Glad to see Coach Golden going with the hot hand. The lineup against Missouri was very unusual, but got the job done against a team that had a lot of burly guys but didn't have a true center Castleton played a terrific all around game, filling up the stat sheet in 36 minutes, which was probably too many, but Golden took advantage of those timeouts every four minutes, to give him so rest. Couldn't believe Richard led us in scoring with 18 points, but 4-8 from "3" and 6-6 from the foul line will do it. Fudge played an inspired second half, spelled Castleton for 4 minutes even with foul trouble Jones played a terrific 35 minutes and dished out 5 assists with only one turnover Lofton plays 34 minutes did most of the ball handling, but had no assists Kugel played an important 19 minutes, made some key shots to get us back into it , but too many turnovers kept him on the bench in crunch time Reeves looked off from the get go and hardly played in the second half Bonham had 8 ineffective minutes in the first half, never left the bench in the second half Jitoboh didn't play at all, which may have been the first time this year.
Quite a game and great effort. IMO Myreon Jones has earned a starting spot over Bonham. The 3 he hit and then coming back and drawing the charge was huge. His defense has been fantastic and has his confidence back on the offensive end. Jitoboh was stretching with the team but was sitting during the first warmup until the big men drills. He was also not wearing his glasses, which either means his eye is 100% or he's not expecting to play. His DNP is surprising, considering Missouri's size and both CC and Fudge having 3 fouls at the 2nd half 12 minute timeout. Will Richard is fearless. He's guarding guys twice his size and doing it very well. Kowacie stopped the 11-0 Missouri run at the TV timeout but other than that had a rough day. We also held the #1 assist team in the country (18) to 9 and 41% shooting. This team is getting pretty good.
Agree. I said during the game thread that this was the turning point. Interesting how much work he got bringing the ball up, after the disastrous first half by everybody.
Myreon has earned the starting job and is getting starter's minutes, but maybe CTG likes bringing him in off the bench. I'd like to see Bonham come in off the bench as the energy guy, however. His excess energy at the start, I believe, is contributing to us rushing shots, forcing passes, and digging ourselves an early hole.
Considering our poor starts of late, Myreon should be starting. I also like Bonham coming off the bench as our version of "Vinnie Johnson"
Bonham turned a couple of games our way early in the year with his energy and hustle off the bench. He was rewarded with the starting job, but now I think he's better coming in as the reliever.
Jones has really turned it on in conference play. He is shooting 42% from the arc, is second on the team in assists, and has the best assist:to ratio during that period. Also has by far the best turnover rate on the team in league play. That, combined with his solid defense and loose ball skills (fourth on team in defensive rebounding rate for the season) and ability to hit free throws (94% on season), and you have a surprisingly effective contributor for a guy who couldn't hit the broad side of a bard through Christmas. Really glad Golden stuck with him in retrospect, because it was hard to watch early on.
I had no idea Jones could pass the ball as well as he has been. We don't have a passer like Nembhard this year, but (at least since the Georgia game) this looks like it could be the best passing team we've had in years. We just need to protect the ball better (don't "show" the ball so much) against man pressure like Missouri's. I haven't been on the site in a while so this may be a little tardy, but our play against Georgia was some of the best "instinctive" (for lack of a better word) offensive basketball I've seen from a Gator team in years. Much better than earlier this season. I had to take a video on my phone of that out-of-bounds play Jones made against Georgia on the baseline where he saved it with a pass toward midcourt that led to a fast break bucket.
I was so done with Jones. Happy to be wrong. He also made a lot of great decisions against their press. Kugel becomes a little less freshmany with every outing. He had an aggressive drive yesterday like he was doing early in the season. This one ended under control and with a nice dish for an assist. I think the game is slowing for him. Should run more sets to get Fudge rim running. Dude is on springs. Us playing small ball is a horrible matchup for Mizzou. It's been an effective formula lately. Hope JJ is OK. Between him and Felder, that's a lot of muscle we've lost.
Agreed on all points. Fudge's strength is beating his man to the basket and playing above the rim. I'd like to see us design some inbounds plays for him, like we used to do for high-rising Kevarrius Hayes. The inbounds plays were perhaps Mike White's greatest strength. Even though JJ's minutes are dwindling, there will be games when we desperately need him. Fudge is a bit foul-prone and very thin, and there will be times when CC gets in foul trouble.
As I see it, Plan A is having Lofton as the PG and Bonham the SG. Unless Bonham is shooting the ball well and making himself useful on defense, Lofton just isn't getting into the offense. Plan B is to use Jones as PG 1a and Lofton as PG 1b (sort of). It seems to calm the team down and get into the flow. It seems to work fine...against the middling teams who aren't shooting great and we are playing sound defense. What we continue to need to move to the next level is to have Lofton be at least PG 1a. He HAS to be the straw that stirs this drink. The thing I am most worried, and likely Golden is also, is that Jones looks good when he is on and looks BAD when he isn't. And so the Jones/ Bonham dance. I mostly think what matters most isn't who starts but who gets the minutes going down the stretch. But what we HAVE to solve is the damn slow starts. We just aren't that talented to expect to win this way against the upper-echelon teams.
