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Those arseholes are probably thinking "Damn kid decides to try after he's no longer here, of course, just our luck" They could never be the problem themselves! LoL. Woody has shown he can develop the hell out of big men if nothing else. Edit: To clarify before anyone assumes I'm implying something, he's obviously good at other aspects of coaching. Woody is a good coach. Not perfect. Good..... no such thing as perfect in sports. That's what makes it fun (sometimes)

I hope he does prove a lot of people wrong. And if not? Personally, I'd hope he sticks around for year 2 in Bloomington... him and McNeeley :O

UConn 94 IU 66

I agree on the bold especially. I'd rather Banks get some of Walker's minutes especially at this time of the year, we need to keep Banks engaged as the year goes on and we shorten the rotation. Or he will be a darn good get for some other team.

For the sake of conversation... (not trying to start the next Army thread)... The first ~15 minutes of the game, we were close to rolling. That was a glimpse of what this team could look like when things are working as they should. Clearly Mack's got some athletic shortcomings and his defense absolutely warrants him sitting when the game is in doubt. It's very very disappointing we could not blow out Army, FGCU, or Wright State even without Mack playing like a 5 star recruit. It's been 3 games. Let's see how things go and root him on... not write him off (as some claim others were doing to Cupps, who is also clearly athletically limited in some ways. Yes he plays better defense. He is a damn good player) Who has more upside though? If this team is going to go dancing, we all better hope Mack gets out of his head, learns how to sustain defensive focus for an entire game, and a lot more...The entire team also has to work on their 3 point defense and rebounding. He's not single handedly the reason we've struggled. On the bright side, CJ looked pretty good. UConn is going to be a blood bath, fine... they just won a natty. We'll get better. Hopefully XJ's ankle isn't too busted. Hope they beat Louisville, if not, I'll agree with others that we may be .500 or less. But until that game (at least) I still think it's too early to act like you can predict how the season will go.

Up 8 5:19 left for those who can't watch (79-71)

.... good thing it's November 16

I agree it's been rough. Both are clearly athletic. But just by virtue of the fact Banks is a sophomore in his second year of this system, I'd prefer him playing over the grad transfer Walker - at this time of the season in particular. Walker is not playing like the smart steady veteran. So better for Banks to develop and get reps if they're both gonna make mistakes... simply because he has 2 more years here and getting more minutes will be huge for his development potentially help raise our ceiling. Walker I'd rather see spot minutes and very clear acceptance for his role, which I'm sure he'd embrace. Seems like a good kid. Just my 2 cents

Honestly... that does kinda concern me considering WSU's best player is out tonight and FGCU's was too... I'm glad we'll have plenty of non-conference tests to get us ready for B10 play

God, I love watching Kel'el Ware play basketball.

Malik.........

Walker hasn't shown anything so far to make me want him playing over Banks at this point

Reneau will go through 3 guys in the post with his shoulder and elbow before he passes out for a wide open 3....

Just saw their leading scorer is out so let me revise... IU 74 WSU 62

36 hours til Wright State guys

I have a sense that Gabe Cupps work ethic is going to pay dividends in a lot of ways over the course of his career... the first potentially being something we will not witness up close, but will become obvious on the court if/when Mack gets it together this season. Not taking anything away from Mack at all, any improvement he makes will be because of his own hard work. When you think about the environment he's in - as Cheaney said - the college game being totally different from high school... He is personally experiencing the early struggles a lot of talented freshmen do when playing D1 basketball. It's a bigger learning curve than people expected right now... That's not because of his physical tools (some people are calling him slow... he's looked more timid than slow IMHO... sure he doesn't have trailblazing speed but wouldn't call that his primary issue right now). He's clearly stated his goal of being 1 and done and obviously understands that's not the trajectory he's currently on. So it's a very simple question of whether he is willing to put in the work. Mack previously mentioned he was really surprised/impressed by Cupps in the summer and referenced his work ethic. Now he's riding pine while the lower rated, less physically gifted kid plays. If a coach has to motivate you under those circumstances, that's a totally separate issue. As a competitor, Cupps is only pushing him to get better. He's got a strong grasp of the concepts, and as a great teammate, I'm sure he is very much working with Mack to get locked in. Mack has shown he is willing to put in the work before (his improvement in HS was insane and you don't get called one of our best shooters ever by a former player unless you've spent 1000s of hours on your craft). So why would he stop now? Again, physical tools look there to me for the most part and it's mostly the mental side that's got to catch up right now. I recall in an interview he did, he was kind of embarrassed about "not being a morning person" and his trainer assuring him a lot of pros also don't do the whole "Mamba style 5am workouts" because they prefer to train at night. Cupps puts in his own workout before the team workouts... would be cool for Mack to start joining him after making the realization he's got to work harder at this than he ever has before. But truth be told, I don't care what time of the day they put in their work as long as they're pushing themselves to get better every day. I hope Mack specifically is getting a crap ton of defensive reps in and studying the concepts so he can move more confidently on the court. Some of it is definitely because of the Kopp role too... but we'll see how things progress over the course of the season.

FGCU is a tough team. Down 5 3 mins left.

I'm going to go with some reverse psychology here... hate to be that guy... may update after seeing Wright State's performance tomorrow IU - 66 Wright State - 70

Just playing around man lol. Pitino is totally mobbed up!

A bunch of new guys learning systems on both sides of the ball that are new to them, and still figuring out how to play together/trust each other. Until we see some marked improvement, I won't feel very confident going into many games. If that is still the case in mid January, well...

The NBA sub pattern can not happen again. It just can't. If Woodson does not recognize that after allowing Army to go on that huge run at the start of the game, I'm seriously concerned for the rest of the year. Let's see how we look against Wright State. Walker... I am sure is a good kid... I wish we picked up a guard in the portal. That and Jakai being injured is seriously gonna limit this back court. Thank God Cupps is ready for big minutes. I hope XJ, GC, and TG don't end up too fatigued at year end. I will say... upon rewatching, yes Banks had plenty of lapses, but I do think he shows the most competence of the wings on our schemes. Mack is looking lost and looks like college game is a little too fast for him right now. Surprising considering all the hype and runs with Kyrie, etc. I do think he figures things out eventually and it helps elevate our team... when exactly, not sure, hopefully sooner than later. As I've said, still think its too early to reasonably project our ceiling. But last night shows us the floor is awful. The good news... the team and staff are obviously aware things need fixing. The bench looked so P.O.ed losing to Army in the first half... everyone knows what a performance like that says about our team right now. Let's see how they respond. XJ's comments about practice are concerning, but it's encouraging that he's calling people out and trying to hold the team accountable. I hope the locker room is receptive. My bigger question though is... will the staff make the proper scheme adjustments to fit this personnel? If not, it will be a long year. This is where XJ's leadership abilities will truly be tested IMO. Can he be the one to get Coach to buy into making necessary scheme changes (shooting more 3s comes to mind)? I hope he knows what buttons to push and the staff is open minded enough to adapt. That said... we won the game, a bunch of big programs lost. Let's see how they look against Wright State... Not sure how much we'll learn from the Empire Classic, considering UConn is going to be a drumming in all likelihood. I hate that right now I don't feel confident saying Louisville would be a win.

Trilly retweeted it... he's quickly becoming more annoying and less fun IMO

Hoping this is a cherry picked snippet of a quote. The replies are meme-ing pretty hard though. Coaching has been a little concerning at times but... Hey... at least we won. Which is more than some other pretty big programs can say! Moving onto Wright State...

Mike said Malik has done an adequate job defending the perimeter.