How surprised?

[BradleyJD]

Given the tremendous growth and improvement this team and program have made this season, how surprised and/or shocked are you?

I was hoping for 12 to 15 wins but many thought 10 or so might be it this year.

How many will BU end up with now?

Great job Coach Ford and to everyone in the program.

[Bravesfan]

Given the tremendous growth and improvement this team and program have made this season, how surprised and/or shocked are you?

I was hoping for 12 to 15 wins but many thought 10 or so might be it this year.

How many will BU end up with now?

Great job Coach Ford and to everyone in the program.

I still want to wait and see how this team does against better competition. I definitely think we are seeing some decent improvement, but I'm not ready to say we are seeing tremendous growth in that we continue to see some of the same mistakes, especially our failure to close out games the way we should. This is not the fault of the coaches as I think they are getting the most out of the players as they can. But I'll proclaim tremendous growth if we can steal a game against one of the top 5 Valley teams at home, and we can win a couple of more road games. I don't know if we have a shot at Evansville this week (don't even bring up Wichita St. next weekend), but there is a small chance this game is winnable for us. But we cannot have these stretches where the team relaxes and takes the lead for granted. But as always, I hope the team proves me wrong.

[Braves4Life]

We are progressing almost exactly as I had projected and hoped for. IMO, we had (have) a legitimate chance to go .500 this year. Next year I am hopeful that we can continue this progression with an upper half MVC finish and some kind of postseason berth... Even if it's an EIEIO Tournament. I expect a Top 3 finish by Geno's 4th season with either an NIT or At-Large NCAA berth. And, by year 5 I expect us to be competing for an MVC title and an NCAA Tourney bid.

[Da Coach]

As I have said, there has been improvement. How could we not be better than last year? My posted prediction was that we would have won exactly the number of games we have won so far.
So, in answer to the topic's question- I am not at all surprised in where we are.
I am sorry to rain on others' parades, but much of this year's improvement is related to weaker opponents (SOS of 234- by far the worst in the MVC, and RPI 167-8th in the MVC)). We have a team consisting of experienced players- 3 seniors, including a 6th year senior, and 3 juniors, including a 4th year junior. We are one of the most veteran and experienced teams in the MVC. All 4 conference wins have been against the 3 worst teams in the MVC. Even our non-conference wins have come against teams with RPI's of 313, 295, 280, 316, 160, 190, 227, and 331!
Now we need to take a step forward and start beating teams we aren't supposed to beat- actually upset someone, not just revel in close wins over bottom dwelling teams. The next 10 games will give us the opportunity to see if we can do that.

[tornado]

I guess the only thing that I am surprised by is that people are surprised that were are in the middle of the conference...
are we not one of the most athletic and most experienced teams in the Valley starting 3 seniors and 2 juniors (one of whom had an extra year of development from a RS)?

Why are people surprised? To me that says people had terrible expectations and didn't think we had any talent...
and that's kind of a slap on the kids who are doing such a great job & working hard!
One of our writers locally called our kids not only lacking in talent but that the talent gap when compared to the better MVC teams ...
"was as wide as the Grand Canyon" ...do you not remember this?

I have said since last year that we have the talent to compete for at least the middle of the Valley - I guess I am a little surprised we didn't get there last year but not at all surprised we're there now, this year.

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[78Brave]

There is a huge talent gap between this Bradley team and the top teams in the MVC. It would be difficult to dispute that. It's a credit to the players and coaches that they have been able to be as successful as they have so far. The players play hard and the coaches have put them in a position to win most of the games they've played. It's refreshing that they have not been losing to the teams they should beat as was often the case the last several years. The gap is closing and the bar will be higher but at this point in this year I'm happy with what the team has done. They deserve to have more fans show up at the games and enthusiastically support them.

[DeltaBrave03]

As I have said, there has been improvement. How could we not be better than last year? My posted prediction was that we would have won exactly the number of games we have won so far.
So, in answer to the topic's question- I am not at all surprised in where we are.
I am sorry to rain on others' parades, but much of this year's improvement is related to weaker opponents (SOS of 234- by far the worst in the MVC, and RPI 167-8th in the MVC)). We have a team consisting of experienced players- 3 seniors, including a 6th year senior, and 3 juniors, including a 4th year junior. We are one of the most veteran and experienced teams in the MVC. All 4 conference wins have been against the 3 worst teams in the MVC. Even our non-conference wins have come against teams with RPI's of 313, 295, 280, 316, 160, 190, 227, and 331!
Now we need to take a step forward and start beating teams we aren't supposed to beat- actually upset someone, not just revel in close wins over bottom dwelling teams. The next 10 games will give us the opportunity to see if we can do that.

So we took a step forward this year, and will hopefully take another next year. We still have plenty of chances this year to beat good teams as well. We needed to learn how to win against bad teams before we can beat good teams. Not sure why this post was spun negative.

Calling BU an experienced team is also misleading. We have a 6th year player which inflates our average, and have a senior who is behind walk ons. Our 4th year junior didn't have a shot in 17 min last night.

[Braves4Life]

One of our writers locally called our kids not only lacking in talent but that the talent gap when compared to the better MVC teams ...
"was as wide as the Grand Canyon" ...do you not remember this?

Our starters can hold there own with most teams in the Valley. I think the huge talent gap lies in the rest of our roster... Guys who give more to the team by sitting on the bench and getting getting good grades than they are capable of giving in practice or games.

[Braves4Life]

Not sure why this post was spun negative.

+1. We still don't have the talent or depth to beat teams like WSU or CU, but at least now we're hanging in the game. You'd think people would be happy for ANY wins after the last two seasons we had... one under Les, the other under Geno.

[tornado]

Calling BU an experienced team is also misleading. ...

really??
everyone who plays significant minutes except Tyshon Pickett - has been here forever...
Walt, Dyricus, Will, Pross, Jake, all have played a bunch since they were freshmen...
How many teams in the Valley start 3 seniors and 2 juniors? All the ones that start mostly seniors are the best teams in the Valley..

[lefty]

Given the tremendous growth and improvement this team and program have made this season, how surprised and/or shocked are you?

I was hoping for 12 to 15 wins but many thought 10 or so might be it this year.

How many will BU end up with now?

Great job Coach Ford and to everyone in the program.

I think most didn't think we would be tied for 4th right now but I also think we have won the games we are suppose to up to this point. I'm still concerned about quality of depth as we go into the guts of the conference. It's hard for WL, DSE, and WE to play at a high level game in and game out if they play 35 minutes a night....

[real fan]

really??
everyone who plays significant minutes except Tyshon Pickett - has been here forever...
Walt, Dyricus, Will, Pross, Jake, all have played a bunch since they were freshmen...
How many teams in the Valley start 3 seniors and 2 juniors? All the ones that start mostly seniors are the best teams in the Valley..

You have been brainwashed by our 2 former coaches in believing you have your best seasons with your senior group which means you only compete for anything every 4 years. There is a reason why this group has struggled to win games over the last 3 years and it is called talent, these players are doing a great job this season yet there is a reason why they were picked to finish 9th,we need more talent in order to get to the top and everyone here knows it.
I picked this team to win around 15 games at the start because I knew they could play good defense and they are much better players then they showed last season .

[real fan]

Our starters can hold there own with most teams in the Valley. I think the huge talent gap lies in the rest of our roster... Guys who give more to the team by sitting on the bench and getting getting good grades than they are capable of giving in practice or games.

I agree and this team could possibly finish 4th if they could get some decent contribution off the bench but the reality is our bench players are too inconsistent to count on which is why the starters log so many minutes.

[real fan]

Given the tremendous growth and improvement this team and program have made this season, how surprised and/or shocked are you?

I was hoping for 12 to 15 wins but many thought 10 or so might be it this year.

How many will BU end up with now?

Great job Coach Ford and to everyone in the program.

Good point , even though some think we have beaten bad teams at least we did not lose to EIU or any exb. games before the start of the season.

[lefty]

Our starters can hold there own with most teams in the Valley. I think the huge talent gap lies in the rest of our roster... Guys who give more to the team by sitting on the bench and getting getting good grades than they are capable of giving in practice or games.

I kind of agree with you B4L....but none of our starters are that dominant that they compensate for some of our weaknesses...all 5 have to play pretty well for us to win regardless of who we play.......if you go up and down our lineup we are weak in ball handlers,PG play,rebounding,3 point shooting, post presence offense and defense.....so hats off to Geno and the staff for making the most of what we have....