Some thoughts on the game tonight

[ricko654321]

1) Law had an excellent game in many respects. He's developed as a driver and scorer, and is shooting well from 3 and the FT line. Also played very good D on Bliznyuk when Sanjay was out. But... he needs to improve his court vision. I'm not expecting BMac level, but there were 3-4 occasions where someone was open under the basket and he didn't find them. Most obvious was that 3 on 1 where he went right at the defender instead of dumping it to Scottie for an easy dunk. Still though, impressive game.

2) Pardon had a solid overall game too. He has long arms and reach, he's got like suction cups on his hands on balls that come near him near the basket. He's clearly been working on his D - less wild with his arms, moves his feet more, reducing the fouls. He still has some work to do, but moving in the right direction.

3) Brown- first chance I've had to see him play. He's got a quick first step and natural release on offense and likes to shoot, which is good. Shades of Tre Demps in terms of his offensive attitude, which is nice given we just lost him. Impressive for him to play his way into the rotation so fast. And some people had questioned his defense - honestly it was just one game, but I didn't see anything that made me have issues on that side of the ball. He took a few chances on steals, but moved his feet well and has good athleticism to contest shots. I don't think he's any worse than BMac on D. Not near as long as Lindsey or Law, but he's less arm / handsy than Lindsey is. My only criticisms for him on O are he forced a few shots today, and he also needs to keep his head up more, especially if he's going to play minutes at backup PG. Missed a couple opportunities for layup assists.

4) Lindsey is clearly progressing on defense, and looks more confident on offense too. Thought his best shot of the game was the one where the clock was running down and he took it to the left elbow to make it with the guy in his face. Solid on FTs too. Him and Law for balance will be huge.

5) BMac is still BMac, which is great news. He is prob even a little bit better. He does seem to have worked on his D, though he still got caught on a couple pump fakes. The commentators rightly noted how he always kept his dribble going to later create shots a few times, and also he did a good job of taking advantage of mismatches on screen switches.

6) Sanjay- I just love when he gets into man-to-man shutdown mode on defense. We stuck him on Bliznyuk whenever he was in, and he was a gamechanger on the defensive end of the floor in the second half. I don't think he gave up one easy shot, and did a great job of moving his feet rather than his hands and avoiding fouls. You can tell that he gives the rest of a team a motivational lift with his energy and intensity on defense, every time he gets a stop everyone on the court is fired up. Plus if he can play defensive stopper then it frees Vic up to have more energy available for offense.

7) Skelly looks like he's been improving generally, but just didn't have some things go his way tonight. I like him though. He should have had a couple more buckets if his teammates would've found him.

Couple general thoughts...
- They make great use of pump fakes. We looked like we were set to defend the 3 early and were giving up the drive. Later we adjusted. But they still did a lot of Tim Doyle style moves in the paint to get looks at the basket. We should prob be a bit more disciplined about not jumping at those.
- Our FT shooting has improved across the board
- Looks to me like there has been a conscious effort to focus on moving our feet on defense and not using our hands. We seem to have collectively adjusted a bit to how the game is called with the handchecking rules now a days (especially early in the season). Our guys very frequently had their hands clearly up in the air and away from the player, to signify to the refs that they were using their feet and bodies.
- We have quite a few more guys that can create a shot off the dribble now, which is nice. Hope that's still the case when we play B1G defenses...
- Same comment about our rebounding tonight - that will get tougher when we get into conference play.

Anyways, some work to be done on defense, and hope our guys keep their heads up more on offense. But I love the pace and energy we played with. And we ran into a team that was sharp offensively and shot well today, and we weathered their runs and hot streaks and never really let them get within imminent striking distance. So nice work.

For the moment, I'll stand by my 8-10 guess for conference record. Lots of bball left to be played, should be fun!

Go Cats

 

[Catreporter]

This was a very physical game. EWU didn't have a big center but they had good size at all positions and at least two guys that could start for a lot of BIG teams. Nice win and great preparation for Butler Wednesday night. This is a very fun team to watch.

 

[Walker Fan]

Thoughts on the game:
1. Law is the leader on offense and defense. His athleticism makes a huge difference. Still not in great game shape.
2. Brown is the real deal. Took a charge and made a steal and very talented on offense even though he forced some shots. But we need him to force the action or create on offense
3. Skelly is having problems guarding back to the basket players but has a great passing touch and grabs weak side rebounds well and has a strong basketball IQ. Great to see a real power forward play at NU
4. McIntosh played well but needs to assert himself more on offense. Still will get abused by bigger PGs like at OSU
5. Need Falzon as a scoring option. Hopefully, his health issues improve so he can hit some key buckets v. Butler.
6. Lindsey made some big plays on offense and defense but coasts at times. Collins' frustration with his game is clearly apparent at times. But then he made a huge basket with the game on the line. Tough to guage his game with his inconsistent play but is playing better than last year
7. Taphorn, Ash, Falzon and Benson were non factors tonight. Played only 7 man rotation
8. So now we know we have a 12th and 13th scholarship available

 

[TheC]

My thoughts:

1. NU got out to a hot start and EWU looked a little intimidated. I think that got into our heads as we let up on the defensive end and started doing too much one-on-one on the offensive end. That allowed EWU to crawl back into it (or at least stem the blow-out). That allowed EWU gain confidence. You could see it. They got a lot more aggressive after the first 10 minutes or so.

2. Law is a stud. He is only going to get better as the year progresses. He'll make those dunks he missed tonight once he's back in better bball shape. But his shooting to go along with his length is so damn exciting. We have never had a player like that at NU.

3. BMac is just steady. There was a point in the 2nd half where EWU was within single digits and threatening to cut the lead into scary territory and BMac just took over. He is our leader.

4. Sanjay will play a lot of minutes for us. He is our best defender by far. That Bliznyuk guy was kind of having his way with Law, but Sanjay absolutely shut him down in the 2nd half. If he can hit the occasional open three, then I think you have to have him in there to stop the other team's wing guys.

5. Pardon played a pretty nice game. When he blocked that shot late in the game that was whistled for a foul, I was shocked to hear it was only his second foul. For as much as he played and as active as he was on the floor, I thought he would have had way more fouls. He seems to have his body under control a lot better so far. The depth behind him is a problem though. Benson is not ready it would seem. And Skelly can't really play that position. He was fouling every five seconds it seemed. He is a high energy player, but he just doesn't have the size and/or foot speed to be effective spelling Pardon. But.... we may not have a choice.

6. Isaiah Brown is going to be important this year. He will need to spell BMac from time to time to keep him fresh. Brown's job is to simply keep the game in check while BMac rests. He may not run the offense as well as BMac, but he can create a couple baskets all on his own which may be enough to keep the game at status quo while BMac catches his breath.

7. The curse of the Cats continues. We thought we had made our sacrifice for the season with Rap, but this Falzon situation is starting to worry me. This is a guy who scored 20 on opening night a year ago and now he is basically non-existent. The couple minutes he was out there, you could tell something was not right. He couldn't move well on either end. We need him to stretch the floor and open things up for Vic, BMac and Lindsey.

8. Final point.... the man-to-man defense (outside of Sanjay) worries me again. I am not sure what it is exactly, but I think our guys are not doing a good job rotating over to help each other out. Man to man is all about help and recover and I don't see our guys doing that enough. Not sure if our man-to-man will work against the more athletic teams.

 

[catfans5]

I think by B10, Brown will be starting. He is a scorer. We will need that which would put 3 slashers on the floor.

We will play lots of zone. We have a big hole in middle. We do not have a power forward.

 

[JournCat]

All good observations. I'd add just two:

- Pardon spent most of the first 30 minutes trying to establish post position and not getting the ball. The game never seemed in doubt, but I thought the turning point was a possession out of timeout where Pardon got the ball inside, drew a foul and sank two FTs, which he followed with two more FGs. He doesn't have Olah's post skills yet, but he can score on pick and rolls and movement inside.

- Law is one of the best athletes I've seen play for NU MBB. His agility and quickness are fun to watch in person. He did a nice job defending Bliznyuk in the second half and could be our best player on both sides of the floor.

 

[HawkCat]

- Law is one of the best athletes I've seen play for NU MBB. His agility and quickness are fun to watch in person. He did a nice job defending Bliznyuk in the second half and could be our best player on both sides of the floor.

I agree that Law is a fantastic player for us. But I'm pretty sure that Lumpkin guarded and shut down Bliznyuk for most of the second half. Whoever guarded the guy in the first half got pretty much abused. Lumpkin is limited offensively, but is almost certainly our best defender.

 

[JournCat]

Law definitely guarded him on several possessions in the second half. I think Lumpkin is a better defender, but Law isn't that far behind with only a season of experience so far.

 

[ricko654321]

My thoughts:

1. NU got out to a hot start and EWU looked a little intimidated. I think that got into our heads as we let up on the defensive end and started doing too much one-on-one on the offensive end. That allowed EWU to crawl back into it (or at least stem the blow-out). That allowed EWU gain confidence. You could see it. They got a lot more aggressive after the first 10 minutes or so.

2. Law is a stud. He is only going to get better as the year progresses. He'll make those dunks he missed tonight once he's back in better bball shape. But his shooting to go along with his length is so damn exciting. We have never had a player like that at NU.

3. BMac is just steady. There was a point in the 2nd half where EWU was within single digits and threatening to cut the lead into scary territory and BMac just took over. He is our leader.

4. Sanjay will play a lot of minutes for us. He is our best defender by far. That Bliznyuk guy was kind of having his way with Law, but Sanjay absolutely shut him down in the 2nd half. If he can hit the occasional open three, then I think you have to have him in there to stop the other team's wing guys.

5. Pardon played a pretty nice game. When he blocked that shot late in the game that was whistled for a foul, I was shocked to hear it was only his second foul. For as much as he played and as active as he was on the floor, I thought he would have had way more fouls. He seems to have his body under control a lot better so far. The depth behind him is a problem though. Benson is not ready it would seem. And Skelly can't really play that position. He was fouling every five seconds it seemed. He is a high energy player, but he just doesn't have the size and/or foot speed to be effective spelling Pardon. But.... we may not have a choice.

6. Isaiah Brown is going to be important this year. He will need to spell BMac from time to time to keep him fresh. Brown's job is to simply keep the game in check while BMac rests. He may not run the offense as well as BMac, but he can create a couple baskets all on his own which may be enough to keep the game at status quo while BMac catches his breath.

7. The curse of the Cats continues. We thought we had made our sacrifice for the season with Rap, but this Falzon situation is starting to worry me. This is a guy who scored 20 on opening night a year ago and now he is basically non-existent. The couple minutes he was out there, you could tell something was not right. He couldn't move well on either end. We need him to stretch the floor and open things up for Vic, BMac and Lindsey.

8. Final point.... the man-to-man defense (outside of Sanjay) worries me again. I am not sure what it is exactly, but I think our guys are not doing a good job rotating over to help each other out. Man to man is all about help and recover and I don't see our guys doing that enough. Not sure if our man-to-man will work against the more athletic teams.

Thanks. Agree with most all of this, only a couple small thoughts in response.
- I don't think Law did poorly on D, Sanjay was excellent on Bliznyuk, Law did decently. Most of his points in the first half to my eyes came against Skelly and a couple times they got guards onto him on switches (like BMac).
- I think Skelly generally defends his position pretty well, he just drew a tough matchup and a guy that was hot. I don't think he played poor 1 on 1 D, he just got beaten by good O a couple times. And the fouls called against him were largely ticky tack, not like he wasn't moving his feet. Also, when we play bigger slower guys in conference we will need his bulk, especially if when Pardon gets in foul trouble (thinking vs Purdue and Md most obviously here).
- I like Brown, but I don't think he will or should start. Opening the game with two guards that are somewhat defensively vulnerable in some way seems a bad idea to me, don't want to dig a hole for ourselves. I like Lindsey to start at 2, and Brown to play 15 ish minutes depending on the game as an offensive spark and to spell BMac at point.

Edit: just noticed the Brown starting comment wasn't yours, sorry

 

[Katatonic]

Too many have dismissed the importance of Lumpkin's D.

Last season, really missed Law's D; this season, Law needs to be the offensive scoring leader w/ BMac, including attacking the basket. So far, so good.

Brown is a bit too, shall we say, enthusiastic, at times, but gotta love that kid's fearlessness in driving to the basket.

Just a couple of games under his belt, but the kid shows a lot of promise.

Doubt that Brown will start; having BMac and Brown as the backcourt is too limited defensively unless the matchup fits (smaller opposing guards).

When Brown is playing the 1, maybe we'll see CC put Law at the 2-spot, Lumpkin at 3 and Falzon (when healthy) at 4.

Speaking of Falzon, hope the knee injury is something that he can completely get healthy this season. And we know that Falzon can hit the 3, need to see him improve his D and add a little more variety to his offense (Shurna had more game than just hitting the 3).

CC had something along the lines of essentially having 8 starters.

Maybe a little tongue-and-cheek, but aside from the current starting 5, seems to me that the other 3 would be Brown, Skelly and Falzon (when healthy).

BB needs work, but he'll see his minutes when the 'Cats start playing teams w/ some big boys.

 

[backdoorpass]

Great comments by all. I just want to add how impressed I have been with Scottie Lindsey. Through the first two games, Scottie has basically played as many minutes as Law and BMac, while making big shots, leading the team in rebounding, making all his free throw attempts, dishing out 8 assists and adding a couple steals and a blocked shot. Huge step up from last season!

Going into the season, the backcourt--both the starting shooting guard and the backup point guard--were areas of concern for most. After two games, I feel really good about the prospect of a solid backcourt rotation with BMac, Lindsey and Brown (and a little Law).

Looking forward to a big game tonight by the whole team at Butler! Go 'Cats!

 

[NJCat]

One note on Dererk: in the post-game interview, Collins said Dererk recently had pneumonia and lost 15 pounds. He is only now regaining his weight and his stamina. I suspect we will see continued improvement from him as he gets better.