BGleas

Just going to assume I'm in the "half the fans", which isn't really accurate. Just making my position crystal clear. I haven't said Cupps is playing well. He's not. We can't have a starting point guard play 20 minutes and basically put up all zeros in the boxscore. That's losing basketball against good teams. With that said, he makes less mistakes than Gunn right now. Gunn is a mess on both ends right now. Cupps clearly has more trust from the coaches, it's crystal clear. If Gunn had so much potential then it really should be super easy to take minutes from Cupps. Gunn isn't doing it and hasn't shown it. So with two guys struggling a coach is going to go with the one that takes less off the table, even if the other guy maybe has the potential to put more on the table. But again, to be crystal clear, my stance is NOT that Cupps is playing really well.

Woah, slow down there. I never said the data was wrong. I understand the data and analytics. But the data and analytics are not the end all be all. For the hundredth time, they are only one part of a larger story. You have to be able to critically think the game beyond the data. Why is the data showing me what it's showing me? Why are guys inefficient? What's making them inefficient? With two inefficient guys, is one high usage and inefficient vs another that is low usage? Are one guys bad defensive stats because he's largely gambling and out of position which causes everyone else to have to scramble and stresses our defense unnecessarily at times and is the other largely because of size? I can deal with the latter but not the former. The why is just as important as the numbers, and Woodson most likely using the data and what he sees and know, which is how it should be.

We're just never going to agree in these topics and that's ok. Leal is not taking Cupps minutes, he's taking Gunn's. I don't even see how that is a debatable point? Harvard was the first game Leal played in and Gunn had his minutes drop to only 3 and didn't play at all in the 2nd half. On this team Gunn is in the guard rotation and can't get minutes ahead of Cupps and has been losing some minutes to Leal. It's just factual. On the JHS/MM thing. MM playing better is just that, he's playing better. Most of us expected him to begin to play better. His defense has improved to a somewhat serviceable point, he's getting himself more involved by rebounding, especially on the offensive side, and Woodson is finally running more sets for him. That's all true, but it doesn't make some early season comparison to JHS last year accurate or true. We both agree their games are completely different, but their early season contributions were also vastly different.

We have a total of 4 healthy backcourt guys (Galloway, Cupps, Gunn and Leal) and one of those guys barely has played in his career. Yet, Gunn is still struggling to get playing time. I completely understand stats and analytics, but once again they are not the end all be all. They are a part of a larger story. It is crystal clear that Mike Woodon trusts Gabe Cupps incredibly more than he does CJ Gunn, at least right now. It's obvious. Cupps isn't even doing anything out there and Gunn still can't get more minutes. That says a whole lot about how Gunn is playing. Cupps is a much smarter player. Is rarely out of position, etc. Gunn is out of position all of the time, goes for unnecessary shot fakes around the perimeter causing the entire defense to scramble, and takes terrible shots. Mike Woodson has shown us with his playing time who he trusts more right now. There is way more to evaluating these things than stats. Being in the right place at the time, understanding the schemes, understanding what's a good shot and what isn't, etc

Yeah, Cupps work to hard and is too smart to not figure it out, the question is just to what level. I've just never seen the Gunn thing. He has some tools. Really good length and athleticism for his position, etc., but he's not a particularly smart player and is a really bad shooter who shoots alot. Maybe his shot develops, but for a shooter he has an incredible amount of improving to do.

There have also been players much less athletic than Cupps that have been really good high major players. His issue right now is strength. He needs to continue to develop in terms of body maturity and add strength and he'll be fine. But, we do need to see Cupps add something offensively. We need to see him bring something to the table. Create, hit some shots, etc. It's not enough to just get the ball up the court and add nothing else.

There are reasons Cupps is getting more time than Gunn consistently. It's not necessarily because of what Cupps is doing, I'll grant you that, but right now Gunn is a hot mess on both ends. Any coach would take the guy he can trust over the guy he can't. Right now, Gunn can't be trusted consistently out there on either end. Honestly, it's a bigger indictment against Gunn that he can't overtake Cupps right now, because its not like Cupps is doing that much out there.

Agree. He needs to watch for awhile and get to a place where the game slows down for him. He also needs to find or understand his role offensively. He is not a shooter whatsoever.

Here's my thing on the Cupps, Gunn, Leal stuff. Yes, Cupps and Leal are going to give up some points due to lack of size and/or athleticism. They just are. Cupps will add size/bulk as he develops and will be fine, but yes right now his strength is an issue. Neither really contribute much offensively, though Cupps does provide a reliable ballhandler that can give Galloway/XJ a break. But, they also don't really take anything off the table offensively. With all of that said, I'll take the above and I think most coaches would too, over Gunn right now. Gunn has the length and athleticism, yet constantly gets out of position and beat defensively. I'll take the guys that are mostly in good position but get beat because of athleticism over the the guy that has the tools but is causing our defense stress because he's out of position and flying by shooters, going for pump fakes that allow penetration, etc. I'll take the guys that might not be adding much offensively vs the guy taking things away offensively. I'll take Cupps 0-for-1 in 20 minutes while providing extra ball handling over Gunn going 1-for-4 in 12 minutes with three bad shots. Gunn and Cupps both have upside, but a coach is always going to pick the guy he can trust more.

Completely agree. Yeah, it wasn't an avalanche of slashers or anything, but we did hit Banks on a backdoor cut in the first half and I think Gunn got one in the 2nd half. Maybe 1-2 more and probably doesn't happen if both bigs are in the paint.

Completely agree. I like the horns sets too with two bigs high. But yeah, I think we saw some positive results of those changes, just need more shots to start dropping. We had more movement, got some easier baskets and got some open jumpers that didn't go.

Great call by Woodson and the staff to go zone! While it didn't completely turn our offense around, I was really excited to see Woodson swith up our approach and to an extent system. We largely went away from the 2 low post offense. First possession and throughout we went with a horn set and then we also went with a 4-out/1-in a lot too. Again it didn't result in drastic improvement, largely because we didn't shoot well, but we did have a bit more space, got XJ and some others into the lane more and had a few more buckets hitting slashers. Really liked seeing those adjustments.

I think for now the rotation should be: Guards and wings (1-3): XJ, Galloway, Gunn, Cupps Forwards and bigs (4/5): Ware, Reneau, Mgbako, Banks Sparks as needed if we have to have some size.

They need to be better, completely agree. But, I'd also argue a bit that the system isn't really set up for them to do much currently. The lane is completely clogged. Our most used offense right now is to drop it to a big on the block and stand around while they make a move. There's not much space right now and we're running almost everything through 2 bigs in the paint. They definitely need to do much, much better on the defensive glass at minimum.

We're not that good in the halfcourt. Our 3pt defense sucks. Our pace is terrible. Reneau and Ware won't be nearly as effective or dominant when we're going against power 5 conference teams. What we're doing barely worked against FGCU and almost lost us a game to one of the worst teams in D1 basketball. Again, we don't need to lead the Nation I'm 3pt attemps, but we need to shoot more to compete once the competition gets better. Our bigs constistsly miss completely wide open shooters when double and tripled team all game long. There is absolutely no reason we can't and shouldn't shoot more.

Again, nobody said "jack 30+ 3's". If we continue to be sub-300 nationally in attempts we're not going to win to the level we all want.

Nobody is saying to take 3-pointers for the hell of it or to lead the nation in 3pt attempts. But, being ranked sub-300 in 3pt attempts isn't a winning strategy either.

I honestly have no clue what you're seeing or talking about? Have you watched him over 4 games (including the exhibitions) completely riding "supposedly quicker" guards up and down the court? Constantly making them change direction and almost never blowing by him. I mean, his defensive pressure literally changed the entire FGCU game around. He's probably our best defensive guard so far this season and that's on a team with XJ and Galloway. Defense and his ability to pressure at the point of attack is literally the reason he's gotten the minutes he has so far.

I think MM needs to get time at the 4. He clearly a college 4 and needs to be in that role. We're wasting his offensively by having him in the "Kopp stand in the corner role". On Cupps and Gunn we couldn't disagree more. Cupps has shown more in two games than Gunn has shown in 1 year and two games. It's not even close. Cupps has All-Conference potential. I'm don't want to write the kid off, but Gunn has massive, massive improvements to make.

I dont care who the better athlete is, I'll take Cupps defense over CJ Gunn's every day of the week and twice on Sunday. Cupps is going to be an excellent Big Ten player over his career and a key player this season. Granted we haven't played the good teams yet, but at this point in terms of staying in front of his man and creating defensive havoc, I'm the least worried about Cupps.

And just stupid! If he's really comparing basketball resumes, Woodson's towers over both of them. But what's worse is just this clown continuing to trash Woodson, IU players and IU recruits.

Dakich is straight trash!

Great breakdown, and the worst part is Donta Scott, a 5th year senior' trying to blame other guys after he single handedly screwed that entire defensive possession up.

I'm not really worried about rebounding, at least compared to last year's team. Ware is a 7-footer, Reneau is a big upgrade over Race interms of rebounding, Mgbako will be am upgrade over Kopp in terms of rebounding, Galloway is Galloway, and XJ is an upgrade over JHS in this area. Yeah, we lost the leading rebounder in program history, but we weren't really a great rebounding team last year, and we've improved at every other spot. Agree with most of your other comments.

Not sure specifically, but I'd be really surprised if they don't regularly have security talking to the team about how to be safe, etc., on a college campus, just like they have PR training.