Great Effort, Unacceptable Loss

[sousaman2089]

That game was embarrassing.

[lefty]

I can accept all that, lefty, but this year's team is shorthanded because of what happened. That's all I am saying. Fans will just have to accept that, and unless we get some quick contributions from the freshmen, it could take a while to get back to where we would have been.

Which we all knew was a possibility...and I think we all knew that this season was going to be this way....hopefully we will look better at the end of the season than we do now....

[lefty]

That game was embarrassing.

Really? I don't think most people thought the game was embarrassing.....I've seen a lot more games worse than that over the last few years and I don't mean that as knock against JL...Mo had some too...although not very many at home AFTER the first year or two

[Gwright]

There are a couple of things I need to say in response to some people in this thread.

First, please actually READ what I initially posted. My point wasn't that the coach is terrible or needs fired, or the team is terrible or anything like that. My point is that great teams cannot accept losses like this. Do you think Coach K would be ok with this loss? Do you even think Tom Crean or Izzo or The guys 90 minutes up 74 would be ok with this? I understand that we are not those teams, BUT I WANT TO GET TO THAT LEVEL. My point is not that everyone must be shot on the spot, my point is that to get into a winning mindset, every single loss has to be unacceptable. If we fall into a pattern where we allow ourselves to think "It's ok, that's a BCS team" or "It's fine, we have a new coach, and a young team" it's 100% ok if these things are true, but that cannot be the response from us, or the coach.
Texas baseball had a hard fought loss once, Augie Garrido (their coach), absolutely lost his mind on the team when he came into the locker room. The result? The team did not lose a game until the Big 12 championship.
Was this a hard fought loss? YES.
Is this a young, raw team? YES.
Is this only the 4th game? YES.
do I have great faith in the future for these boy because of their heart? YES YES YES
Is it acceptable for us to be "OK" with a loss and expect to get back to the glory days of BU basketball? No.

I will put this into an analogy, I know a lot of you are parents, so hopefully this will give the situation some context. Suppose your child comes homes from school with a poor grade on an exam (A loss). They might have tried really hard (good effort in a loss), but their pencil broke (Terrible shooting), and the room was too hot (we don't practice in Carver), and the teacher didn't like them (poor Refs). If y'all are anything like my father, even voicing those excuses would be a very dangerous idea! However, because anything other than A's was never acceptable, I did actually become a good student, and I have actually managed as a fairly unintellectual individual to break into a career that is more mentally taxing than physically taxing. Had my dad (the coach) ever once shown that he was "OK" with a C, I don't think I would be where I am today.

Second, There is obviously (and has been for a LONG while) a serious gap in our fanbase about the JL GF situation. The problem that I see on these board every single day is that an opinion that you don't agree with automatically labels the owner of that opinion as either a JL hater, or a guy who is never going to give GF a chance. That simply isn't true. Please stop dragging that into arguments, it helps no one. JL is gone, Sammy is gone, GF is here, and we are 3-1 with a young team. Let's move on from what happened in the past.

And yes, to whoever asked, I am 100% serious, I care about our Braves, and I care about Bradley, and I am never once going to back away from that.

[bu fan 9]

our offense sucks we are out of control a lot take quick dumb shots. When we get in the half court offense we just stand around.We don't guard the 3 point line at all. Its like watching a pick up game at the YMCA.

[lefty]

First, I want to say that the players fought hard, and kept this team in it till the end. But, this is not an acceptable loss, nor is it a loss that we as a fan base can be "ok" with. Being fine with losses like this will lead the program directly down the path of mediocrity. I don't want excuses, and I don't want an explanation, I just want to firm stance from the coach, team, and administration that they are doing everything they can to avoid losses like this at home. GF sounded like he was almost ok with tonight. You may be fine with this Mr. Ford, but I am not.

I didn't think he sounded "ok" with it but you still have to be realistic about your situation. I'm guessing you would hear a different response deeper into this season and/or after a couple of years with guys in your system for awhile and then lose a game like this. And you may have heard a difference response if we just gave up and lost by 12-20 points....but we didn't...we had our chances and didn't pull it out. Geno said we lost earlier in the game with our play...really when you think about it...it came down to JP having an atrocious game and Walt shooting poorly from the line....if JP does just average we win...

[mrcoachdude]

Playing Wisky had a significant impact on their shooting statistics. Apparently never practicing in Carver Arena doesn't have the same impact on Wofford as it has on Bradley.

you had to didn't you

they shot good because they are good shooters...it really is simple

good shooters will, shoot well, pretty much anywhere, but will shoot better at home...
Average shooters will, shoot average, pretty much everywhere...but will be better at home..

[mrcoachdude]

our offense sucks we are out of control a lot take quick dumb shots. When we get in the half court offense we just stand around.We don't guard the 3 point line at all. Its like watching a pick up game at the YMCA.

were we watching the same game? I saw guys fighting through screeens trying to get to the shooters...Woff hit some crazy shots give them credit...and no one I saw was satanding around...but I guess I could look at the archives...

[bu fan 9]

We stand around a lot when we try to run a set. Yes I was at the same game and it was ugly.

[mrcoachdude]

Thompson was brought in as an example of someone who was brought in to a good amount of hype by various people who hasn't exactly lived up to it.

I'm not saying the current freshmen are or are not ready to contribute. Geno thinks at least one is. Just saying there are no guarantees the incoming guys who might have been here would be contributing any more or to expectations.

I'm not the only one in this thread who asked how you take a step backwards from last place, so it's not just me.

We have who we have. Those other guys aren't here and won't be here, so to continue to pine for them through the term "fallout" is a worthless endevour.

I know I shouldn't but here goes anyway..."fallout has been brought up so much more by other folks its crazy...

Yes we finished last, but REALLY..it was without Sam and Taylor...and we were so much better at the end of the season..it took a while to overcome the losses of TB and SM...onward and upward!

I hate losing, but really like this team and the coaches...I am actually excited to see how we bounce back vs Wisc...

[OrangeandBlack74]

our offense sucks we are out of control a lot take quick dumb shots. When we get in the half court offense we just stand around.We don't guard the 3 point line at all. Its like watching a pick up game at the YMCA.

Thanks for the insight...next time I'm at the Y, I'll look for Geno!

[Bravesfan]

There are a couple of things I need to say in response to some people in this thread.

First, please actually READ what I initially posted. My point wasn't that the coach is terrible or needs fired, or the team is terrible or anything like that. My point is that great teams cannot accept losses like this. Do you think Coach K would be ok with this loss? Do you even think Tom Crean or Izzo or The guys 90 minutes up 74 would be ok with this? I understand that we are not those teams, BUT I WANT TO GET TO THAT LEVEL. My point is not that everyone must be shot on the spot, my point is that to get into a winning mindset, every single loss has to be unacceptable. If we fall into a pattern where we allow ourselves to think "It's ok, that's a BCS team" or "It's fine, we have a new coach, and a young team" it's 100% ok if these things are true, but that cannot be the response from us, or the coach.
Texas baseball had a hard fought loss once, Augie Garrido (their coach), absolutely lost his mind on the team when he came into the locker room. The result? The team did not lose a game until the Big 12 championship.
Was this a hard fought loss? YES.
Is this a young, raw team? YES.
Is this only the 4th game? YES.
do I have great faith in the future for these boy because of their heart? YES YES YES
Is it acceptable for us to be "OK" with a loss and expect to get back to the glory days of BU basketball? No.

I will put this into an analogy, I know a lot of you are parents, so hopefully this will give the situation some context. Suppose your child comes homes from school with a poor grade on an exam (A loss). They might have tried really hard (good effort in a loss), but their pencil broke (Terrible shooting), and the room was too hot (we don't practice in Carver), and the teacher didn't like them (poor Refs). If y'all are anything like my father, even voicing those excuses would be a very dangerous idea! However, because anything other than A's was never acceptable, I did actually become a good student, and I have actually managed as a fairly unintellectual individual to break into a career that is more mentally taxing than physically taxing. Had my dad (the coach) ever once shown that he was "OK" with a C, I don't think I would be where I am today.

Second, There is obviously (and has been for a LONG while) a serious gap in our fanbase about the JL GF situation. The problem that I see on these board every single day is that an opinion that you don't agree with automatically labels the owner of that opinion as either a JL hater, or a guy who is never going to give GF a chance. That simply isn't true. Please stop dragging that into arguments, it helps no one. JL is gone, Sammy is gone, GF is here, and we are 3-1 with a young team. Let's move on from what happened in the past.

And yes, to whoever asked, I am 100% serious, I care about our Braves, and I care about Bradley, and I am never once going to back away from that.

First, to you Gwright and those others I was responding to last night, I apologize for sounding flippant in my tone. I was responding to your original post and a couple of others regarding Ford and how he people felt he was doing after the fourth game of the season.

Now I did reread your original post Gwright and I still stand by what I said. I know you do back Geno and are willing to give him a chance to see what he can do with this team. However, just because Geno uses positive reinforcement to get his team to play better does not mean he tolerates losing. I still liked what I heard from Geno on the post game show last night, and I don't think he needs to spell out what needs to be done after every loss. Plus we don't know what he said to the team after the game anyway. Some coaches scream at their team and sometimes that method works and sometimes it doesn't. Other coaches use positive reinforcement and sometimes that method works and sometimes it doesn't. Regardless of the method coaches use, as long as the players continue to work hard and the coaches continue to teach the players what they need to know, good things will eventually happen. It's just that we have a relatively young team that is still trying to learn his system. I still think this team will eventually turn into a Valley contender under Geno, but it will take baby steps this year before that happens. I think we can win more Valley games than we did last year, and maybe even play our way out of Thursday night, but until Geno fills up the roster with his recruits, he probably won't be able to take a team of new players and finish first like he did with Kent St. last year.

Now regarding whether Coach K, Tom Izzo and others would tolerate losses like this, well let's just say that they run established BCS programs with rosters filled with blue chip recruits and McDonald's all-Americans. The last time I checked, there were not many of these types of players, if any in the Valley! Of course I would be ticked off after a loss like this if I had a team where a bunch of McDonald's all-Americans fell into my lap. But Geno does not have this luxury and it will take patience for this team to turn around. And I'm sure Tom Crean does not tolerate losses like this either. How well though has that worked for him? I think even he new it would take quite awhile to clean up the mess that the last coach left at Indiana.

Anyway, whether Geno spelled out how ticked off he was at this loss or not, it will not change things until this team learns his new system and more importantly we establish some depth. We don't have that, and even if we shoot free throws and three pointers better, our lack of depth will hurt us in many games. Give Geno some time to get his recruits in here, and I'm sure we will be very competitive with the upper half of the Valley in the near future, just probably not this year.

[Da Coach]

And for the record- even though AT was projected to be more of a contributor than he has, nobody ever expected him to come in his first year and be a factor. He was always a project. There have been others like Marcellus Sommerville, Zach Andrews, Lawrence Wright, etc., who were expected to be important contributors right away, and they were.
IMO, a player like SH would also have been a great help to this team. To compare him with AT is not logical.
But we have to play with the hand that we're dealt, and I still think these guys can win a lot of games and be competetive in the MVC.

[sousaman2089]

Really? I don't think most people thought the game was embarrassing.....I've seen a lot more games worse than that over the last few years and I don't mean that as knock against JL...Mo had some too...although not very many at home AFTER the first year or two

I may be the only one embarrassed, but when an opposing player makes 11 threes while we as a team miss 14, I get a little embarrassed. Especially when Geno says we're not a good 3-point shooting team. So many comebacks got short circuited because we jacked up 3's like it was going out of style, missed, and saw Wofford drive down the court for open shots.

[Da Coach]

For the record, Giltner did not make 11 threes.
He was 11-17 overall, and 5-8 from three.

Most were falling away, and defended pretty well.