A bit concerning is minutes played as Justice, Braun, Jalen, and Pipes are all going over 35 with J and J going 38/39. Herb’s best season tough was his first using a 7 man rotation with Jared, Kratch, and Feagin playing almost the entire game. Was at the UCI game and fatigue definitely played a factor down the stretch.
Herb’s had a short bench in all of his 5+ seasons at SCU. Yes, his best season was his first one where he inherited KK’s players (which speaks volumes to me) and those kids played pretty much the entire game all season. Funny thing is back then when a few of us were questioning the short bench, Noob was making an argument that the kids could play 40 mins a night… they were used to playing 2 AAU games a night and so on. Now he leans on it like a crutch (as if it’s not completely under Sendek’s control).
As I see it, a short rotation isn’t conducive to player development (at least for those guys who never get in) and it creates an atomsphere of complacency for the team.
It’s not like Herb doesn’t have a bench to put in, he just chooses not to. Besides, if the complaint is that those guys who don’t play aren’t ready then the coach needs to either get them better or recruit better.
Short rotations have additional troubles adjusting when a player is absent, and generally struggles against any aggressive defensive approach (espically late in the game)
I think a fair criticism would be “Did they not vet the Besselink interest in playing college hoops properly?” From the article I read, it basically said he liked the basketball at SCU but had no interest in the school part. Seems like we could have figured that out earlier. As for the Harvard grad transfer, no idea what to make of it…but in a year where depth should not have been a problem with the free year from Vrankic, we have managed to be left with no depth at the moment…mostly due to injury/illness especially if Bediako is out for any reasonable amount of time to go along with Vrankic and Holt. Tomley giving producitve minutes should ease some of the backcourt depth issues. I really hope Herb can get Stewart to play a productive 10 to 15 minutes a game. He is a major work in progress and kind of out of control at times but he has the athleticism to attack off the dribble this team needs.
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Thanks for the feedback. I hope heavy minutes played do not lead to additional injuries which could hinder us during league play. I admit being so old I remember the Mark A, DePaul teams playing 5 the entire game but the game was different then. No shot clock made for a much slower game and with no 3 pointer, defensive intensity on the perimeter was not needed.
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Yeah, it’s definitely too much. But there aren’t really many other choices right now.
Djuricic, Besselink gone
Holt out
Vrankic out
Bediako injured during the game
Tomley not 100% fit
Whatever is happening with Knapper, obviously he isn’t available.
You basically have J Williams, G Williams, Stewart, Pipes all guards. Justice a combo forward. And Braun and Tongue. Tongue commits a foul every like 3 minutes or something. Just not ready.
So if he isn’t ready to play, then Justice has to play the 4.
The one thing I would say is Pipes would have spent a lot of last game on the bench if it was me. He had nothing. But obviously the coaches thought Stewart was even less reliable, which might be true bc he’s wild right now and he can’t stay in front of people on defense.
Ironically, it’s not J Williams or Justice that are really suffering though, and they play the most minutes. I’ve said before I think Pipes is struggling with the increased tempo and increased freedom on offense after being at GB. And maybe Braun got more worn down by playing against the big kid than he would have if Bediako was out there. But he really shouldn’t. He’s not a freshman. You have to know what you need to do in the preseason to get yourself ready for whatever the season may throw at you. Maybe this is why he didn’t play much at Missouri – maybe it wasn’t about the talent but the physical readiness (the required level of which would be higher in the SEC).
Hopefully they can get the job done early against Mt. St. Marys and be able to get some rest time. La Tech blew out their opponent before playing SCU, I think Lofton only played like 20 minutes. So that probably helped them going into the SCU game.
For those of you that bellyached about the schedule not being challenging enough, well, I hope you’re happy. Because this is the other side of it. Probably would have been better off with a few less “challenge” games and a few more recovery games.
“People change their minds” is my explanation about Besselink. His dad played US college ball, so he probably felt like he had an idea of it but when he got here, he wasn’t feeling it. Unfortunate for the team, but hopefully the right move for the player.
Being down 5 (almost all) bigs is a killer for basically any team.
Yeah because I’m sure you would have no problem with playing people that in his opinion are inferior and being a worse team for the sake of playing the bench.
You seem like the kind of person that would be totally understanding and not critical at all of that.
"For those of you that bellyached about the schedule not being challenging enough, well, I hope you’re happy. "
Noob, lets get this straight… it’s not like this is some amazing schedule. Playing a bunch of teams in the bottom 1/3 of D1 (along with non D1 teams) is pretty much worthless. Yeah, it’s a step up for Herb compared to his first 5 seasons at SCU, but it’s certainly nothing special.
Not interested. I have no interest in engaging with you. You actively root against the program because of your irrational hatred for the coach, and you simply never know what you’re talking about.
I have nothing to add to what I have already said in reply to others.
Honestly, the only reason I don’t block you is so I can report when you make abusive posts toward me.
I mean, you are unable to even pay me enough respect as to address me with the proper name. So why should I give you the time of day? I won’t.
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Dude, you need to quit it. Pipes is in a little slump and that’s it. Look at GB history over his first 3 years, as they lead country in pace. Last year was a new coach and Wisconsin old coach son who wanted a slow pace. His first three years they pressured the ball all game full court man to man. Get your facts before just trying to analyze something you have no idea about.
You can bet, Pipes will find his offense and even with his offensive struggle he still playing 35 minutes and there’s a reason for that even if you can’t see it.
Stop trying to have a reason for everything and just be a fan. There is up and downs and we don’t want it but it happens as JW had 2 low games also for one reason or another too.
Current top minutes in WCC…
I believe the offense will return and I hope soon as his legs may be a little heavy but that’s it…
I’m not sure why you think what this chart reflects is different from what I said and why you’re angry about it. I also again do not think it is appropriate for you to tell people what to say, what to think, and how to post.
I think Pipes is a good player, or at the least he has good games in him, but I also think he offered very little yesterday. And if he is a player and a competitor worth his salt, he will think the same.
I saw and called out the signs of fatigue early on – passing on both a wide open pullup and an open drive on the same possession showed he just wasn’t feeling himself. And his shot didn’t look much like the one he had vs. Stanford and TCU. etc. Eventually, it caught up with him on defense also.
The reason he’s playing 35 minutes is because half the team is unavailable, they had to play a wing as a starter-minutes power forward after Bediako went down, the coaches don’t trust Stewart right now, and Tomley is getting back to game shape (he probably played a few more minutes than he was ready for, but he did decently). They wanted to pull Pipes out for some rest around 12 min of the first half, but it didn’t last long bc Stewart went in and immediately turned the ball over and then his defender burned him on a straight line drive. Tongue was worse, making it imperative that Justice swing to the 4 most of the rest of the game.
Pipes hasn’t look confident since the TCU game, and his confidence looks to go up and down in general. Wasn’t even looking for his outside shot the last two games and I imagine the coaches were probably on him to do that, so he took several 3’s but he just didn’t have the legs.
Green Bay did play a faster tempo under Darner (who I think was a good coach and I was surprised he was let go, though I’m as in the dark about the details behind that as it seems most people are, including people in Green Bay), but Pipes was also a non-starter for the most part under Darner, and was also not the primary ballhandler (and I’m not sure he really is at SCU either, but he’s doing more playmaking than he was).
He’s also stepping up in level of competition on a consistent basis, so maybe he’s being affected more physically by that. I don’t know the reason, but I know the tells. Hopefully he can adjust and get back the level of performance he’s showed flashes of, and get there more consistently, bc SCU would be a lot better for it.
Panther thanks for the chart, having our 4 in the top 10 was a bit surprising. I don’t expect a lot of + from our bench but feel Williams, Tomley, Tongue, Stewart can give productive minutes to rest our starters. Kerr found a positive way to use Chris Chiozza (resting a league mvp) so I’m confident our bench can come through when given the chance. Maybe we can change our style, pace of game when bench is in to buy some minutes? When Josip comes back that will help but I would still like to see more from the bench as I actually like what I’ve seen. As far as being down players, Djuricic and Besslink never put on a Bronco uniform and chose to not be a part of this team so I could care less.
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They were still planned on being part of the team at the start of the year. Losing them is no different than having players injured. They’re still pieces you expected to have and built the team thinking you’d have…that you didn’t.
If the staff knew what was going to happen, they wouldn’t have been and two other players that would stay would have been recruited.
You only get so many scholarships, and in theory they could replace them, but in practice it is practically impossible and almost unheard of, and at a school like SCU even less likely than the already extremely unlikely that it is anywhere.
It’s like buying a car with a V8 but only 7 of the cylinders work properly when you get it. You can still drive it, but it’s not what you thought you were going to have. And right now SCU is running on about 5.
Guessing several other schools in the WCC have players playing similar minutes in competitive games, but were able to play the bench more in games against lower competition that some here have bellyached endlessly about.
SCU has dropped 3 of their last 4 so Noob is in his make ridiculous excuses for the coach mode… Mount St. Marys is coming up so perhaps he’s give the cry baby routine a rest soon (at least for a short spell).
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We have a good roster, 14 cylinders and need 5 to compete. One goes down for repair so another one needs to step up and I like what we have in reserve. To say we need 8 and have only 5 means the mechanic is doing a poor job. I don’t feel that way.
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Flagged as inappropriate and off topic.
Yeah that’s not how any of this works.
Sure if you lose 1 that’s one thing but when you’ve lost half a dozen or so…well that’s quite a lot. Especially when one of them is one of your best players.
It’s not a matter of anyone doing a poor job. It’s just the way things have happened. SCU has been dreadfully unlucky certainly in the last two years and a time or two before that. This isn’t even the first time they lost two players before the season really got going. I won’t elaborate bc either you remember or you don’t and you don’t seem inclined to care.
And I’ll reiterate, this isn’t football or soccer. Players don’t get injured all that often in basketball. Let alone several at the same position. You’re just not going to be able to keep replacing forward after forward and not feel the effect.
Nah, I’ll do what I want, and I think it’s inappropriate for you to try to tell someone what they can and can’t say.
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I did no such thing. I just disagreed with you.
But nice try? Well, no, not really. Pretty bad try, in reality.