Another game, another sub 30% shooting performance on the road vs. a Sim. Let this be a lesson in what happens when you have 6 of your top 10 players start the year with an F in offensive IQ. We have been blocked 17 times through 2 games, while we have gotten 1 blocked shot. Not a good ratio.

And now I get to play USC. They have an overall rating 100 points higher than mine, and with my IQ issues, this is a lost cause. SO, I am going to try to salvage something and start all 5 of my freshman. At least that will speed their IQ development & WE a little bit, right?

I am starting to think that Crowe might not have been a good as I ranked him. That 16 WE is really slowing him down, despite the fact that he is starting and Pierce is on the bench, Crowe has gained 6 points to Pierce's 8. But since tonight is fab five night (or maybe mediocre five?) Crowe will continue to start.

I am also thinking I have zero clue how to set a good distribution in the Triangle. I have gotten pretty good at maximizing output from a motion offense, but Triangle might be different. (the key to motion is not TOO much distribution for anyone, and give everyone who is decent some, you will get fair players to shoot 40% from 3 if they are taking 4-6% of your team's shots.) But Triangle I think favors more concentration of distribution. Which would be fine if I had anyone I wanted to concentrate it in.

William H. Macy at SF might be that guy someday, and Mount at PF will be that guy in the future, but both need to gain 50 points and 2 grades of IQ before they will be ready. This season might be a case study on 'how to not jump to D1', but at least that could be amusing for our 1000's of loyal readers.

Only lost to USC 40-55..that is some progress I guess. Maybe I can get a win one of these days. Or a least a single digit loss.

Well, the Shockers have now dropped 4 straight, but at least shot 43% in our last loss, 80-58 vs. Stephen F. Austin. Mount had 17 points, 5 rebounds and 2 blocks, which was a good sign.

Maybe the defense is the problem now. We are giving up 49% from 3point range, and 52% from the field. And only forcing 10 turnovers playing a press. But the offense isn't good either.

My big dilemma is whether to switch to a Man/Press combo. That was the idea, but having to put 25 points into Triangle doesn't leave much to get M2M up, while still practicing the press. So I have just been playing press and putting a few points into man. But my team sucks for press. We are equal in speed & athleticism to our opponents, but our stamina sucks. My 4 big guys have stamina's in the mid 60s (3 are freshman with high potential) and my 2 SFs have stamina's of 65 and 71 (freshman with high potential again). Its so bad that Macy, who I promised a start and 15 minutes to has been averaging 15.3 minutes, and he starts and is set to getting tired. And he hasn't really be in much foul trouble except for the USC game.

Another game, another loss, as the Shockers fall to 0-6 on the year. But we were actually in the game through the midpoint of the second half.

The positives are that we are holding our own rebounding. The negatives are our FG shooting, which hasn't broken 40%, and our opponents are shooting 50%. That combined with the TO margin of about -6 or -7, and its no surprise we are in trouble.

Trying to stay positive, I don't think there were any games in there we 'should' have won, its just a lack of talent right now. And that is slowly changing. We have to be improving faster than the other teams right now, as we started 5 freshman last night (Pete, Macy, Mount, Pierce and Crowe).

Our last four noncon games are on the road vs. Sim teams. Hopefully Wichita State's first win is out there somewhere.

Lost #7....more positives this game.  Only 73-61, and it was a lot closer than that.  Mount continues to play well, shooting 8 for 17 with 7 rebounds and 16 points. William H. Macy chipped in 9points and 8 rebounds too, so my freshman forwards were looking good.My centers, Crowe and Pierce were the problem.  The combined for a woeful 2 for 16 from the floor, 5 of 9 from the line for 9 points.  The did grab 16 rebounds and block 7 shots, but that shooting killed me.  We shot 36% from the floor with only 6 assists.  And we're averaging 34% from the floor this season.  I think part is the IQs not getting any easy baskets, and part is that our low stamina's are making us too tired to shoot well.  At least my SOS is 120, which isn't too bad.  At least I am not 0-7 vs. a 300 level schedule.

Yay we finally won a game. By 20! William H. Macy showed why I stole him from San Diego. 7-11 from the field for 19 points with 3 rebounds and a couple assists.

Mount was solid too with 10 points and 8 boards.

On the bad side, the MVC is really struggling. We're mostly all first year coaches, so our rosters suck, and we have some tough opponents, but we have the worst RPI in D1. That's no good. I know I am contributing to it. I like to go 7-3 or 8-2 in noncon as a balance between getting wins and playing tough games, but I am not going to even be .500 this year.

We just need more time and more humans. I know we have several interested D2 coaches. They just haven't qualified. Maybe that is the silver lining. After the Sims suck for another year their prestige will drop to a level that others can take them.

On the recruiting front, I started scouting with my remaining $$$. I got a 2-star center 10 miles away from Campus, and with 2 senior big men graduating, he looks to be an early target.

Dissappointing loss by 3 on the road.  We shot 20 of 37 from the line, and Mount who has  a B went 3 for 8.  Actually I have a pretty good FT shooting team all around, with no one below a C, yet we are shooting 63% on the year.  I have to think it is due to our well-documented Stamina problems.  Those are slowly improving, but like everything on this team, its going to take more time.My worst offensers are Pierce 61=">66," Crowe 63=">66" and William H. Macy 65=">68."  Hopefully they will gain another 8-10 points by the end of the season, and all start their sophomore years in the 70-75 range, and hopefully they will all keep their high potential.As far as the Crowe / Pierce thing goes, Crowe's 16 WE is hurting him.  More than I thought it would.   Crowe has equal or better potential than Pierce in every category and equal PT.Pierce is up 26 points, 17 in core areas as compared to Crowe's 16 points, 11 in core areas.  My improvement leader is Victor Mount, which is impressive since he is backing up Macy.  He is up 31 points through 9 games, and a whopping 24 in core areas.

Well, finished noncon 2-8. I was hoping for 3-7, but we're really not very good so getting a 78-57 win feels good. They went to a -2 in the second half, and Pete scored 16 and Papp added 12. Mount is going to be a great scorer with another 13 points off the bench.

Overall noncon was a disaster, but it was expected. We got outshot 48% to 38% from the field, 43 to 34% from 3. Rebounds were pretty equal, as well as TOs (13 to 12.5) due to massive improvement the second half. The other area we had a bad time was blocked shots. We got blocked 6.8 times per game to only 2.8 for us. Yikes. Get THAT &*$% outta here.

I am happy to have the day off between noncon and conference play to improve IQs a little more. Our offense is now C- or better, Man is D+/C- and Press is about a C/C+. Bad, but getting better. Mount & Pete are up 35 points each too. And Macy is up 29. Crowe needs to get that WE up, only up 16.

Well it is midseason and we are 3-10. Not so great, but we did lose our last 2 games by a total of 5 points and have a winnable home game vs. Missouri State tonight.

I think it is worth the time to review our recruits and see if they are living up to expectations or not.

First up is PG Kevin Hummel

ATH 37(+1), SPD 82(+2), REB 47, DEF 49(+1), PER 55(+3), BH 86(+1) Pass 78(+2)

Hummel has gained 10 points in his cores, and had only Perimeter as high potential. His 24 WE is hurting him and he is redshirting. Nothing else to report, but I think he will be an upgrade at PG next season if he gains another 10 points and doesn't lose them all in the offseason.

Next is SG Phillip Pete 21.2 min/G, 40% FG, 42 3PT%, 1.5 reb, 2.0a, 2.3TO 6.9ppg.

ATH 61(+4), SPD 75(+7), Def 71(+5), PER 68(+1), BH 76(+6) Pass 64(+5)

Pete has gained 28 points while starting and his low Perimeter rating hasn't prevented him from shooting ok. I am actually pretty excited about his rapid improvement in speed and solid gains in BH/PA/ATH. He started with an F in Triangle, but has improved steadily and should be ready to breakout and average double figures in the second half.

SF William Macy 19mpg, 38% FG, 28% 3PT%, 2.8rpg, 1.1apg, 6.5ppg

ATH 65(+5), SPD 67(+3), REB 44(+2) DEF 65(+4) BLK 32(+1), LP 52(+2) PER 49(+4), BH 25, Pass 60(+5)

Macy is still just a potentially good player. His results have not been very good, but his 26 point gain in the cores is 3rd on the team, and he has so much farther to grow with only BH as a low potential area. He is also my smartest player, picking up the IQ the fastest with a C/C-/C in my 3 sets, when he started with 2 F's and a D.

I'll try to report on my big men tomorrow. Overall though, I am still feeling positive, but I am worried that this season will kill my already dismal D+ prestige. Macy is the guy that is so key to the team and figuring out his practice schedule is tough, as SFs are always the trickiest.

Hey reinsel - what do you think of coaching at low-level D1 so far. While I want to move up in the ranks eventually, i already miss the GSC

Hmmm, good question. I am taking my lumps. I have pretty much haven't had a difficult season in my life (10-12 straight NTs), so this losing is weird.

It also kinda sucks not being in one of the top 2-3 conferences, which I have always been in. But this is where the top competition is.

Recruiting is the best at D1 I think. No draft where the A teams take whoever they want and the B's cannot do anything about it. Just a ton of strategy to recruiting.

I am hopeful that the MVC will one day be a top 10 conference, and full of 5-10 serious, dedicated coaches, just like the GSC or the commonwealth in D3 that I came from.

But man I hate losing double digit games.

Well, we are now 4-13. Still battling, but the weakness of basically having 4 starters as freshman is showing. Plus our FT shooting is really off....My 2 bigs have C and C+ ratings, which aren't great, but their shooting 50 and 53% from the line, and we really struggle to score, so any free points are needed.

But I am still optimistic. If I can have another good recruiting season, that will give us 10 solid underclassmen next season and then we can really begin to compete. My D2 Senior transfer is my 3rd best guard, which is really sad.

And my RS Hummel has barely improved (24 WE), but everything else is coming together nicely. I still need to figure out the correct distributions for optimum triangle performance, I used to know the motion pretty darn well. But I can learn that more easily when I can actually experiment a little and see what works. Right now, nothing works :)

So for all you our there complaining that work ethic doesn't matter with the inclusion of potential, you are really going to be happy, because I have proof it does matter. And it makes my happiness with Crowe look a little silly earlier in this thread.

Crowe & Pierce have had equal playing time, and Crowe has better potential. Result? 49 pts for Pierce and 29 pts for Crowe. Same Practice plan too. Only difference is Pierce wins the WE battle 53 to 19. Hopefully Crowe will become a good player, but I think he is going to be a case where he does improve all through.

Well, 3 straight wins have gotten us to 4-5 in the conference, 6-13 overall and a big bad 260 RPI. Signs of improvement for sure. We need to do better as a conference next season in the noncon season. We all did so poorly (my 2-8 mark included) that it really makes it difficult to even be mediocre without going 15-1 in conference.

I am hopeful that the sims continuing crappiness will drop their prestige to the point that humans can grab them, as I know a couple D2 coaches that are interested, and maybe we can become a destination for new coaches looking for an up and coming league.

In any chase, there are a lot of reasons to be optimistic at Wichita State, not least of which is not having to start with F IQs next year :)