Can somebody please post a link to the golden presser following the Wake Forest loss. I haven’t been able to find it. Thanks
Say what you will about Mike White, heck I was a heavy critic myself, but you can’t honestly say at any point that defense was an issue. I’m not saying Mike didn’t have his flaws (was awful at protecting leads/offensively), I’m just saying he was really good at defensive adjustments. Just facts that 23 wasn’t doubled nor was their big man. At some point you have to concede that your guys can’t guard them one on one.
So you're saying defense didn't have anything to do with not being able to protect leads? That's ironic since you said defense wasn't an issue.
Mike White was a pretty good defensive coach but his offensive system was average at best. His lead protection strategy failed way too often. He'd get a smallish lead and then let the air out of the tires. A glaring example was when it cost us the game against Liberty in the NCAAT. In that one, we had taken control and had (IIRC) an 11-point lead and the ball with about 9 minutes left. He milked the clock on that possession and then had one of our guys throw a prayer at the hoop as the shot clock expired. Long rebound, runout for Liberty, a 4-point play and suddenly it's a 7-point game and they have the momentum. And STILL he milks the clock. He's going to do that at UGA too. You know he will.
Pretty good at best. Combined with an average to below offense and his lead protection was exactly what you state. His defense wasn't good enough to win games with his offense. I remember screaming at the TV during the last part of the Liberty game while watching him look dumbfounded seeing what was happening. He never learned. Kind of like Muschamp getting a 3 point lead and hoping his defense could hang on.
In what way? Not being able to hold onto leads is definitely a defensive issue, especially with his weak offenses, and your the one who said his defenses weren't an issue. Don't get me wrong, I liked Mike White and really hoped he'd succeed, but it was clear he didn't get it.
I made a decision not to watch the game. I can only hope the expectation for good officiating wasn't like what we saw during the Pitt game, which was mostly a free for all. Good teams adapt to the officiating that varies from fame to game.
True, but it's hard to overcome biased or poor officiating, regardless of how good your team is. "Swindle in the Swamp" comes to mind.
You flipped my point and turned it into me being an advocate of Mike White’s offensively philosophy. I was just talking about defensive adjustments dude.
That Liberty game was when I got off the Mike White train. He just blew that game so horribly. He has been around sports long enough to know what can happen when you let your foot off the gas. That was one of the worst coached games in UF history and I was done supporting him as our coach.
No, I didn't flip the script. You're the one who said his defenses weren't an issue. His overall coaching was a problem, and how do you rationalize his defensive adjustments being good when it didn't improve enough during games to make up for his poor offensive coaching. If it made up for the offensive woes, I'd agree with you 100%, but it didn't. I mentioned the way Muschamp coached as their philosophies were similar, and both got canned.
Im not disagreeing that his overall coaching was a problem. When we had a lead often times our offense would become stagnant in order to use up clock. I think Will Muschamp was a terrible overall coach. But wasn’t he a good defensive coach? Same logic.
Exactly my point when bringing him up. He had the same loser mentality of relying on defense in hopes the defense would be good enough, but they rarely were. Same as White. In order for that to work, you have to have great defenses. We had neither under each of them.
We never had the personnel to be great defenses but the coaching philosophy and calls were much better.
I get the Mike White venom but you have to admit that he designed some great inbounds plays and his players executed them well.
That too. Some of the best I’ve seen. I’ve been all over MW but you don’t go to the tournament that many times in a row being a horrible coach in every sense.
I’m going to let him and his team get their legs under them before I bury them. They need to play better defense, I think they can and will.
We actually play good defense, with the one glaring exception being the 3-point line. Too many open looks given up there.
I’m not “burying” the team by having an opinion that we should change up our defensive looks on a team who only had 2 talented players and a point guard who was pretty erratic.
