Mid Season Report Card

[GP1]

Tonight, believe it or not, completed one half of this regular season. Time for the mid season report card. Your assignment is to grade the following groups. Groups 1-3 are to be graded as a group and not individuals. The scale is A, B, C, D or F. No (+) or (-).

1. Guards

2. Forwards

3. Centers

4. Coaching

5. Overall

[GP1]

No mid season grades from anyone? This team is trending up and it would be interesting to see where their grades end up compared to the beginning of the season.

[ZachTheZip]

Some quick grades, before I go out and brave the North East Ohio tundra.

Guards: C - Abreu's presence is the difference between competing against top-25 teams and losing to teams on the level of the MAC West. Walsh is becoming a very good shooting guard. Deji's impact has been limited and Nitro has straight up disappeared. Diggs is not a guard. Nik is not a guard, no matter how hard he believes it.

Forwards: B - The forwards have carried this team. Harney, Treadwell, Nik (when he plays his position), Diggs (ditto), Chauncey, these guys are playing great and stepping up for each other to cover bad individual outings.

Center: B - Zeke is inconsistent, but he is doing better than he's ever done before and has shown a vastly improved understanding of what he needs to do when he's on the court. Egner hasn't played too much, and hasn't had the chance to really show off his hops.

Coaching: Incomplete - Dambrot and staff's biggest challenge was developing chemistry among this motley crew of players. You can see that it's still coming along, but significant progress has been made. Baffling substitutions are still being made, but that's just how Dambrot operates. It's hard to judge the coaches right now because they're only half way done putting things together. Will the team come together in a way to win the MAC and go on a tournament run? it remains to be seen.

Overall: B - Half way through the season, we have 10 wins. That's on pace to get to 20 before the MAC tournament. We have two good wins over Mississippi State and Marshall, while we usually don't have any wins over teams ranked that high at this point. Overall, the positives outweigh the negatives, and we're having an above average season, but not an excellent season, so I'll give the team a grade of B, but with a note on the report card that they're leaving a lot of potential unfulfilled and I think they can improve.

[Jalapeño Zippy]

It's too hard for me to grade anything at this point...they team itself has maybe played together for only 5 games. But what I have seen is potential and a lot of it. The team just needs to trust KD and each other.

[The Hip Zip]

Guards: B This area should improve as AA is getting healthier and Walsh is quickly finding his niche

Forwards: A Our depth at this position is amazing. We can go big and strong or quick with perimeter scoring.

Center: B Zeke has had his moments, both good and bad. I'm still in his corner and expect him to progress further. He's improved from the T stripe and his sholt blocking and altering continues to be great.

Coaching: A I expected some bumps in the road as we gel as a unit but through this process we are winning games. I like the fact that we have won our first two MAC roadies despite not playing our best basketball. This is the mark of a very good team.

Overall: a solid B. we are doing what is needed to win in this conference and we still have a lot of growth ahead of us. The new guys have been big already and will do nothing but get better. I am very happy with this team.

[johnnyzip84]

Guards - C

Abreu’s injury, Nitro’s struggles, and Gilliam’s lack of playing time have all conspired to prevent the Zips from having a stellar 1st half of the season. Q obviously isn’t the 1st choice at PG, but I respect him for sacrificing the finer points of his game for the sake of the team. The good news is, there is no reason why this group can’t play much better in the 2nd half of the season and down the stretch.

Forwards - A

Have to agree with Zach on this as this has clearly been the group that has held the team together. Tree, Harney, and Nik have proven to be difficult matchups for anyone, let alone the MAC.

Center - B

While his overall game has clearly improved, particularly shooting from the floor and from the line, Zeke remains plagued by inconsistency. His defense has also improved, on average, but there remains work to be done on the boards. Tree has done fine here when Zeke is sitting.

Coaching - B

KD has been forced to deal with a few things this year that are not typical. I think he’s handled the off court issues very well. I think there’s room for improvement with the way he’s handled playing time.

Overall - B

Nobody should complain that the schedule was too easy this year, that’s for sure. This has resulted in a mixed bag with 2 big road wins, several missed opportunities, and a few outright dogs. All in all I can’t say I’m too disappointed given the off court issues and youth of some of the key players on the team. The team is positioned very well to challenge for a top tourney seed in a very competitive MAC East.