Maybe to surprise everyone afte 45 years that the will only play zone!
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It’s agreed upon in exhibition and scrimmage games as respect to the other coach so they can run their man stuff too…
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We used to even do situational stuff too like each team gets 5 possessions with the shot clock at 10…. Certain out of bounds situations…. Some press and traps… zone, man etc.
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Great point
Hoosplace ACC rankings - 10 through 6:
My view: he’s way too low on FSU (#8) and too high on Wake (#7).
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Hoosplace ACC 5 through 1:
My view: Way too high on ND. The underwhelming class that just won’t go away hasn’t quite gone away. They turned into a first four team who needed double OT to win in Dayton (but then won a game in round 1) because they had an awesome near lottery OAD guard. Will Starling replace Wesley? Maybe, lots of people roll snake eyes twice in a row (but most don’t). Plus they replace an at least serviceable ACC PG with a MAAC PG.
Too high on Miami – they went from bad to pretty good last year because of Waardenburg, McGusty making the leap, and Moore providing steady enough PG leadership. All three are gone and they bring in the Medical App promo all-star team. That team will take its bad chemistry to MSG in the NIT b/c someone will convince them that’s a good place to monetize their brand, or whatever garbage has been fed to those kids.
Duke – hard to predict. Not nearly last year’s talent, but still some intriguing talent. Multiple potential lottery guys, but also injury concerns and shooting concerns (what else is new) and not that top end talent of the better Duke teams.
Tbh, I don’t know who my top 5 would be.
EDIT – okay, here are the four I’d put in the top 5, along with UVa (we will be top 5, I think, but might not be as automatic as some of the computers and humans are leading us to believe):
1 - UNC – safe pick, but Duke’s talent upside probably higher
2 - FSU – going all-in on my FSU pick. Probably #2 to Duke in terms of NBA talent on this roster.
3 - Duke – gotta slot them somewhere
4 - Ok, let’s get wacky – NC State.
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Notre Dame has zero size and no depth in the post. That’s going to haunt them. I could see Tech finishing ahead of both Miami and Notre Dame as much as that pains me to say. Guess it comes down to how good Basile is
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Yeah, Atkinson is a big loss
Hot take alert … Starling is better than Wesley … like a good portion better.
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T Smith is like Kyrie - no idea how to play 5 on 5 basketball … watching some last year it seemed Casey was actually the only one on that team who understood 5 on 5 principles on both ends.
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Maybe more clearly defined roles w/o Seabron? I don’t know … spitballing.
Ok, lemme slip one more UVa-related thing in here: one of my quibbles with nearly every single piece of offseason UVa content is encapsulated in this (emphasis mine) :
The preseason polls and computers like Virginia to bounce back into being one of the nation’s better programs this year, largely because with this much returning experience the defense should bounce back nicely a year after atypical roster churn deprived the Pack Line of its usual continuity. But shooting will absolutely need to improve as well for the Hoos to hit this kind of ceiling.
From Feb 1 to the end of the year, per Torvik, we were the #21 ranked defense in the country. I think that #21 rank has already baked in that continuity. Basically, I think we’ve already squeezed the continuity citrus fruit. And it resulted in a pretty good, but sub-elite defense. With that defense, we still couldn’t beat the Bonnies in our own house. We couldn’t beat No Texas in regulation. We barely beat Louisville. We couldn’t hold off FSU’s crazy comeback. And we couldn’t stay within high teens of UNC in our most “must win” game. The core 6 returners defense is still under-sized and under athletic at the high major level. And to solve those problems, you need to hurt the continuity.
And then on the flip, the offense was only ranked #86. There, the prevailing theory for optimism is either (a) Armaan was hurt and now he’s not hurt, or (b) we fixed Armaan’s shot like a leaky toilet – just had to jiggle the handle, or (c) Justin gave Armaan the secret “make your 3 point shot look great briefly” beans.
That’s basically my complaint: I still haven’t seen many UVa hoops previews that really grapple with our actual issues or how this team would solve them. They are all “hand wavey” in the extreme.
I know saying that makes me a contrarian, belaboring, pessimist jerk, so I apologize for anyone who has to read this or anything I write. Thank you and go about your day peacefully. 
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Saying this simply makes you observant …
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You have now given me license to completely ignore any other thoughts you have on ACC preseason rankings/team quality.
Just kidding, haha. But I don’t see how you put NCST that high. Last year they had two NBA quality players and sucked, and this year they have one and a coach looking at being fired in a matter of months, and they’re going to be much better? I mean who knows, maybe, but I think the case for other teams in the middle of the pack is stronger.
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I’m mostly with you on this analysis-- basically, we are top 15 to 25 (assuming some improvement from last year), until some things that would indicate a significant improvement manifest themselves as the season progresses. Those things indicating significant improvement would be a jump to a top 10 defense, three point shooting at 37%+, and a breakout first year player.
Where I hesitate is on the conclusion that the defense can’t be better than #20 because of the lack of athleticism, size, and a really good 6’7"/6’8" wing defender. That makes sense to me until I look back at our two best defenses under Tony in 2015 and 2020 and see that those rosters didn’t fit the ideal mold either. In fact, the 2015 had four players in Tobey, Perrantes, Gill and Anderson who were not generally considered to be great individual defenders. Nor were Clark (by some), Huff, and Woldetensae in 2020. So I’m with you that I want to see it happen first, but I do think it’s possible the current team could be a top 10 defense.
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Definitely a flyer. I think there’s a theory: last year they lost Manny Bates and the D was bad. This year, maybe Duwouna (sp?) helps at the rim? There’s some continuity with Morsell back and now a senior leader? Like I hypothesized above - maybe better defined roles? I mean, basically the theory is Smith as a potential lottery guy in year 2 of college hoops and enough else around him.
(plus, probably obvious, but a healthy dose of : hey, what the heck?)
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I actually broadly agree with the points you make here, but would just note a few legitimate reasons for optimism despite them:
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We don’t know that we’ve actually squeezed all the juice from the ‘continuity benefit’. We may have squeezed what could be gotten from playing together in season, but this team has now had an additional offseason to address issues they saw playing together last year. Could be an additional benefit, at least somewhat.
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We will have a better bench and more versatile pieces this year. And yes, playing new bench guys cuts against the continuity benefit somewhat, but there’s a very good chance it outweighs that minor negative. We now have bench pieces we believe can shoot and be versatile wing defenders. Who knows how long it’ll be before they contribute majorly, but that’s significant. And if they play a good amount, it gives the starters more rest and may make them better too.
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We may be implementing some new offensive concepts that could be beneficial. This also slightly cuts against the continuity benefit, but presumably the offense has been somewhat designed with the players we have in mind and based on experiences from last year.
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We have players at the stage of their college careers where expecting a jump isn’t unreasonable. While the 4th and 5th years are likely pretty baked at this point, Shedrick or Reece or both could make significant jumps forward, and that would be a big boon even if we’re running the same line ups as last year.
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Maybe Justin did teach Armaan how to make the deal with the devil where you have one good year of three point shooting and before your appendix explodes and your fingers shatter late in the season.
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- We are gonna push the ball on misses
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If the theory is “Number of NBA players on the team has halved but Casey Morsell gets to be more heavily featured and some new guys might make the defense come together” it’s hard for me to buy in, haha. But sports is unpredictable! And if Smith is truly NBA talent and getting better then who knows. I’ll be putting my figurative money on some other horses though.
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I’ll give it a shot: Marginal improvements in a few core areas would be enough. This seems reasonable based on the rumblings around the team, the new recruits, retained talent, and history. On the latter point, we’ve seen Bennett teams flip a switch very quickly on defense, sometimes mid-season - which can work both ways (thinking of a terrible 3 game stretch in 2014-2015). I don’t think our ceiling is particularly high (not 2014-2019), but I don’t think the floor is very low either.
Basically, you can look at every individual weakness and say “how is this going to improve.” Which is a hard case to make, but one I don’t think you need to make. You just need to look at the full scope of the team’s play and see a little improvement in a few important areas. Often that’s something clicking for a guy on D, or a few % points to 3 point accuracy. A few of those taken together is enough to win a lot of games we didn’t win last year.
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