HookEm

Pope is a good player. He averaged almost 17.6 PPG with decent efficiency in the PAC 10 last year. He just hasn’t gotten it going yet. I think Tre Johnson being out may be what he needs to stop being passive and play to his potential.

In a surprising turn of events, Shedrick gets a 3 drained right in his face. For only the 200th time this year.

Tournament success is obviously highly correlated with regular season success. If you are a 4 seed or better, the odds are that you will periodically make the Sweet 16 or better. If you are always a 10 seed you are stuck hoping for a favorable matchup just to win a game. We need a coach who never misses the tournament and considers it a failure if seeded 5 or lower. We don’t need one who always has us on the bubble and hoping that an 8-10 conference record is enough to make it in. That kind of program wouldn’t be good enough for any other sport at UT.

I would be shocked if we won two tournament games this year. I think it is more likely that we miss the tournament completely.

Exactly. Everybody knows RT is mediocre at best. We can do better than him or Barnes or Shaka. Not sure we can do better than Beard. Holy hell he was the perfect fit here. But he is clearly unstable, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see the wheels come off again. I give RT full credit for the E8. That could have easily been a 12 win team following Beard’s departure, especially playing in the brutal Big 12. The team got better and better as the year went on. He knew how to manage the players and restore their focus. A+ job. Last year was “ok”. He built a decent roster despite losing two NBA caliber freshmen at the last minute. And he won more tournament games than Shaka did his entire tenure here. Regardless, OK isn’t close to good enough with our resources.

I get your point, but that stretch includes the two time defending champion and another Final Four team from last year in addition to Syracuse, a top-25 historic program. The shitty teams are shitty though. Agreed.

My dad's birthday was yesterday. He was telling me about how his granddad died on his birthday when he was 7. I was like... cool story. Texas basketball died on my birthday, December 12 two years ago.

I always felt like Shaka was close to turning the corner at Texas, but he just never could do it. Every year it seemed like we had 4-6 VERY close losses that could have changed the whole season with a win. 2016 should have been a good year. Isaiah Taylor, Jevan Felix, Roach, Ridley, Ibeh, etc. Lost a few close ones that could have moved us up to a 4-5 seed. Instead we are a 6 seed and lost to Northern Iowa. Fail. 2017 was a shit show. Finished the regular season losing 7 in a row and 14 of the last 17. Fail. 2019 had wins over #7 UNC, #9 Purdue, #15 ISU, #17 KU. And then put it together to win the NIT. (Big whoop). They also had TEN losses by 6 points or less. Just win half of those and we would have been a medium NCAA seed. Fail. The 2021 team was really good. We were 19-8, but again 6 of those losses were by a combined 11 points. That team was full of NBA talent in Sims, Kai Jones, Greg Brown. We had a great senior PG in Matt Coleman. And Jones / Ramey were solid. That team should have been a S16 or E8 team. Nope. Stepped on our dick vs. shitty ACU. Fail.

I like Caitlin Clark precisely because all the annoying WNBA players hate her. And I have enjoyed watching her take it to them on the court. And I also like that she has largely stayed out of politics (which is part of what makes those other WNBA players so annoying).

In the last 17 years, Rick Barnes and Rodney Terry have been to exactly the same number of Elite Eights. In the last 5 seasons, Chris Beard has won a grand total of TWO tournament games. Shaka Smart has made it past the first round in the tournament exactly one time in the last 14 years. Yes, these coaches are ranked highly right now, but lets see the season play out before we cry too hard.

In his last 8 years at NW Missouri St he was 253-21 (0.923) with four National Titles (and would have been a 5th if Covid didn't cancel 2020). Is that good? Seems good.

Here is a rambling synopsis: We are very strong on the wings with three excellent players in Tre Johnson, Tramon Mark and Arthur Kaluma. We take care of the ball and are #10 in the country in turnovers (vs. #173 last year). And we are efficient scoring the ball: #9 in eFG% and #13 in 3PT%. Our defense overall is good at ~#28 in defensive efficiency. Tre Johnson is our "star". He is a 6'5 SG/SF who plays like a poor man's Ray Allen. He is a certain one and done lottery pick and plays with a lot of fire. That said, the team tends to stand around and watch him cook when he is in the game. He also can try to shoot himself out of a slump so he occasionally has really bad nights. He can be the best player on the court regardless of who we are playing on any given night. Tramon Mark is a solid SG/SF who started the year hurt and is just getting his feel with the team. He is a really good defender and can guard just about any position on the floor. He is a decent rebounder and really nice mid-range scorer. He was all over a player out on the 3-point line fighting through a screen and he reminded me a little of a very poor man's Kawhi Leonard back in San Antonio. But he is definitely still shaking the rust off. Arthur Kaluma is probably our best player. He is a SF/PF with range and impacts both ends of the floor. He is a good rebounder and is an efficient scorer and can create his own shot. All three of these guys have some dawg in them. We just haven't seen them all put it together. Our best point guard is Jordan Pope. He has been very subdued and hasn't yet played to his potential. On the plus side he doesn't turn the ball over and has been reasonably efficient. But he disappears for long stretches of the game. We need him to step up as a leader on the team. Our other point guard is Julian Larry. He is a more active player than Pope and seems to create more offense. He is also a better defender than Pope. But he is a little more careless with the ball. Neither of these guys have really done much to separate from each other, so we get about 20 minutes from each of them. Chendall Weaver is probably the most fun player on the team, much like last year. He has bulked up a little and does his best Russell Westbrook impression trying to take it to the rack and dunk on people at every chance he gets. He also flies around getting offensive rebounds. He has improved in most facets since last year and is a key contributor. Part of me would like to see him as our starting point guard with the above three wings. Our weak point has to be center. Shedrick.... well you just have to watch him and make up your own mind. Opinions on this board are mixed. When he stays down in the paint, he can be an "ok" post defender. And he can score when he gets it down there. But too often he drifts out to the perimeter on both offense and defense. I swear half of our opponents scores this year seem to have been when Shedrick is switching off on someone and gets beat for an open 3. But I digress. Onyema has shown signs of improvement. He is in better shape and is playing much more confidently. I generally like it when he is on the floor. He is a decent defender he is moving well. We also have some solid young pieces in Nic Codie, Jamie Vinson, Devon Pryor. We also lost a huge key player in Jayson Kent, who would have been ANOTHER versatile wing player, and probably best rebounder on the team. I am starting to doubt we see him again this year. Overall the team is well constructed outside of our weakness at center, and even there we aren't horrid. But the coaching remains a big problem. Against weaker teams, we blow them out as we should. But in SEC play, we are going to struggle if Mark doesn't step up as an All-SEC caliber player and if Pope doesn't play to his potential. It is frustrating because the pieces are there for this to be a Sweet 16 or better team. But the coaching is so bad that we could miss the tournament entirely.

Fair. I’m old and fat.

My favorite center Shedrick had 2 rebounds tonight against a high school team. Meanwhile Weaver had 8 in fewer minutes. Yes, he had 14 points and hit a 3, but that isn’t what we need out of him.

I’m pretty sure I could play for APB.

Looks like we are projected to be 6-12 if we win all the ones we are favored in. And we are projected to be 8 -10 if you add the probabilities. Not good.

I still think Vinson has the best potential of our big men. He has 9.8 +/- for the season vs. 4.8 and 4.4 for Shedrick and Onyema respectively. I would have liked to have kept Dillon Mitchell on this team. He could have played small ball center for us and does basically everything better than Shedrick. He is a better defender, especially on the perimeter. And he is a better rebounder. This year he is even shooting 3s better than Shedrick. Of course if he would have stayed then we wouldn't have signed Kaluma - and Mitchell fits terribly with Shedrick. Dillon Mitchell Kadin Shedrick Also Tyrese Hunter is a better player than either of our current point guards. I wish we could have kept him as well. He has improved every year including this one. I would have also liked the continuity bringing back a couple of guys who were key parts of the program, including during the Elite 8 run. Tyrese Hunter Jordan Pope Oh well that ship has sailed. We need to get Pope playing up to his potential. All of his numbers are down this year and he just looks sooooo passive. As the point guard he needs to step up and lead the team. Match Tre Johnson's competitiveness.

Mark + Tre Johnson + Kaluma is such a good collection of wings. I’m not sure we have had a better group ever at Texas. The problem is at PG and Center. Pope and Larry are fine, but they aren’t elite. And you need elite guards at the college level. And center is also really sub par.

Any update on this question?

Literally nobody said our floor was Sweet 16. But a lot of people were optimistic and thought we could be better than last year. Losing Mark for the start of the season hurt and losing Kent continues to hurt. I still think this is a well constructed roster (outside of Shedrick, but I have beaten that horse to death). But they are just not coached to their potential. Give this roster to Bill Self and you would have a great team.

This is why I like the concept of crowd sourcing the computer models. One model may emphasize one type of data, another emphasize another. But if you have 50 computer models, then combined they will use all possible data to some degree. And if one uses an obscure method, then it will be only a small fraction of the overall rating.

Things would be so much better on offense if Tre was running around everywhere through screens without the ball like Steph Curry. Instead the whole offense is him playing ISO ball. That won’t beat tournament level teams very often, I don’t care how good he is.

We all know the ceiling with RT is pretty low. That said we aren’t firing him for at least another year or two. That said, Haith has been horrid. He should be fired after this year for sure.

Cool every possession is hero ball, which is just so much fun to watch

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