Akron vs. Winthrop

[GP1]

I just got home from the game. Just some thoughs.1. As sports fans, I hope all of you at least have some understanding of athletic talent. Here is the truth of the game tonight. Winthrop had better players at every position than Akron. Period. They were taller.....they were faster......they moved better......they shot better (especially when it counted)....they smothered Akron with their athletic talent at the end of the game. Where are our 6' 3" guards? Where our 6' 9" centers who have soft shots from five feet? How come none of our forwards can gracefully drive to the basket or hit a pull up jump shot?2. Winthrop was absolutely horrible for 35 minutes of the game and they still won by 10 (I think). Had Winthrop played the way they are capable for 40 minutes, Akron would have lost by 25. When Winthrop was playing bad, Akron did nothing to burry them. Winthrop couldn't have thrown the ball into the ocean for about five minutes. Had Akron poured it on the first 35 minutes, they would have won easily.3. I said earlier on the board that Akron should schedule big time teams, because according to you folks, they have a good team. I didn't think they would get run out of the gym. I am here to say that I was completely wrong and I should stop listening to you people until I see things myself. The team I saw tonight would lose by 30+ to a UNC or someone like that.4. Coaching. Outside of recruiting better athletes, I'm not certain what else KD could have done tonight. My only question is why when Winthrop was pressing the last ten minutes, was Dials bringing the ball up with his parallel partner as Quaid? Wouldn't Middleton have been a better partner?5. I'd sure like to know where the muscle is Nate L. and Quaid M. added to their frames. HGH and now.6. I like the Dials/Middleton back court better than the Dials/Dru back court. I also really like that McNees (sp?) kid. He hit some good shots tonight.7. Winthrop looked like a team that plays higher level competition than Akron. When they hit the gas, they went. When Akron hits the gas, they sputter.8. Wood was absolutely smashed in the head with about four minutes to go. It happened right in front of me.9. Akron is what they are. At half, I was convinced they would win the MAC Tournament this season. Now, I'm hoping they will win the MAC Tournament. There is a big difference.10. No inside/outside game again this year. It's either all inside, or all outside. When our big guys had the ball, they didn't seem to be able to get the ball to a smaller player on the perimeter easily. This has always troubled me with the team. I like all five players being involved.11. Lots of local UofA grads at the game. None of us knew each other and we all live in the area. I wish the Univeristy would have alumni organizations around the country so we could watch games on TV with like minded people. Every other school does it......and we wonder why there is no alumni support.

[skip-zip]

GP1...to add to your comments about playing against better players tonight, KD seemed happy about the way we played tonight. And maybe he really was, if what you say is true about Winthrop having far superior talent. Nice to have a perspective from someone who was there, other than S. French.

[Zip Watcher]

I just got home from the game. Just some thoughs.

Thanks for the notes from on site .. I appreciate them.

2. Winthrop was absolutely horrible for 35 minutes of the game and they still won by 10 (I think). Had Winthrop played the way they are capable for 40 minutes, Akron would have lost by 25. When Winthrop was playing bad, Akron did nothing to burry them. Winthrop couldn't have thrown the ball into the ocean for about five minutes. Had Akron poured it on the first 35 minutes, they would have won easily.

To be fair .. you saw one of UA's worst shooting nights of the year .. at the end of the year, I suspect it will be in the bottom 3 percentage wise. After 35 minutes, an average Akron night had them up 10. I suspect that if Akron plays to their potential in this game .. they could have won by 20 .. seems to me the teams were a pretty good matchup.

4. Coaching. Outside of recruiting better athletes, I'm not certain what else KD could have done tonight. My only question is why when Winthrop was pressing the last ten minutes, was Dials bringing the ball up with his parallel partner as Quaid? Wouldn't Middleton have been a better partner?

I think this relates to the calvalry that we hope arrives in 2 weeks time.

7. Winthrop looked like a team that plays higher level competition than Akron. When they hit the gas, they went. When Akron hits the gas, they sputter.

Certainly the case tonight .. wasn't so in the past 3 games.

9. Akron is what they are. At half, I was convinced they would win the MAC Tournament this season. Now, I'm hoping they will win the MAC Tournament. There is a big difference.

A work in progress? This is why it's a good thing this is game 7 & not game 33.

10. No inside/outside game again this year. It's either all inside, or all outside. When our big guys had the ball, they didn't seem to be able to get the ball to a smaller player on the perimeter easily. This has always troubled me with the team. I like all five players being involved.

Here again, this was absolutely the case tonight .. but on the whole of 7 games this season, it's an outlier .. recently (games 4-6), they have been extremely efficient on the inside out game. I think if you can make it to a couple more games later in the year, you'll find this to be a strength of the team. Against Wyoming .. you don't get 80 points out of 4 guys if you're not moving it around to the open player.Nice notes .. thanks again for reporting in.ZWStill ...

[Dr Z]

Nice notes GP1. Thanks.I caution making overall general opinions about the team based on seeing 1 game.I did the same with Can't State one year and I was dead wrong. Hopefully this is a team that learns from their mistakes and gets better as the year goes on.

[ZachTheZip]

Only three games matter this year, and they will be played at the Q. Everything else is just a learning experience leading up to that point. We could go winless in the regular season then win the MAC tournament and go dancing, and the season would be more successful than any we have ever had.KD learns from his mistakes, and so do his players. Keep in mind that we still don't have a true PG, although I heard that Ronnie actually dressed for the game yesterday, so there is hope that he will be in soon.

[GP1]

Three other thoughts about the game last night. I wanted to sleep on them before posting them....12. I arrived at my seat 20-25 minutes before the game. Here is what I saw. The Winthrop team was warming up and you could tell they were as serious as a heart attack about the game coming up. There was no laughing or kidding around. On the other hand was Akron. There was Nate L. and Nick G. throwing the ball to each other acting like a couple of baseball pitchers and giggling like a couple of school girls. They were bahaving so poorly that one of the balls flew into the stands and could have hit someone. I'm sure that if Coach D. had been on the floor, he would have taken his belt off and beat those two boobs like the children they were behaving like. By the way, why does Nick G. wear a sweatband around his head? The guy doesn't play long enough to sweat.13. I'm going to try to get some photos on the board today. Please note the quality of uniform. Winthrop had Nike and they looked great. We wear that Addidas (sp?) and look like a bunch of hobos. When Winthrop runs out of the lockerroom, they are all dressed EXACTLY the same down to the shoes. Akron has various types of tops on and various types of shoes. Maybe this is nitpicking, but things like that matter. Nike = classy, Addidas = not Nike. Get out of the Addidas contract ASAP!14. Coach D. could learn from the post game interview Winthrop's coach gave on the radio. Instead of KD complaining about the crowd in interviews, he should be thanking those people who come to games. A lot of you put out your hard earned cash and time to go watch teams like Walsh. You all should be given awards for showing up to those games. Winthrop's coach made a big deal of the influence the crowd had on the game and the influence they had. I'm here to tell you all that there were maybe 3,000 people at the game (6,100 seat arena). That's a generous estimate. The crowd noise was anywhere from quiet for the first 35 minutes to kind of loud the last five. The roof certainly was not getting blown off the arena. KD needs to worry about his team on the floor and let others worry about tickets.

[Captain Kangaroo]

Only three games matter this year, and they will be played at the Q. Everything else is just a learning experience leading up to that point.

I disagree. We have four seniors who log major minutes. Despite the aforementioned guard issues, we shouldn't be getting outscored 23-3 in the final 4:46 of any game. I don't buy the "learning process" with this team. Next year...when we only have 1 senior and a bunch of Fr's and Soph's? I'll buy it...sorta.Sub .500 from the FT line? Stiffs from the crowd shoot better than that during the Zips halftime promotions?People say the MAC can't get an at-large bid. Maybe...maybe not. We'll never know if we blow "marquee" games like this. Looking at how we closed out the 1st half...Quade pulls a "Jacquemain"...we're up four with 2.6seconds left and he tosses a perfect spiral out of bounds? CJ11's decision-making at the end of the UConn 1st half may have been trumped? The Linhart goes "Tim Crouch" on us and gets flagged for the hold with 2.6 seconds left? Instead of being up 4 to 7 points at half, we're only up two. We couldn't have botched the end of either half any better if we tried.Dials shoots 29% and 22% in games where our opponent begins with a "W." For his sake, thankfully we don't play Wofford next.In my opinion, this loss makes the Dayton game pretty much a "must win" if we want any chance of a post-season berth...should we falter @ The Q.

[Zip Watcher]

..... although I heard that Ronnie actually dressed for the game yesterday, so there is hope that he will be in soon.

GP1, can you confirm this?

[Captain Kangaroo]

..... although I heard that Ronnie actually dressed for the game yesterday, so there is hope that he will be in soon.

GP1, can you confirm this?

Frenchy mentioned it in the pregame.

[Zip Watcher]

That HAS to be a good sign.

[GP1]

..... although I heard that Ronnie actually dressed for the game yesterday, so there is hope that he will be in soon.

GP1, can you confirm this?

Sorry.....I wouldn't know him if he walked in my house.

[Marty McFly]

I think that we are starting to see a trend. The lack of point guard has cost us two games, almost three if include Temple. If you think about it, both losses were games that were lost in the last 5-7 minutes of the game. I don't think that it is conditioning. I think that it is not having a PG to handle the ball against a press. Maybe KD dropped the ball about 2-3 years ago when he didn't recruit a PG. Think about it. Had he done so, he could have been a redshirt frosh or true frosh last year who could have gained some experience while giving Joyce some breaks. Now this year, he would be ready to go to lead this team, and have some experience.We (thus that frequent this board) have put Steward up on a pedastool and the one that is going to save the season and the backcourt. Remind me again how many games in college has this kid played?The other thing that we saw (or heard from Frenchie) was the crowd helped in this game. I bet that the crowd's will help in other places, such as Oxford, Munchie, Can't, Athens, Dayton, Toledo, BG....Oh wait. Everywhere but Akron!

[skip-zip]

wow...yet another comment about "these games don't matter".Does anyone truly want us to play the entire season as a "warmup" for the MAC Tournament? Winning games against the likes of a Temple or a Winthrop gets you more respect on a national level, which increases the exposure of your program, and aids your recruiting efforts, and hopefully gets the attention of people that are on post-season selection committees.As far as the MAC schedule goes, if some of you recall, the MAC regular season champion is now receiving an automatic bid to the NIT. Then in the MAC tournament, having a good enough record to receive at least a first round home game, or better yet, a first round bye, dramatically increases your chances of getting to that title game.These games matter, and so do the conference games....If we ever want to grow this program.

[Zip Watcher]

Does anyone truly want us to play the entire season as a "warmup" for the MAC Tournament? Winning games against the likes of a Temple or a Winthrop gets you more respect on a national level, which increases the exposure of your program, and aids your recruiting efforts, and hopefully gets the attention of people that are on post-season selection committees.

I'm confused. I thought you said the other day that these games aren't enough to help elevate the program. Now which is it?

These games matter, and so do the conference games....If we ever want to grow this program.

Agreed .. all the games matter. This one was a loss. And it was one loss from which there is much to learn.

[ZippyRulz]

Only three games matter this year, and they will be played at the Q. Everything else is just a learning experience leading up to that point. We could go winless in the regular season then win the MAC tournament and go dancing, and the season would be more successful than any we have ever had.

After what I saw happen last year, I agree completely. With the 2 losses we have already, I hold out no hope of an at-large bid to the Greater Akron Jr. High Charity Invitational, let alone any other tournament. At best, these regular season games are just for bragging rights in the mid major poll. At worst, they are nothing but scrimmages to prepare for the MAC tourney. Having said that, losing a 10 point lead does not constitute a choke job in and of itself. It's not like the other team gives up when they're down, especially on their home floor...if anything they play harder. Winthrop has a home court record much like ours (and BTW, their attendance was about like ours). But shooting 35% from the field and 50% from the foul line will get you beat almost always. Now I'm starting to think we should play as few games as possible at the JAR...it just makes us overconfident and does nothing to prepare us for playing at the Q at the end of the season.

[Marty McFly]

Correct if I am wrong (and I just checked and I am not) - Winthrop has 3 straight NCAA tournement appearances.2007, 11th Seed - Beat 6th seed Notre Dame in the first round 74-64. Lost to 3rd seeded Oregon 75-61 in the second round2006, 15th Seed - Lost to 2nd seed Tennessee 63-612005, 14th Seed - Lost to 3rd seed GonzagaSounds to me like a win over Winthrop would go a long way to the Selection Committee. And since, other than Miami (Oh), this is the only team that made the tourney last year, I think that this was a huge game for Akron.

[Valpo Zip]

KD didn't drop the ball by not recruiting a PG. He recruited Darryl Roberts who was supposed to be a RS freshman or a soph this year, he couldn't get the grades though.This game was blown because of the lack of leadership. :blink: with 4 seniors on the roster, no one could step up in the last 2 minutes. Turn overs, missed free throws and non sense like that.Talking about senior leadership, can you immagine our team next year? only one senior and who ? Nate Linhart... this is his third year and he still makes the most horrible fouls to kill the momentum and destroy the team. Freshmen don't do those mistakes. Conyers' contributions are still very minimal and McKnight is also a big disappointment so far.

[Marty McFly]

KD didn't drop the ball by not recruiting a PG. He recruited Darryl Roberts who was supposed to be a RS freshman or a soph this year, he couldn't get the grades though.This game was blown because of the lack of leadership. :blink: with 4 seniors on the roster, no one could step up in the last 2 minutes. Turn overs, missed free throws and non sense like that.Talking about senior leadership, can you immagine our team next year? only one senior and who ? Nate Linhart... this is his third year and he still makes the most horrible fouls to kill the momentum and destroy the team. Freshmen don't do those mistakes. Conyers' contributions are still very minimal and McKnight is also a big disappointment so far.

I will give you that about the senior leadership. They shot 25% last night. 14 of 41, accounted for 9 of the 13 turnovers and went 5 of 11 from the FT line

[GP1]

Having said that, losing a 10 point lead does not constitute a choke job in and of itself.

Absolutely correct! Akron didn't choke the game away last night. You guys have to understand something. Winthorp WENT OFF the last five minutes. It was as impressive of a display of college basketball as I have ever seen in person. Akron couldn't do anything right because Winthrop would not let them.Back to my original post. Did Akron play bad? Of course. However, for the vast majority of the game, Winthrop played well below their standard.....their stats were bad like the Zips stats were. They are a team that has made three straight NCAA Tournaments and have the banners in their gym to prove it.....winners find ways to win. Akron did not take advantage of their struggles. When they found their footing, they smashed us. My prediciton would be if Akron played them in a best of seven series, the Zips might win one. Last night would have to be the type of game they won and they let it slip by.The Zips will learn from this. The first thing I hope they learn is they need better and bigger athletes on the team. KD is a good coach, but not a great coach. Players make coaches great. He needs to get better players.

[Quickzips]

From where I'm sitting (and take this for what it is worth, as I've yet to get the opportunity to see these guys in person yet) there are 3 things, short of the supposed calvary coming in that could help this team.1) Ronnie Steward gets healthy and starts his takeover of the PG position. Dials is doing an admirable job holding down the fort, but it isn't his comfort zone and it isn't allowing him to do the things he does best. We need him to move back to the 2 guard. This would also allow Cedrick to move back into that 6th man role where he is infinitley more valuable to this team. McNees has been servicable thus far, but I'm not entirely comfortable with him starting and he isn't quite the true PG that we need. Ideally Steward would be able to take over the starting PG position by the time we get into the meat of the MAC schedule.2) Conyers takes over the 3 spot for good. I know he's starting right now, but Linhart is still logging just as many minutes and KD seems to still trust him more in crunch time. The problem is that Nate really hasn't done much to earn that trust. At this point, Nate has peaked. He isn't going to get better than what he is. Conyers on the other hand still has a lot of room to get better. On top of that, the team seems to play better all around with him in the game. Let him know that the spot is his for good, let him stop looking over his shoulder at Linhart and let's see what he can do.3) Bardo starts at C. I know he still has a long way to go in his development as a player, but let me explain. Right now, the entire presure of our frontcourt is all on Wood. Bardo starting isn't going to take that pressure off, but it will allow Wood to switch over to his more natural position at PF. Milum is who he is. A tremendous athlete who will never be a consistent basketball player. He needs to go back to coming off the bench. If he's on his game on a praticular night he gets more minutes off the bench, if he's off, those minutes go to McKnight or we play more out of that 3 guard set.Just one man's humble opinion.

[skip-zip]

Zip Watcher....games against teams like Temple and Winthrop are the best we have in our OOC schedule, but we HAVE to win them. They are all that we have right now to show that we have any credibility on a national level.YES, I still believe that the current OOC schedule is not nearly enough to get an SOS high enough to get serious at-large consideration at the end of the season. But we can still gain some ground nationally by winning the semi-high profile games that we DO have.

[zip37]

Two words-- no leadership.

[zip37]

From the players, that is.

[skip-zip]

Quickzips...I like the point you make in #3.Jeremiah would best be served by having a Center next to him. And Bardo is all we have. Quade is a bench player. Even if McKnight plays a little bit more inside along with Jeremiah, that would help us too.We can't go through this entire season with Jeremiah handling all of our post scoring, rebounding, and all around "muscle" play. He'll wear down by mid-season.

[ziptrumpet87]

Same with Ced and his bad knees. If he continues to play lots of minutes, I fear he will be unable to play come tourney time.