Cal Men's Basketball In Season Retrospective: Roster Construction

We know about the coaching but what about the program's sum of its parts?

Sam Alajiki on the dribble against Cedric Henderson Jr. via calbears.com and Kelley L Cox of KLC Fotos

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I do hate to rain on Nick’s parade of optimism and joy with the Cal women’s basketball team with more doom and gloom, but we all know you can never have too many good things at once as a Cal fan ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

Much is known about the Cal Men’s basketball coaching staff’s ability to recruit, coach, adjust in game, and deliver results. Part of their impact is the way they choose to construct the roster, which are fighting their way through one of the worst seasons in Cal’s history. But how much of this is the coaching staff not maximizing its talent and how much of a chance did they even give themselves to make it work in the first place?

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Here’s the roster by position (from those that play or would have played so not everyone will be listed):

PG #1 Joel Brown

PG #3 Jarred Hyder (injured, out for the year)

PG #30 Wrenn Robinson (RSF walk-on)

PG #55 Devin Askew (injured, out for the year)

SG #32 Jalen Celestine (injured, presumably out for the year)

SG #33 DeJuan Clayton (injured)

F #0 Marsalis Roberson

F #2 Monty Bowser

F #13 Kuany Kuany

F #14 Grant Newell

F #23 Obinna Anyanwu

F #24 Sam Alajiki

C# 21 Lars Thiemann

C #22 ND Okafor

Tell me what you notice. Is there balance? Is there depth? Positional depth even?

The keys were given to Devin Askew and Joel Brown to run the offense, full well knowing that both Jarred Hyder and Jalen Celestine would be out for a long time. That left Brown, Askew, Clayton in certain scenarios and even walk on Wrenn Robinson, who joined the team midseason in the backcourt. That’s not a lot of depth inherently. And that’s before you consider the talent level within the context of the Pac 12.

Cal has had struggles with ball-handling and when Joel Brown becomes your only facilitator, that’s a problem. It’s even more of a problem when Brown isn’t a threat to shoot from deep or the free throw line, leaving opposing defenders glued to their man instead of getting them to overhelp on rotations. A lineup of Brown, Bowser, Alajiki, Newell, and Thiemann/Okafor is stuck between a rock and a hard place, because the lineup is athletic but the Bears don’t run. And that’s with a team filled with solid athletes.

As you can also see from above and have seen on the court, the Golden Bears have a bevy of forwards. And they all see court time as well. Kuany, Newell, and Alajiki have all started at one time or another. Roberson, Bowser, and Anyanwu all see the court in a significant capacity off the bench. In some cases, Bowser and Kuany become the defacto shooting guards in some lineups, out of position at the very least. Furthermore as it was mentioned earlier, Cal doesn’t push the pace and the coaching staff’s refusal to adapt to their roster has been infuriating to see.

Monty Bowser sizing up an ASU defender vs @calmbball on twitter

Additionally, the Bears defensive rating is the worst it has been in the Mark Fox era, turtling in at 106.1 defensive rating overall and 110.7 within conference play (pre UCLA). Let’s take a step back. A team filled with athletes, that struggles to shoot and create off the dribble, and in this case defend, isn’t running? With all these athletic forwards and a speed demon in Joel Brown? Compare it to football for a minute. A cure for any ailing offense is a 2 minute drill. In basketball, it’s running in transition. Cal has the horses to do that and do so relatively effectively.

Let’s take another step back. The Bears have the worst shooting percentage in the Pac 12 at 39.5%, worst 3 pt % at 30.8, and score the least amount of points per game at 58.7 ppg (all pre UCLA), and are the only team in the conference to not average double digit assists per game. Yet the philosophy is still to plod around and hope for the best? Especially when the part of the court that this staff hangs its hat on the defensive side has been abysmal at best, odious at worst.

It’s one thing to try and fit a square peg into a round hole. It’s another thing to not cater to the personnel that was brought in by the coaching staff themselves. Effective coaches and teachers can adapt schemes around players, and not only fit players into their own schemes. Cal forcing the 2nd least amount of turnovers per game (10.4 TO/g) with all the length isn’t good enough. Them not pushing the pace on offense and getting into transition isn’t good enough. The construction of the roster can work in some respects given the right situation. Clearly this is not that.

ben @mpete91

rex volcanø @RexVolcano

@mpete91 46 points is officially the most mark fox number of points

You could apply this meme to any number of games this season.

Simply put, the balance and roster construction is off. How much of that is on the coaching staff (at the very least it’s a lot) and their ability to develop talent versus the roster simply not being good enough? You can probably tell where I stand on this dilemma but I want to hear your thoughts. Like many, I’m ready for a new voice in Berkeley.