San Jose St.
Tim Miles’ Spartans appear better than usual, 7-3 so far on the season. But still only considered a Quad IV opponent and are currently ranked #192 on Torvik. Best wins are over Ball St. and Northern Colo. Losses are to Hofstra, N. Texas and by 41pts to a good Arkansas team.
Many of their rotation guys are returning players. Top guys appear to be:
6-8 grad transfer forward Sage Tolbert (10pts, 8rebs)
6-1 guard Alvaro Cardenas (10pts, 3.3 assists; highest volume 3pt shooter but only at 31%)
6-7 wing Trey Anderson (9pts, 44% 3pt shooter
7-0 center Ibrahima Diallo (7pts, 4.5rebs, 2.1 blocks)
Spartans have decent size on the wings and frontcourt and rebound well at both ends of the floor; the Broncos typically good defensive rebounding this season needs to continue. They play at a slower tempo, shooting efficiently on 2’s, middle of the pack on 3’s. Defensively, nothing remarkable overall, hold teams to low 2pt % but don’t defend the 3 well nor do they generate many turnovers.
For the Broncos, an area of strength, defensive rebounding, needs to hold. Spartans play slower, we’re better playing uptempo, so need to grab those defensive rebounds and go.
Spartans don’t create many turnovers so hopefully we can keep our TO’s to a reasonable #, a challenge for us all season. In particular, I want to see our posts take better care of the basketball; they’re getting stripped in the post or stolen by help defenders when they try to dribble way too often.
I hear you buckets, I don’t like the 2pm starts either.
If it makes you feel any better, SMC’s tipoff vs. SDSU Saturday is at noon…so it could be worse.
SCU had finals this week so most students will be gone by this evening so tomorrow’s game time probably won’t have any impact on student attendance.
SJS is having a much better year than usual. Broncos need to maintain focus throughout this game amid Portland State. If we play strong these are games we could get more players into the game and see what they can do. If we lose focus we can lose these games. Toughest games are UCI and Boise State… We always seem to have trouble with UCI. Go Broncos!
Maybe when i retire i will see if i can find the afternoon game W-L stats. (Or better put, the L-W stats). But i am ok with it today since the game in sandwiched betweeb a
morning hike and a an evening holiday party. Works for my personal schedule.
Our 3pt shooting is carrying us, two each from Podz and Justice, 3 from Stewart.
3pt shooting can go cold, need to shore up some other areas to hold or extend this lead; we know SJSU rebounds well and we’ve given up 6 off boards so far…too many.
Reminds of last year when Carlos Stewart dominated San Jose State. Although, he is doing it with the 3pt shot tonight versus more slashing last year. With Stewart shooting it so well from 3, I really like when the Broncos make Podz the primary initiator of the offense. He has shown to be very adept at reading pick and roll coverage with the ability to make accurate long diagonal passes to get Stewart and Justice some excellent looks from 3.
Was worried this would happen, 3’s can only carry you so far.
2nd half D hasn’t been great, allowing Moore and Amy to get in to the lane too easily.
And silly TO’s continue to haunt us.
Tough game to watch. Too many basic/fundamental errors. Simple things that make a high impact. For example: When offense picks up the ball, our defense steps back vs violating their space so much - offensive player is too blind to see any option. Weakside boards are being missed. (Our bigs do not BEND the player behind them when boxing out so long boards are easily picked up for second shot opportunities). By looking at this game and not the stats - I feel we are getting outboarded.
Cam is out for today (illness) - and I do believe they miss having him as an option today. I feel his aggressiveness and hustle would have helped. Some key boards missed would not have been, I am hoping coaching staff takes note. Would really like to see our Broncos play with a sense of urgency. Get tougher, faster, and control the ball better.
If we canot figure this out - it is gonna be a PAINFUL conference play.
11 pt loss to those guys is embarrassing. We should never lose to the Spartans, don’t care if they’re a little better than their typically weak squad.
Now 8-3. Need to get to at least 10 wins, preferably 11 in non-con. Now absolutely have to beat Portland St. and Cal then hope we can put a complete game together and knock off either UC Irvin or Boise St.
Ugh.
I’ve never been a fan of Sendek’s “equitable offense” and today certainly didn’t do anything to change my mind. I doubt his players even have individually specified/defined roles.
The kids play hard on D, but they end up wasting so much energy racing down to the blocks to help and then back to the 3 point line to defend the open kick out that it does more harm than good.
Bucky-
Agree on point guard. Carlos is great, he should be on the floor a lot but he doesn’t play like a point, he’s a combo guard at most. Knapper appears to be only true point guard. Two ways I see to mitigate the issue:
More Knapper. And more specifically, get him consistent minutes, his PT has been all over the place from very low mins (1 min vs. Sac St., 5 mins vs. SJSU) to 20 or more minutes in four games. Would like to see him on the floor a consistent 12 to 15mins a game. And along with that allow Carlos to slide over to the 2 guard and play some minutes along side Knapper when either Podz or Justice need a rest. Stewart is better suited to playing off the ball in half court sets.
Put the ball in Podz hands more, as we did with Jalen frequently over the past 2 years. We’re already doing this to some degree but be more purposeful with it, especially in half court Off sets. He’s a better decision maker and does a better job of reading the D and setting up his teammates.
