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2013-2014 B1G Men's Basketball

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NFBuck said:
I don't know. I hate me some m*ch*g*n, but that's a pretty talented team. I never take too much from early season upsets. Remember, scUM upset both Duke and UCLA (when they were good) back when the crapweasels legit sucked at basketball. College basketball is a giant crapshoot all season. All that matters is how you're playing in February-March. They may be overrated, but I think McGary is the real deal, Robinson is a good wing, Stauskas is a deadly shot, and they have depth. The biggest question is whether those guys can make up for the difference between Walton-Burke. I still think they're 12-6 ish in the B1G this year.
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Yeah, early season there are sometimes some really strange looking results at the end of the year - for instance, one year in November an awful DePaul team beat a Northern Iowa team that knocked off overall #1 seed in the tourney Kansas in March.

But that being said, I don't think the result yesterday was particularly time-sensitive (i.e., ISU probably could've beaten UM again 4 months from now as well) and UM is clearly not on the level of last year having watched them yesterday. There are a number of important differences. McGary will be forced to manufacture offense farther away from the basket more often without as much of a drive & dish element - Burke could penetrate and draw defenders and then dump it off to McGary for a layup last year, and it remains to be seen whether Walton or whoever they have at PG can deliver anywhere close to the number of room service dimes. Clearly McGary did not put up particularly big numbers scoring-wise against ISU, and it wasn't because they have a stud defender in the post, it was because he wasn't getting nearly as many close-range shot opportunities against one defender as he got towards the end of last year. Now GR3 has moved from a supplemental offensive player that could just score within the flow of the offense to one that has to take a lot of shots and score a lot more, and will have defenses keying in on him, and Stauskas also has moved up on the scouting report and will face stiffer defense than he faced most of last season. Walton hasn't shot the ball anywhere close to Burke from 3, and so teams may be able to sag off of him and limit his ability to penetrate and set up his teammates. LeVert went from being a guy that if he did anything positive last year, it was an unexpected bonus to being a guy that now is relied on for major scoring and can't struggle shooting the ball like he did yesterday or they won't beat anybody who's any good.

I also question how productive their depth will be. Irvin hasn't given them much so far. Are they a top-25 team? Probably. But are they a team that is likely to make the Sweet 16 again? I doubt it unless Walton finds his shooting range and turns into an All-Big Ten level player this year.
 
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Wisconsin scores 103.....

hell-freezes-over.jpg
 
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MaxBuck said:
Vonleh is a beast. IU will give Sparty a run for the B1G title this season IMO.
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Not quite ready to say that, yet. They certainly didn't look like world beaters to start the year and this Washington team lost to 2-2 UC-Irvine. Plus I still have many reservations about Tom Crean's coaching ability (actually they're hardly reservations, I know he's not good).

Yogi, Sheehey, and Vonleh's continued development is certainly plenty of talent to work with, however.
 
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MaxBuck said:
Vonleh is a beast. IU will give Sparty a run for the B1G title this season IMO.
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So does that mean that LIU-Brooklyn would give Sparty a run? Because they sure as hell were better than IU for about 38 minutes of their game.

Buckeyes better figure out some offense or they'll be sucking hind tit.
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They need to figure out just enough offense to win. The defense is what their mainstay is.
 
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I know it's becoming increasingly difficult to be considered objective unless you say tOSU isn't a great team and list at least three or four teams that are "clearly" better than the Bucks...no matter which sport...but...

If there's one thing I'm not worried about in Buckeye sports, it's the Buckeye hoops team as long as Thad is coaching here. His teams have started strong. They've started slow. All of them have won twenty games and most have been playing damn good basketball by the start of the B1G schedule. There have been individual teams that have been better in a given year. Thete have been programs that have been better over a select couple years in a row. However, since Thad arrived, there hasn't been a more consistent winner in the B1G. Maybe even the country. I'm not worried about tOSU sucking hind antything, regardless of how they look in November.
 
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BUCKYLE said:
I know it's becoming increasingly difficult to be considered objective unless you say tOSU isn't a great team and list at least three or four teams that are "clearly" better than the Bucks...no matter which sport...but...

If there's one thing I'm not worried about in Buckeye sports, it's the Buckeye hoops team as long as Thad is coaching here. His teams have started strong. They've started slow. All of them have won twenty games and most have been playing damn good basketball by the start of the B1G schedule. There have been individual teams that have been better in a given year. Thete have been programs that have been better over a select couple years in a row. However, since Thad arrived, there hasn't been a more consistent winner in the B1G. Maybe even the country. I'm not worried about tOSU sucking hind antything, regardless of how they look in November.
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I totally agree .Matta will get this team clicking by January..December will be ugly..as the players accept and learn their roles. Just because many players return the on court dynamics have changed without DT and the team must adjust.
 
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