this game reminded me of the game against 'Cuse. Both had tall and long athletes, and our Smurfs never had a chance in the paint. The only way to win was to shoot over them but their length meant we needed to jack up threes from way beyond the arc, particularly against Syr.
Lazy passes led to easy steals. Dribbling into a double? Uh, going the other way (as Andej found out, frequently).
If Madsen is going to make any type of push towards the NIT, let alone the Dance, his team’s need to be far more efficient on both sides of the ball.
OR, he needs to have 4-5 pro-caliber players in the rotation, which he does not have. Honestly, only two players on this current roster are legit ACC caliber starters. ISO ball and NBA-style schemes with kids from GCU, UTSA and W Carolina is a challenge.
Agreed - this offseason is SO key: a program like Cal’s, with a modest-at-best NIL, simply can’t afford to suffer a mass exodus and just reload every season…got to be able to count on some roster consistency and development, and they have to shoot the ball better if this ISO O is what Madsen’s gonna rely on.
Plus, they really need to keep at least some of this core together AND add more talented ballplayers to it. Jovani Ruff is intriguing, but they’re very likely gonna lose Wilkinson, and there remain a few players that really don’t give them anything and simply aren’t P5 guys. Retaining a core of Andrej, BJ, Rytis, JOJ, Dort, and Mahoney, while adding Ruff, another shooter and a quality big, would do wonders. If Wilkinson does somehow stick around, all the better.
Helpful write-up for the casual b-ball fan looking to understand our trajectory and why. That “decade ago” insight speaks volumes about the state of college sports in general. Thank you, Nick Kranz.
Did Andrei’s performance signify an upward trend? Until a couple of makes during garbage time he was poised to have one of his worst shooting performances of the year, and when the game was within reach he turned the ball over multiple times trying to dribble through people. I think he would say this is not where he wants to be in his game at this point.
Madsen teams here in Berkeley have yet to play anything close to solid enough defense…not sure if it’s personnel, scheme, effort…maybe a little of all. We certainly miss Omot and JOJ, but even with those guys the squad oftentimes looks lost on D and gives up too many easy buckets.
Meanwhile, Duke was caught looking ahead to its matchup against us and got bit by Clemson.
Our overall trajectory as a program is still upward, but I am becoming a bit concerned about how Madsen teams struggle to jell. We have more overall P4 starter talent this year and saw success out the gate...and then just kind of hit a ceiling. There's a lack of consistency that has us in the KenPom 120s when our talent feels more 80s-90s. But maybe that's merely a symptom of this being essentially a year-one team and I'm being unreasonable.
We missed Andrej, and we really miss Omot. Petraitis is also having the worst 3P% season of his career, which is unfortunate because the dribble penetration has set him up for plenty of good looks from the arc. But even with all that, the D needs to be much better if they’re gonna be relevant come March.
Need a significant talent upgrade in the backcourt and at the 5 as well…
this game reminded me of the game against 'Cuse. Both had tall and long athletes, and our Smurfs never had a chance in the paint. The only way to win was to shoot over them but their length meant we needed to jack up threes from way beyond the arc, particularly against Syr.
Lazy passes led to easy steals. Dribbling into a double? Uh, going the other way (as Andej found out, frequently).
If Madsen is going to make any type of push towards the NIT, let alone the Dance, his team’s need to be far more efficient on both sides of the ball.
OR, he needs to have 4-5 pro-caliber players in the rotation, which he does not have. Honestly, only two players on this current roster are legit ACC caliber starters. ISO ball and NBA-style schemes with kids from GCU, UTSA and W Carolina is a challenge.
Thanks Nick. Well put.
Agreed - this offseason is SO key: a program like Cal’s, with a modest-at-best NIL, simply can’t afford to suffer a mass exodus and just reload every season…got to be able to count on some roster consistency and development, and they have to shoot the ball better if this ISO O is what Madsen’s gonna rely on.
Plus, they really need to keep at least some of this core together AND add more talented ballplayers to it. Jovani Ruff is intriguing, but they’re very likely gonna lose Wilkinson, and there remain a few players that really don’t give them anything and simply aren’t P5 guys. Retaining a core of Andrej, BJ, Rytis, JOJ, Dort, and Mahoney, while adding Ruff, another shooter and a quality big, would do wonders. If Wilkinson does somehow stick around, all the better.
Helpful write-up for the casual b-ball fan looking to understand our trajectory and why. That “decade ago” insight speaks volumes about the state of college sports in general. Thank you, Nick Kranz.
Did Andrei’s performance signify an upward trend? Until a couple of makes during garbage time he was poised to have one of his worst shooting performances of the year, and when the game was within reach he turned the ball over multiple times trying to dribble through people. I think he would say this is not where he wants to be in his game at this point.
Agreed. He was 1-9 at the under 12 2H timeout, and he and Rytis were combined 3-19. Tough to win that way, especially when you don’t D up.
We gave up way too many easy baskets due to a lot of defensive mistakes or leaving your man to help on a double team.
Madsen teams here in Berkeley have yet to play anything close to solid enough defense…not sure if it’s personnel, scheme, effort…maybe a little of all. We certainly miss Omot and JOJ, but even with those guys the squad oftentimes looks lost on D and gives up too many easy buckets.
Meanwhile, Duke was caught looking ahead to its matchup against us and got bit by Clemson.
Our overall trajectory as a program is still upward, but I am becoming a bit concerned about how Madsen teams struggle to jell. We have more overall P4 starter talent this year and saw success out the gate...and then just kind of hit a ceiling. There's a lack of consistency that has us in the KenPom 120s when our talent feels more 80s-90s. But maybe that's merely a symptom of this being essentially a year-one team and I'm being unreasonable.
I concur with this statement. On paper, we should be better than this.
So, the coach may not be getting the most out of his players, may have a poor game plan and may not react to ingame developments effectively.
Let's face it, Coach Madsen does not appear to be the second coming of John Wooden.
We missed Andrej, and we really miss Omot. Petraitis is also having the worst 3P% season of his career, which is unfortunate because the dribble penetration has set him up for plenty of good looks from the arc. But even with all that, the D needs to be much better if they’re gonna be relevant come March.
Need a significant talent upgrade in the backcourt and at the 5 as well…
At least it was competitive for a while. An improvement over the Wyking Jones era
Wyking was nonetheless a step-up from Mark Fox, who had no excuse to be that awful.
The season is over.