At least this can be a home revenge game next year like Little Rock was this year.
In all seriousness, Domask has to be hurt. He doesn’t look like the same Marcus at all to me.
While Domask is supposed to be co-leader so he is indeed heavily responsible, I'm kind of surprised that you seem to be singling out Domask when the other leader shot 4-14, scored less points and had 5 TO's. The entire team stunk it up, not just Domask.
Domask improved a bit in the 2nd half but still had a bunch of bad turnovers and kept slipping and wincing. To me, it looks like he has some sort of hip injury like he had last year. I know he had surgery in the offseason, I'm hoping that's just bothering him and it's not the same injury flaring up again.
I'm not singling him out, I think this team has problems outside of him and Jones that are much more concerning. Just saying that Domask hasn't looked right to me this year. He is currently shooting 39.5% and 29.4% from 3. You're not gonna win many games if your best player is shooting like that. And 2 of those games were against OVC teams so it's not like they've all been against great competition.
sagarin has bumped the screaming eagles all the way up to number 341 after their convincing win, just one spot behind the maine black bears.363 teams playing college basketball according to sagarin, we just got blown out by number 353.
The schedule looks a bit different after a game like this: Tennessee State won't be easy, but still some bit chances to lessen the sting form this one with SLU, UNLV, and potentially Minnesota still left in the non-con.
Congrats to USI.
I would say that while this team can beat almost anyone on the schedule, excluding St Louis, they can also lose to ANYONE remaining on their schedule. Honestly, I feel like if things went the right way, they could win the SoCal challenge, but they just as easily could go 0-3 there.
Unfortunately, this team, similar to last year, is going to live and DIE by the 3.
Not sure living or dying by the 3 feels like a winning approach for the season considering several guards who play a lot do not have great track records in that department: Johnson, Banks, Newton, even Brown. Puts a lot of pressure on Domask and Jones to be hitting, and we saw how that looked yesterday when that wasn't the case.
Wonders could be an X-factor if he gets his stroke going, but I would imagine the coaches will be looking for ways to generate more points in the paint, especially on the road, where teams are less likely to be hot from 3-point land.
Nobody's saying this team's in the same neighborhood as those Van Winkle disasters...
Hey Goro, not many of us are old enough to remember those disasters. 😀
Those Van Winkel teams were far better than Joe Gottfried's 0 - 18 MVC bottom champ. LOL
That Gottfried season was easily the nadir in Saluki basketball history, just ahead of Lowery's final season. We're a LONG way from that, but if Mullins doesn't start putting up a couple of postseason-worthy campaigns, he'll end up in Van Winkle/Hinson territory, just another coach who will be remembered as being a marginally better than .500 coach with no success in March.
I've been saying this for three years. The open shot has been coached out of them (except for Jones). They pass up wide open looks for "one more pass," the shot clock evaporates and up goes the garbage/off balance prayer, if they get it off at all. This bothers me a lot. MD and FW will always fake the shot then dribble for an awkward time sensitive shot. Don't get it. I'm all for an extra pass if the pass goes to a guy better positioned, but it almost never happens.If the Salukis are going to have a great season, they have to put this game behind them. What concerns me the most is that they looked sluggish from the beginning. If we are not making outside shots, the spread offense will not work. When our outside shots aren't dropping, the defense sags off and makes it harder to drive to the basket. I do agree with the earlier comments that our outside shooters hesitate to much when they have a good look. I realize it is a matter of confidence, but we can't return to eating the shot clock down to 5 seconds and expect to win. I believe the Dawgs can turn it around again as they are just days away from one of best wins in years.
March on triumphantly!
Nobody's saying this team's in the same neighborhood as those Van Winkle disasters...
Hey Goro, not many of us are old enough to remember those disasters. 😀
Those Van Winkel teams were far better than Joe Gottfried's 0 - 18 MVC bottom champ. LOL
That Gottfried season was easily the nadir in Saluki basketball history, just ahead of Lowery's final season. We're a LONG way from that, but if Mullins doesn't start putting up a couple of postseason-worthy campaigns, he'll end up in Van Winkle/Hinson territory, just another coach who will be remembered as being a marginally better than .500 coach with no success in March.
I'm no Hinson fan, but the Van Winkle teams were considerably worse than the Hinson teams. Van Winkle was well under .500 during his tenure at SIU, Hinson was over .500. I have been going to Saluki games since the mid 1970's and the talent level was greater for the Hinson teams too.
I thought about this this morning. After the fun game that was Little Rock and the gutsy win over a Power 5 team on the road, there was optimism to think that this team was something special, something different. A team you would talk about 20 years later and compare current teams to, like we do with the 2002 and 2007 Sweet 16 teams.
Now, almost 24 hours later, maybe it's just a normal, average team with it's share of ups and downs, a couple of exceptional players in Jones and Domask, but not the necessary role players to make this team really good, even when the exceptional players are having off-nights.
3 games is not enough time to make an accurate assessment of this team. They played very poorly yesterday, but it was in a very short turnaround with much travel and 2 injured post players. If they look like this after the California tournament then I would say you can assess the team as possibly nothing special. You cannot overlook the fact that they beat a very good OSU team on the road and were very impressive against an over matched team in the opener. Also, that was USI's Superbowl, as it were. 1st home D1 game against a good, similar market team. If our next five games follow the pattern of this game I will agree that this just a slightly above average Saluki team. If they get back to playing like they did in the first 2 games or continue to grow with the many new players then we may indeed have a special team. The jury is certainly still out and making an analysis based on one game would not be accurate.I thought about this this morning. After the fun game that was Little Rock and the gutsy win over a Power 5 team on the road, there was optimism to think that this team was something special, something different. A team you would talk about 20 years later and compare current teams to, like we do with the 2002 and 2007 Sweet 16 teams.
Now, almost 24 hours later, maybe it's just a normal, average team with it's share of ups and downs, a couple of exceptional players in Jones and Domask, but not the necessary role players to make this team really good, even when the exceptional players are having off-nights.
Safe to say Newton has not yet found his niche from a scoring standpoint. At Evansville he was pretty effective getting to the foul line but there hasn't been much of that in the early going this season.
He would be one of the candidates to hopefully pick things up from a production standpoint to get the offense out of the mud.
One more thing to add. I think Thursday nights game may tell us quite a bit more about this team. Unlike the USI game we will be better rested and will probably be playing the best team on our non conference home schedule. Tennessee State was picked 2nd in the OVC preseason poll and has been quite impressive in their 1st 2 regular season games. They just beat a South Carolina State team by 19 that took South Carolina to the buzzer, losing by 3 on the road 4 night before. Tennessee State is legit, so let's see how the Dawgs respond and adjust following a crushing performance in Evansville.
Sorry, one more observation just occurred to me. I'm sure some of you remember when Indiana came to the SIU arena at the beginning of December 2001. Indiana was highly touted and SIU blew them out! We had an incredible crowd and the game was the biggest thing to happen at the arena since the early 90's! Indiana didn't know what hit them! Well, that Indiana team went on to play in the national championship game that year. I think playing at USI was a similar ambush on a different scale. USI had a big, loud crowd and this game was by far the biggest game ever played in their arena. I'm sorry, but D2 playoff games aren't as big as your first home game in D1 against a talented regional rival! Yes, SIU went on to the the sweet 16 the year they beat Indiana, but still we weren't nearly as good as Indiana was that year. Let's hope the season plays out similarly where USI ends up better than expected, and like Indiana in 2001/2002 SIU overcomes the early season ambush to have a special season.
Good teams lose to bad teams sometimes. It happens, hopefully the guys forget about it and focus on the next game. Seems like there has been a lid on rim at times.
They are getting open shots which I like so I can't knock their perimeter game too much, just go to get to the line during those scoring droughts.
The 2005-2006 team lost back-to-back games to Monmonth and Alaska-Anchorage and then in March we won the Valley Tourney.
Saluki Insider? I barely know her!
I have watched college basketball for many years. I see games such as this all the time as I am sure most of you do as well. A game where a more talented team is beaten by a highly motivated, hot shooting at home team. However, I am not sure I believe this to be the case in this particular game. They seemed quicker, bigger, more athletic and better shooters than SIU. It was not just the cold shooting that makes me say this. How many dunks did we have ? How many offensive rebounds ? How many blocks ? This was against a first year D1 team. OSU had us on the ropes. LJ took over that game in the final minutes to save our bacon.
I just keep going back to one simple question. Even when healthy, where will we get consistent points other than Domask and Jones ?? Just getting a bad vibe from this team. Hope, I am wrong. And, as everyone keeps saying all good teams have games like this.
I've been saying this for three years. The open shot has been coached out of them (except for Jones). They pass up wide open looks for "one more pass," the shot clock evaporates and up goes the garbage/off balance prayer, if they get it off at all. This bothers me a lot. MD and FW will always fake the shot then dribble for an awkward time sensitive shot. Don't get it. I'm all for an extra pass if the pass goes to a guy better positioned, but it almost never happens.If the Salukis are going to have a great season, they have to put this game behind them. What concerns me the most is that they looked sluggish from the beginning. If we are not making outside shots, the spread offense will not work. When our outside shots aren't dropping, the defense sags off and makes it harder to drive to the basket. I do agree with the earlier comments that our outside shooters hesitate to much when they have a good look. I realize it is a matter of confidence, but we can't return to eating the shot clock down to 5 seconds and expect to win. I believe the Dawgs can turn it around again as they are just days away from one of best wins in years.
If kids are good enough to be on the floor for meaningful minutes and have the green light from three, they should be encouraged just as much as your top two players to take a decent shot when the opportunity presents. If your schemes begin to override natural instincts, then that is when an offensive game plan becomes detrimental to cohesive flow. I know that when you get into your own head in that way its a total confidence killer.
--Insert something witty here--
