I'm a Wake alum and have watched more terrible Wake Forest basketball over the last few years than most. A few things that echo or add context to the previous comments and main article:
1) Chaundee Brown is a great fit for this team in that he is a stronger defender than the metrics are likely to show. Wake lacked an identity on defense (and on offense, but more on that later) and was terrible at anything that you would hope a well-coached team would be. Any success that Brown had on defense was due to his own ability. Putting him in a coherent defensive system that currently needs a physical presence should allow him to flourish.
2) Offensively, Brown is a great role player that was often forced to take on a role that asked him to do more than that. The cause for this was Wake's lack of offensive identity. Wake's offense consisted of alternating streaks of feeding Sarr in the post and passing the ball around the three point line until someone jacked up a three or took a highly contested drive to the basket. On the rare occasions that worked, Sarr and Childress had huge games while Brown showed many of the offensive traits (good and bad) outlined in the original article. I think that Juwan Howard's offense and coaching should help a lot on this end of the floor.
3) As a Wake fan, I am bummed to see him leave, which passes the Bill Simmons test of basing the success of a transaction on how the opposing team's fan base feels about it. As a Michigan fan, I'm anxious to see what he can do on a team that isn't competing for dead last in the conference.
I think it's funny that he posted this on his twitter just recently. He seems like he's leaning more towards State (why else would you associate yourself with WIlliam Gholston), but from all accounts, he also seems like a kid who hates the additional attention from the media that comes with being a big time recruit.
Michigan has THREE wins in the last 14 years ('00-'13). I know this doesn't make any bit of the 11 losses feel better, but if you're so bent out of shape about the last decade and change, care enough to get the stat correct. Why is that significant? A certain publicly funded university located in Ohio had exactly THREE wins against Michigan from 1986-1999, another 14 year span.
In terms of the original post, I am with the consensus here that the decision was not only awesome, but correct, and the play call left me wondering what could have been. We don't know how hurt Gardner was and how that may have affected the decision not to roll him out with some run pass option. It was encouraging to see Borges remove his head from his ass and realize that the offense he wants to run has to include an effective screen. I think this came from Brady Hoke chewing him out behind closed doors, instead of in a public forum as many here expect him to do after any poor performance. We'll see how the bowl game goes, but I think this team and this staffed matured a tremendous amount this year, as painful as it was for all of us to watch.
This is definitely a good idea, especially since I find Griese and Spielman to be completely biased when they call games for their respective schools. Watching the Northwestern replay on BTN the other night was good evidence of that for Griese, and Spielman sounds like every other Ohio fan when he gets to announce for the fighting Urban Meyers.
I didn't realize there were bad seats in Michigan Stadium. It's a freaking bowl fergodsakes. I remember going to the Wisconsin game in 1998 and sitting practically on the roof of Crisler Arena [Center], and it being the best day of my then young life. Everyone here is arguing back and forth and I understand both sides, but the fact of the matter is there have been way too many games, meaningful ones at that, where those top 20 rows have been embarrassingly empty. If I were a senior this year I would be just as mad as some of you are, but at some point you have to realize that, as usual, everyone gets punished for a couple people doing not doing the right thing.
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I'm a Wake alum and have watched more terrible Wake Forest basketball over the last few years than most. A few things that echo or add context to the previous comments and main article:
1) Chaundee Brown is a great fit for this team in that he is a stronger defender than the metrics are likely to show. Wake lacked an identity on defense (and on offense, but more on that later) and was terrible at anything that you would hope a well-coached team would be. Any success that Brown had on defense was due to his own ability. Putting him in a coherent defensive system that currently needs a physical presence should allow him to flourish.
2) Offensively, Brown is a great role player that was often forced to take on a role that asked him to do more than that. The cause for this was Wake's lack of offensive identity. Wake's offense consisted of alternating streaks of feeding Sarr in the post and passing the ball around the three point line until someone jacked up a three or took a highly contested drive to the basket. On the rare occasions that worked, Sarr and Childress had huge games while Brown showed many of the offensive traits (good and bad) outlined in the original article. I think that Juwan Howard's offense and coaching should help a lot on this end of the floor.
3) As a Wake fan, I am bummed to see him leave, which passes the Bill Simmons test of basing the success of a transaction on how the opposing team's fan base feels about it. As a Michigan fan, I'm anxious to see what he can do on a team that isn't competing for dead last in the conference.
I think it's funny that he posted this on his twitter just recently. He seems like he's leaning more towards State (why else would you associate yourself with WIlliam Gholston), but from all accounts, he also seems like a kid who hates the additional attention from the media that comes with being a big time recruit.
You do see the sleeves on the undershirt, right? They could not help themselves.
I didn't realize there were bad seats in Michigan Stadium. It's a freaking bowl fergodsakes. I remember going to the Wisconsin game in 1998 and sitting practically on the roof of Crisler Arena [Center], and it being the best day of my then young life. Everyone here is arguing back and forth and I understand both sides, but the fact of the matter is there have been way too many games, meaningful ones at that, where those top 20 rows have been embarrassingly empty. If I were a senior this year I would be just as mad as some of you are, but at some point you have to realize that, as usual, everyone gets punished for a couple people doing not doing the right thing.