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I don't think they're playing faster than their abilities. I think they're just still adapting to a ton of new faces and a new offense. In simple terms, growing pains.

I’d say 2, they’ve really figured each other out. Emil, Victor, Beto, were new to Dyson, Malik, WKWK and Jonas. They are totally different now than in September. I do think #3 has some merit also. ND and WMU were not the same as 2023 and VCU was apparently a fraud, finished 4-5-7, and didn’t even make the A10 tournament. Not necessarily the abominations like Temple and IU Indy, when we couldn’t score, but our BE games this year we played a really talented but young Georgetown and didn’t get St John’s, Providence or Seton Hall. 5 of 8 of our BE opponents finished below .500. If you seeded the whole conference we played #4, 5, 7, 8,9, 10, 11, 12 with a combined record of 45-57-35 The next 2weeks will tell the story as the competition improves.

Can't we just go to the rec and find another one?

More BE Conference stats: The entire conference has a record of 6-30-10 in rpi quad 1 games. Quad 1 games are home games against team ranked 1-30, away games against teams ranked 1-75. Quad 2 games (home vs 31-75, away vs 76-135) Conference record 12-18-6. Zips BIg East 2024 opponents: Quad 1 : 3-24-5 Quad 2 : 7-16-3 ( Gtown has 4 of the wins) Zips record vs: Quad 1 : 1-1-2 Quad 2 : 0-0-1 Quad 3 : 6-0-1 Quad 4 : 4-2-0

Enrique appreciation post. No matter the size discrepancy, he always produced.

Where in the hell are you seeing yellow and light blue??

I worked in the athletic department back in the 2010s and Gerry was one of the nicest people I met. He was always walking around talking to everyone. He had some great stories from his time at Notre Dame and was always so grateful for his coaching opportunities.

Figured I'd share for anyone else curious. Mikal Dawson is averaging 6 PPG in 23 MPG but his shooting numbers are ugly - 5-26 from the field overall and 4-19 from 3. Good kid, hope he can turn it around. Ryan Prather Jr. is playing well early for Robert Morris, starting and leading the team in scoring. He's averaging 13 PPG and shooting a red-hot 67% from deep range. Darrion Baker is averaging 7/2 in 15 MPG for SIU Edwardsville.

I thought that it would be good ....to know which Georgetown players ...to watch out for You can see in the news release below that they had 3 Hoyas make the first team and they had 4 players selected to the 3rd team. Defender Tate Lampman was named freshman of the year and was selected to 3rd team all league. Defender Maximus Jennings was selected to the first team Midfielder Matthew Van Horn leads the Hoyas in points with 15 (6 goals and 3 assists) Van Horn was one of 3 Hoyas selected to the Big East First team Zach Zengue was their 3rd first team selection. The Big East news release shows him as a forward. Most of the Georgetown box scores list him as a midfielder Zengue was tied for 2nd in points with 11 (3 goals and 5 assists) Forward Mitchell Baker was not selected to any of the Big East teams. Baker is tied for 2nd in points with 11 (4 goals and 3 assists) I went back to the Akron vs. Georgetown box score on September 28th to see who took the majority of shots for Georgetown in that game. Most of us remember that Georgetown led Akron in shots in that game (Malik made his shot count 😎)....17-8 what I was amazed to see.....was that Georgetown had 14 different players take shots in that game. Mitchell Baker took 3 ...Zach Zengue took 2 and 12 different players had 1 shot apiece. I also looked at the Akron-Georgetown box score and compared it to their last regular season game against St. John's and their tournament game against Creighton ...to see if they had any players that started in September...but did not start in tournament game against Creighton. 3rd team Big East selection Joe Buck started and played 78 minutes against Akron. he started and played 74 minutes in last regular season game against St. Johns Joe Buck did not start against Creighton and he did not play at all. the Hoya news release says that Joe Buck started in all 17 games that he played 1st team Big East selection Matthew Van Horn is their leading points guy...but it appears that he does not ever play a full game for them Van Horn started and played 54 minutes against Akron. He started and played 55 minutes against St. John's Against Creighton, Van Horn did not start. Ended up playing about half the game...46 minutes their news release says that Van Horn started 13 out of their 18 games. Georgetown used 20 players when they lost 1-0 to Akron when Georgetown beat Creighton 1-0 , they used 19 players There is a lot of good info on their players in the Hoyas press release. The Info on Maximus Jennings really impressed me. The Georgetown team shutout their opponent in 11 out of their 18 games. Maximus Jennings First Team All-BIG EAST Jennings has started all 18 games he has appeared in and has one goal for two points on the season. On defense, the team captain is part of a backline that has posted 11 shutouts for a .611 shutout percentage which ranks the squad second in the nation and first in the BIG EAST Conference. Jennings was named the BIG EAST Defensive Player of the Week on both 9/3 and 10/14 and earned a nod to the BIG EAST Weekly Honor Roll on 10/7. This is his first-career postseason award on the Hilltop. He was a Preseason All-BIG EAST selection. https://guhoyas.com/news/2024/11/12/mens-soccer-lampman-honored-as-seven-hoyas-earn-postseason-awards.aspx

Excellent comments by @NYC ZIPand @zippy-claws Victor Gaulmin really grew in confidence and quality of play as he got more time.....gelling with the front 3. I think that the coaching staff adjustment to insert Josh Hardin as the right back...and move Malik Henry to right winger was the key coaching move of the season. Josh Hardin was not a starter in any of the first 4 games. 11 minutes in game 1. 53 minutes in game 2. 39 minutes in game 3. Josh had red card against WMU...so no minutes against Cleveland State (as NYCZIP pointed out, Beto also missed that game). Cleveland State was the game where the back line gave up several soft goals. Josh Hardin started against VCU and that was an excellent game. For some reason against IU-Indy, Ashton Kamdem only played 40 minutes with Daragh Reilly playing 43 minutes. Ashton and Josh have been an excellent pair as outside backs. Malik has also shown that he can be an excellent defender when Josh needs a break. However, Malik has been an absolute handful for other teams to handle after he was moved to Right winger. To me, an underrated change during the season is that Wan Kuzri Wan Kamal also grew in confidence during the season....and did a much better job running forward into the box. Having WKWK in the box gave the zips more options and opened more space for Emil to do his magical goal scoring.

All this to say…. Let’s go Zips!!

That's the best team the Zips will play in the regular season. Take their lumps, get back to it and move on.

The Akron Basketball Classic comes to the JAR November November 22nd through the 24th. Nebraska-Omaha, Alabama State and Lamar are the other teams in the tournament. The Zips play Lamar on the 22nd (6:00 p.m.), Nebraska-Omaha on the 23rd (4:00 p.m.) and Alabama State on the 24th (3:00 p.m.). Here's some info on the Lamar Cardinals- https://www.beaumontenterprise.com/sports/lamar/article/lamar-men-s-basketball-team-starts-new-season-19893923.php Info on the Nebraska-Omaha Mavericks- https://unomahanews.com/2024/11/06/uno-mens-basketball-season-preview-new-faces-same-spirit/ Info on the Alabama State Hornets- https://www.rockmnation.com/missouri-tigers-basketball/2024/10/8/24236000/non-con-preview-alabama-state-hornets-missouri-tigers-basketball

I thought it looked strange on TV. The royal blue makes the logo stick out, which is what we don't need. They should have painted the logo I invisible ink.

Edit: Interesting article. Thanks for sharing.

Noticed on X that there are some NLI signings occurring today. I guess it's non-football early Signing Day? Keep a look out for Tai'Ree & Josh 💪💪

Groce not having it 👀👀😂

Yes, box out! Just like Ohio Wesleyan did to us just a few days ago. They were shorter and less athletic than we are but they were sound fundamentally & it made for a decent game. Box out!!!

Likewise. I was surprised Ryan Prather & Darrion Baker transferred out and equally surprised Tavari stayed. Having said that, he is but one micro-adjustment away from averaging >10PPG... but I thought the same thing last year. He gets off good shots but doesn't (yet🤞) have that knack for getting them to fall.

Ok, let’s try this again. Where are you seeing light blue and yellow? Maybe you should see an optometrist?

He's not bringing much to the table yet. It's not like he's a plus on the defensive end either

Harris is 2024’s Xerius Williams.

Reminds me of when I used to play basketball with my son in the driveway and I was a foot and a half taller than him.

Out: WR - Adams WR - Mason WR - Walker DT - Lavea LB - Cooper S - Anderson S - David

Games on CBSSN should be outlawed

I think an important part of the gelling was very little lost time for the top 11. Beto missed two games after a dirty late tackle vs Ohio State and that was it. Ashton missed 2 games and Hardin missed one with red cards. I think that was it.

For the first time in a long time, the excitement isn't building.

I agree that #2 is my consensus. It seemed like it took about the IU-Indy match to start to see cohesiveness, but up until then the staff played a LOT of players, giving them pitch time and also seeing what they had. Once Jared settled into a tight rotation (if there even was a rotation!) play improved as players were more familiar with each other, each other's styles and personalities, etc. Just my 2 cents worth...

Can the Zips play clean game, and not simply hand it to NIU on a silver platter with fumbles, INT’s and bonehead penalties galore? If do, they can win. Some of the Zips players have obviously spent a ton of time choreographing various celebration dances and pantomimes. It’d be a shame if the couldn’t use them.

One NIL signing came in 😆

Gerry was a great man. He genuinely cared for everyone he met. I was very fortunate to get to spend some time with him over the years. As others have stated, he could tell some stories and was very funny in doing so. The world could use more Gerry's in it, not less. I feel Gerry never got the respect he deserved from us fans. If you look back, he still has the best single season in '92 going 7-3-1 since going to D1 as well has the best win % for his career here. .426 as D1 and .441 over all

I think the new offensive philosophy was brought into focus by an injured Evan Wilson on the bench in a boot during the Ohio Wesleyan. On more than one occasion I saw him up on his feet urging the team with his arm motions to get moving up the court after a defensive rebound!

We need to do better as a team of rebounding. They missed a total of 35 field goals. Of those St. Mary's got 20 offensive rebounds on their misses. That's just not a winning formula. Even if it means sacrificing fast break opportunities, we need all 5 defenders crashing the glass.

It's definitely a much, much different style of basketball than we have been playing. I agree we don't look comfortable yet, and that's led to some really ugly possessions. You just have to hope and believe they'll find it and click at some point. There's definitely a lot of talent on the roster.

Upon further review (St. Mary's 20-point loss) .... never mind.

@TennZip is an absolute stud 🫡

I noticed last year - and I'm almost positive I posted about it - that in some random pregame warmup Amani was absolutely stroking 3's. IIRC he hit 9 in a row from the corner & none of them even hit the rim. Also, after we first saw he had signed out of Columbus Beechcroft (IIRC he was a surprise late addition to the '22 class?) I remember us finding Amani's high school highlights & we thought his game looked stretch 4 - at the time we were crossing our fingers for our next Xeyrius Williams. It's good to see him start doing that at this level! He could be quite a weapon in the MAC - but, as someone mentioned above, right now it looks like we really need him banging down low.

https://www.the-daily-record.com/story/opinion/editorials/2024/11/11/ohio-shrinking-population-solutions-needed/75839793007/ Editorial about Ohio's projected population shrinkage.

So Lyles is a shooter now? Cool

JD Brookhart just joined The Summit Circle 👀🙌💪🫡

I really liked the guy, he was very friendly. I bet he was a great fundraiser judging how he talked to people. An awesome big time high school coach/recruiter, a lot of us thought he could translate that to college football. He was a very nice man. Maybe too nice to be involved with big time college ball. Maybe that’s been Akrons problem, hiring great guys who aren’t ultra seedy recruiters. Rest In Peace Coach

Have to win games consistently to get students and the city remotely interested. Can't do that with the way the AD has scheduled over the past 7-10 years. It's a chicken and egg debate.

"The Boys played hard!" was his standard response first thing out of the box at press conferences. I used to enjoy talking to him at Green Hills Golf Course in Brimfield where he "worked" as a starter after The U. What stories! He would always stop where I was at basketball or football games and say Hi and kibbitz for a time. Great Guy.

One of the nicest human beings I've ever met during my time around Akron. Genuinely kind and sincere person. He will be missed.

That's the bigger annoyance to me - insisting on Zippy being female rather than androgynous.

I understand it was a personal fit issue, not grades. Furman is a university named after a Baptist pastor with a school motto of "Christo et Doctrinae" which translates to "For Christ and Learning." That had to be quite a transition from the Portage County School of Animal Husbandry.

This incident was blown way out of proportion. The fingers in question were not even from the Club Level. I brought them into the stadium after finding them in a big container behind the KFC. However, I did get some special recognition out of the misunderstanding; kind of an honorary tittle. From now on the stadium security guy told me, I am "persona non grata" there." Pretty cool.

Every kid in attendance gets a free beer and a pack of smokes.