RoyalBlu
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On 5/13/2023 at 6:48 PM, Let'sGoZips94 said:
Are these the only 2 games at The Fieldhouse that day? Or is this an all day event with games TBA?
If the promoters are smart they'll add at least one if not two more games to this lineup. Try to get Dayton or Xavier or UC to play CSU, OU, YSU or 'some other school,' then add some cheesy gimmick to it all to lure some casual fans. (Get Huggy to play Santa between games???). Make it an all day ticket. I'm guessing you could get 8-10,000 if promoted well.
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3 hours ago, Let'sGoZips94 said:
Why was he a key factor in those games? He hit his 3s. He shot 40.7% that year from 3. His worst games occurred when he didn't hit from beyond the arc. Understandable. However...
He's a career 34.9% 3PT shooter. If Ali Ali doesn't produce like he did in 2021-22, are people as excited about him coming back? If you remove 2021-22, he's a career 27.6% 3PT shooter. That's 3 years of sub-35%, with 2 years of sub-30% including this past year which was 25.5%. The ball and hoop don't really change, no matter where you play in D1 college basketball.
If we get 35%+ 3 PT shooting from Ali Ali, wonderful. That level of game fills massive voids we had from last year.
If we get 30% or less, his scoring seemingly comes from dribbling the air out of the ball and hitting layups/mid-range jump shots for 6-8 ppg. Where does that level of game fit on this team?
My expectations are tempered. I hope Ali Ali is able to fire on all cylinders this year. I have my reservations. Does he try to hard & press during his comeback tour? If he struggles, has he grown enough mentally to not get as down as he used to?
Hitting a great 3-point percentage isn't the be all, end all for how he actually delivers. Does he hit the ones that really matter will be the key, and does he make up for poor 3-pt shooting with rebounds, assists and defense? He has to be an all-around player and not just an offensive trigger.
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In alphabetical order, early projections for Top 4 teams in the MAC 2023-24:
Akron - Senior leadership
Bowling Green -- (pay attention people!!!!) Quality transfers galore
Kent State -- They usually figure something out
Ohio -- Good coach, still in the portal looking
Toledo -- Rockets always have firepower
everybody else ....
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20 minutes ago, Let'sGoZips94 said:
We have 13 scholarship guys. IMO, Kamali is the only redshirt candidate. Even then, I wouldn't redshirt anyone. Transfer Portal eliminates the redshirt potential for me.
Ali Ali coming back only works if he is as efficient as he was in 2021-22 - and that's his outlier year by far as a D1 basketball player.
I think this is a very sober opinion that has to be factored into projections for the coming season. Which Ali will be back with the Zips???
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This whole Ali Ali deal is starting to seem a little fishy. If he's coming, say so, and work out the details (academia???) later.
Either he wants to be at Akron, or he doesn't. Be it now or 24-25. Either the Zips want him at Akron or they don't. Be it now or in 24-25.
Or maybe I/we are just frustrated with the whole deal.
Yes, he makes the Zips better, if/when he plays. But this is starting to have an air of entitlement about it, and I'm not sure that is worth it.
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Not to be a debbie-downer but two questions?:
1. Nobody has said/confirmed Ali would actually be immediately eligible if he came back. I would not be surprised if he is, because likely more of his Butler hours are good at Akron than vice-verse when he left.
But still.
2. In this portal era, it is not safe to assume everybody stays if Ali comes back (although hopefully all do). Does Dawson look to exit instead of stay???
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4 hours ago, Let'sGoZips94 said:
Bass?
He picked the perfect school for this then. Pinky once again doesn't even have to recruit.
"Looking for a school with low academic and character standards? Look no further than Can't State."
Good luck to Bass memorizing the colors in Crayola's 64 box of crayons. Hopefully he's at least better than his classmates and doesn't eat any.
I get the digs at "That" program ... but let's face it. A 1.8 GPA (if accurate) for a freshman athlete in any major college sport (FB, Mbb,) is probably more likely than not, no matter what school they are attending, including Akron. I would think any coach would be more worried about that overall FG % than fixing that freshman GPA. And let's not forget, Mr. Carry had a really bad FG % as a senior ... and still was a handful for most teams to deal with.
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Copy-Cats ....
Anyone notice the pattern of once Akron gets a MAC transfer player from the Portal ... Kent gets a MAC transfer player from the portal. It has happened again. CMU's Reggie Bass headed down the road.
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I don't understand what you mean by "cheating out on basketball" ... please explain.
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3 hours ago, clarkwgriswold said:
That article is the gift that just keeps on giving. Some of my favorite parts:
"I took the coach at Kent State's job, Rob Senderoff. Rob Senderoff was cheating his brains out for Kelvin Sampson at Indiana and Kelvin is pretty smart. He got rid of Senderoff, but took care of him"
"He slips me a camp check and says 'give it to Senderoff, would ya?' So Senderoff gets fired in the middle of the 2008 season, and then because cheating pays, he ends of getting a job at Kent State becuse he has buddies there. He went back to Kent State and got a job because he's a scheming little guy.''
"Senderoff was a little cheat, and he wasn't even any good at it,'' Dakich said. "He got caught easy when he was at Indiana."
"You've got to understand that when I came to Indiana after 16 years at Indiana with Bob Knight, this little weasel Senderoff tells me 'this is as new Indiana. There's a new sheriff in town,’ “Dakich said. ''I said, ah, man, you guys are great. You're all awesome.' About a month later, I find out that Senderoff and McCallumn and Sampson are all cheating like crazy.''
Dakich said that Senderoff ''has done a good job and Kent State, and has a good team,'' but he also interjected that he ''probably still gets his players the same way Kelvin Sampson does, by cheating.''
"You can't lose to little Robbie Senderoff. He had no idea how to coach nothing. He was coaching the bigs, and that's what I did after he was fired. We had D.J. White. I said 'D.J., you need to get a jump hook.' Senderoff never did that. He's a whiner, he's a baby.''
I'm guessing there is both a lot of truth and a lot of revisionist history going on here.
Let's face it: (1) Both Sampson and Senderoff have gone on to better things in the last 15 years. (2) If Dakich knew so much hanky-panky was going on at his alma mater, I'm sure the NCAA would have gladly listened and threw the perps under the bus.
Instead the NCAA wrist slap for both was for illegal cell phone calls -- that became NCAA legal shortly afterward.
That said, if Sampson and Senderoff are such bad coaches, what does that say about Dakich, who can't sniff a basketball job. Daffy Dan was a great sideshow and coach his first tour of duty at BG ... but once he accepted/turned down West Va. he kind of showed his true colors. And when he went back to BG his players never respected him again.
That Sampson, McCallum and Senderoff all became head coaches after Indiana's NCAA sanctions says more to me about the severity of the miscues, ... just as Dakich' failure to land another head job speaks for him.
I'm sure Indiana would have hung all three (Sampson-McCallum-Senderoff) out to dry w/the NCAA if that would have cleaned out the Hoosiers closet. But it didn't happen.
We all have opinions about the quality of their coaching ... but the fact at least Sampson and Senderoff have had a relatively high level of success for a long period of time kind of speaks for itself.
And for the most part over the years I believe the Zips vs. Senderoff have had the better of the matchups ... which is what really matters.
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41 minutes ago, NWAkron said:
That is total B.S. about last year. Not sure why you would even write that or try and denigrate what they did...especially a year later. Akron was playing exceptionally at that moment. If anything Kent took this year's run out of Akrons playbook...defense.
Sorry ... did not mean to denigrate? After two close losses last year Akron most likely wins no matter what. Third game theory. Just trying to say that gameplan and that defense was the difference ... and made stronger w/o Jacobs, who to me is the key to Kent, not Carry.
IMO.
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14 hours ago, GP1 said:
Yes, but not in the way you might think. It's poo in the way that sports fans use statistics to make meaningless points. Facts aren't reasons.
Each game unfolds differently. Different strategies are deployed resulting in different outcomes across the board, including point totals.
Sad to say, but MAC Tournament game last year was an outlier. Great win for the Zips to be sure, and great gameplan, too, but Kent not having Jacobs for the first half really helped that gameplan, and sent Carry into a game-long funk. Akron home win this year was stellar as well. But the last two games Kent was clearly the better team, and I actually think Akron matched up better last year (w/Ali) ... but still lost two close ones.
Tough to swallow ... but it is what it is.
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13 minutes ago, LoyalZIP said:
Carry MVP, Castaneda all-tournament
I actually thought Thomas was the MVP for the tournament ... didn't have three straight games like that all season.
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15 minutes ago, Z.I.P. said:
Kent was and is the better team. They defeated Toledo with the same force they defeated Akron -- overwhelming numbers of excellent players. They lose 3 or 4 starters next season? The MAC will be up for grabs again!
They lose Carry, Jacobs and Thomas .... will need to hit the portal hard for guards. All their big guys are back.
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2 hours ago, NWAkron said:
putting my bias aside, they do come off as arrogant pricks led by Santiago.
Taking a step back a bit ... it seems whenever there is a dominant team in the MAC over the years be it Kent or Buffalo or even the Zips, they are somehow portrayed around the league a classless, and/or thuggish, arrogant and more. Truth be told, it takes a bit of swagger and physicality to dominate and that almost always comes out on the defensive end.
The season is not even half over yet. Certainly not time to crown any team yet. As someone noted above, Kent didn't start rolling until February last year and were very ordinary before that. If this is their year, so be it. The tournament is still the deciding factor in the end. Just ask Toledo ... or look at the Zips.
No need to trash the opposition, no matter who it is. Just play ball. Loyola Marymount looks pretty good today, right!
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The MAC has never had an undefeated BB team in its history, I believe. Certainly none since the 1970s. If that Big Dog-Cheatum team couldn't do it ... or that PCCC-Elite 8 team couldn't do it, and none of the recent high-scoring Toledo teams couldn't do it ... I wouldn't be putting my $$$ on any MAC team doing it. Certainly not making that bet in December.
Now if things look different come Valentine's Day ... then maybe I go to the bank.
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Frankly thought the Zips would be No. 1 ... and probably would have if more than just the coaches voted. That said, a serious and legit argument can be made for any of the top 3 teams. Ball State, if the new coach is the real deal, might be the team to watch as the Cardinals have a lot of experienced freshman talent back from last season plus some VG transfers. Without a target on its back, Ball State may be tough to deal with come February.
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Neither is Gross ...
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41 minutes ago, LZIp said:
You guys are pretty good at convincing yourselves these departures mean nothing lol. If they players are on the team, they're good. If they leave, they sucked anyways.
The staff has their work cut out for them if we want to repeat or more.
If we want to repeat or more .... what do you mean? Repeat by winning three games in Cleveland ... or ... repeat by being a 4th place MAC team again. One (4th place) is a lot easier to do than the other.
32 minutes ago, NWAkron said:We don't have any control over it, so we might as well look at it in a positive way. Reminds me of the panic when KD left. It all worked out. On my own private list, Aziz was the first I thought should go. As for Ali, that certainly is a loss in that he produced a lot of points. But he is replaceable.
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37 minutes ago, Z.I.P. said:
Who's going to start the New MAC Coaches for 2022-23 thread? We can start with Michael Huger's replacement.
Didn't he sign a 3-year extension last year.
Unless somebody moves on (TK???) really don't see any coaching moves this season.
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3 hours ago, NWAkron said:
This is the most likely bracket:
Ball State isn't going to pull off any upsets. Maybe Miami can surprise.
I say the opposite ... Ball State is the wildcard in that bracket.
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11 hours ago, Let'sGoZips94 said:
They haven't beaten anyone. If it's an increase number of games, those games have been against garbage competition. These records would warrant a Top 30/40 ranking if they were legitimate, not top 60 ceiling.
The MAC blows. I'm hoping we'll prove that on Friday against OU.
Don't forget, the MAC now plays a 20-game schedule, not 18.
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1 hour ago, The Hip Zip said:
Yep, he's still playing and apparently playing well after parting ways with Keith at Duquense.
Mid-Major Madness
@mid_madness
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4m
Tavian Dunn-Martin had one of those games again tonight… He dropped 43 points as FGCU beat Liberty in overtime, 82-72. The Eagles out scored the Flames in the extra frame, 16-6. Gonna be a sneaky team in the ASUN Tournament.
Say this for Dambrot ... he knows guards. --- If Duquesne still had Dunn-Martin, Sincere Carry and Norman at WMU (combined averaging about 60 ppg!!!!) the Dukes would not be on an 11 or 12-game losing streak. Yikes.
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This was supposed to be a week to get well (WMU-NIU-EMU) vs. three worst teams in the MAC ... what happened???
Transfer Portal Watch
in Akron Zips Basketball
Posted
C'mon, really. Maybe he has enough credits to join Ali Ali. Let's be a bit bigger/better than this.