Zipgrad01

I really do understand what you are saying, but that isnt fair to your son. It is human nature to get attached to certain players and AA was one of those guys for me as well. Granted, I didnt take it as hard as a 5 year old would with a hero, but I wouldn't let one guy that messed up spoil it for you son. It is a lesson learned in life, although a crappy one for your son. I think we have some really good young men on this team, so hopefully, one of them steps up and wins his spirit back!

OSU beat that same Northwestern team by only 1 or 2. Big deal.

It is a winners attitude. I don't want people coming in here that think they are going to have the same success as we have had in the past. I want them to think to expect to take the program to the next level. This is how the guys at big time programs talk. I would be pissed if he thought it would be ok to compete for the MAC every few years and then get booted from the first round in the NCAA. We have been there and done that.

Anyone that watched the spring game should be thrilled that he decided to transfer in. Our current backups are not D1 quarterbacks. We had all of our eggs in the Woodson basket hoping that he will come in and be what we all expect him to be. I feel a lot better now.

Have you spotted Keontae Hollis? Where is he on the roster? Sorry if I missed it somewhere, but I haven't seen or heard about him being there. I was excited about his signing.

Extremely concerning.

It is extremely hard to get drafted. As much as I hope he does, I really dont see it happening.

Nice to see Jamel Turner still on the roster as well. I hope a year in the weight room did him well.

He picked Coastal Carolina. I pray that he picked them because he had a scholarship from them and not from us. It would be pathetic to lose football recruits to Coastal Carolina.

Anyone that attended games last year knows that the team is heading in the right direction.

Has anyone heard anything about Jamel Turner? I was really hoping that a year in the weight room would turn him into a 250 pound DE nightmare.

I already have some steroid sized shimp set aside for the occassion!

Nice analysis. The thing Michigan did that we should have done was keep the ball in the middle of the floor. One of the keys to beating VCU's press is to not let the initial defender turn you to the sideline. The primary plan of their press is to turn you to the sideline so they have another defender (the sideline) to trap you with or they make you turn back into the 2nd defender waiting to jump you. Michigans guards didn't allow this and took the ball right at the VCU defender, which reduced the effectiveness of the trap, but also allowed them to push the ball to the basket as you explained above. Akron did the exact opposite. We inbounded to the sidelines and then tried to beat the press up the sideline and got trapped or we reversed the ball to the other sideline and got trapped. We went sideways and not right at the press. If that wasn't enough, we kept 2 ball handlers in the back court and then stuck Zeke at center court further clogging the area with more defenders and making things even worse. Basically, we had a horrible plan to attack the press.

Who was Dambrot supposed to develop as a ball handler? All of our ballhandlers were either suspended, sick or out with back spasms. You can't even remotely compare the two.

How?

BS..it is called a coach preparing his team for their next opponent. Smart said that he knew Michigan was a bad matchup for his team because their guards would be able to handle their press. He knew this would come down to a halfcourt game, yet he chose to not work on their halfcourt defense against Akron. I don't understand how this is "experimenting".

And he is also dumb enough to get his ass kicked by Michigan because he spends no time on his teams weaknesses.

You know, this comment has been bothering me all afternoon and if this post is true then Shaka Smart is too stupid to be a D1 basketball coach. Smart had to know that there was no way that VCU would have success running their press against everyone. I am pretty damn sure that Smart knew that Michigan would be a bad matchup for his style of play. If I were VCU, I would have told my guys that it was the perfect time to work on their half court defense because they stink at it. I can understand him building the big lead, but when they got up 30 or so that was the perfect opportunity to work on something that is a weakness of theirs. If he is that stupid and stubborn then he deserved to get blown out by Michigan because he refuses to work on an obvious team weakness. It makes it even more obvious that his whole point was to run the score up, which is classless. Maybe Shaka will spend the offseason working on some half court defense, but it sounds like he isn't bright enough to get his team out of their comfort zone.

Michigan struggled with SDSU the other night and I believe that they were the most unathletic D1 team that I have ever seen. That VCU game was a fluke. They would never beat us that bad again if we played them 100 times.

Really? Name one time when Akron ran up the score on OU? It was a 12 point game with about 5 minutes left.

That is absolutely laughable if you even try to equate todays game with Thursday.

I don't need walked off the ledge and I am not scarred. I am, however, angered by the lack of class. I have full faith in where our program is going. The Akron team I watched Thursday night was not one that I have ever seen and I am not going to put too much in one game. It was a one point overtime game last year. VCU didn't get 45 points better in a year. That game was a culmination of a bad few weeks for our guys and dealing with that adversity short handed finally broke them. You could just see it.

Michigan called off the dogs about half way through the 2nd half. You are right, great teams exploit matchups, however, they don't purposely humiliate their opponent. You can say whatever you want about being butthurt, your coach is a classless prick and I will be pissed off every time I hear Dambrot say something good about him. With friends like him, who needs enemies? I used to pull for Smart and VCU up until I walked out of that arena Thursday night. Never again.

Those people exist and they would be called morons.

I thoroughly enjoyed watching that beat down. I lost all respect for VCU and Shaka Smart after watching them full court trap while up by 50 in the 2nd half against us. Don't give me this "that's just how we play" crap. It was classless. I absolutely hate Michigan, but I got an awful lot of satisfaction from watching VCU's players getting completely demoralized. That made my day.