I don’t think anyone was seriously celebrating the Maryville win and doubt anyone cares what happens against NAIA Missouri Baptist. They’re gross games that prove nothing and just make their record look 2 games better than it is.
When the schedule was announced a few months ago, we all complained about how gross it looked. San Francisco ended up being much better than they looked at that point but a 5-5 record against D1 competition is annoying. You throw out the bottom-feeders and they went 1-4 against equal or better competition and dropped that disgusting game at Little Rock, a team that might lose 20 games this year. Maybe things change in conference play but this doesn’t look like a team ready to turn that corner.
There are some on here that jump at the opportunity for gloom and doom and others that are just the opposite. Both extremes are mostly due to their own version of passion for Saluki basketball. At least I hope that's what it is.
Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, I was unable to watch the game. That being said, I'm somewhat surprised at how upset the board was. While I totally get the frustration, SIU lost to a better team. It seems the board is bi-polar....getting all fired up after beating a D2 team and then ready to burn the place down when they lose to a superior team.
Without the eye test, I'm not sure how accurate this is, but by looking at the numbers, it seems that had Domask played his normal game and Lance was 100% healthy (and able to cut, drive, etc) SIU actually had a shot in this game, on the road against a really good team.
I feel like the story that will ultimately be written about this team for the year will be what they do in Valley play. If they surprise me and finish in the top 3, I think we can forget about some of the early season negative results. If they surprise me and finish in the bottom half, then we have some serious concerns going forward.
I think every college team's board is a little bipolar lol
If you think we're bad here, check out @boardgeniuses on Twitter. We got nuthin on some of those people.
People need to seriously back away from the ledge. We won't beat anyone shooting 3-20 from 3. We shoot better yesterday and the game probably goes down to the wire. We weren't going to get an at large bid this year, so let's hope for a good conference season. For all the Domask haters - he has been playing with a hip injury all year. He was the focus for San Francisco's defense. They had a great game plan. He still shot horribly, however he did have 6 dimes, 2 steals, 5 rebounds and played good defense. Jones is also still limited due to his toe injury. We have not been good in the post overall, but Muila(player of the game yesterday) is improving and we have help on the way in Hornicker and Ebube. I think Muila will continue to improve and be more of an asset as the year goes on and next year. That will give Hornecker and Ebube time to adjust and grow. D1 center is a huge adjustment from HS or Juco. Ebube needed to redshirt, but mark my words, he will develop into a good D1 center. If Jones and Domask get closer to 100% I think we can compete for the top of the mvc this year. Drake is not nearly as good without Penn and Yesafu. Loyola has separated from the field non-conference. However, conference is a different story when each team knows your plays, schemes and tendencies intimately.
There is no doubt we need to play a lot better than we have been, but I think we have the talent to do that. This team is the best defensive team we have had in a while. Offensively, we have not been good and need a lot of improvement. We cannot have off shooting nights against good teams and win.
The Loyola game on January 2 and the Drake game January 5 will go a long way into determining what kind of conference season we have. We win 1 or both of those games and we can seriously talk about competing for the top of the conference. We lose both and the season is basically over until the mvc tournament. We already have a road win in the conference and those are very hard to come by no matter who you are playing. Win the conference, get the auto bid to the NIT, and get a top seed in the mvc tournament. That may seem unachievable to most on this board, but I think we will know if that is a pipe dream or a possibility at around 9pm on January 5.
I would like to see D'Amico at the 4 and Domask at the 3 in the starting lineup. Jones at PG. And then Coupet or Brown when he is healthy and whoever at the 5, it doesn't really matter.
I think some of the frustrations are not that SIU lost to a better team, its that nearly from the jump it was clear that they were in a different class than SIU. Yes, we shot poorly, but the Dons had a lot to do with that. Most shots were well contested. Nothing was easy. There's also a large gap in size and athleticism between the two rosters.
Pushing 15 years of mediocrity and irrelevance is a tough enough pill to swallow and the very poor record against the 'quality competition' portion of the OOC slate in year 3 under Bryan Mullins leadership feels uncomfortably familiar. The worst part for me is I kinda expected it, but I hoped for better.
Now we'll see how Valley play goes. I still think if SIU gets fully healthy, they'll have a shot to compete for a league title. The MVC isn't nearly as good as we thought it would be.
Speaking of getting healthy ... that is something that really needs to happen. It feels like we've been various degrees of banged up for basically a year and a half now. Shades of Chris Lowery still hanging around and running things during our in-season practices?
--Insert something witty here--
I have not even bothered to read most of the post game responses, but anyone hating on Marcus Domask is an ignorant fool. Don’t know any other way to put it.
The advancement and diffusion of knowledge is the only guardian of true liberty.
James Madison
I have not even bothered to read most of the post game responses, but anyone hating on Marcus Domask is an ignorant fool. Don’t know any other way to put it.
Don't think anyone really was, people just pointed out he went 0-10. Not worried about him at all, he'll be fine. And yes, he's been battling a hip injury that caused him to miss practice around the Evansville game.
@insaluki Ever take a look at "Lord Moser's" record at ISU? Sometimes it takes a while for a coach to develop, just like it does for athletes. I for one am not ready to give up on BM!
WOW!! Looks like the Saluki Insider Whine & Cheese Club is fully engaged tonight!!
I am trying to find positives, but they don’t seem to be very relevant to the discussion. I would say that it’s a positive that Mullins recognizes the flaws of this team, but it would also not be enough for those who only want to acknowledge positive things to acknowledge this team has flaws. I would settle for people keeping an even keel, but that would require both negative and positive camps to meet in the middle somewhere, and I can recall on only a few occasions where that has happened with any sort of Internet discourse I have observed.
Also, the discourse is orders of magnitude better than near the end of the Huck tenure. I don’t see an excessive amount of negativity here. I see two different viewpoints of people who stuck through hell and are still here supporting SIU. Let’s not lose sight of that. Of course everyone wants to see Domask healthy and able to be productive again. That’s a given. We all want better and if people are pointing out flaws, it’s because they want those flaws to be fixed.
I really dont think this team is as bad offensively as it appears.
SIU is just really really thin in the frontcourt. Domask is a 3 forced to play as a 4. While they would both be great depth neither Muila or Filewich are starting caliber players at least for an MVC team. Filewich has offensive upside but is poor defensively while Muila is-while marginally better than Filewich-not very good defensively either and very poor offensively. They are pretty similar when it comes to rebounding.
This team really misses Browns defense ability to stretch the other teams defense as well, opening up Filewich and Jones both inside and our. Ben Coupet in a perfect world would be a 6th man backup to the 2 and 3 positions. His production as a 24 year old 6th year player is not anything to write home about. Verplancken is likewise better suited to a backup role.
Given what we have heard about Ebube and Wonders along with injuries to Brown and the general ineffectiveness of the front court at both ends along with struggling offense overall makes one wonder if redshirting them was the right call.
Get Brown back healthy and D'Amico in the starting lineup and I think this is a much stronger team.
I do think Filewich is an MVC quality player. He is a different player than Muila and they can complement each other. Filewich gets a lot of rebounds for the time he is in the game and can help offensively when he is confident. He also handles the passing part of the game well. I hope Coach Mullins can keep him in the game a little longer so that he can get his confidence back. I would like to see Filewich and Muila/D'Avanzo in the game at the same time when we have size issues. Go Dawgs.
@uncledawgpound I listen to Mike and Rodney every game. Rodney really knows his stuff and points out exactly what we need to be doing. That said, it's a lot more difficult to have that objective view when you're on the bench and really involved in the game.
