CLK wrote:

I really want this guy

https://twitter.com/PghSportsNow/status/1778816043483312504?s=19

Wouldn't prefer Jashean Corbett over AJ Casey, Staton- McCrag and/or Maximus Edwards....  To be sure he is a tall (6'7 shooting guard) who generates points in the paint and lots of rebounds.  However he's not too prolific on 3 point shots (28.5%), assists and ball handling --nor foul shooting (.695%). 

I guess you could say that Dru Joyce is ‘super  low-key’ and maybe question whether or not he could generate the enthusiasm that a successful program needs.   Listening to him however, he’s the kind of coach you might want your own kids to receive mentorship from.  The low-key approach also may stabilize the detrimental adrenaline rushes that college age kids might generate on and off the court.  Going back to some of the old WWII war stories, and battlefield preparation – there was always a lot of talk about the value of the quietly confident platoon leaders & squad leaders instilling success in the troops on the eve of going into action.   The guy is well spoken—  

Wow, there are a lot of similarities between the two teams.  Looks like they'll be clashing heads.  BYU is a taller, beefier team than the Dukes which could be a problem for us...when we're both going for rebounds.

My student attendance at Dukes games goes back to my freshman year in 1959 when George Brown, Bob Slobodnick, Ned Twyman, Paul Benec, Billy Strom were the starters.  While the overall record that year was not good, the 'big triumph' that year was losing to Cincinnati and Oscar Robertson by only 61 -58 at Pitt Field House.  And then we lost two close ones to the Bonnies when they were nationally prominent with the Stith Brothers.  The team played great basketball despite a very tough schedule that year, but ended with a losing record (7-13).  However in 1961-62 with Willie Somerset, Clyde Arnold and Mike Rice… we upset #7 Duke, #6 Bradley, #9 St. Bonaventure, and lost to #3 Cincinnati – then after beating Navy and Bradley in the first two rounds of the NIT, lost to Loyola and St. Johns.  Ended with a 22-7
record!! 

In those years we averaged between 3 and 5,000 attendance per game at the Pitt Fitzgerald Field House and sometimes more at the Civic Auditorium for the bigger games.

Nevertheless I continued to attend the games once I moved back to Pittsburgh, and still buy season tickets to this day.

Have met many of the players and am enthralled with the success we are currently enjoying (IN MY LIFETIME NO LESS!)   Only wish we could get the students and more local fans to attend in the coming years.  GO DUKES!

gjgsr wrote:

Looking at the roster stats sheets for each of the teams - it appears on paper UMass has the edge:

UMASS advantages
3 point shooting
size
rebounding edge
foul shooting proficiency
number of players participating
home factor
foul calls will favor Umass

DUQ advantages
defense - which could negate some of UMASS offensive advantages.
turnover ratio
in the paint scoring
age/experience factor

I see UMASS winning by 2..

HOPE I'M WRONG!!

[list=1]
[*]Foul calls favored UMass -  you can always predict that with a Dambrot team because that occurs in most of his games.  Can’t we convey to the team ‘that fouling puts their key players in a hole every time!’  They then have to widely substitute resulting in a lack of team continuity and using 12+ players.  Is that a coaching problem?
[*]foul shooting proficiency – Umass gets lots of shooting fouls and make 70% versus we get fewer shooting files = a 12 – 15 point differential.  Do we work hard on foul shooting?  Coach??
[*]Rebounding edge -  goes to UMass despite their 2 bigs were out for much of the game and Dukes had the height advantage.  How does that happen?
[*]In the paint scoring – goes to Umass despite their bigs were out for much of the game.
[*]Turnover ratio favored Umass
[*]FG% favored Umass – Duq couldn’t shoot consistently inside or outside.  Not ready Coach?
[*]Age/experience advantage thought to favor Duq – did not.  Coach, what happened here?
[*]Defense for Duq was lacking and in fact contributed to the lopsided fouling - despite we even employed a zone defense for awhile.
[/list]
I was wrong about:
[list=1]
[*]the 3 point shooting.  Umass didn’t need any.
[*]In the paint scoring – Umass took control of that   
[/list]

 

From Santa Clara Website - you can tune into radio play-by-play at 5 PM

Dae Dae Grant broke Dick Ricketts free throws in a row!  I believe it was 42...   Foul shooting in general seems to have improved.   That certainly will help them win games...

Nice to see the Dukes take charge here. 

No doubt the Big 10, and Las Vegas are never gonna allow an A10 team get in the way of one of their teams.  Nope..  Big money wins every time.  It’s a sham.

I thought the stiff arm (2nd half) to David Dixon was the coup de grace.  Then toward the end when Dukes were making a comeback,  Jimmy Clark drives in -- makes the basket in what should have been a foul (hit him on the head) shot against Nebraska!  No call until Clark made a ‘low key protest.’… and got hit with a technical and removed from the game.  There’s no way they were going to let margin get under 8.

The Dukes have a lot of heart and are going to be tough in the A10….

Interesting sidelight in the 2nd half, Foussini Drame drew the ire of Dambrot at one point, seemingly for not following his directions on a play.   Was surprised when he physically yanked Foussini while he was still on the court, to get his attention.  But all was well when the game ended, as Fosseni came over and gave the coach a reassuring hug.  The chemistry seems to be OK..

Dambrot having them press in the latter half really put pressure on Princeton.   After the Fosenni Drame miss, i'm not sure why - with possession of the ball and 9 seconds left, Dambrot didn't call a timeout.  He could have drawn up one last play... 

A snapshot of a difficult schedule indeed.  Dukes can't afford any injuries or academic screw-ups!  I see Dukes coming in 4th...  Anybody know how accurate College Sports Madness has been in past?  The non-conference is  tough enough...

Atlantic 10 projected finish and nat'l ranking– according College Sports Madness (2023-2024)
[list=1]
[*]#43 Duquesne
[*]#53 Dayton
[*]#73 Fordham
[*]#79 Loyola (Ill.)
[*]#112 St. Bonaventure
[*]#126 St. Joseph
[/list]
*Duq plays Dayton twice, St. Bona twice, Fordham twice, Davidson, Richmond, VCU and others once
 
Non-conference teams played (nat’l ranking & toughest games on schedule)
[list=1]
[*]#72 Charleston @ Annapolis
[*]#95 Princeton @ home
[*]#100 Stonybrook @ home
[*]#109 Bradley @ Bradley
[*]#127 UC Irvine @ home
[*]Santa Clara @ Santa Clara
[*]Cleveland State @ neutral site
[*]Marshall @ Marshall
[*]Nebraska @ Nebraska
[*]UC Irvine @ neutral site
[*]Rider @ home
[*]St Peters @ neutral site
[*]Cleary @ home
[/list]

Styles1229 wrote:

If the media covered this team and coach as thoroughly as they cover, say, the Pirates and the Steelers, you would not get these types of articles.  Puff pieces.  There's never any good follow-up questions or requests to further explain a blanket statement.  If we are talking about KD as a coach it's ridiculous that some of the people on this board do not want to hear about last year.  I'm thinking these same people do not want critical race theory taught to our children either   I am enjoying this season tremendously AND I am able to form a nuanced opinion about the coach.  I think it is interesting to discuss how KD built the last 2 teams and to compare and contrast them.  Remember, KD did the same thing last season with completely different results.  He got rid of bad characters and rebuilt the team with good character guys.  When those guys went 6-24 they became bad character guys and uncoachable.  Now they are good character guys and coachable somewhere else.  It's all just lip service to feed the the narrative.  What really happened is that KD did a poor job last year of recruiting/building a team.  After TDM left he had no experience in the backcourt other than Acuff (minimal) and he barely played him.  He did not recruit enough bigs, especially when you consider his offensive strategy, and when injuries happened he was outmanned.  You would think that a coach with all the wisdom of his years coaching would not be caught off guard by these developments but he was.  He also did not adjust his offensive strategy to play to the strengths of his roster..And finally, he also chose to use a Division 2 grad assistant over a raw 7 footer who would very likely have gotten better and better as the season progressed with enough playing time. All of those factors led directly to the poor performance and none of them had anything to do with the likely good, talented players on the team being coachable or not or having good character or

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