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nol · 08-13-2014, 12:26 PM

November 2035

Well, I managed to convince Dave to also implement a man-to-man defense with aggressive help principles. I might be a little biased towards man-to-man, but no matter how well you run a zone defense, there will be weaknesses teams can exploit if they're completely prepared for it.

I'm put in complete control of our players' training. While coach Holston and I will almost certainly disagree over the rotation (and Dave definitely appreciates that there's no point in having an assistant coach who's just a yes-man), it's particularly nice to work with some of the guys I believe can have a bigger role than they themselves anticipate.

By and large, I'm extremely pleased with how training camp went. Beau is looking even quicker than before and has an entirely new level of confidence in his jump shot; it would've been easy for him to coast on his incumbent status but I can tell he doesn't want to be remembered for playing on the worst Boston College ACC teams in history. Lindsey had some massive improvements all around (+2 JPS, FTS, HND, PAS, PRD; +1 QKN, JMP). I'm really optimistic this will leave coach Holston no choice but to find a starting spot for him - we'll definitely need him as a secondary ball handler to take the pressure off of Beau. For Nathaniel's training, I wanted him to stick to his strengths rather than overthinking things to try to be a player he's not, and he really responded to that (+3 ORB, +3 STL). Lloyd Hintz was someone who didn't strike me as a top-150 recruit when I first met him, but with his work ethic in the weight room he looks like a completely different player over just the course of the summer (+1 QCK, STR, JMP; +8 STA). Big John Kratzer's going to be an even more reliable offensive option and rim protector for us (+1 INS, FTS, PSD; +2 BLK), but try as I may, I can't get him to box out consistently. Probably the biggest disappointment for me was Quesada; His conditioning is still nowhere near where it should be (0->6 STA), and all that work prevented him from developing much in other areas. He's able to bully our guys in practice with his 6'6, 250 pound frame but I'm not sure how that will translate to games.

Dave still wants Quesada starting (to add some toughness to the team, he claims), and I know it's going to be a losing battle. Unfortunately that leaves Nate Doss as the odd man out, and I insist in our staff meeting that we keep a short leash on Quesada and have Doss playing as much as possible as the sixth man. While preparing for our first game, we receive a commitment from Gong An. I personally feel he could start or at least be in the rotation for us right now, so I can't wait to work with him. We're still in the lead over Seton Hall for Robbins, so hopefully we can wrap up our recruiting season soon.

In our first game at Rutgers, both teams started out hot. Rutgers stayed in the game thanks to their three-point shooting, but we took 47-41 lead into the half thanks to huge performances from our star Duley (15, 4, and 4) and Doss off the bench (still think he should be starting, but if he's getting 13 first half minutes I can't complain too much) with 10 points and 3 steals. In the 2nd half we put the clamps on Rutgers defensively and extended the lead to double digits. Rutgers scored some garbage buckets at the end but we open the season with a 72-62 win at their place!

I thank the guys in the locker room for making things easy for me in my first game; I only called one timeout all game, and it was to set up a play with 5 seconds left in the first half (Beau got an decent look but missed the jumper). Beau put up 25, 6, and 6 (with just one turnover) on 11-17 shooting. That's a new career high for him! I could tell from working with him that he was tired of losing and wanted to take his game to another level his senior year. John Kratzer had a very workmanlike 12 and 8 and had me holding my breath a few times the first half as he took a coule charges while already having two fouls. They were great hustle plays, but if those calls go the other way we're left extremely thin in the frontcourt.

We start off playing like ass in Game 2 hosting Yale. I call a timeout 3 minutes in as they're shredding our 1-3-1 defense and, after a heated discussion with Dave, convince him to have us go man-to-man. We stop the bleeding to some extent but still trail by 10 at half; we simply don't have the outside shooting to quickly make up deficits, and 2-6 free throw shooting doesn't help either. Their starting big Spencer Owens is on fire from mid-range and has 15 points in the first 20 minutes.

The 2nd half is more of the same as we come out half asleep and fall behind by 20. We slowly claw our way back in, but miss too many free throws to close within single digits (4-11 on the game is unacceptable in both quantity and accuracy). Owens was All-Ivy League last year so he's no scrub, but after watching him take our lunch money to the tune of 19, 12 and 3 blocks on 7-10 shooting I'm not looking forward to seeing the best bigs the ACC has to offer. I'm already starting to get fed up with Dave's insistence on playing Quesada - he was 2-9 with 4 turnovers today while Doss put up 10 on 5-8 shooting off the bench.

Our last game this month is at Rhode Island, led by freshman SG Myles Belk who's currently averaging 16 and 7 boards through 3 games (out of character note - would have been happy to have this guy at St. John's if we hadn't already landed the #2 and #41 overall recruits, both SGs). The first half is a barnburner, with our guys clinging to a 44-41 lead thanks to Lindsey Jones. He's been on fire with 21 points on 5-6 shooting from 3 and has still had time to dish out 3 assists. Hopefully the other guys can step up and take some attention off of him the 2nd half.

And we do just that. Kratzer and Diaz had some great possessions inside for us to start the half, getting buckets and drawing fouls. Doss came in and provided his customary spark, picking Belk's pocket for a fast break layup and with 12 minutes left we were up 21. The rest of the game passes by without incident other than Nathaniel Doss trying to claim the Hater of the Year award by dunking all over some poor URI guy on a fast break alley-oop with 15 seconds left in the game and then getting T'd up for staring him down. I was unsure of what coach Holston would do, but even he cracked a smile and kept him in; I suppose he knew Nate had the right to let off a little steam with how well he's handled his sixth man role. Lindsey had a quiet 2nd half to finish with 25, 8 and 6 on 8-14 shooting, and Kratzer (22 and 6)was the guy we rode for the last 20 minutes. The constant through it all, of course, was Beau. 16, 11 assists and 5 boards without a single turnover. All in all, a great way to rebound from the ugly Yale loss; maybe we need to play all of our games on the road.

08-13-2014, 12:26 PM	#5
nol Banned Join Date: Oct 2003	November 2035 Well, I managed to convince Dave to also implement a man-to-man defense with aggressive help principles. I might be a little biased towards man-to-man, but no matter how well you run a zone defense, there will be weaknesses teams can exploit if they're completely prepared for it. I'm put in complete control of our players' training. While coach Holston and I will almost certainly disagree over the rotation (and Dave definitely appreciates that there's no point in having an assistant coach who's just a yes-man), it's particularly nice to work with some of the guys I believe can have a bigger role than they themselves anticipate. By and large, I'm extremely pleased with how training camp went. Beau is looking even quicker than before and has an entirely new level of confidence in his jump shot; it would've been easy for him to coast on his incumbent status but I can tell he doesn't want to be remembered for playing on the worst Boston College ACC teams in history. Lindsey had some massive improvements all around (+2 JPS, FTS, HND, PAS, PRD; +1 QKN, JMP). I'm really optimistic this will leave coach Holston no choice but to find a starting spot for him - we'll definitely need him as a secondary ball handler to take the pressure off of Beau. For Nathaniel's training, I wanted him to stick to his strengths rather than overthinking things to try to be a player he's not, and he really responded to that (+3 ORB, +3 STL). Lloyd Hintz was someone who didn't strike me as a top-150 recruit when I first met him, but with his work ethic in the weight room he looks like a completely different player over just the course of the summer (+1 QCK, STR, JMP; +8 STA). Big John Kratzer's going to be an even more reliable offensive option and rim protector for us (+1 INS, FTS, PSD; +2 BLK), but try as I may, I can't get him to box out consistently. Probably the biggest disappointment for me was Quesada; His conditioning is still nowhere near where it should be (0->6 STA), and all that work prevented him from developing much in other areas. He's able to bully our guys in practice with his 6'6, 250 pound frame but I'm not sure how that will translate to games. Dave still wants Quesada starting (to add some toughness to the team, he claims), and I know it's going to be a losing battle. Unfortunately that leaves Nate Doss as the odd man out, and I insist in our staff meeting that we keep a short leash on Quesada and have Doss playing as much as possible as the sixth man. While preparing for our first game, we receive a commitment from Gong An. I personally feel he could start or at least be in the rotation for us right now, so I can't wait to work with him. We're still in the lead over Seton Hall for Robbins, so hopefully we can wrap up our recruiting season soon. In our first game at Rutgers, both teams started out hot. Rutgers stayed in the game thanks to their three-point shooting, but we took 47-41 lead into the half thanks to huge performances from our star Duley (15, 4, and 4) and Doss off the bench (still think he should be starting, but if he's getting 13 first half minutes I can't complain too much) with 10 points and 3 steals. In the 2nd half we put the clamps on Rutgers defensively and extended the lead to double digits. Rutgers scored some garbage buckets at the end but we open the season with a 72-62 win at their place! I thank the guys in the locker room for making things easy for me in my first game; I only called one timeout all game, and it was to set up a play with 5 seconds left in the first half (Beau got an decent look but missed the jumper). Beau put up 25, 6, and 6 (with just one turnover) on 11-17 shooting. That's a new career high for him! I could tell from working with him that he was tired of losing and wanted to take his game to another level his senior year. John Kratzer had a very workmanlike 12 and 8 and had me holding my breath a few times the first half as he took a coule charges while already having two fouls. They were great hustle plays, but if those calls go the other way we're left extremely thin in the frontcourt. We start off playing like ass in Game 2 hosting Yale. I call a timeout 3 minutes in as they're shredding our 1-3-1 defense and, after a heated discussion with Dave, convince him to have us go man-to-man. We stop the bleeding to some extent but still trail by 10 at half; we simply don't have the outside shooting to quickly make up deficits, and 2-6 free throw shooting doesn't help either. Their starting big Spencer Owens is on fire from mid-range and has 15 points in the first 20 minutes. The 2nd half is more of the same as we come out half asleep and fall behind by 20. We slowly claw our way back in, but miss too many free throws to close within single digits (4-11 on the game is unacceptable in both quantity and accuracy). Owens was All-Ivy League last year so he's no scrub, but after watching him take our lunch money to the tune of 19, 12 and 3 blocks on 7-10 shooting I'm not looking forward to seeing the best bigs the ACC has to offer. I'm already starting to get fed up with Dave's insistence on playing Quesada - he was 2-9 with 4 turnovers today while Doss put up 10 on 5-8 shooting off the bench. Our last game this month is at Rhode Island, led by freshman SG Myles Belk who's currently averaging 16 and 7 boards through 3 games (out of character note - would have been happy to have this guy at St. John's if we hadn't already landed the #2 and #41 overall recruits, both SGs). The first half is a barnburner, with our guys clinging to a 44-41 lead thanks to Lindsey Jones. He's been on fire with 21 points on 5-6 shooting from 3 and has still had time to dish out 3 assists. Hopefully the other guys can step up and take some attention off of him the 2nd half. And we do just that. Kratzer and Diaz had some great possessions inside for us to start the half, getting buckets and drawing fouls. Doss came in and provided his customary spark, picking Belk's pocket for a fast break layup and with 12 minutes left we were up 21. The rest of the game passes by without incident other than Nathaniel Doss trying to claim the Hater of the Year award by dunking all over some poor URI guy on a fast break alley-oop with 15 seconds left in the game and then getting T'd up for staring him down. I was unsure of what coach Holston would do, but even he cracked a smile and kept him in; I suppose he knew Nate had the right to let off a little steam with how well he's handled his sixth man role. Lindsey had a quiet 2nd half to finish with 25, 8 and 6 on 8-14 shooting, and Kratzer (22 and 6)was the guy we rode for the last 20 minutes. The constant through it all, of course, was Beau. 16, 11 assists and 5 boards without a single turnover. All in all, a great way to rebound from the ugly Yale loss; maybe we need to play all of our games on the road.