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Thornton and Scott have been less that expected. They're also not getting many minutes, each averaging less that 20 minutes a game. It takes a while to build Groce's trust and become an important part. Right now, he's going with the guys he trusts and that's why Tribble is playing the point (he's always going to be on the floor whether or not he's the point). When LCJ left, we lamented our point guard play until X hit his stride. When Big Dog graduated, we lamented the drop off in post play. When McLaughlin left, we missed the great point guard play. When Joe Jakubick left, we missed high scoring guard play. I suspect when Len Paul graduated, we probably missed top notch small forward play. Now we're missing X's play. You always miss the play and contribution of legends. Scott and Thornton have career three point percentages that are nearly identical to the Zips average this year. I'll be more worried if they haven't settled in by the end middle of February.

Looks like these are the 2024 spring opponents for the Zips. Good competition to get the guys going and try to put it together. The other division is Butler, Xavier, Louisville, Ohio State, and Marshall.

I'm not confident it will make it through the day!

Mike Dawson has not been able to get into the flow following his first few games. He is shooting 32% from the field and from 3pt. If you take away those first few games it's even worse. Thornton and T Johnson have not show any kind of consistency. Neither has shown the ability to take the ball to the basket and shoot or dish to the open man. They are too prone to turnovers and defensive lapses. We lack a ball handler who can break the press or get open on inbounds plays without drama. Teams with big athletic front courts have given us trouble. We have size but not strength. I like our odds of winning the MAC but it won't be pretty. Lots of close games grinding out wins.

Agreed. I thought Chambers seemed solid as a RT, but was sometimes out of his depth at LT. Kindred definitely has more natural ability. I think the HS OL recruiting has been strong and we need those guys to become regular contributors soon. Landers, Williams, and Davis already have (did) from the first class. Would like to think James, Morris, and Mann will do the same in 2024. while Williams and Davis continue to progress. Unfortunately, there’s just no quick fix to the OL. Year 3 should prove to be the best (although that may not be saying much) in JoeMo’s tenure. I think we’re two in vs two out on scholarship OL and have offered over 20 portal OL. So have to think at least a few more guys are on their way out.

Dawson had big games against SD State and UNLV. He finished strong is 2021-22. The talent is there, the consistency just isn't though.

I hate to be pessimistic but without a true point guard I still think we will struggle at times as we did on the last play with St. Bony. Scott & Thornton have been ok at best. If Groce had any faith in them they would have been handling the ball on the last play. Tribble is not a true point guard and does not have a great outside shot. Tavari went from being a starting point guard to playing just a couple of minutes a game. His confidence must be shot and of all the guards is probably the worst defender because of his size. Ali is a small forward playing guard. Groce is putting his 5 best players on the floor because they play good defense but at times there is no flow because we do not have a true point guard that can handle the ball, distribute, and shoot. We know what X did for this team the last few years and that piece is sorely missing from this team.

I should have mentioned that with the attempts to get him minutes at the point last year behind X, I really thought Tavari would be a factor. I wasn't expecting huge stats, but I thought he would be someone that could come in an make some open 3's when called upon. That ship appears to have sailed.

Again advocating for Thornton, he has never been much of a scorer. Last year he averaged 8.8 PPG(career high) and shot 41.8% (career high). This year he is averaging 46.2% on 12 fewer minutes per game. He also has a 2.3 Assist to Turnover ratio this year, up from 1.65 from last year. Groce has commended Thornton the last few games, he just doesn’t get the minutes down the stretch

More likely, other factors came to light.

Yup that's him. That would make sense.

Kamron Payne from the Dayton area posted on his IG that he committed. His mom posted it in the Akron Football Fans Facebook group. I know absolutely nothing about him. Maybe @catdaddyp can shed some light.

I disagree 100% with this take in regards to Groce over coaching. The prior seasons under Groce the Zips have had excellent veteran guard play and in crunch time, Coach let them run the offense usually without taking a time out. He knew they would make the right decisions and either take the game winning shot or get the ball to an open teammate. This year the Zips backcourt is mostly brand-new players that have not played well and have not shown any ability to create their own shot or a shot for others hence the timeouts to set up the right play. Unfortunately, the Zips didn't execute out of the timeouts against the Bonnies. Several times this year, they have. See the wins over SDSU, Southern Miss and Bradley. They also have some tough losses as well. It is going to be a season of growth. You may not be aware that Ali Ali had to sit out the first 8 games this year waiting for the NCAA to approve a transfer request that had been in for months which has further hindered the Zips cohesiveness on the court. Enrique dislocated his thumb in the second half which is why the play was probably not drawn up for him giving even more need for a TO.

I agree 100% with the talent being there but he has way too many games where he is a non-factor in every phase of the game. After the SDSU game I thought we found the missing piece. I hope we do before we head back to Cleveland.

Interesting, but I don't care that much. He can be someone else's problem.

I’d like to see someone overtake Chambers. He’s played a lot due to injuries, but has really been pegged as a back up his whole career. Him starting this year feels like it would be a necessity rather than earned. I’d hope at least Kindred would be able beat him out if we don’t bring in someone else. Would also like to bring in another interior OL for depth at the very least. Also as time goes on, our holes being filled should start to come from HS recruits more and more. We’ve had a few already like Williams, Davis, McCoy, and Marcus Moore and Norton to an extent. But them stepping up along with others like Kaiwan Murphy, David Jester, Zayden Laing-Taylor, etc should go a long way.

Buyers remorse by BSU.

My best guess if it was a grades issue, they may not trust that he will return and keep things in good standing. Might also be an admissions issue if grades were a problem before? I also assume the staff is high on James and Morris. If Blanchard comes back healthy and one of the two redshirt freshmen are ready for significant snaps, we should be fine there. That’s a lot of “ifs” though.

Something is off here. Felt like a situation where, at bare minimum, it was a mutual agreement for him to leave. Seeming more and more like that.

They play hard and appear to be giving their best effort, but neither provides any threat of offense. Other teams lay off of them and neither has shown they can regularly hit an outside shot consistently. We got spoiled watching X and LCJ these past years, but as of this post there is not PG on this team even close to being a regular offensive contributor.

They got some dudes ... Hill, Agee and Spurgin would start on every team in the MAC ... outside of Akron .... and Hill would start at Akron, too.

If they play like they did in the Cotton Bowl we might have a shot…

As much as I hate Mr. Pinky he always seems to have the Flushes in the mix. As for NIU and BG I'll have to see it to believe it. NIU has played a less than stellar schedule and has dropped 5 or their last six, beating only Calumet College, an NAIA program. BG just never seems to get there. Maybe a change at the helm helps, but their schedule has been pretty damn weak.

I'm not sure I'm ready to put BG at #3. They have 9 wins, but look at their schedule. Until I see them win some conference games, I'd be more worried about Kent and Ohio.

After playing against a lot of size yesterday, hopefully we'll be prepared for it Tuesday.

Here's NIU's starting five from their last game and their stats going in: G- David Coit (5'11", 175, 17.5 ppg, 3.8 rpg, 3.8 apg, 1.1 spg, 42.2 FG%, 33.3 3FG%) G- Philmon Gebrewhit (6'7", 190, 9.5 ppg, 2.0 rpg, 1.9 apg, 36.1 FG%, 26.3 3FG%) F- Zarique Nutter (6'7", 200, 15.7 ppg, 5.1 rpg, 2.4 apg, 55.5 FG%, 46.2 3FG%) F- Xavier Amos (6'8", 215, 11.6 ppg, 6.1 rpg, 1.0 apg, 55.9 FG%, 44.1 3FG%) C- Yanic Konan Niederhauser (6'11", 255, 8.5 ppg, 5.7 rpg, 64.3 FG%, 28.6 3FG%) That's some decent size.

Wouldn't Aziz Bandaogo and Jermaine Marshall be looking awfully good in blue & gold right now? 😩 I like Shammah more than Garvin Clarke... but barely. I've been rather disappointed in him honestly. Love his defense (I liked Clarke's defense). I do think Shammah finishes better at the rim than Garvin, is more athletic and a better ball handler. You stole my words in regards to Nate. He's playing with veterans & it just doesn't doesn't look like he feels like a team leader. Hopefully next season he'll take a big jump when he's the locker room veteran. But I don't know if we're a deep team, or not. It's been quite the disappointment that none of Tavari, Lyles, or Prather appear to be at all serviceable at this level. I had relatively high hopes for Tavari coming into the year but he's yet to duplicate last year's early season game vs. Nevada. That was a long time ago now. And that Nevada team was as good & athletic as any team we've faced since. Weird.

St Bona alum from Akron here — not to gloat but to say we know this was a tough loss for Zips Nation. Like most of our fans, I too have tremendous respect for the Zips. The banter on our fan board is that this is a big win for us. I’ve been a Zips admirer dating back to the Huggins years, and hope to get to a couple games soon. Both teams battled hard, especially on D. As Groce said “it sucks to lose” a game like this because he knows it would have been a quality W. The refs were horrible for both teams which hurt the flow of the offenses. They called the wimpy contact but missed some major body bangs. Bonnies had a 10-4 foul disadvantage at one point of the first half. Our little PG Tyrell Luc had a breakaway dunk and got undercut, fell hard to the ground. No call. You had a guy get blasted on a drive and no call. The Zips are the best team in the MAC. We fans are always blasting the head coach when we feel a close one got away. If you shoot better from the line today we all know that your coach is getting accolades and not ridicule. Zips battled from 10 down in the first half and 8 down in the second half against an SBU defense that held potent #6 FAU to 64 points on 40% shooting and 25% from deep. Our offense is as deep and as potent as you will face this season … and we struggled and scratched for every point. Our 5th year PG made a stupidly ridiculous shot over Freeman’s 7-2 wing span, and then our best defender Evans got a big deflection on the inbounds play to disrupt your final play. It’s the smallest of margins. Would love to have the Zips and Bonnies play again in the near future. Olean NY is a lovely place this time of year to see a college game. Good luck in conference play. Hope to see both teams in March at the big dance!

Very tough non conference as planned by Groce. I think it definitely challenged the team as well as Groce himself. Nobody in the MAC had that many battles like we did. We will see how the guards perform and check back in February.

We have 2 P5 guys coming in this week. We need at least 1 to commit.

After halftime the refs apologized to Groce for missing the obvious foul on Tribble. Probably should have been a flagrant too.

What's going on here? Did I wander into the land of the trolls?

The deflection on that inbounds pass completely threw off that final play and turned it into 1 on 5 basketball. They need to work to transitioning into an effective on the fly play sometimes rather than go to the timeout, especially against a good defensive team.

It's Groce. G-R-O-C-E. If you're going to be an ass, use proper spelling. Groce doesn't "over-coach". The succession rate of the plays he calls during timeouts can be questioned, but that's an execution issue - not an over-coaching issue. We are lacking guard play, you are correct, which means Groce should absolutely be calling timeouts to draw up plays and make sure the team is on the same page. If you have a solid floor general, those timeouts aren't as necessary. The name of the game is putting the ball in the hoop more often than your opponent. We simply didn't do that. One of the guards needs to figure out how to step up as a scorer next to Freeman, Ali Ali, and Tribble. We were right there at the end with one of the most experienced teams in the country. Pretty good showing that will sharpen our March iron. You should worry about scoring more than 3 points against Missouri; leave the Akron criticism to us Akron fans.

Feeling supremely confident regarding the Zips chances for an upset next fall! osu 🦨 🦘💪🏽

Gathings is apparently backing out of his signing with Ball St (or they aren’t taking him).