PG situation, Jacob Cofie, team defense, miscellaneous stuff!
*Edit - oh and a lot of the new offense threaded throughout!
Great stuff, Cuts. I have this exact same sentiment after attending in person but having a chance to rewatch
I left the game in person feeling pretty bleak about the result and, especially the backcourt but, on rewatch, am more encouraged by the team’s potential to develop than I was. There’s real talent in the frontcourt and at the SG position. We’ve got good spacing, the potential to absolutely catch fire shooting the ball, and many interesting lineup iterations to explore.
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Maybe a cliff notes or executive summary version would be helpful.
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TLDR version:
The new offense is not as old as the old one
Cofie good
Power not as good
Dai dai another day?
Rohde best point guard ever
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Whoa.
Imma sue.
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Just getting started, but two thoughts on this:
Rohde’s best position and the one where he can contribute the most for us this season is PG;
- If I were on this team, that would also be true of me (I could state my earnest point better, but I think the snarky version kinda gets the point across better).
- His biggest liability is bringing the ball up to midcourt. If Rohde could just initiate the offense and make nice passes in the halfcourt, he’d be pretty good at that. If you ignore the part of the PG’s job where he has to get the ball up the court without low major guards smelling blood, then Rohde could be a half decent PG.** For years and years and years, we had the luxury of ignoring that part of a PG’s job.
** and assuming you are a team with the luxury of not needing much else from your PG (which we aren’t, which seems like another key point)
You’re right – this play encapsulates a lot of the good and bad of what we saw in game 1:
- (Bad) Rohde struggles to get the ball to halfcourt. Drink. Or gummies. Or psylocybin. Whatever works for you.
- (Neutral - totally and completely neutral) Hey, look, Taine’s here, everyone! Hey Taine. Let’s have you touch the ball once, not do much, and then stay in the corner. Cool? Cool.
- (Bad) None of iMac, Taine, or Rohde are a serious threat to drive, so a low major D is just blanketing us out there and happy to deal with the consequences…
- (Good) … which to be fair, are pretty good! The offense is creating opportunities and the ball finds Cofie in a spot where he can create something! Cool. I like this.
- (Good) And Cofie was a real solid spot in the offense, and makes a nice play.
- (Good) And not only that, great instincts from Blake to see it develop, make the right cut and get to the hoop!
- (Bad) Blake finishing at the rim!
- (Bad) Blake goes to the FT line
One more Rohde bash: So this is your hopeful Rohde nugget:
But, yeah, Rohde can absolutely be effective greasing the wheels within the context of surrounding him with good shooters and within the new offense and these spread lineups. He’s just got to have the batteries charged and the opposition can’t have had the ability to adjust to him all game.
On one hand, yeah! Rohde’s a glue guy. He’s good at connecting other good players. Which is good when you have enough other good players.
He’s got to have batteries charged? I agree - how about 15 minutes or so per game which I’ve basically thought ever since we got him? That should be enough to keep the batteries charged.
Opposition can’t have had the ability to adjust to him? I mean, you are basically saying that if we Lenny from Memento’d every opposing player and coach and therefore every time Rohde has the ball, the kid guarding him has absolutely no idea what his strengths and weaknesses are, then Rohde can be effective. Because once they know they can just pressure him and never let him do anything good, then he’s totally neutralized.
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Sorry, @Cuts_from_The_Corner , my TLDR here is basically that I think “Rohde was actually maybe kinda good at PG, I don’t know, right?” is the Slate-iest of Slate takes.
Tbh, I don’t think I disagree too much with anything here, other than you need a starter, and I’d make Dai Dai the starter, and have Rohde be the 15 mpg backup. Because ultimately, having nobody on the floor who can break down a defense on their own will remain a problem. Overcomable if the frontcourt keeps coming along? I doubt it, but maybe.
Watching the game live, I was very unimpressed with Dai Dai. I seem to recall calling him a “non entity” in the game thread. On rewatch, I would temper that a bit. He actually seemed fine with maybe one or two mistakes but also one or two indications that he may have the gear to get a step on his man and also that he’s actually a point guard.
My issue with rohde at PG is that you can call him that if you want but he still just seems to be a “secondary facilitator” that brings the ball up the floor, somewhat languidly. Ie not that different than last year. Sure, he had some nice passes, but he just doesn’t seem like he’ll ever be the guy that can “make it happen” and we are going to need some of that going forward. Dai Dai showed some flashes of being able to do that. If anything, he seemed a little reticent to press too hard, probably because he’s trying to fit in and not get pulled. It’s just unclear to me why the minutes distribution was so uneven.
I will say re: the “new offense” as a guy who doesn’t claim to be an Xs and Os expert, the thing that stood out to me was that we seemed a little more intentional about trying to attack the goal as early as possible in the possession. Sure, there were plenty of possessions where we did a lot of passing around the perimeter but it felt like that was more that there was no there there. It didn’t quite feel as much like intentionally burning clock as it has the last few years.
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I’d like Ames to be the starter too… and I believe I said many times that’s the weakness of the team.
I don’t think either are good enough for us to be as good as we’d like. Both have strengths and glaring weaknesses.
So where I’m coming from is I think it’s better playing them as complimentary players who are completely different covers (and defenders) than leaning into either for 30+ mpg.
But yes I’d give Ames the ability to audition this game when you can afford to.
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Agree. Ames audition and give him some opportunities to play to his strengths. Felt like we had the parking brake or even “the boot” on him
Who was the guy from UNC or NC ST who had the boot on his car, but just drove away anyway? 
Whoa - it was 4 boots!!
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Coppin’s PG is 5’10”. Give Ames at least 20 mins running point.
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