Game 1 - American University, Nov 8th, 7 PM, No TV

[smccart5]

was wondering about that, do we not do exhibition games anymore?

 

[Old Man]

Did we look great, not so much. So my positive comments below are not meant to soft-shoe around some potential issues identified throughout this thread should they continue to play down to their competition, but I thought it was not as bad as some of the 'sky is falling' comments are making it out to be. So here goes my positives ...

• Mason had all the pressure on them. American had none. We've just moved up in a league and I'm sure the guys believe they need to prove they belong in the A10. Nothing much is expected of American this year. This is where I think the early lapses came from, but the team recovered and had a lead at the half.
  
• American just came out and lit up the 3, but as averages go, they returned to earth as expected and Mason was able to stop the outside shooting. Sometimes, daring a team to shoot from 3 gives you a bunch of rebounds, and sometimes it hurts you. This was a tale of both, in which we were able to overcome good shooting and force bad shooting.
• Historically, this is the type of game we lose. We let an inferior team hang around just long enough where they start believing they can play with us, and they do. In this game, there was this same feeling after the first 5 minutes, and again in the first 10 minutes of the second half. But with 4 minutes left, our guys took control and put the hammerlock on the game. Sure it was close, closer than it had to be, but we got the W, which is all that matters.
• We had 6600 for a nothing team when Georgetown was playing Oregon on TV opposite our game.
  
• And FWIW, Trey Porter was sitting in front of me and seems like a really nice kid.

 

[Plink833]

I see were still not doing anything in the Pat Dome about the PA announcer shouting into the mic like he thinks the mic isn't on and he has to shout so the people in the upper reaches can hear him. The Pat Dome experience is bad enough as it is, I was hoping with the move to the new conference we might have had a change there, unfortunately not I see.

 

[gmutom]

It did in 2006 and 2011. Wonder what the difference is?????

Jim, I know St. Francis Brooklyn is a much bigger powerhouse than AU, but this reminds me a lot of 2007.

http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/11/09/3741394/rebuilding-miami-hurricanes-fall.html

 

[Walter]

Yep. Coach L always struggled with a young team. It takes some time to get young guys to understand their role in Larranaga's system. What I want to know is how long does it take to understand Hewitt's "system?"

 

[gmutom]

What I want to know is how long does it take to understand Hewitt's "system?"

Very good question, Walter. If you watched the post-game news conference, Hewitt was not happy at all with the ball rotation in the first half and during certain stretches of the second half. He didn't mention names, but my guess based on Allen taking over the point is that Corey is still struggling to grasp the offense. Maybe he needs to simplify things if some still aren't getting it, because I'm tired of watching guys stand around like they don't have a clue.

As for Coach L's "system," let 's not pretend like we ran something complicated like the Princeton offense. It basically consisted of throwing the ball into the low post to studs like George, Jai, Will, Monroe and Pearson. If they got double-teamed, they tossed it back out to an open shooter.

Coach L would be the first person to admit an ACC team should never lose at home to a team picked to finish 7th in the Northeast Conference (whatever that is). We looked like crap at times last night, but at least we won.

 

[GMUgemini]

I am not going to get pessimistic off of this one game. I disagree about the defense. Aside from the first 8 minutes - when the team settled down - the defense was really good and AU did not get that many good looks at threes. The played off screens more effectively.

On the Arledge dunk - it was not a charge - the defender actually moved back into that little Arc after Alredge was in the air. It should have been a charge. Also we had less dumb passes and turnovers that we usually saw last year.

I know many people think we should have had a 10-15 point lead - I would blame the one glaring flaw on free throws for that. However, I also think AU is a bit better than everyone has expected they do have a new coach - so it will be interesting to see what they do in the season.

At least its a win. Kudos to the marketing team - the atmosphere was great.

They missed a lot of and-1 opportunities getting hacked going in for layups. They need to start finishing those plays.

The poor FT shooting wouldn't have mattered as much if they didn't start the second half going 3-15 from the floor.

 

[Dawgs99]

I'm more worried about how we played rather than the score of the game. This team looked very similiar to the one that made all of us pull our hair out last season. Poor perimeter defense and a motionless motion offense. On a postive note like other have mentioned I really like what I saw from Jenkins. I also think Marko is primed for a big season, Kid can do alittle bit of everything. Nice to see VG back in the rotation.

 

[ArrozBlanco]

As for Coach L's "system," let 's not pretend like we ran something complicated like the Princeton offense.

Don't forget how we ran the "motionless motion" offense. My son understood it by 10 years of age and was lucky enough to play against a local AAU coach who ran it. Let's say he had his career high in steals that game.

 

[gmubrian]

I am a little confused by all of the gloom and doom after a win, no matter how ugly it was at times. It seems like there is a race to be the first person to say "I told you so" regarding coach H. Granted it seemed eerily like last years team (surprise, we have pretty much the same team again this year), but it was the first game of the year. There is hope that it was first game rust and that the team will gel here shortly as they seem to have a great attitude and feel good about how they have been working better together this year by all accounts.

Marko had one of the best performances of his Mason career, scoring 13 points, and I don't recall a single foul in 28 mins of play. That is a huge change from last year where I don't think he went 28 minutes of play time without getting 5 fouls. Granted it was against a weak AU team. Vaughn Gray did not light up the stat sheet, but he was definitely more engaged than last year. Bryon Allen seems to have carried his improvements from the end of last year into this year.

So, even though there were issues in the game, there are signs of improvement as well. I choose to be cautiously optimistic until there is evidence we should be really concerned with this year's team.

 

[Washingtonian]

I have had the theory for a long time that a team should not be judged until after game 10.

Vaughn Gray certainly improved his attitude from last year.

Regarding the exhibition question, I don't recall a season in recent memory that there wasn't an exhibition game. Bowie State and Marymount have come to Fairfax in recent seasons.

 

[JBiggs]

Marko had one of the best performances of his Mason career, scoring 13 points, and I don't recall a single foul in 28 mins of play. That is a huge change from last year where I don't think he went 28 minutes of play time without getting 5 fouls. Granted it was against a weak AU team.

He also scored in a variety of ways from all over the place. I haven't seen a Mason player effectively post somebody up for an easy two since Pearson left. His post game looked great, and I thought we should have gone to him more since he was playing with such confidence.

Sent from my HTC6500LVW using Tapatalk

 

[gmutom]

Marko had one of the best performances of his Mason career...

Marko does a little bit of everything well, which is why I have officially deemed him the Serbian Luke Hancock.

 

[JBiggs]

Marko does a little bit of everything well, which is why I have officially deemed him the Serbian Luke Hancock.

SLH, for short.

Sent from my HTC6500LVW using Tapatalk

 

[99 Patriot]

Couple positives and negatives that may not have been mentioned:

Negatives:

Every guard not named Allen was incredibly lazy on perimeter defense. It was almost like they wanted to get picked so they could pass their guy on to one of our bigs and then were not that interested in switching back even when the opportunity presented itself. These switches of course led to plenty of wide open looks from deep for AU.

Edwards in general was awful. If PG improvement was your biggest concern heading into the offseason, Friday night did little to ease your concerns.

Though he played through it, the training staff seemed really concerned about Marko's knee. Hope everything is ok. JW2 looked incredibly rusty and once Copes is back I see him as the odd man out.

Positives:

Bryon Allen. This is his team now. Best athlete I've seen at Mason in my 19 years. He'll frustrate at times but with new handcheck rules is also about impossible to guard.

Rebounding. Yes, it was AU, but without Copes this was a big concern. We seemed to do pretty well (except Edwards who doesn't seem interested in trying for rebounds).

We pressed and trapped trying to force turnovers, not just to control the tempo. Pretty sure a lot of people complained about this last year.

Arledge's dunk. Foul or not, this is a guy that for 2 1/2 years seemed unable to dunk all alone under the basket without being blocked by the rim. He kicked off his senior year by jumping over someone and throwing down. Great sign for the rest of the year.

Game atmosphere. Students in particular deserve a ton of credit for turning out big time.

 

[Five Two]

If PG improvement was your biggest concern heading into the offseason, Friday night did little to ease your concerns.
.

It was and I still am concerned.

 

[JBiggs]

I think everybody is, @Five Two. And I think it's pretty inevitable that Corey Edwards won't be a starter within a few games.

@gmujim92 has mentioned it before, but I think the likeliest scenario is Pat Holloway replaces him in the starting unit, and would share ball-handling with Allen, while Allen would probably run the offensive sets in the half-court. Allen certainly showed on Friday that he's going to score lots of points, regardless of whether he's playing PG or off on the wing.

Edwards didn't even seem like he wanted to be there on Friday, and because of that, I'm very surprised we didn't see Marquise Moore. I understand that it was a close game, so Hewitt was probably hesitant to insert a frosh PG, but it certainly wouldn't have hurt to see what he could do in the first half.

 

[Cool Disco Dan]

Pat at point is something many of us would like to see and have speculated about...all of us except for PH, that is. PH mentioned giving VV a shot at point when CE and BA were struggling last year, and VV's handle is much looser than Pat's. I'd love to see it, but I'm pessimistic that Hewitt actually even gives it a shot.

 

[JBiggs]

In my mind, Pat wouldn't be the PG in that scenario, per se. I think Allen would be the "point guard" in terms of controlling tempo and commanding the offense, but Pat would serve as a second ball handler who could help bring it up the court, and help run sets here and there. That would be one hell of a dynamic backcourt on offense.

I really rooted for Edwards, but his head doesn't seem in it from what I saw on Friday. I think he really could be our PG if he had the mentality Allen did this offseason. He obviously didn't work hard enough for that.

 

[PDGL Hoops]

Pat wouldn't be a good point guard because he is too busy doing his best Mark Davis sad face when he can't hoist 10 3's every posession and then gets pulled when he isn't effective on defense.