25-26 Season

This team is pretty much exactly as I thought they would be in November, aside from Ament hitting form midseason. Missing a scoring two guard doomed this group.

 

Speaking of which…

*changes channel*

Well, not losing. I don’t love those grays though

 

I’m kinda surprised that Ament finding his form doesn’t especially seem to have raised the ceiling. Two of our biggest wins came with him no-showing. We seemed like a borderline 5/6 seed early on and we still do

 

We are going to be dominated by Candy if their coach doesn’t bolt.

 

I figured Ament would need to grow. Not disappointed in his development.

Am disappointed in Gillespie's ball handling as a PG. He was not consistent enough (for me).

And the team sucked at FT line (at least when I watched them).

 

I forgot to mention: [uck fay] Vandy

 

Ament, Boswell, Brown, and Evans combined to go for 1-24 today.

I love many things about Barnes, but I will not miss the love affair with mediocre 3-star combo guards who can’t shoot or score.

 

So honestly, are we supposed to be tipping the refs or what? Are we breaking some etiquette? They can't be so terrible on accident. Can they just level with us on what it will take to get an even whistle? Is it money? Perks? Sex stuff?

 

I still think Boswell can be a good piece for us, but he was horrendous today. I’m not sure he came back in the game after that possession where he missed two threes and then picked up a foul.

 

Boswell has been pretty consistently bad for like a month, in all facets of the game. I don't really want anyone back, but I'm not sure that's even possible. I'm fine with Evans and Brown returning, apprehensive at best about anyone else.

 

Yeah Boswell has fallen off starting about when Ament showed up.

I still like some of the underclassmen (Boswell, Henderson, Evans, Brown), but next year’s team doesn’t have much at this point (not that that’s much different than this time last year)

 

We need at least two really big hits from the portal. The rest of the team is a collection of role players.

 

When people ask me how I can possible like the NBA more than college, I'm just going to respond with this post, going forward.

 

I can see that coming from someone who ain't from around here, so to speak or perhaps went to a small school in another state. I'm sure there is an intellectual, logical reason in that person's mind. And they are welcome to that reasoning.

Some of us went to school @ Tennessee; some of us have relatives who went to school @ Tennessee; some of us were born in the State of Tennessee; some of us live(d) in the State of Tennessee; some of us have kids that went (or want to go) to the University of Tennessee. Perhaps some of us are "ride or die" for the University of Tennessee for none of the reason listed.

I suspect anyone with kids will watch every game their kid plays (or sits on the sideline) in and they won't tell him/her that you prefer watching grownazz men making a butt-load of money play a professional sport over going to watch his/her team suck.

Go Vols!!

 

Well he didn’t raise his game yesterday. He was awful.

 

Conditioning after being out

 

He and Evans both gimpy and in treatment and PT the next 2 days.

 

This team still has the pieces to make a run. I expect them to lost Thursday/Friday, but the pieces are there if they could get their collective heads out of their asses.

 

Look, my heart is all Tennessee, and I don’t have the same kind of connection to any NBA team, but…well I did have Spurs wallpaper as a kid, and I just turned on their game against the Hornets—first time I’ve tuned into the NBA all season—and the level of shooting ability is really astounding. NBA was my favorite league in the mid-90s, and the game is just unrecognizable right now. I can see why people like the product, even if I don’t have the same kind of emotional connection.

 

Some things we do that will get you beat against real competition:

Bad FT shooting
Poor/nonexistent outside shooting
Poor perimeter defense that relies on poor outside shooting/finishing at the rim from the opponent to not get shredded
Turnovers
Prolonged scoring droughts

Some things we do that can help you advance:

Offensive rebounding (if it leads to second chance points)
Drawing fouls (ideally shooting an acceptable FT% so they aren't basically turnovers, but effective against a team without quality depth regardless)
Explosive scoring bursts

I think we're more Column A than B. I'm not even sure matchups matter for us, as we're unlikely to face someone at this point that can't expose our weaknesses on the defensive end. Maybe if we draw teams that offer zero resistance in the paint? Otherwise, I think we have to hope for random bad shooting nights combined with a decent night of our own. Not a recipe for success.