kreed5120

Akron was 9-0 last year in MAC play at home and 4-5 on the road. 4 of the 5 teams we lost to on the road we beat at home (Toledo we never played at home). There is no denying the fact the Zips have built a home court advantage at the JAR. That success I'd guess would transfer to a new arena. New arena or not I don't see that being the reason teams won't come play at Akron. Oregon State really hasn't been a great basketball program since the late 80s and Kent had to do a 2 for 1 to get them to agree to come to Kent for a game. Bigger name schools won't agree to come to Akron for the same reason Akron wouldn't agree to go to play at Coppin State. They feel it is beneath them. Our best hope to get a Purdue or Iowa State to agree to play at the JAR is we have it built into the 1 and done football contract. Personally as a general admission STH that breaks out to $4 per game it's kind of hard for me to bitch about who we play at home. I can see how those of you that pay $400-$1000+ could be disappointed not seeing higher level competition.

I'm looking forward to hearing the national TV guys that have absolutely no exposure to the MAC coming in. At least the other MAC announcers will recognize some of the faces.

Where in my statement did I say I wasn't enjoying this season? All teams should be looking to improve as the season progresses so they are peaking at the right time. This team might have more improvement needed than some Akron teams of recent past, but that doesn't mean I don't think they can compete in the MAC this year.

I agree we made a few too many unforced errors. I'm glad to see Antino and Noah finally came around on offense. Georgia Southern and in particular Air Force should provide to be tougher tests. Just keep working on improving week to week and hopefully we are performing at our best come that final weekend in Cleveland.

With Kwan and Big Dog leaving at the end of this season there certainly will be minutes that will need to be filled.

I wouldn't read too much into Poke playing the 5 for a brief moment last night. Big Mike was battling foul trouble most of the night and Radford was pretty undersized themselves. Between Big Dog and Big Mike I wouldn't expect for him to get many minutes playing there this season.

I wouldn't really call Georgia Tech prominent. They've made a grand total of 1 Sweet 16 this century and haven't made the tourney since 2010. To Joe Akron they are no different than Arkansas, USC, or Penn State, all teams Akron has beaten in the recent past. Gonzaga is actually a school Joe Akron knows for being good. I'd rather have them on my schedule than Georgia Tech.

Gonzaga and Creighton (our money games) are both much better teams than a Georgia Tech team that is expected to finish last in the ACC. Akron needs to improve it's OOC scheduling, but OU has probably the worst OOC schedule in the entire MAC. Don't believe me, look for yourself. http://www.bobcatattack.com/basketball/schedule.asp

I'm scared for next season when we lose Big Dog and Kwan and will be led by Antino and Robotham...

Preferably I like Ivey at the 3 as he looks like our best option so far. I wasn't understanding what you were getting at that somehow getting taller at the 3 would help Big Dog on the offensive end because bringing in someone that is taller but less talented doesn't make us better. I don't understand why you want to pull Ivey when he is excelling at the 3 spot and move him further away from the basket so that he would have to create more of his own shots and won't be in a position to get as many boards. The teams real issue is that Noah and Antino have played below what they are capable of. I'd like to see Josh get more minutes at the 2 instead of the 3 and would like to see Antino get more minutes running the point coming in to spell Robotham. We have more depth at guard than we do at SF so I don't see why we would want to move our best SF to SG. There are only 80 minutes of guard play to go around per game. If Antino, Noah, and Josh split them equally, that is 26.66 minutes per game for each of them. Who are you going to bench to clear minutes for Ivey to play guard? I will concede it would be nice to get someone else to emerge that could provide ~10 minutes per game to backup Ivey at the 3 so Williams could solely be a 2 guard.

How exactly is getting taller going to eliminate the offensive burden on Big Dog when the guys that are taller than Ivey that could play the 3 haven't shown the ability to hit shots? If anything staying small and keeping Williams at the 3 will force teams to respect the outside shooter and not cheat to double Big Dog. I think you are looking at the heights too much and not looking at how big someone plays. Reggie at 6'7 last year averaged 4 rebounds per game and had only 1 game last year of 9 or more boards. 81% of his shot attempts came from 3 and he rarely got offense in the paint. Ivey plays much bigger by attacking the basket for rebounds and gets to the rim on offense. What he lacks in height, he makes up for in athleticism.

I agree people getting physical copies of newspapers is dying, but there will always be a need for someone to provide local community news. I'd expect the online presence to continue to grow. Newspapers will eventually rely on online ad revenue as their main source of income and they would need to grow their coverage area to produce more web clicks.

Starting Williams at the 2 and Ivey at the 3 makes our height just fine for the MAC. Ohio looks to be our stiffest competition. Their starting 5 comes in at 388 inches. Our starting 5 of Noah/Williams/Ivey/Kwan/Big Dog would be 387 inches. This isn't the NBA. You don't need a 6'4 2 guard and a 6'7 SF.

Ivey might be listed as a guard, but he has SF written all over him. He is a rounded player with length who attacks the rim and gets to the charity stripe. He said in the post game interview that he actually played the 4 in high school and he does have some post moves we haven't seen yet. Game 1: 14 points, 9 boards, 2 assists, 1 steal Game 2: 12 points, 11 board, 1 assist We have a SF averaging 10 rebounds for us. I want to keep him in a position to create these extra possessions for us.

If you are starting Ivey at the 2 and having Williams and Antino coming off the bench, who are you starting at the 3? Personally this is how I'd like to see it shake out. Start Noah at the 1, Williams at the 2, Ivey at the 3, Kwan at the 4, and Big Dog at the 5. Use Antino as a combo guard off the bench so he would backup both Williams and Noah.

Antino really needs to step it up. In the 1st 2 games he is a combined 4/15 shooting for a total of 9 points, 4 boards, 2 assists, and 4 turnovers. I was glad to see Ivey produce. He had a clear path fast break dunk waved off for traveling. He's got to be more mindful of those things, but it was nice to see some transition offense for once.

That's a big reason why I was telling you I didn't like white numbers on white jerseys a week or 2 back. IK they would be hard to read.

I haven't looked at a boxscore, but watching live dare I say Kwan was our best player of the 1st half. Big Dog needs to do a better job of finishing at the rim and we need to hit those open looks from 3. We should be up more than 8 right now.

Son of a b****. I just burned my last like for the day leaving me none for the game thread. So worth it though.

I agree that's probably how the discussion went. Woodson has shown enough when healthy that I can't see his job being in jeopardy. The back-up job and 2018 starter role would have to be earned, not just given to someone.

Kwan is a very streaky shooter. He had some really good shooting nights and some really poor nights last season (against YSU he was somewhere in between shooting 41.6%). If we had perimeter players that could actually stay in front of their man, I could see perhaps giving Kwan a shorter leash on those nights he clearly isn't feeling it. The fact is so often times Kwan is our only line of defense against an easy lay-up/dunk after our perimeter players get beat off the dribble.

Big Dog put up a 17 7 5 on 6/10 shooting in 26 minutes of play. Those numbers are better than the 13.6 7.6 1.6 numbers that he put up last season to become 1st team all-MAC. There is a lot of blame to go around for the game 1 loss, but I felt Big Dog was one of the few that actually showed up to play...

Isn't telling 18, 19 year old kids things they want to hear part of recruiting? I'm not saying Rourke won't be the backup and eventual starter and the coaching staff very well might feel he can be, but I do feel Kato will have every opportunity to earn those titles in the off-season by outperforming Rourke. It's not like Kato will be given those titles transferring elsewhere as he hasn't shown anything to this point.

Kato would have had to expect Akron would be recruiting a QB this recruiting class. If they didn't, they would be heading into next off-season with only 1 QB on the entire roster. As it stands now Rourke has 1 FBS offer so its not like this guy is some hot shot that Kato has no opportunity of beating out for 2017 back-up or 2018 starter.

Kwan very well might be our best defensive player. For a team that surrendered a 90 point game, we need his defensive presence on the floor. I would like to see him take more of a backseat on offense. He should never be our lead shot taker like he was against YSU. We have plenty of other guys that can put the ball in the net. We don't have many + defenders.