As I sit here watching us manhandle Tarleton State by 30, I'm wondering why Drew isn't getting a couple more guys minutes.

I'd like to see at least Asemota try and get more minutes with our best players. We are 1 injury away from needing to play him.

Anyone else agree?

BUGrad2012 said:

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As I sit here watching us manhandle Tarleton State by 30, I'm wondering why Drew isn't getting a couple more guys minutes.

I'd like to see at least Asemota try and get more minutes with our best players. We are 1 injury away from needing to play him.

Anyone else agree?

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I agree.

I think a 7 man rotation is a good thing. I think tonight was about getting the rotation minutes because we play a very good St. John team on Thursday. We could have won this game tonight going deep on our bench but I really think it was about game minutes with a big game coming up and we've only played 3 games.

On the flip side, he's getting much needed minutes for this team of brand new players to gel. If we had even 3 returning starters from last year, I think he would have sat them earlier.

I think that CSD has been to all the workouts and practices. I think he knows more about basketball that anyone here. He probably knows what he is doing. Tell us how you would do it and how your ways have worked?

To me, it is at least a bit curious as in past years Drew has used the early non-con cupcake blowout games to experiment with different combinations that include bench players that eventually won't be in what is normally his 8 man rotation. Also makes me wonder if he's holding out informed hope that Love will eventually be the 8th rotation man, or if he's presently planning to stick with the seven man rotation, hoping we luck out and don't have eventual injury issues(?).

Love is injured and Asemota is the only guy who would ever be in the rotation if there were injuries. Asemota did get time last night. Not sure what the issue / discussion is.

A Love return would definitely solidify an 8 man rotation. But that feels like a pipe dream. I'll be pleasantly surprised if he plays for BU this year or honestly ever again. Dude simply cannot stay healthy.
The OPs point was were 1 injury away from needing a guy who's currently getting 0 minutes. It's definitely a valid concern as the BB team has dealt with multiple injuries the last 3 years.

The discussion is incredibly obvious… he was asking why we weren't getting some of the deeper bench guys minutes when we were up 30-40 in the 1st half.
But you knew this. You just couldn't help but be a smart ass

IowaBear said:

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The discussion is incredibly obvious… he was asking why we weren't getting some of the deeper bench guys minutes when we were up 30-40 in the 1st half.
But you knew this. You just couldn't help but be a smart ass

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This must be an emotional topic for you. I hope the rest of your Monday goes better.

Nothing emotional about it. OP ask a simple question and we have the usual dbag responses from you and red neck. God forbid someone ask a legit question.
I love Mondays, my favorite day of the week aside from Saturdays.

IowaBear said:

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This is a message board for DISCUSSION. Not once did he say he can do better than Drew. It was a simple question.
It blows my mind that people like you come on here and ***** and moan about DISCUSSION. It's a legit question. No one past the top 7 saw minutes until late and we were up 30 10 minutes into the game.
You should probably stay off message boards if you can't handle simple discussion snowflake.

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I can't remember a season since the early years of the Drew era where we had this much change in key personnel. With all the new players--plus the defensive changes--I am not surprised with the player rotation when they are still learning to play together. I also think what really surprises many fans is the 4or 5* Freshman forward who is not getting significant playing time as of yet. I would guess there were crucial questions about our front court we needed to get answers on before moving into conference play (can Josh and Norchad play together, can Omier play with 4 fouls, etc.). The rotation question may only get more complicated if and when Langston comes back. Difficult questions are good questions to have of course. This team faces some interesting matchup questions down the road, but it is most definitely a fun team to watch...

I don't disagree in the thought of wanting to get the top 7 as much time on the court as possible due to the turnover. I'm just surprised he didn't mix in the younger guys earlier to play with the top guys some in prep for the injury issues BU will likely face.
Perhaps this is in prep for St Johns and potentially Tenn this week.

IowaBear said:

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I don't disagree in the thought of wanting to get the top 7 as much time on the court as possible due to the turnover. I'm just surprised he didn't mix in the younger guys earlier to play with the top guys some in prep for the injury issues BU will likely face.
Perhaps this is in prep for St Johns and potentially Tenn this week.

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Honestly, what "younger guys" do you see ever getting rotation minutes besides Asemota? Even in the event of multiple injuries?

I will hang up and listen.

It seems Asemota needs to be eased in. In the limited time I have seen him, he is rushing and trying to do too much. We don't know what is happening in practice. He apparently is not ready to contribute. It is a tough balance in the brave new world of transfer portal and NIL. Most young talented guys like Asemota are not willing to wait around and put in the work to develop when not getting immediate playing time.

We play 7 as is. If 1 goes down we're going to be forced to play some others. Omar looks promising. Asemota to me has been less impressive than Omar in the limited minutes we've seen both.
The point was obviously that if/when we suffer injuries some of these guys are going to have to play in spurts. Happens almost yearly.
This is operating under the assumption LL doesn't play which seems likely

Crawfoso1973 said:

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Love is injured and Asemota is the only guy who would ever be in the rotation if there were injuries. Asemota did get time last night. Not sure what the issue / discussion is.

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I agree

IowaBear said:

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This is a message board for DISCUSSION. Not once did he say he can do better than Drew. It was a simple question.
It blows my mind that people like you come on here and ***** and moan about DISCUSSION. It's a legit question. No one past the top 7 saw minutes until late and we were up 30 10 minutes into the game.
You should probably stay off message boards if you can't handle simple discussion snowflake.

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So my input ends asking two questions. Seems like promoting discussion.

Yours ends with telling someone to stay off message boards and namecalling.

Which of us is promoting discussion?

Your input always revolves around the idea of questioning Drew or implying we as posters or in this case (OP) couldn't do better. Coaches can be questioned, doesn't mean anyone here thinks they could do better. After all CSD is a future HOF'ER
In no way was he dogging Drew ( which you imply on the regular)
We were up 40 he was simply asking why the backups/youngsters weren't getting PT with the starters to gain experience. In no way shape or form is that dumb question like you and Craw seem to think

As I dodge the mudslinging between Iowa vs Redneck, I too have never understood why Drew tends to play his rotation players deep into blowout games. Let me first say that I completely understand the need for your top 7-8 guys to get reps even if it means pressing a team in the 2nd half when you are up by 40. I totally "get" that these guys have never played together and they need time to gel. However, I do believe you can get to a point of diminishing returns. There is a tendency during blowouts for players to develop bad habits and focus more on padding their stat line than rotating correctly on defense or making the extra pass on offense. Also, Tarleton State was down their Top 6 players so were we getting better reps against these guys than we would 1s vs 2s in practice? I'm not sure you build muscle eating cotton candy. Lastly...I believe the risk of injury goes up substantially against bad teams. Our guys know what to anticipate (and avoid) when playing against better athletes. That changes when you play a team where guys don't know what to expect or anticipate because these opponents are pretty bad. Things can get reckless pretty quick. Just a thought.

Game situations are hard to replicate in practice.

UConn looks really big or desert aggy is really small

Nice to see Langston Love play last night. I expect he will probably play some tonight as well although his impact was limited: 16 minutes, 0 points, 4 assists, 3 rebounds.

16 minutes is a great number, if he could give us 16-20 minutes a night and stay healthy that would round out a nice 8 man rotation. Love appears to have lost a lot of weight especially in his upper body. Perhaps he's intentionally carrying less weight to put less stress on his lower body.

However it remains to be seen how effective he will be for us. Was last night simply rust or will he remain a shell of himself this year? That was the question many Baylor fans had about EJ when he returned. I knew EJ would never be the same guy, but many folks on this board held out hope. EJ was a great source of inspiration but was never able to contribute at a high level after his gruesome injury. I wonder the same about Love. Love's injury wasn't as traumatic as what happened to EJ, but he has accumulated so many lower body injuries over the years he may never be the same player he once was.

Langston got into the lane with ease. Dude had 4 assists in 16 minutes by getting by his defender causing others to collapse resulting in easy kick outs. He's going to be just fine. Kid stays healthy he's going to be one of our 3 best by seasons end.

I hope so. Even if he doesn't shore much, I like to see him contributing. Just stay healthy!

I attribute the limited results to the fact that it was his first game this season. He has the potential to do much more going forward.

It's his first live game action since last season I do believe. That factors in off season etc.
He also made his return against a legit top 20 squad who was incredibly long on the wing. He's going to be a massive part of BU's success if he stays healthy.

IowaBear said:

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It's his first live game action since last season I do believe. That factors in off season etc.
He also made his return against a legit top 20 squad who was incredibly long on the wing. He's going to be a massive part of BU's success if he stays healthy.

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Brother, I sure hope so. We often disagree on a lot of things, but this I agree with 100%.

These boards would be boring if we agreed all the time haha.
I want badly for him to stay healthy. Kids had 1 bad luck injury after the next. Kinda reminds me of Craig Williams on the FB team few years back. Absolute dog when healthy. Unfortunately constantly bit by the injury bug.

Craw I'm confused here. Love looked a step slow and hesitant. But his movement was similar to before. I don't expect it to be a Jon situation. He still had his skills and was able to get to some spots on the offensive end.

Debuting in a chaotic/ frantic game against a good team wasn't ideal. If he's healthy he'll be fine. He was deferring a lot which is completely understandable.

Comparatively, I think he clearly looked better than he did when he came back from knee surgery. It is difficult to step in to game action against a team like that. Also, Langston's strength has never really been attacking the basket or getting downhill. He is a shoot first guy, who can create action by getting ran off the 3 point line. He will get back to who he is.

LL is my boy! Light it up tonight

You guys are kidding yourselves on Langston. The kid can't even move laterally and that doesn't clear up over 2 months when it's already been 9 and he hasn't healed. Check back to this thread in March and we'll see what kind of factor he played this year. I wouldn't count on it being much at all. I hope I'm wrong because he's a great kid and I would love to see him do well. It just ain't happening this year unfortunately.

I hope you are right that he can round into form. Our depth is razor thin so if he can't be at least 75% of what he one was....we are in for a world of hurt.