I was in a foul mood after the game yesterday; no I didn’t kick the dog but just felt lousy. As the day wore into the night, it eased as I was able to process more rationally. Playing your first conference game at Rupp is daunting but I didn’t feel we were timid or overwhelmed by the moment - that’s a huge positive. It has been discussed reasons why we lost, defense, FT’s, inability to stop drives to basket, etc. Brea was unconscious and while he may be great, that won’t happen every night. We clearly did not adjust too well at half and maybe there wasn’t enough time to counter how UK was gashing us. But, I’d much rather lose early than late, not only because of seeding but to counter future opponents from trying to do what UK did to us. It’s up to TG and staff to turn this into a positive. It’s apparent we can score and equally obvious our defense needs work. I’m hopeful we will be improved in our defense and FT shooting. No team is going through the SEC without a loss or probable multiple losses. We are a very good team that is uber competitive and does not quit; it’s possible a slow start is what we needed to avert a poor finish, especially given the absurd unfair schedule given to us.
Our weaknesses? 1) With a lead: Tend to get a little sloppy with the handle on dribbling, a little weak on passing and receiving, and maybe a little weak in shot selection, although I hesitate to say this. We should dance with the girl we brought. 2) No true point guard. This is less of a weakness as our three guard lineup is crazy good. 3) Condo's hook shot. If he can get that down, he will be a much stronger player. 4) Aberdeen's love of the dribble can sometimes stagnate us. 5) Slow on time outs to talk to them, to tweak the lineup, etc. Our strengths? 1) Offensive rebounding 2) Effort, no heads down when we are in a drought. 3) Sealing the defender for a layup. I don't recall any UF team that was so well coached in this. 4) Multiple players that can score in a lot of different ways. 5) Zero panic.
As far as the UK game, I would add we didn't play with the same aggressiveness as other games this year. By that I believe the players were trying to adjust to the SEC refs and when you start out at Rupp you don't want half your starters in foul trouble. I'm not saying we were timid, only we lacked the edge of aggressiveness at times, which resulted in several runs at home for the Cats. Call it missed shots or one and back, but we didn't force many turnovers or jump the passing lanes like we have been. When you are not getting those key turnovers at big moments of a game like this, you lack control in a hostile environment.
Kentucky always seems to shoot way above their average at home against us. It's just the way it is. How many times can you remember us playing Kentucky in Rupp and saying to yourself "Jesus, do these guys ever miss a shot?" For them to shoot so well (I was having Chris Lofton flashbacks the way Brea was shooting) and we still could have won with some better FT shooting tells you how good a team we have. I also think better coaching could have prepared us for all those easy back door cuts they were scoring off of, including some timely timeouts before they went on too big of a run and got the crowd into it. Coach just can't allow that to happen on the road. A little better coaching might have made up that 6 point deficit, so don't want to put the loss all on the guys.
It’s basketball, and basketball is a funny game. I actually thought we got a pretty friendly whistle for Rupp. UK made some incredibly tough shots. It happens. Comes down to just a few sequences: the three late first half turnovers by Clayton that turned it into 10 pt game, and the two missed assignments that led to open 3s by UK to close it out. Toss in too many missed free throws by guys who have to make them (Clayton, Martin) or by Condon in big moments, and that’s probably a 15-20 point swing. In a 6 pt loss. On the road. In Rupp. My biggest takeaway is how competitive this team is. Like the UNC game, these guys do not fold when momentum turns against them. Martin went on a heater when we got down, Clayton made some insane shots, Richard found ways to contribute when his shot wasn’t there, Condon and Chinyelu were monsters on the glass and contesting shots at the rim (and shockingly combined for 6 assists against 1 turnover). Our offense is every bit as good as last year, our defense is better, and our competitiveness is through the roof. We will lose on the road to teams that run offense as efficiently as UK, and to teams at home with elite defense who slow the game down, but I don’t see us getting upset on our home floor, and I think we will be competitive in every game we play. Still don’t expect anything better than 11-7 (optimistically 12-6) with this schedule, but our efficiency stats will be very high and I can’t imagine us not getting a 3-4 seed, at absolute minimum.
I really think TG just needs to have a few defensive schemes that he can go with and utilize at critical points within a game to stop the other teams offense from their flow or rhythm. TG is an offensive minded coach and he does it well but he does basically go with the same defensive scheme the whole game and he can usually get away with it because his team is so good on the offensive end. He could really use a Larry Shyatt type coach on the bench to help with the defensive sets.
For certain, Shyatt turned those teams into defensive stalwarts; BD was smart enough to see it was needed. If you think back to some of the 04 tourney games, we just completely stymied our opponents offenses so effectively, we just play decent on offense and game is over. I can’t say if we need that now; maybe he needs to get them to play hard and with intensity on EVERY defensive play. We certainly are athletic enough to play lock down defense the entire game. You can get away with sub average defense against UNF and Stetson but it will not work against UK, UT, Auburn and the entire SEC; you will be exposed and you may lose. He has to drum this into their heads at every practice and game prep activities. I’m sure TG knows what to do and we shouid see this on the court now!
I was disappointed but not angry yesterday. It is really hard to say there are "good losses" but that is as close to one as you will get. My thoughts: - FT shooting disappointing but shit happens. We are normally a good FT shooting team and I see this as an anomaly that maybe gets the guys to understand that the little things make the difference between a W and an L against good teams. - Defense, especially closing out, cannot be over emphasized enough. Playing better defense than last year is not enough. Every play, everything you got b/c you never know when another team will go unconscious. Don't let them get on a role. - Careless dribbling (Clayton) and passes. A few possessions can, again, define whether you get a win or a loss. UK was lights out and we were uncharacteristically poor from the line. This game tells me that we are certainly as good as UK (first really good team we have played) and that if our guys clean up the details, I think we can beat anybody.
The perimeter defense has to improve. We could also use a deeper rotation. Uk got 8min from their ninth player and all others were in double figures. We got 5min from our eighth player.
We're a much better defense than we showed yesterday. UK just had a system rolling smoothly that continually got us out of position.
Kid comes of bench for KY and hits 7-9 from the three point line. Perhaps we can defend the three point line more effectively but second string guard was hit the difference in game IMO.
Tennessee is going to bring a brawler’s game to us and Barnes will work the refs. They aren’t #1 because they are undefeated, they bring it. Hope we don’t get sloppy and we take it to them all game. Tennessee has a very talented team and they have depth that they will use. This will be tougher than Kentucky!
Yes and it’s too bad we don’t play them in Gainesville like we usually do late in the season; pretty sure we would beat them down at home. Everything clicked for UK yesterday while we had several substantial deficiencies yet only lost by a few points. You just can’t let a good team go on a 16-0 run; we did and could have won nevertheless. Our team is gutty even in defeat. I’m positive we will have a great season, hopefully memorable.
They will for sure but they won’t have the home cooking they usually have at home. They will be swiping, hanging on us, pushing us around like they always do. We just can’t let that affect our game plan and/or get upset at the endless grappling they are known for. Just have to play on and hard.
Always stings to lose, but the game just reinforced for me that we're a pretty good team! It generally takes a heck of an effort to beat us. Hats off to UK for how well they played.
The rotation is pretty much set. We just need better minutes out of Alexis. Needs to give us 12-15 minutes. Golden usually plays 8, but will go 9. Just not sure wanted to test out a defensively weak Klavzar on the road against one of the best offenses in college hoops. We also need more productive minutes out of Aberdeen.
I don't think at UK was a good time to put Klavzar in, but I do think that he'll give us good minutes in coming games. I'd like to see an all-shooters lineup with him in for a few minutes to see what happens. Maybe if UT's defense is causing us big problems, Urban's scoring and passing will be a quick tonic.
Gotta be able to defend better, and when that’s not working… defend differently. Don’t wanna be ncaa hoops version of the Bengals. And I say that as a sad Cincy fan.
