Minnesota at Purdue: MASTER DISCUSSION THREAD
- Thread starter Travis Miller
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Morton was a beast in the second half, damn did that man guard!
TKR - 2/6 (two front ends)
ZE - 8/14
Boilers' 2nd half defense and limiting turnovers (7 1st half, only 3 2nd half) really got the job done.
Key to game. And I am no Morton fan. But dude was a tough mother out there on D
Yeah, I'm officially starting to worry a little. Not sure what is going on there, but it's not just a blip anymore....
Gillis is a better offensive player. It helps having him with the second unit when Zach and/or Braden sits.
Watching the game I thought , man that Wilson guy on Minnesota is huge. No wonder, he played football at Washington State before becoming a grad transfer to Minnesota.
Agree - they could possibly do some damage with the way they're playing. And again, there's NINE conference teams between 6 and 8 losses......Minnesota has seven.
On the other hand, I really like having him in the game with Edey as he is really hard to double off of.
we saw his talent when he played at UNC 2 yrs ago vs Purdue
Overall I have not watched Minnesota this year and was impressed with them. Seems like they are currently playing better than their record and metrics indicate.
I'd love to roll every team by 20, but I think it's better for this team in the long run to have some more of these grinders in conference. Nice to see them be down double digits in 2nd half and flip it.
Lots of mistakes to learn from, practice FTs, and get ready for an interesting national TV game with OSU.
I'd love to roll every team by 20, but I think it's better for this team in the long run to have some more of these grinders in conference. Nice to see them be down double digits in 2nd half and flip it.
Lots of mistakes to learn from, practice FTs, and get ready for an interesting national TV game with OSU.
I felt like Smith played like he’s the best point guard in the country tonight. In a way it felt like a quiet performance, but he really ran the offense to perfection and was disruptive on defense.
Dang close to triple double
Matt trying to protect Zach from fouls. Purdue hasn’t doubled as much this year as in the recent past and “should” help the D by not doubling as you implied. Guessing he valued Zach more than what he thought he could lose by doubling
Four more steals tonight.....I think three of them were in the 2nd half......he is the Boiler Barometer. ZE is the foundation, but Smitty I think will be the biggest indicator for how far the team can go.
JMHO
Just a matter of time, IMO......what if it happened in the post-season? You never know.
Smith was great as always. Gillis comes through again, rest of the team came through when needed. Concern is free throw shooting lately especially Zach. For me the nicest thing to see was Furst step up when Zach had to sit. Overall a good win when the team was off.
Nice game from Gillis, Smith, Edey and Furst. It was Furst's best game in awhile! Winning percentage of .920 is darn good...only University of Connecticut and Grand Canyon University are the other teams w/such few losses.
and Morty's defense might have been key factor in us winning. Bench overall had best game they have had for quite a while!
Why do you think Matt doesn’t do that? He has started Trey all year and so it isn’t an accident. What do you think Matt’s reasons are for starting Trey instead of Mason?
That is one reason. I'm sure the collective can come up with more if they try.
it was mentioned in the threads months ago about Trey and Mason starting , not starting...experiment and so forth
IMO you both have points. I would say Trey is a different offensive player though better inside, but not as good behind the arc. We all suspected that would be true when Matt said Trey would start and yet here we are with a team that can win a lot of ways...and so far Trey's D on the perimeter is not the problem many thought it would be.
Interesting that you can point out different advantages, but certainly not surprising. There is no clear answer. What do you need and what are you willing to give up. Add to that the previous comment from BoilerDaddy about playing before bonus with Trey and not only having Mason when in bonus, but maybe when FTs are really crucial. Trey should draw more fouls than Mason helping getting into that bonus for all playing while in bonus. Now is either player better playing a lot of minutes or is Purdue better off with fresher bodies playing at different times. In other words would either player contribute any more if his minutes were increased 50% or so?
Matt isn't so concerned with splitting Braden, Fletcher, Lance and Zach minutes. Matt subs for them, but they generally play a lot of minutes with maybe Fletch getting the least out of the four and so Matt must view that 4 spot a bit different than the 1,2,3 and 5 spots...at least it seems that way to me
I haven't watched him but figured his game must be mostly jump shooter since they had Fletch on him
As one that was impressed the first time I saw him he still impresses me. I knew Purdue was getting a really good player, but he has been even better quickly than I figured. I asked Ginny before the IU game if she has seen it all and she said that he still surprises her. She asked if he makes me nervous and I said no and we started talking about him laying it off the glass for Zach and such. I turned to Dustin and said, ya know...over thirty years ago I thought about using the glass when they were fronting post players and nobody ever did it. Yeah it looked like Braden moved his defender is such a way so that when Mason came up for the three which he hit that Braden had a good angle to get the ball to him. He just has such a high basketball IQ...which at times can lead him believing he needs to control all aspects of the game all the time, but he is sooooooo good in so many phases
Did you see how he used angles vs. straight up. Man, the younger guys need to learn from him. Got to give the bigs some credit on the hedge defense as well. They were preventing that dribble drive and made that ball stay outside the lane....for the most part. Great overall 2nd half defense by the team.
And he abused fletch. Morty did a phenomenal job in the second half. As did the whole team—defense was a lot better than the first half.
Sir, what is this Basketball IQ you speak of?
My point was that if he was the best perimeter scorer, Fletch started on him and he must not be as big a threat to drive the ball or Lance would have him. I imagine Lusk/Johnson prefer Fletcher to not be trying to contain the dribble as much when possible...and then there sometimes is not that large a difference maybe in the 1,2 and 3 and Fletch just takes maybe the taller one.
Ethan has played a lot...seen a lot, and tries to stay in his lane doing what he can do effectively and tries hard to do exactly that giving the team 100% of what he can do. I think we can say that about the whole team where each piece is a bit different than another in how many positive contributions he can make and what particular skill may be needed at different times.
I don't recall any specifics, but know there was a thread concerning it or lack of.
It is like the skill chess grandmasters develop. They don't see individual pieces, they see the whole game,
