Battle of the Dakotas

[merle]

I am not at liberty to say, without breaching some confidentiality issues, exactly what the penalties are. You will read about it in the next couple of weeks. Lets just say it is unfortunate and if he could wind the clock back it would not have happened.

[kiyoat]

Dec 22, 2020 9:46:38 GMT -6 merle said:

I feel I need to clarify the recruiting of Noah Freidel with some accurate information; Neither Noah or his high school team mate Justin Hohn were recruited by USD or SD State, even though they were probably the two best high school basketball players in the State. During the Summer before their Senior year, Noah and Justin were playing in a tournament in Las Vegas. Wright State offered Noah after that tournament. Cal State Irvine, the Anteaters, offered Justin Hohn, based on his play, at the same Tournament.

Thanks for the insight.  It's always interesting to see which (if any) in-state or local standout players get recruited.  It's easy to criticize USD and SDSU for overlooking some local players they failed to recruit, while still holding them up to a standard of results that would be unattainable with only local talent.  Especially on the men's side.

Clearly both Friedel and Plitzuweit have shown they can play at the D-1 level.  I'm happy that both found opportunities to play for their home state, however that came about.  Let's hope that you are right, and he matures.

[sdyotefan]

I see that Friedel has not played in the last two games and assume that he may not play tonight against WIU again either. No info on Summit or Jacks sites. Well hopefully it is a lesson learned!! Maybe delayed penalty coming for Stig??
It is tax time.....

[kiyoat]

Jan 9, 2021 8:41:21 GMT -6 sdyotefan said:

I see that Friedel has not played in the last two games and assume that he may not play tonight against WIU again either. No info on Summit or Jacks sites. Well hopefully it is a lesson learned!! Maybe delayed penalty coming for Stig??
It is tax time.....

Ha!  Well, color me surprised about Noah's in-house suspension (assuming that's what it is).  Maybe Hendo's a stand-up guy.  That's what many have said, but coaches tend to stick up for each other (publicly) even if someone is a toxic @sshole.  Maybe Noah is in the right place for personal growth, after all.  I'd hate to see his talent squandered.

[merle]

Noah was suspended by the Summit League for the meaningless game against Mount Marty then the first game back in the Summit. His coach did not start him in the next game but he came off the bench and scored 25. He also had to take care of the necessary apologies, more formally to Coach Lee and Stanley Umunde. His coach is holding his feet to the fire and instilling some discipline that is needed.

[Coyote Fan]

That is great that the coach is taking this seriously. I think as long as Noah can stay clean he should be forgiven. So far they are doing the right thing here. He made a mistake and is paying the price for it. Lets move on now.

[gopheryote]

Dec 12, 2020 7:42:05 GMT -6 gopheryote said:

My 2 cents:

Pros: I've hoped for improvement each game, and honestly that has happened. Stan and AJ are really really good. A third scoring option appears likely in Fuller/Archambault. Our bigs play with emotion. The offense movement is creating some open shots (not all isolation and 1v1). Three point shooting is back to normal, even pretty good at times.

Cons: When you are 0-5, it can be a long list. There seems (out of necessity) to be 2-3 guys on the court at all times that are D2 level players (as opposed to role players). The bigs play defense with their shoulders/chest, not their feet, so they will always be in foul trouble. It doesn't seem like the new players are comfortable on defense - the look like they are guessing what they should be doing. Generally, it is a pretty small team. Would like to see something to take advantage of being smaller (full court pressure, zone, half court trap, etc.). At this point points outside of Stan/AJ and one of Fuller/Archambault feel like a bonus, not an expectation. Not sure if we track +/-, but I would guess KPH has a staggering -, but is a starter.

The challenge for me is the the only fixable Con is some incremental improvements on defense. Hunter Goodrick would help if he returned, but that wouldn't solve a ton. There is a lot of unbalance nationally in how prepared teams are due to COVID - even Duke will take time to become Duke. And the Yotes had a notably bad pre-season with quarantines. Personally, I want to see how the team is playing in mid-January before being ready to show Lee the door, but will admit it isn't looking good right now.

Quoting myself for transparency, here is where I think the Yotes sit right now (8-6/6-0):

It doesn't take a basketball insider to see the team doesn't even look like the one that took the floor the first 5 games. Coach Lee asked for patience, and gave us some info into what was/wasn't happening to prepare for the season. It appears his assessment was correct - they needed practices together and some time to gel/find an identity.

Pros: There are two 1st-team-all-conference-level players on this team, including one that has the ball in his hands a lot. Now there are also a few role-players who are fitting into their role (Fuller & Tasos leading that category). There is a clear offensive flow/plan in place that, honestly, may be the best one we have seen since Coach Boots. Scoring droughts we are used to are now very rare. Though AJ & Stan can both take over a game, they don't have to. In fact, last night when the Yotes blew the game open, neither of those two were the reason - it was a full group effort. Defensively, they take playing D seriously now - there is effort, and you see people grabbing pine when the are lax or out of position. Once you have that, it is easier to adjust to what other teams are doing (ex - Tasos out, extra guard in when WIU started raining in 3s). Fuller has really stepped up to be D-first, and is quick enough to cause issues, and the bigs fundamentals have improved a ton (positioning and moving feet, not just pushing).

Cons: I still think we have players seeing the floor that will need to over-achieve to be a solid SL player. (But the SL is down in general, so most nights that weakness will be masked.) Shooting has improved, so it is no longer a concern. The bench has shortened - which is normal as a season goes on - but it has made the team smaller. Tasos is often the 5 at 6'8".

All in all, I think Lee should get credit for the team coming together - or rather given a bit of a free pass for the first few games. I think Utah State is a good example of how different teams look early vs. late this year. USU looked awful at the beginning of the year, but got it figured out. Some teams just need a pre-season more than others I guess. The ceiling for this team seem low on a national scale, but pretty high in the SL. There isn't a SL team that is clearly going to beat the Yotes 8 out of 10 times or something that shows the other team is clearly better. They can win the SL, but I suspect they will drop a head-scratcher or two outside of the 50/50 games. The ORU games should be fun to watch (each team with 2 dynamic players going at it), and the SDSU games will be interesting, though it may be deflated by the WBB games before them. The cons I noted will be insurmountable against P5 teams. In a SLT scenario, I think it will be a crap shoot like last year. The best teams are not significantly better than the worst teams (take WIU's record compared to their games against SDSU & USD), so who knows. But we, as Yotes fans, should truly expect a good SL run.

[captaincoyote]

The team is definitely finding its identity, and, consequently, playing faster and more confidently. We needed this stretch of games badly.

SL tournament predictions are very hard to make, and I definitely want to see how we do playing against ORU and the Dakota schools a second time around before declaring that we have a shot at winning it all.

Overall, this season no longer looks like the disaster it looked like at first, and I am happy with that.

[easmus]

Size is also an issue because Heiman is hurt. But I wasn’t super impressed with his game when he was playing.

[elcoyote]

Nice to realize that regardless of what happens the rest of the season in conference play, the worst road record possible would be .500. What's the old axiom about taking care of business at home and splitting on the road? Steal one more road win and the 'Yotes have a winning road record. Who would of thought that possible at the beginning of the season?

[yote18]

I think we have a very good shot at splitting the series with SDSU. We’ve played them close in frost before; heck we’ve even led in some of those games until the very end. They’ll be battles but I think it’s doable. UND and ORU will be the wild cards to me, NDSU will be a split I think. I’ll admit I was/am critical of Lee, I’m still going to hold his feet to the fire cause I want to see USD win the tournament, but he told us to be patient and he was right.