Great discussion everyone, some excellent points made. Agreed with all, at this point we know what uguak is and it’s not helping much. There were at least two opportunities yesterday where no one was within 5 feet of him on the three point line and he just passed the ball without even attempting a pump fake to draw someone to him. He has shot poorly but boy, you won’t get a better look in college ball. Porter has said how he can nail shots in practice, you almost wonder if it’s a performance anxiety issue? If he isn’t crashing the boards, driving, or doing back door cuts what is his purpose? He does play good defense, but is it such good defense that we can basically play 4 on 5? That’s how it was yesterday, no one is scared of his shot.

At this point, Pipkins starting should be tried to see if opposing defenses would ease up a bit on Krut. Pipkins appears to at least score efficiently at times and play solid defense. Uguak has a role on the team, just think it’s as a bench guy, subbing in to bring high energy, grabbing rebounds and taking drives to the basket. Think he would be better used as a sub and may help his confidence as well as it appears he doesn’t have much left on the offensive end.

with non-conference officially over, I’m still happy about almost everyone we have on the team. I’m impressed with everyone we have and think we have a huge upside going into conference play.

Welch concerns me because I think he’s good and I don’t want him to get frustrated with a lack of playing time. If he hangs in there, he’s going to be a valuable sixth man next year, and a huge part of our team his junior year.

In fairness to Uguak, he’s not the only one concerning at this point. Williamson is yet to put together a string of games where he plays to his potential.

Clemons, pipkins and Kennedy have all settled in perfectly and are ahead of schedule in my opinion.

People on the other boards can say what they want, but I’ve watched every game and if we had all our pieces for 13 games, I think we are a 10-3 team with no blowout losses, and we are right there with UNI going into Valley play. Even a good team like Davidson masterfully schemed to shut down Krutwig and we still had the ball with 10 seconds left with a chance to take it to overtime. This is all with Williamson on the bench for a majority of the game. There are not 3 other teams in the valley that are better than Davidson. They have a strong center and the A10 player of the year at guard. If we can compete with Davidson without Williamson, we can take down every Valley team, including UNI.

I legitimately think we can go 14-4 in the Valley.

I was thinking the same thing about Welch that’s why I really hope he can see a bit more playing time in place of some of Aher’s current minutes. He was very hyped up in recruiting and I hope we don’t lose that talent due to lack of minutes. Negron struggled to get minutes and he left, I have higher expectations for Welch and don’t want the same thing to occur.

interesting discussion with important implications. The Final Four team was so blessed to have a line up where the team had multiple players with offensive and defensive skills with few weaknesses....This years team might even have much better athletes but seems like everyone has a hole...and Coach will need to do what we are trying to do ...match these guys up to get the best line up and decide whether to win offensively or defensively...which may come down to figuring out strengths and weaknesses of our opponents. Someone left out of this discussion to a great deal has been Paxon Wojcik...who at 16mpg ranks as our 3rd best offensive player behind Krut and Clemmons...also interesting is that Ugauk and Welch have 30% turnover rate...Also apparent that having Clemons in the line up has been plus plus
https://www.foxsports.com/college-baske ... team-stats

Is this contingent on Porter taking your advise and sitting Aher?

To clarify further, what is your forecast:
1) With Aher starting and playing the same number of minutes;
2) With Aher coming off the bench and playing fewer minutes.

I’m not overly concerned about Welch leaving. He’s so engaged on the bench with teammates and he hasn’t been dog housed, he’s just is a tweener that needs to work on both his guard and/or post skills to settle in. He’s come along well and after next year would be the likely choice to take the 4 spot for his junior and senior years.

Porter went out of his way to hype him up after his back to back Davidson stops. Plus the kid takes a charge, and seems to respond well to coaching. He’ll find his way as he fills out and continues to work on guard skills.

I agree Wojcik could be a big piece too. His wing span can make him a pest on defense, I’d love to see him shoot more in conference play. We really have a massive wealth of depth, and you can make the case for a lot of players getting minutes. Crazy all these pieces could potentially come back PLUS Coop, Norris, and Hebb. The lineup projections for the next 3 seasons are just fun.

I’m may just have been a bit paranoid because I’m really happy with the team that we have right now. He does seem like he’s a great team player and is buying into the system well. Between all of the new guys we got this year and the players we have coming next year it almost seems to good to be true, couldn’t be happier about the future if this team. I would like to see Wojcik shoot more as well, it’ll come with time but he’s a great all around player with a very high basketball iq. He always seems to be in the right place at the right time.

My opinion on Aher is we need some offensive plays for him to take advantage of out current lineup and their strengths and weaknesses. I think he's still kind of plugged in to do what Donte Ingram did. Aher is best when attacking the basket, and he does that best when he's got room going downhill to the basket. Draw up some plays for that, using Krut getting double or triple teamed, or Krut making room for him to drive the lane.

Also, I think Aher is a pretty good rebounder, and it might be worthwhile to use him to make an effort at offensive rebounding or put backs in some cases rather than Porter's edict to forget making an effort on rebounding jump shots.

I've noticed a lot of teams (or at least more teams that never used to do it) are setting screens for threes this year. As of today, Loyola has taken a total of 195 three point attempts, which ranks 329th among the 353 Division I teams. Our opponents have MADE 37 more threes that we have. In 9 of our 13 games, opponents have made 8 or more threes. In those nine games, Loyola is 4-5. We're 4-0 in games where opposing teams hit 7 or fewer threes. Meanwhile, we're 5-0 when we make five threes or more. We have to have that threat to open the floor.

Since getting Keith Clemons back from injury, our three point shooting has been MUCH better-- we're 4-1 overall, we're shooting 46.8% on threes (even with shooting only 26.7% against Davidson). Weird, though, that our 2 point shooting percentage has dipped a little bit.

Finally, with the speed, athleticism, quick first steps, depth, and good hands that we have this season, I'd really like to see how we can change things up with a full court or half court press every once in a while.

That's my two cents. Maybe this should be a new thread, but I couldn't decide or figure out where to split it.

My 14-4 claim isn’t so much a prediction as much as it is what I think this team can do with the adjustment to how we use Uguak. Porter is a smart coach and I think he is aware of the issue of Krutwig being stunted by opposing teams with strong enough centers to contain him with help. Uguak still is valuable and can provide solid minutes against teams without a strong center. Krut can handle double teams where he clearly outmatches his center counterpart. The issue is when a big man can jam him up a bit and then gets help from uguak’s man. There is typically 8 to 10 minutes per game when Krutwig gets a rest — this is where I think Uguak should be in the game, providing solid defense and trying to keep the opposing team’s offense at bay. This time is where I like Kennedy running clear outs and taking it to the hoop (not typical of our style, but can be a fresh offensive look mid game to confuse the defense on how to play us). The key isn’t just taking Uguak out of the game - it’s more not having him in the game for long stretches with Krut on the floor trying to spark the offense.

I’m guessing Uguak and Krut are both on the floor together about 20 minutes per game... i think it needs to be more like 10 minutes, and no longer than 3 minutes at a time (about 2 to 3 offensive possessions). This way opposing defenses can’t continually leave him alone on the arc for 5 to 6 offensive possessions (which is what I believe stalls our offense for long multi-minute periods in a game).

Again - Uguak isn’t hurting us in games like St. Joe’s where the other team doesn’t have a capable center. His passive offense hurts us against teams with strong centers like Furman and Davidson. Uguak is valuable defensively. If we are up by 6 with 2 minutes left, I want him in the game switching in and out on the defensive end, because I think he gives us the best chance to get a stop. I DONT want him in if we start the second half with no points in the first three minutes and Krut can’t get the ball down low.

But Krut plays far too consistent to think he’s the one having a bad game if he’s struggling. If he’s struggling, the other team is doing something to slow him down, and it’s never going to be a more talented center going against him alone. Keeping teams honest against Krut leads him to get 12+ points and 8 assists a game. If we can do that, we are not going to lose 5 times to teams in this league.

As long as we don’t have 3 to 4 minute scoring droughts we can win every game. If we are having those types of droughts, it’s because a team figured out how to contain Krut.

I honestly think Porter recognizes that and has been slowly building experience with our bench for conference play to fix it. There are not capable centers on all 9 other Valley teams. We beat the lower four teams in the league twice on Krut’s dominance at his position alone - that’s 8 wins. Doing what we are doing and hoping we can overcome higher teams scheming puts us at 11-7 I think. Freeing him up and making the better teams with centers play honest on defense should give us 3 more wins if we execute.