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About Jay developing big men

In the average publics eye Jay has always been considered a coach who develops guards but not big men. This has been a total fallacy. Jay has developed the big men he has gotten over the years including Mouph, Ochefu and now Reynolds. He has also developed power forwards, who, though not big play like big men when asked to take that role. By this, I mean Pinkston, Jenkins and Cunningham. Next year should put a total end to the fantasy when Omari, Painter, and Pascal play.
Jay has done the best with the big men he has gotten and will finally put to rest that he is not only a guard coach but a big man coach. Go Cats.

Press break

Anyone else extremely concerned with our press break / in bounding? Everytime we post up with our guards and throw that lob pass I think it's a turnover. Yesterday, it luckily didn't result in any turnovers that I can remember...but a team with 4 guards should not have to use a lob pass after 4.5 seconds to get the ball inbound. I know we've been saying forever, but why is the coaching staff so against running screens in the front court, or even having a big run to mid court to set a screen for a guard to flash to the ball, then turn and show as a last resort??

Throwing a lob to 6 foot, athletically challenged guards in the backcourt is a terrifying situation...

Current Ballots

Bozich - Nova #3

Seth Davis ‏@SethDavisHoops
1. Nova 2. Okl 3. Md 4. Iowa 5. Mich St 6. Xav 7. West Va 8. Kan 9. Va 10. NC 11. Oregon 12. Iowa St 13. Wich St 14. Ariz 15. Miami 16. Louisville,
17. Tex A&M 18. SMU 19. Texas 20. Baylor 21. Prov 22. Kentucky 23. Purdue 24. Dayton 25. Valpo

Thoughts from The Dunk

Great time had by all yesterday....

We sat about 10 rows behind the nova bench...had a great view of the action.

Our team defense and athleticism were impressive...bridges is all over the court..... Jenkins game is very multidimensional... Fun to see him mix it up.... Josh Hart is such a joy to watch.... Gus Johnson was gushing about him postgame. "A beast 13 boards".... His motor is always running on overdrive.....arch is a killer... Reynolds played with such skill and confidence...the staff drew up a good plan to get him in the flow offensively....

We stayed around postgame to catch up with fannon... Enjoyed seeing these kids & their families. Lots of good team chemistry all around. Also confidence....

This has been a super year so far and with the continued development of the young guys during the next month+ I think the squad is gearing up for a memorable postseason...

Big East Picture

The Big East pecking order has been established to some extent, but the picture is still muddy. Here's how it looks to be playing out now:

LOCKS - Nova, Xavier
IN TODAY, BUT MORE WORK TO DO - Seton Hall, Providence
BUBBLE - Georgetown, Butler
OUTSIDE LOOKING IN - Creighton, Marquette
OUT - St. John's, DePaul

The conference really only has two stone cold locks right now. Locking up PC was premature on my part given the minor swoon they are currently in. PC is an easy tournament team today, but let's make sure they don't go on a complete nose dive from here on out, and the schedule isn't exactly favorable - still have road games at Marquette (who already beat PC), Xavier, and Seton Hall.

Seton Hall is trending the other way, making this an easy four bid conference right now. Some tough games to negotiate down the stretch, but three more wins gets SHU to 20 wins on the season and 10 in the conference. - and they should get two of them against SJU and DePaul (although both of those games are on the road). 3 more wins is enough for a bid IMO, and one win in the BET likely locks it.

On the bubble, Butler is clearly in the best shape now to make it a 5 bid league, but they are not safe by any means. The win at home over Georgetown was huge, and the Purdue win is still holding up. But the RPI is not good right now (68 - behind teams like Arkansas-Little Rock, Stony Brook, Yale, and Princeton). They need an absolute minimum of three more BE wins, and probably need at least four before the conference tournament. It starts with a big game on Wednesday night at home against SHU - a win there would really help Butler. After that, two more big chances for marquee wins down the stretch against Xavier (at home) and at Nova.

Georgetown is in major trouble. 11 losses already, currently 3 in a row, and two, possibly three, terrible losses on the resume. Couldn't get wins at Butler or at SHU. I don't think the Hoyas can afford more than two losses down the stretch, and they still have to play at PC, SHU, Xavier, Butler, at Marquette (where Butler just lost), and at Nova. Very, very hard to see them going 4-2 in that stretch the way this season has gone.

Creighton/Marquette are well outside the bubble right now - both RPI's in the triple digits. This is looking strongly like a 4-5 bid league.
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