Game Thread: Oregon @ AZ

[CatsTopPac]

Well, should be interesting to see how we respond without Ashley. I don't think it will be as big of a deal as it seems. Obviously we still could have beaten a solid Cal team on the road without him.

But he will definitely be missed, and we'll feel it more in March.

Gotta protect McKale this weekend. First goal, beat Oregon.

 

[GumbySquad]

I have never believed in moral victories... and this was no moral victory, however, when a team loses it's best post player 3 minutes in, it's leading scorer goes 1/14 and it's leading play-maker has no assists and they still have a chance to win in the last minute on the road against an NCAA tournament team? I don't see that as a negative.

They played as poorly as they could at times on offense. Missed easy shots, way too much 1-on-1, and yet they were still in it down to the wire.

The big problem now is going to be Sean Miller's stubbornness. We love him as a coach, but his biggest weakness is not preparing the 8th, 9th and 10th players on the bench during blowouts. Been harping on it for a few years now... but getting Korchek/Peters/Pitts some minutes earlier in the season would have been the right thing to do.

Now you have a situation where if Ashley is out for extended time, or for the rest of the season... well, now you have to play guys in important spots who have not seen the court. Now Miller is forced to wedge Pitts/Korchek into the rotation when they have no real in-game experience. Sean Miller will now do one of two things: He will be playing guys 10-15 minutes a game who have not seen 10-15 minutes of court time in the last two months... or he will overexert his 6 rotation guys and they will be worn out by the time March rolls around.

I really hate it when coaches do not develop their bench early in the season. It is pretty dumb.

 

[Arizona_Sting]

Our starting five is still better than most teams in the country. Zeus-Gordon-RHJ-NJ-TJ with York off the bench. Now someone else needs to step up.

 

[nogicat]

Ashley being out is a big big deal.
He could create his own shot, played solid D, and was averaging nearly a double double for us.
I agree 100% with everything Gumby said, all this recruiting and depth and we limited ourselves to 7 players. Really coming back to bite us in the ass.
Pitts seems smart and will be fine IMO its korchek adjusting Im worried about.

 

[520GGATO]

Sucks. I feel realy sorry for Bash.
But this team WILL come together and others WILL step up.
I think this is the part when Zues takes over and goes on a tear and the freshman start to find their shot. TJ goes back to his natural playing abilities(passing/scoring). I have a good feeling about Matt. Maybe he's so-so the first few games, but then starts to improve real quick. Mayes, I don't know about him, but I hope he starts playing well, rediscovering his shot. I'm not worried about NJ though. This is all IMHO. Or maybe it's just wishful thinking, but I'll stick to it.

 

[CatsTopPac]

Ashley being out is a big big deal.
He could create his own shot, played solid D, and was averaging nearly a double double for us.
I agree 100% with everything Gumby said, all this recruiting and depth and we limited ourselves to 7 players. Really coming back to bite us in the ass.
Pitts seems smart and will be fine IMO its korchek adjusting Im worried about.

I think it's a big deal too, just not as big as some are making it. He's obviously the 2nd best scorer, 3rd best rebounder, and our longest player. You don't just brush over the importance of losing him.

I just think that if we were playing a bunch of ranked teams in conference, then it would definitely come into play. And that's not to say that the Pac is a cake walk. But the rest of the team can still run the rest of the Pac season. I'm still worried about the Mountain trip, and even @ Oregon still. And hell, it's the Pac; if someone like NJ has another bad game, we could lose in addition to the ones I listed above.

But I think that if we play Arizona basketball, we can still win out (or only lose another game, maybe two). I think it will be getting deep into March where we are playing top teams that we will really need him, and can surely point to his absence as a weakness. That's all I was trying to point out. I just don't see the loss of Ashley as a death sentence for us winning the Pac, or making a deep run.

 

[CatsTopPac]

As far as Miller's coaching, I think we talked about this, GS. If not, I know I have definitely talked with some of my buddies about it throughout the season.

It's almost inevitable that something happens to every team during the course of a season. Aside from Zeus' sprain, or even NJ, major personnel adjustments factor into almost every team, every year. It's an outlier for it to not happen.

And some of us have been raising the red flag in this department. It's like one of my old sergeants used to tell us when we were packing for the field, "If you have two, then only have one. If you have one, then you actually have none." Well, if we have two coming off the bench, we only actually have one.

There have been so many games this year (ASU, USC, WSU, NAU, SU, NMSU, TT, URI, FDU, LBSU) where we have absolutely stomped teams this year, and Miller refuses to give a guy like Korchek any meaningful minutes. That's almost half of our games, which we have won by anywhere from 20-50, and Korchek has still never seen double digit minutes this year. I get that he wanted to get the rotation as a more cohiesive unit, but when we are blowing teams out by 30+, you have to get the end of the bench in there for as long as possible. Korchek has only played 45 minutes this year total. How is that acceptable? We beat URI by 28 points, and he only plays 3 minutes. Jacob Hazzard has played in only 2 less games (1 before Saturday) and has more mpg.

Before the game, I stated that I thought Korchek should have gotten the start in the WSU game. I completely understand the nod to RHJ for his efforts, but are we trying to give out gold stars, or are we trying to develop into the best team possible? Again, I understand that starting RHJ helps his confidence, and shows him that hard work pays off. I also understand that it would have been a slap in the face to him to start Korchek over him. But I was thinking about it in the context that Zeus might re-injure his ankle. And here we are, with Ashley gone.

And I don't care about Korchek not looking good in practice. He needed to play. Miller certainly had no problem putting Mayes in to try and develop him, despite Mayes looking like a train wreck every time he came in. He needed to be a part of the action. And now, we either stay with a 6 man rotation, bring in Mayes and/or Pitts to run 3 guard rotations, or we bring in Korchek. At this point Korchek knows damn well that Miller has no confidence in him. How is he supposed to do anything when he hasn't been trusted at all this year?

It should be interesting to see what happens. I think he shuffles in Mayes and Pitts in and moves either NJ (or Pitts, if NJ is out) over to be the 3rd guard, and that way those bigs can get some rest. But then AG is our backup C to give Zeus rest, and against big teams, that's going to be a weakness.

Overall, as much as we hold Miller to the standard of elite coaches, he is still only in his first decade as a head coach. So he obviously has much to learn. He's going to make some mistakes that seem obvious, and maybe he's just learning what risks he should be taking. Still a hell of a job. And unless we lose far more than I think will, next year we should definitely be deeper.

Again, I think that the Pac title, a #1 seed, and the Final Four are all certainly achievable goals. I'm definitely taking us off the board for favorite to win the NC though.

 

[GumbySquad]

Yes CTP, I have been talking about it for years, so I'm sure we had a conversation about it at some point.

The way I see it is this: Sean Miller is still a very young coach. He is in his 10th season. He is still learning, just as the players are still learning. When he first got to Tucson, his use of timeouts was atrocious, he wasted more time outs and had more games come down to the wire in the last few minutes where he was already out of timeouts that it was maddening. He still calls the bad TO from time to time (ie: 30 seconds before the official TV timeout), but for the most part, he has figured it out.

Unfortunately, in a situation like this, about his stubbornness to play the 8th-10th guys in blowouts... it is going to take injuries, or serious foul trouble for him to realize his mistake. Now is the true test: If he remains stubborn and over-uses his rotation players in the next 9+ games before the NCAAs? I will be very disappointed in him... if he finds a way to get Pitts/Korchek/Mayes to split 20-30 minutes, even if it means that they have to lose a game or two?... well, then maybe, just maybe it will be the first step in him realizing his mistakes.

...maybe in seasons beyond this one you will see more of the fringe-rotation guys getting into blowout games earlier in the season.

 

[The Derski]

Who do you guys think becomes our 7th player now? Korcheck?

 

[The Derski]

I see now reading Gumby's comment it could be a combination of a few players.

 

[GumbySquad]

I think that Miller will base the rotation on the matchups. If Arizona is playing a bigger team, like Utah he will probably give Korchek more time (at least, he should...). If they are playing a guard-dominant lineup, like Oregon, he will play York/Mayes/Pitts more.

 

[CatsTopPac]

I think that Miller will base the rotation on the matchups. If Arizona is playing a bigger team, like Utah he will probably give Korchek more time (at least, he should...). If they are playing a guard-dominant lineup, like Oregon, he will play York/Mayes/Pitts more.

I agree with this, and with your previous comment. He's still trying to fine-tune his operation. He is doing very well for his first 10 years in the game. And sometimes it takes getting burned before you learn the lesson, otherwise, your feet aren't really held to the fire to learn.

I think it also depends on matchups, and yes, I really think that he needs to (now) force the issue to rush their development. It sucks that it couldn't happen during some of the blowouts, but you never know, maybe it can still happen. We are definitely going to need to get other bodies in there, and I feel like we will only be as good as the drop-off in ability from starter to back up.

 

[CatsTopPac]

Damn I hate waiting until gameday.

 

[dcZONAfan]

Damn I hate waiting until gameday.

you said it man. it's the worst, especially this week when we are desperately waiting to find out how we will react to the loss of Brash...

 

[CatsTopPac]

you said it man. it's the worst, especially this week when we are desperately waiting to find out how we will react to the loss of Brash...

Yep, good call. And then next week we only play once (@ McKale North).

Fuuuuuuuuck.

 

[dcZONAfan]

Yep, good call. And then next week we only play once (@ McKale North).

Fuuuuuuuuck.

yikes, those weeks are the WORST. That is, until we blow ASSU off the court

 

[CatsTopPac]

yikes, those weeks are the WORST. That is, until we blow ASSU off the court

These are the weeks we need to cram as much in during practice for the bench players to get them up, and yet still ease up a bit on the starters to the extent that we can. Because we have a road trip to the mountain schools, home weekend against the Norcal schools, and then on the road to the Oregon schools to finish the season. After that, straight into the P12 tourney, and then after that, straight into the dance.

Again, not looking ahead too much, just enough to say that we can't be running our starters into the ground right now, there's plenty of time for that after ASU. These next two weeks will be crucial to see how Pitts, Korchek, and Mayes react to the increased expectations that are now put upon them.

 

[Arizona_Sting]

I like AG at the 4 a lot more than at the 3 honestly. He just looks too awkward on the perimeter.

 

[dcZONAfan]

I like AG at the 4 a lot more than at the 3 honestly. He just looks too awkward on the perimeter.

Agreed, but only partially. He is pretty terrible at posting up. He has zero post moves, and I think last game that little baby jump hook was the FIRST time he scored in the post in a looooooooong time. I can't even remember another instance all year in which he did that.

We now have ONE back to the basket option, and for some reason we feel the need to ignore Zeus on a regular basis, whether he is having a crappy game or the game of his fucking life like he did against Cal.

 

[gordontrue]

Hmmm... doesn't really sound like Miller is eager to let more of the bench play...

If we did nothing different other than just give the players who have played, minus Brandon, more of an opportunity, that's part of our solution," Miller said. "With that in mind, we know foul trouble and fatigue can certainly weigh against you, but we don't have to do this for 30 games, just nine regular-season games and then we're in the postseason.

(Arizona Wildcats searching for answers without Brandon Ashley - ESPN)

Worries me a bit, what do you guys think?