by bluejayfan00 » Sat Dec 30, 2023 4:42 pm
My issue with this loss is the bigger picture. Sure, there is no shame in losing to top 10 Marquette on the road. But context matters. A lot of the same mistakes keep happening over and over again. This season, and dating back multiple seasons.
-First time we've started 0-2 in the league since 14-15. That team at least played hard ALL the time and had an excuse to be playing poorly.
-Inexcusable home loss to Villanova after leading by 14.
-Basketball is a game of runs, but this game was winnable. We were up 14-3. From that moment on, Marquette dominated the game. The only reason it was so close was because how poorly they shot it in the first half.
- I hate to pile on the guy, but Ashworth was a huge miss. He seems like a great dude and a great teammate, but he hasn't had a positive impact on winning.
- Lawson was a massive miss.
- The point above goes into this one, we have little to no bench when we play good competition. King is meh. For as much crap as I give Kalk, the game completely changes with King in. We can't go into next season with him as the starting 5 and expect good results. Traudt is a heck of a shooter, doesn't provide much else. Farabello is basically a taller Tyler Clement. May not kill you, but he's just out there.
- Trey isn't the player we all thought he was or could be. He's still a damn good player, but he isn't an alpha, #1 type on a Final Four contender good.
- IDK where we'd be without Baylor, but even he has his limitations and we ask him to do too much sometimes.
- We miss R2, and he misses us.
- We miss Art.
-I've said this dozens of times, but the roster construction makes no sense to me. We are one dimensional, and unathletic. Prior to 2016-ish, I had the same complaint. Then, we brought in guys who not only were athletic, but also had a little bit of an edge to them. Athleticism and an edge is something this team doesn't have. Guys like Mo, Foster, Khyri, JP, MZ, TSA, DJ, Mahoney, CB, R2, Art, AOC, etc. I could go on, you get the point. All those guys were either of a different athletic profile than we currently have, or had more of edge to them. Neither of those things are things that can be coached. We seem to have reverted back to focusing only on skill. Listen, I don't want to play 54-50 games and be offensively inept. Skill/shooting is important. But, we're offensively inept a lot of the time this year anyways, so what's the difference? Might as well get some guys who can defend, rebound, slash, and also tell someone on the other team to F off every once and again. We still have a lot to play for this year, but it's hard not to look forward to next year and be concerned. We will lose every heavy contributor off this years team besides Miller/Traudt. We bring in 3 highly touted freshman, but only one of them seems to have a play style that's unique from what we already have on the roster.
I get anytime you criticize our players or Mac, the majority of the fanbase gets upset and calls you crazy, but whatever. They're not above criticism. Facts are facts. On one hand, Mac has done a really good job elevating this program. We had never gotten to a Sweet 16 as a Valley school. He got us to one, and an Elite 8. But a lot of people are just content with that. He's been here 14 years and has a Sweet 16 appearance and an Elite 8. Coming off our run last year, we should have been able to capitalize on that and improve our roster and our standing in the college basketball world. Instead, as of now, looks like we took a step back. And a lot of the issues we complain about with this years team aren't issues that are unique to this core/group. IDK, maybe we're spoiled and need to understand our place in this sport. But, I want more, and I felt like coming off of last seasons run we had a great opportunity to build on it.