trueblue32

Graham isn’t dressed. 9 players dressed, approximately 9 fans in the stands

With the caveat that I started at UB (and started closely following) the year after McCrea graduated, I think the #1 scorer and #3 rebounder in program history needs to be on the wall. CJ being (imo) the best player in program history also gets him on the wall. Perkins being another 4 year stud and the #2 option in the greatest era of UB history, and playing in the most games in UB history gets him on the wall. Jeenathan's case is a little fuzzy to me, his UB career alone frankly probably doesn't deserve to be on the wall, based on how few players have been honored, but him making to the NBA is certainly an important feather in the program's cap and worthy of honoring in my opinion. I loved Segu in his time at UB, but in my opinion his career is not particularly close to being worth "honoring" his number. He had one MAC second team honor in his career, and never led a MAC championship team, we'd need a huge wall if that is the bar.

Good news: we’re gonna win Bad news: I’m not sure that effort beats anyone else in the MAC other than CMU when they shoot 5% from 3

DooleyBull06 is sure that playing 1 game won’t count towards burning his eligibility (it literally does, barring an injury that would require a medical waiver) so we will burn a year of free college, living paid for, and development towards a professional basketball career. Not my life so who cares right

Giving a few less minutes to Adams, Chatman, and Smith to get Graham on the court is not improving this team in any meaningful way. The only outcome that it possibly flips is the 6 point home loss in the opener to FDU. This team is getting killed and Graham isn't going to save fans' attention. If we're truly "rebuilding" this year then burning a year of Graham's eligibility would be coaching malpractice and frankly would be unfair to him. Is there any guarantee that he'd even be eligible beyond the 14 day window of the TRO? We want to burn his year of eligibility for a single away game where we'll be 20 point underdogs?

Honestly let him redshirt and hopefully he’s a piece of a competitive team next year. Chatman will be gone and Adams will eligible to grad transfer (presumably). Wing/Forward isn’t even the weak spot on this team so he’d probably just dilute minutes for our few experienced players

People keep saying this, but this isn't pro sports where we need to tank for a high draft pick. There is literally no reason that this team should be the worst in UB history by a wide margin. Is the idea that the recruiting gets easier after the mystery of what could be is gone and Halcovage is just a coach leading a team coming off of (what we can hope is) a 5 win season? Spoiler alert: even without a coaching change there is no guarantee that any of these players are here next year. We are not rebuilding anything currently. Next year Halcovage will be rebuilding from the depths that he has plummeted the program to. If he thinks rebuilding is recruiting off a 15 win season then he is about to find out what rebuilding is.

You’re underselling Curtis Jones who is the 6th man on the #20 rated KenPom team. ISU’s starting PG is going to be in all-American consideration

Maybe I’m just sour on Halcovage but I’d love if he spent less time whining to the refs in games that we’re down 20

A UB classic the past few years: a sports center top 10 dunk at home down double digits

FWIW WKU is 305th in minutes continuity with a first year coach and UB is 314th. Would’ve liked if our “rebuild” looked like theirs lol

He’s the best player on the team, the pieces will fall around him. McVeigh, Zaakir and Bryson Wilson are probably out of the rotation if we make a push to be competitive in MAC play

An account trying to promote a local semi-pro basketball league is attempting to alienate the UB basketball fanbase

Yep. "Foul trouble" is always self inflicted. The refs don't get involved until 5.

Worse teams than “unprepared” Butler have slapped a basic 1-2-2 on and beat the brakes off this team so it’s progress

Chatman is good! Imagine if he had 4 fouls to give!

Sabol is still knockdown with his feet set. He’s being asked to do too much at this point in his career

It’s bad coaching. Not getting your best players on the floor is not good coaching. Possessions count the same no matter when they occur. If you don’t foul out and you sat because of “foul trouble” then you wasted some X possessions on the bench. The other major difference you might notice is that Villanova had talent in spades and UB has 2 D1 frontcourt players. If a player is fouling due to fatigue, frustration or something that can be coached it makes sense to briefly pull them. “Foul mode” is not a thing that requires sitting a half. Let’s pretend UB was playing in the MAC Championship against Ohio and the MAC decided they wanted an Ohio school to win. The MAC decides that UB’s players foul out of the first half with two fouls but Ohio’s do not. You think that’s fine? That’s what our coach’s official strategy is in a game that he is a 24 point underdog in

I think there are better shooters than their numbers but you can’t tell because the offense generates no looks for spot up shooters. Every 3 we get is off a dribble or just shooting over the top

Yeah and that’s fine for today but it’s a definite trend now. As a younger coach I would’ve hoped that was something of Jay Wright’s that he’d abandon but I guess we’re stuck with it

Halcovage’s 2 foul auto-bench is so bad

I think it's fair to be critical of the hire already. We need to stop pretending that this was just the hand that Halcovage was dealt as if it was entirely out of his hands whether or not we retained any players on the roster. The only player he retained that wasn't forced to be here due to transfer rules is Zaakir Williamson who is not a D1 caliber player. Even if we pretend that having experienced players was out of Halcovage's hands, here's a list of teams with equal or lesser minutes continuity and D1 experience, and a first year coach. 180.) Notre Dame 274.) Southern 287.) Texas A&M Corpus Christi 298.) Green Bay 318.) Valparaiso 322.) Manhattan 338.) Buffalo 341.) Northwestern St. 342.) Idaho 360.) Coppin St. 361.) North Carolina A&T Even within this specific set of parameters Halcovage is not doing a good job early compared to teams that are universally less resourced aside from Notre Dame and (maybe) Valparaiso. Alnutt hired a coach who hasn't led a program and only worked in a program that's success was predicated on 4 year guys and few incoming transfers. Is that a recipe we expect to succeed in the current basketball landscape as a mid-major? The bigger issue is where are we getting money to buy out Alnutt and hire a replacement? Then where are we getting the money to buy out these coaches and let a new hire replace them? It's not happening, Alnutt has positioned us here and we're stuck here. At some point people need to accept that UB's Top 25 seasons were flukes that we've now cut all connection to. We're not a special school that's destined for greatness, waiting for the right guy. We're UB before Oats and Leipold. We don't need guys who are doing their best in the tough circumstances of being a mid-major. We need coaches and administrators with plans to succeed in spite of that.

Sabol has grown a lot even in a month so far. I hope we keep him for 4 years lol

FWIW 3P% defense is one of the least sticky defensive metrics (i.e. over a large sample 3P% allowed is more a measure of the caliber of shooters you played than your ability to defend). UB is currently 358/362 allowing opponents to shoot 43.4% from 3. The worst team in the country allowed 41% percent last year, and shooting generally improves significantly as the season goes on. I think they're due for significant positive regression which will make the defense numbers look a bit better. That said, that would be a lot more encouraging if we were losing by 5 instead of 20.

They were missing their starting PG so we matched up well against them because we also don’t have a PG