This stings

[emmitt01]

Watching La Tech lose to UAB, I kept thinking “we would have beaten them.” 
 

Then, when UAB’s coach said “No disrespect to anyone, but we felt we were the best team in Conference USA all year long” all I could think was THEN WHY DID YOU LOSE SO MANY CONFERENCE GAMES??!

[CMJ]

I mean, we sorta felt like the best team in the league last year even though we didn't win the regular season title.  If you're in the mix, you probably always feel that you're the best team even if you have more losses.  I'll give him a pass.

 

 

[BillySee58]

They certainly have a better roster. We have a better coach. 

[RiseUNT]

13 minutes ago, CMJ said:

I mean, we sorta felt like the best team in the league last year even though we didn't win the regular season title.  If you're in the mix, you probably always feel that you're the best team even if you have more losses.  I'll give him a pass.

 

 

I felt WKU was the best.

[CMJ]

5 minutes ago, RiseUNT said:

I felt WKU was the best.

I felt like it was basically even, but given my natural fear of WKU I figured we'd lose to them.  Still though, I'm sure the TEAM felt like they were the best.  And that's more what I really meant...if you have a team in the top 3-4 and are within a couple of games of the #1 team -- you probably feel like you're really the best.

[NT80]

More depth has advantages in regard to injuries, foul trouble and poor shooting nights.   It's cute to say we only play 7 guys and have the same starting lineup for 3 years, but in reality we are not taking full advantage of a 15-man roster. 

[BigWillie]

5 minutes ago, NT80 said:

More depth has advantages in regard to injuries, foul trouble and poor shooting nights.   It's cute to say we only play 7 guys and have the same starting lineup for 3 years, but in reality we are not taking full advantage of a 15-man roster. 

Uh oh. This is going to fire up @Andrew

[RiseUNT]

6 minutes ago, NT80 said:

More depth has advantages in regard to injuries, foul trouble and poor shooting nights.   It's cute to say we only play 7 guys and have the same starting lineup for 3 years, but in reality we are not taking full advantage of a 15-man roster. 

In three years we won 2 regular season titles, one tournament title, won our first NCAA tournament game, and beat our first ranked team since before a lot of us were alive.

[NT80]

30 minutes ago, RiseUNT said:

In three years we won 2 regular season titles, one tournament title, won our first NCAA tournament game, and beat our first ranked team since before a lot of us were alive.

All excellent accomplishments, especially considering our teams used a limited number of players.  Why limit ourselves?  Our style of play is what is winning, but as we saw last night, sometimes we will have an off night and just need a little something extra....like another guy or two or three that can make a basket, or a simple free throw...

[NorthTexasSportsNetwork]

AK said "North Texas was the better team in the regular season." Punch in the nuts right there

[emmitt01]

3 hours ago, texx2818 said:

Certainly could be worse, we could have an overweight slob as our star player, or we could have a guy named “Jelly” on our team. Look on the bright side, right? Sigh

An “overweight slob” who averaged 16.5 points and 10 rebounds this season (and put up stat lines of 9 points w/ 12 boards against us…then 23 points w/ 9 boards in the championship game)?  
 

Or a guy named “Jelly” who put up an average of 20 points and just under 5 assists this season (with a stat line of 27, 6, and 4 in the championship game)?  
 

Jesus, I hope Mac isn’t looking on the bright side and is trying to recruit all the overweight slobs and condiments he can find.  
 

[Andrew]

10 hours ago, BigWillie said:

Uh oh. This is going to fire up @Andrew

To be fair we didn’t run a 7 man line up in the past. 10 guys played over 20 games last season as compared to 7 this season. If I recall even Robinson who didn’t play 20 games last year still played against Purdue and had that dunk which was shown all over internet/sports channels for a sec. 
 

-He said 3 years but this year is the anomaly and is mostly due to the fact….  it seems we cannot recruit. If we could we would be playing more guys and have better role players

[Andrew]

22 minutes ago, emmitt01 said:

An “overweight slob” who averaged 16.5 points and 10 rebounds this season (and put up stat lines of 9 points w/ 12 boards against us…then 23 points w/ 9 boards in the championship game)?  
 

Or a guy named “Jelly” who put up an average of 20 points and just under 5 assists this season (with a stat line of 27, 6, and 4 in the championship game)?  
 

Jesus, I hope Mac isn’t looking on the bright side and is trying to recruit all the overweight slobs and condiments he can find.  
 

Is Jelly considered a condiment? Some people think it isn’t apparently… It enhances the flavor which is one of the definitions of a condiment but Peanut Butter does the same and isn’t considered a condiment. 

[GMG_Dallas]

13 minutes ago, Andrew said:

it seems we cannot recruit. If we could we would be playing more guys and have better role players

Reserve judgment on this. Scott may be the only true freshman who had significant playing time but we have 2 other freshmen with good recrutment profiles as well. They may have simply not been ready. Abou barely contributed his freshman year and look now.

Now we need to see if the staff can develop talent.

[Andrew]

15 minutes ago, GMG_Dallas said:

Reserve judgment on this. Scott may be the only true freshman who had significant playing time but we have 2 other freshmen with good recrutment profiles as well. They may have simply not been ready. Abou barely contributed his freshman year and look now.

Now we need to see if the staff can develop talent.

This is true. We have some bright spots, but Mac has shown he can win and UNT looks like a favorable destination. Especially to North Texas hoopers. 
 

Perry, McBride, Jones, Scott, Abou

-decent starting line up if they all return. Especially chemistry wise.

Bench: Stone, Chris M. and Browne.

That leaves 5 roster spots (assuming Zephyr is gone… didn’t show much this year at all). 

Priority is a big and I don’t care where he comes from (Hs, JUCO, GS). We need a solid 6’10” banger. 
Then we need a back up PG who can run the offense and play two way ball. 
After that I have ideas like a 6’5’-6’7’ wing replacement for Bell who can stretch the floor. 
 

We need to get some solid recruits!

[emmitt01]

7 minutes ago, Andrew said:

This is true. We have some bright spots, but Mac has shown he can win and UNT looks like a favorable destination. Especially to North Texas hoopers. 
 

Perry, McBride, Jones, Scott, Abou

-decent starting line up if they all return. Especially chemistry wise.

Bench: Stone, Chris M. and Browne.

That leaves 5 roster spots (assuming Zephyr is gone… didn’t show much this year at all). 

Priority is a big and I don’t care where he comes from (Hs, JUCO, GS). We need a solid 6’10” banger. 
Then we need a back up PG who can run the offense and play two way ball. 
After that I have ideas like a 6’5’-6’7’ wing replacement for Bell who can stretch the floor. 
 

We need to get some solid recruits!

I am certain Mac is taking meticulous notes.  😏

[NT80]

1 hour ago, GMG_Dallas said:

Reserve judgment on this. Scott may be the only true freshman who had significant playing time but we have 2 other freshmen with good recrutment profiles as well. They may have simply not been ready. Abou barely contributed his freshman year and look now.

Now we need to see if the staff can develop talent.

That is the whole issue with this team.  Apparently the staff only feels confident in 7 player's abilities to get on the court this year, unless a blowout.  Were we recruiting development players instead of ready-now players or did they just turn out that way?   

[GMG_Dallas]

44 minutes ago, NT80 said:

That is the whole issue with this team.  Apparently the staff only feels confident in 7 player's abilities to get on the court this year, unless a blowout.  Were we recruiting development players instead of ready-now players or did they just turn out that way?   

Considering how much they expect of their players, they may simply not been ready in *their* eyes. We have no way of knowing which is true until we see what they do next season.

2 hours ago, Andrew said:

This is true. We have some bright spots, but Mac has shown he can win and UNT looks like a favorable destination. Especially to North Texas hoopers. 
 

Perry, McBride, Jones, Scott, Abou

-decent starting line up if they all return. Especially chemistry wise.

Bench: Stone, Chris M. and Browne.

That leaves 5 roster spots (assuming Zephyr is gone… didn’t show much this year at all). 

Priority is a big and I don’t care where he comes from (Hs, JUCO, GS). We need a solid 6’10” banger. 
Then we need a back up PG who can run the offense and play two way ball. 
After that I have ideas like a 6’5’-6’7’ wing replacement for Bell who can stretch the floor. 
 

We need to get some solid recruits!

Looks good to me overall. Your idea of what a replacement for Bell looks like shows me we expected too much out of Bell on offense. He was put it positions to score more than what he should have been. As it pertains to length and stretching the floor, I see Rubin Jones as that fit. I think Bell's replacement is here. Get another big who can contribute now to go with Ousmane (or start Scott at the 4 and put the big on the bench to keep Ousmane fresh) and slide Jones to Bell's role.

We then need a PG as you described. People have trashed the JUCO PG, Themus Fulks, who we offered but watch his highlights and you'll see why they offered. He blows by defenders and goes straight to the rim to either finish through contact or kick out to the open guy. Hits his free throws, plays with pace, gets out in transition to put pressure on the defense. He makes them get back or get scored on. Our glaring weakness this year is nobody on the perimeter but Perry could create his own shot. Lock him down and the others were just playing hot potato until somebody had no choice but to throw it up. Get somebody who can make the defense collapse on him in the paint to free up those perimeter shooters and this team will open up. That's what Fulks looks like to me. Whether he can be as successful in D1 as he was at JUCO, we'll find out, but check out his play and I think you'll be pleased. My hope is a guy like him is the starter and Perry stays as 6th man. Wear the defense down then bring in Perry to take advantage of tired legs. Murray wasn't going to do that.

Edited March 13, 2022 by GMG_Dallas

[UNTLifer]

This fan base is maddening.  Two weeks ago, everything was cheery and bright.  A late season "swoon" after emotionally winning the conference title has everyone questioning recruiting when I see that Mac and staff brought in the likes of Smart, Hamlet, Reese, McBride, Abou, Perry, Jones, TBell, Scott, etc...  I also read people questioning the ability of this staff to develop players.  Have you all watched Abou this year?  Stop with the knee jerks.

[DeepGreen]

[RiseUNT]

If SMU is the last last four in and we are the first first four out what will happen to this board?

[NT80]

58 minutes ago, UNTLifer said:

This fan base is maddening.  Two weeks ago, everything was cheery and bright.  A late season "swoon" after emotionally winning the conference title has everyone questioning recruiting when I see that Mac and staff brought in the likes of Smart, Hamlet, Reese, McBride, Abou, Perry, Jones, TBell, Scott, etc...  I also read people questioning the ability of this staff to develop players.  Have you all watched Abou this year?  Stop with the knee jerks.

 

[UNTLifer]

What truth am I missing?

[UNTLifer]

14 hours ago, texx2818 said:

Yeah, and that overweight slob is sitting around watching UNT in the postseason and Jelly…well, his name is Jelly.

Would love to see Lofton join us in Denton.

I am not a fan of Walker, but love the nickname.  You would probably be critical of Magic, The Big O, The Mailman, Pistol Pete, The Iceman, Chocolate Thunder, Dr. and Doctor Dunkenstein as well.

[meangreenlax]

Not sure why some are taking offense to the suggestion that this team, on the surface, looks like it needs to make some adjustments.

Without question it was a magical season. Having a deeper bench with more contributors combined with the quality we already have, and good coaching might make the difference between having to sneak a couple victories on last second shots, and winning comfortably. Or maybe we beat Miami, and end up with the quality win to get over the hump. I know it certainly would have helped against UTEP and LaTech.

Yes it’s all easier said than done. But this is a Internet forum. What else should we be talking about?