Nice win, but need improvement

[ColonialCrazy]

The Colonials picked up a nice win last night, but almost blew a 14pt lead.

Juanie Newton made the play of the game late in the second half Karvel turned it over. It appeared that UTA had an easy breakaway lay up to tie it up. Newton raced down the court and used every bit of athleticism he used to win the RMU dunk contest to contest the layup at the rim. His D forced a crucial miss.

Karvel was awesome but that does't even surprise me anymore, he's that good of a shooter.

That D could use some work, and whats up with the crappy 2pt FG %???

According to KenPom the Colonials have the 329th best two-point field goal percentage at 39.9 percent. Thats's god awful. They were at 46% last year.

Obviously it's really early but that concerns me.

Ant was awesome last night. In complete control finding guys in good places to score. Toole will take 10 and 9 from him every night. 6-6 from the line including a big 1-1 where he made both FT's. Awesome.

Can't wait for the Cleveland State game. Should be a good test against another quality mid-major on the road.

 

[Andrew_Chiappazzi]

I thought Andy Toole's comments about UTA's run last night were enlightening when he said the second half defensive issues were 40 percent UTA's ability, 50 percent RMU, and 10 percent the NCAA. Against highly athletic guards, it's really tough to handle things on the perimeter and on dribble penetration right now.

Toole and his staff teach not to foul, but the team still needs to be physical. Combine that with so many players in new roles, and I think it'll just take a little bit of time to be better defensively.

Also, there's this: While watching practice Wednesday night, the people that were hardest on the newcomers weren't wearing polo shirts and track pants. Toole was his usual demonstrative self, but the four voices that were preaching defense the loudest were Anthony Myers-Pate, Karvel Anderson, Mike McFadden and Lucky Jones. Myers-Pate, Anderson and Jones were particularly vocal, with Anderson really pushing David Appolon and Jones really digging into Charles Oliver.

We'll see how the leadership dynamic continues to adjust with this team, but if the same message is coming from multiple voices, including players, that can only be a good thing for a basketball team.

The two-point field percentage is certainly awful, but I think the big thing is who the misses are coming from.

Jeremiah Worthem is shooting 28%, Anthony Myers-Pate is shooting 16%, Stephan Hawkins is shooting 26%, Lucky Jones is 36%.

Myers-Pate and Jones will improve, and we saw evidence of that last night. Myers-Pate had a rough start to the season, but I think going 6-for-6 from the foul line will improve his overall confidence. He's figuring out exactly how he fits in as the distributor on this particular team; remember, with as many minutes as he played as the 1B point guard to Velton Jones, he was working with a lot of the same weapons each year (Velton, Russell Johnson, Coron Williams). With so many new weapons, it's taking a little time to figure out when he can dish and kick, dump down low, or keep it himself.

Jones will be just fine. His jumper isn't there, but when he started forgetting about the 3-pointer and driving the lane last night, he was better.

Worthem reminds me of Jones his freshman year. He has to learn when to drive and bull his way to the hoop and when to stop and kick it back out. He missed a couple chances to get an assist last night because he put his head down.

Hawkins is also an excellent shooter, but he needs to simply be stronger around the rim. Too many cases of him missing five feet from the tin.

If McFadden, Anderson and Jones are the primary scorers, with high percentage contributions from Newton, Oliver and Myers-Pate, plus the occasional chunks from Worthem, Hawkins, Tate and Appolon, the numbers will rise.

 

[GoRMU]

I was glad to see that Kavon Stewart was on the bench, although not dressed for the game. Any speculation on when he will be back playing?

 

[Andrew_Chiappazzi]

Kavon will miss Saturdays game, but I expect him to be available against Buffalo. We'll see if that holds true
Posted from Rivals Mobile

 

[Carlester]

3-2 is probably where we should be given all the new players and that we've played three games on the road. Hopefully, we can learn from the EMU loss and get a win today. Great to see Ant have a strong game on Thur. Karvel is tremendous and so fun to watch. Lucky came up with several key rebounds down the stretch when we really needed them. No question that we need to improve our finishing around the rim across the board. That said, I really like Worthem's aggressiveness and athleticism. He is going to be a very difficult matchup in the league. Go Colonials!