Instant Reaction Podcast: Texas Drops Iowa

We all hate losses, but c'mon, we/Iowa learned and benefited more from tonight's game than playing a dozen NDSUs.

Exposure of your weaknesses, especially on national TV sucks, but is a necessary evil if you will.

The TX game is a microcosm of what the B1G holds in store. Better to get a dope-check now than in January/Feb.

Look I get that losses create overreactions and Texas is a damn good team.

With that said, what was really learned??
We have 3 guys who have started almost every game for the past 2 years. We are a team coming off a year that collapsed and a team that should be hungry.

Point being we ain't young and we shouldn't have any sort of fat cat mentality.

The simple truth is we lost to a better team.
 
Look I get that losses create overreactions and Texas is a damn good team.

With that said, what was really learned??
We have 3 guys who have started almost every game for the past 2 years. We are a team coming off a year that collapsed and a team that should be hungry.

Point being we ain't young and we shouldn't have any sort of fat cat mentality.

The simple truth is we lost to a better team.

Off the top of my head....

#1--Against elite competition, our guards are probably going to have to play perfectly to not be outmatched.
#2--We can hold our own against elite competition, but, have to figure out a way not to crash in the 2nd half.
#3--Uthoff needs to read #2.
#4--Our team won't lose because of our front court.

I'd say we pretty-much sorta kinda knew this before the TX game, but now we know for sure.
 
We all hate losses, but c'mon, we/Iowa learned and benefited more from tonight's game than playing a dozen NDSUs.

Exposure of your weaknesses, especially on national TV sucks, but is a necessary evil if you will.

The TX game is a microcosm of what the B1G holds in store. Better to get a dope-check now than in January/Feb.
We already knew shooting was not good. Didn't need Texas on national TV to know that.

So what is Fran going to strengthen this team's weakness of poor shooting?
 
Texas did a real good job of getting back on d and limiting our transition/garbage points. We aren't a good half court offense. The pace was there in the first half and we fared well. We are a better helter skelter team. Once Texas took the lead, settled and controlled the pace, we were done.

I agree with others tone. We are just too limited outside with our style of play. We have to have guys on the perimeter willing and able to make/take shots to open up the offense or we will see this over n over. We clearly know they can't get it done going to the rim. This includes white who played outstanding. If he is going to handle the ball outside the 3 point line as much as he does with everyone sagging he has to shoot. He's not gonna get bailed out with fouls forever when he drives.

We are a good team. We have been. They just don't know how to handle adversity or finishing a game. They need a few close ones to go their way. They need that last second shot to drop (or not drop against). We as fans need to support. Be positive. They read this. They want to give us what we all want, which I guarantee they bleed for it more as they put in the actual work. Wins.

Regardless of how last year transpired, we were competitive, entertaining and ranked in the top 10 at one point. Its been awhile...
 
Seems to me Iowa had absolutely no inside game against Texas. No inside offense. No inside defense. No rebounding. No shot blocking. Woody was his same timid self. Gabe seems to have regressed from last year. I wonder, did Gabe take the off season off? Iowa has absolutely no inside game.

Add that with poor shooting (other than White's), poor PG play (we need a good PG), and my gosh, Iowa seemed so slow against Texas (other than the new PG who's still not under control, when an Iowa player attempted to drive around his defender, he was cut off.. by long and lean Texas players), Iowa has a lot of improvements to make. If it weren't for FT shooting....
 
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Seems to me Iowa had absolutely no inside game against Texas. No inside offense. No inside defense. No rebounding. No shot blocking. Woody was his same timid self. Gabe seems to have regressed from last year. I wonder, did Gabe take the off season off? Iowa has absolutely no inside game.

Add that with poor shooting (other than White's), poor PG play (we need a good PG), and my gosh, Iowa seemed so slow against Texas (other than the new PG who's still not under control, when an Iowa player attempted to drive around his defender, he was cut off.. by long and lean Texas players), Iowa has a lot of improvements to make. If it weren't for FT shooting....

Iowa was outrebounded by 1 -- 40 to 39. We had 10 steals, 4 blocks, more assists, and we outrebounded them by 5 on the offensive glass. Our inside game was terrific, especially considering who they were up against. The problem is very simple. 46% to 30%. We shot horribly. Can that be fixed? Maybe, maybe not. We learned we can hang inside against an elite frontcourt, though.
 
Who the heck is Jin Miller, and why is he giving an instant reaction podcast?
 
Wasn't expecting to win this game, but that first half gave me a little hope. Crashed back to earth a couple minutes into the second half.

PG has to be Sapp/Trigga' Trey. MG cannot play D1 PG. Iowa is gonna struggle with guard play all season unless Dickerson can be the man there. Haven't seen his best yet.

Uthoff HAS to take more shots.
 
Bad 2nd half... I might be the only one, but I was encouraged by a lot last night. I had no delusions of this Iowa team being elite, so maybe that's why I am encouraged. I think they are fringe top 25 and probably on the right side of the bubble and that's what they looked like last night. White looks like he's taken his game to a new level and Woody is going to have a pretty great season I think. Some of his moves to the hoop last night were something I've never seen from him. I think Jok and Trey are still finding their rolls with the team, Uthoff has looked great but needs to shoot it more and its just getting started. Clemmons is much more aggressive. I'll be shocked if this team doesn't win at least 20 games, bad guard play or not.
 
Seems to me Iowa had absolutely no inside game against Texas. No inside offense. No inside defense. No rebounding. No shot blocking. Woody was his same timid self. Gabe seems to have regressed from last year. I wonder, did Gabe take the off season off? Iowa has absolutely no inside game.

Add that with poor shooting (other than White's), poor PG play (we need a good PG), and my gosh, Iowa seemed so slow against Texas (other than the new PG who's still not under control, when an Iowa player attempted to drive around his defender, he was cut off.. by long and lean Texas players), Iowa has a lot of improvements to make. If it weren't for FT shooting....

Agree 100%. Iowa got totally DOMINATED in the paint in the second half (and that's putting it mildly). If the 3's aren't falling, then you'd better be able to score in the paint, and I'm not sold that Iowa can do that against another team with a physical front line. We saw it against Baylor 2 years ago in the NIT, and it doesn't look like this has changed.

Fran - Go recruit a big guy!
 
Bad 2nd half... I might be the only one, but I was encouraged by a lot last night. I had no delusions of this Iowa team being elite, so maybe that's why I am encouraged. I think they are fringe top 25 and probably on the right side of the bubble and that's what they looked like last night. White looks like he's taken his game to a new level and Woody is going to have a pretty great season I think. Some of his moves to the hoop last night were something I've never seen from him. I think Jok and Trey are still finding their rolls with the team, Uthoff has looked great but needs to shoot it more and its just getting started. Clemmons is much more aggressive. I'll be shocked if this team doesn't win at least 20 games, bad guard play or not.

Agreed, you're never as good as you seem after a win or as bad as you seem after a loss. I still think we make the tournament. Texas is one of the most physical and biggest teams we will see this year. Woodbury looked solid and held his own against Ridley, White looks like he's taken a step forward. I've been saying this all offseason but Uthoff needs to realize that it's ok for him to shoot, hell it's ok for him to take bad shots. I'd rather see the 6'9 guy with a good jumper trying to hit tough step backs and then watching Clemmons or MG have to try to create something late in the shot clock. Some guys are just reluctant scorers. Haluska was somewhat the same way, he should have been the leading scorer on the 2005-06 B10 tournament champion team by a wide margin but he deferred a lot to less talented guys in Horner and Brunner. Uthoff will have every opportunity to be a 15 shot a night guy on this team if he wants to be.
 
Iowa's defensive intensity in the 2nd half, in particular the first 5 minutes of the 2nd half was terrible. If you have a hard time scoring, you better be able to buckle down on the other end and Iowa didnt do that coming out after the half. Look at Texas first possession of the 2nd half, Iowa easily gives up the baseline and Texas has an uncontested dunk. White fell asleep twice and let Texas get a couple open 3s the next couple of possessions after that. That didnt happen much if at all in the first half. I thought they played well defensively in the first half, everything was contested for the most part and they were attacking the glass.
 
Texas did a real good job of getting back on d and limiting our transition/garbage points. We aren't a good half court offense. The pace was there in the first half and we fared well. We are a better helter skelter team. Once Texas took the lead, settled and controlled the pace, we were done.

I agree with others tone. We are just too limited outside with our style of play. We have to have guys on the perimeter willing and able to make/take shots to open up the offense or we will see this over n over. We clearly know they can't get it done going to the rim. This includes white who played outstanding. If he is going to handle the ball outside the 3 point line as much as he does with everyone sagging he has to shoot. He's not gonna get bailed out with fouls forever when he drives.
Your post is a little late.
This is 2014-15 not 2013-14. Because it sounds like you are describing the same problems as last season.
Although I have read Marble was the problem last season.


I agree with you.
 
Clemmons is a PG, and thats it. Gesell is a 2G, and that's it. Trey is a PG who will have to learn to play within himself.
I too, will respectfully disagree. Gesell decent ballhandler-reasonably low turnover ratio. Not a confindent jump shooter, knees buckle at the FT line if there is any pressure on the game. Just don't see a 2G here. Think his best role be at PG and needs to learn to effectively drive and dish- not a fading floater that most times gets tossed.
 
I don't know what Gesell is but a guy who is as poor of a shooter as he is is definitely not a 2 guard.

Here's the thing about that...he is a two guard, who isn't being used as a two guard who still thinks he is a point guard because the coach is playhing him as a point guard. Just like I screamed all last year White was not a three...he's not. Gesell is either a two guard at this level, or he should not be at this level. If he had to focus solely on the two, he has a good shot. They just arent falling because he is being asked to do a lot of things he won't be successful at.
 
Here's the thing about that...he is a two guard, who isn't being used as a two guard who still thinks he is a point guard because the coach is playhing him as a point guard. Just like I screamed all last year White was not a three...he's not. Gesell is either a two guard at this level, or he should not be at this level. If he had to focus solely on the two, he has a good shot. They just arent falling because he is being asked to do a lot of things he won't be successful at.

Are there any stats to back this up? We're over halfway through his college career and he's shooting barely 30% from 3. He started really slow last year when Marble was playing more point and he was off the ball more. Unless Dickerson really comes on I don't think we can move him off the ball, Clemmons just isn't a good enough ballhandler to run point against good teams.
 

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