was just unusually hot hands, but 9 players are not just getting hot simultaneously. We showed noticeably better offensive energy, passing and movement than in prior games. That improvement is replicable, even if 20 for 34 is usually not. And if we can bring the same energy and movement consistently on both ends we may have something special.

Someone else noted that we ‘lack perimeter quickness again.’ Yes, AGAIN. Is it that difficult to recruit a couple of legit D1-quick backcourt players? Don’t believe Williams has ever done that, prioritizing instead athletic midwestern shooters whose games don’t translate because they have trouble getting their shots off or playing good D against good D1 competition. And no, Williams’ daughter is not likely to be an exception when healthy. Since we don’t have any truly notable defenders, seems to me we should give most of the minutes to the players who are at least average defensively through hustle AND can score, i.e., Potts, Markowski, Bozan, Prince, Hake, Nissley, Rimdal and maybe Hargrove (sample size too small). Coley and Petrie aren’t playing much anyway, and the minutes of Moriarity are largely wasted. Sadly, the same may be true for Weidner, who now seems to be at best an average defender and below average scorer due to lost quickness. Don’t mean to sound totally negative. Potts, Bozan, Prince, Nissley and maybe Hargrove are a promising nucleus for the future. As for this year, the 7-8 players noted above, properly utilized and avoiding injury, can probably win 20-21 games and make the tourney given our ridiculously easy ooc schedule. This seems to be the ‘rinse and repeat’ ceiling for Williams’ teams.

Very astute observations, all of which I agree with. This team was very frustrating to follow. It had pretty obvious deficiencies noted above and yet looked terrific at times, e.g. against Iowa twice. At other times they looked like they were just going through the motions, e.g., Rutgers obviously, but after an impressive run through the B1G tournament they played poorly in the dance against both A&M (barely winning against a 12-loss team playing without their best player) and OSU (who played poorly in that game and were ripe for picking off). The same can be said for the key players, Shelley and Markowski, terrific at times and MIA other times. Not sure what the answer is, but I do agree that both portal recruiting and development need to ratchet up.

As another sometime critic, Amy (and the players of course, especially Jaz) absolutely deserve mucho credit for this sustained excellent performance. Dumb turnovers and ill-advised 3s have at times been serious problems this year. I said in another thread that the team needs to make ‘good look’ 3s (at >35%) and control turnovers (<12) to beat good teams. It did just that against MSU, and while they had 15 to’s against Maryland they also made 13 3s @ 45+%. I stand by my opinion that the team is not overly athletic or quick, which usually has shown up in ineffective man-to-man defensive spurts throughout the season. But they’re now playing really high energy TEAM defense that largely compensates for any quickness limitations. So once again, kudos to the coaching staff and players. Do they have enough left in the tank to overcome a probable Iowa rubber match? Big ask, but that’s why they call it madness.