I'm stuck with the same thinking. For our 9 man rotation to win 10 games we would need to successfully add Coulibaly as a regular and reliable part time contributor. We haven't seen enough of Louth to even know if he is better than Palm but I watched portions of the Hawaii games vs Nebraska and Oakland and Jerome is still Jerome. Despite that there are minutes where his big body, limited range skillsets are handy to have.The teams that are going to contend for the regular season championship will need to win 8-10 games at home and split their road games. So, if we expect to be in middle of the pack, we should win at least 9 games. To do that, we need to go 6-4 at home and 3-7 on the road. Anything less than two wins, I don’t think we will get to 9 or 10 wins in conference play.
You'd think that if Louth was part of this year's plan, he would have received much more of a look than he has so far. I doubt anything changes at this point with that situation. I also don't disagree that the interior defense could use a bigger body.
This ought to cheer everyone up.
Why haven’t we mortgaged the farm to get a legit 5 rim protector and interior menace?
We were so fortunate to have Vashil and what he brought to every game. Surely there is a guy out there somewhere who can do even some of what he brought to every game.
When he was signed, Scroggins was presented as that guy. But unlike Vashil, he is not gaining bulk nor it seems is he progressing.
To be honest, if I could miraculously give Kaspar 3 more inches of height, he would be the answer: Instinct for the ball. Great positioning. Then, given the extra height, he’d be swatting shots away like crazy. And he has great fundamentals and would be able to score down low.
But sometimes just height isn’t the complete answer. Dave Cowens was the Celtics center for a couple of NBA championships at only 6’8”. But he kicked butt in the paint.
EDIT: I realize that there are very few legit 5s out there. I also realize that within that small population, a very small number of those would consider the smallest school in the MVC with the oldest high schoolish gym to be where they want to spend the remainder of their college career.
Why haven’t we mortgaged the farm to get a legit 5 rim protector and interior menace?
We were so fortunate to have Vashil and what he brought to every game. Surely there is a guy out there somewhere who can do even some of what he brought to every game.
When he was signed, Scroggins was presented as that guy. But unlike Vashil, he is not gaining bulk nor it seems is he progressing.
To be honest, if I could miraculously give Kaspar 3 more inches of height, he would be the answer: Instinct for the ball. Great positioning. Then, given the extra height, he’d be swatting shots away like crazy. And he has great fundamentals and would be able to score down low.
But sometimes just height isn’t the complete answer. Dave Cowens was the Celtics center for a couple of NBA championships at only 6’8”. But he kicked butt in the paint.
EDIT: I realize that there are very few legit 5s out there. I also realize that within that small population, a very small number of those would consider the smallest school in the MVC with the oldest high schoolish gym to be where they want to spend the remainder of their college career.
During Cowens time, particularly in the Eastern Conference, there weren't a whole lot of guys much bigger than him. He may have come across as a guy playing out of position because his offense could move to the perimeter but, for instance, in the year he won the MVP he had the likes of the Knicks Willis Reed/Jerry Lucas combo who were basically the same size as Cowens; Unseld who was shorter. Walt Bellamy? Otto Moore? Elmore Smith was legit. Some of these guys were basically backups on a good team.
That all said.....I agree. We had heard and were told that Scroggins was likely to be a big contributor but he's been essentially a zero. This forces a guy who's unfortunately too small and not offensively gifted to try and man the paint along with a guy who's "want to" I sometimes question defensively. The team will be eaten up by any team which has an inside presence.
Realistically, Valpo cannot mortgage the farm. Or any mid major at this point. Take a chance on a guy, and you run the risk of him leaving, others leaving, or all of the above. Unless the portal gets reigned in. You can't be taking those risks.
If Valpo goes 2-2 in the next 4 games, it is truly time to get excited for these guys. They are improving, but now the training wheels are coming off against better MVC teams.
Folks in Des Moines are really paying attention to Drake and the McCollum express. We will see how long this will last.
I do think that if Powell can make a statement in the next year or 2 people will hop back on the train much like Des Moines is now. Valpo fans still do exist. Lots of them came out of the woodwork after the Western Michigan game.
Drake is one injury away from being middle of the pack. Only Lottich's 2018 2019 team came close to winning at Bradley, otherwise it's never been a game there. I think most of the lack of attendance at the Calumet game was the opponent, but the fans did not exactly show up after the excitement of the Western game. As others have said, start stringing together 3, 4 wins. 2-2 would be a great start, 1-3 realistic, 0-4 very disappointing. 3-1, stunning.
