Pathetic showing in a LOSS TO RADFORD today. The highlanders were picked to finish third in a weak Big South conference. Another 50% day from the FREE throw line. Sadly, that's 22% better than the FREE throw percentage against Penn State. Still no tough guys on this roster. We have weak minded individuals who don't feel they can step to the line and sink some FREE throws . Inexcusable to be this bad from the CHARITY stripe.
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Breathe brah.
"Tough guys hit free throws"
-Buzz Williams
don't know where the DV came from and not being smug or sarcastic but, I remember watching you guys out in salem back in the day Did u play bball for those guys too? Thought u were pretty good out wide. Did u go play somewhere?
Thanks I appreciate that. I did end up playing in college.. After shoulder surgery, I had to go the football route in college to get a degree. Ended up playing at Concord University, a division 2 school in West Va. Actually they're in the final 4 this year. Doing quite well.
Cool bro, congrats to ya and happy to hear that. yea I know of Concord didn't know they were in the Final 4. The new CFBP makes it much harder to focus on d2and d3 schools as the bcs format, which sux. I used to watch the playoffs for d2 and try to catch the d3 championship over in salem. Now the buzz is all in the AQ 5.
now back to topic. They guys just need to put it together. some extra time shooting free throws and set shooting would make a world of difference. I don't know what their schedule permits but 30-45 personal minutes of extra shooting works wonders. 10 percent better might not seem like much but it would have won the game. They are leaving alot of points out there. but this is a tall mountain to climb (the team that is). The guys are still young and there needs to be another post guy to allow SP and JVZ to play like they are free vs. worrying about depth, fouls, and their natural positions. this is the beginning of a build though and they will be okay.
Forums are intended to stimulate discussions. Please refrain from rants and absolutely do not levy personal attacks on anyone. I doubt you'd walk up to any of these guys and call them "weak minded individuals." So don't do it here.
Want to critique? Go for it; let's have an intelligent discussion. Calm down.
"Tough guys hit free throws"
-Buzz Williams
You keep saying this, but it's not a law of the world. GOOD FREE THROW SHOOTERS make free throws. There are guys on this team that have never been good free throw shooters because (choose one) lack of practice, lack of form, were never taught how. Tough guys make free throws is applicable to the Gonzaga-Arizona game where Byron Wesley missed three free throws at the end of overtime including an air ball on the first shot. Tough guys make free throws is Devin Wilson being our best free throw shooter after a terrible season last year. Just like everything else free throws take practice, and these guys need practice.
Ehhh...The idea that anyone playing D1 ball hasn't been taught how to shoot a free throw is...a stretch, at best.
The OP didn't do a great job of presenting the topic in a way that promotes discussion, but if you can look past the tone and personal attacks, he makes a fair point. Before tonight's game, we were ranked somewhere in the 300's in FT%. That isn't acceptable, and it's literally costing us games. I played some HS ball, and if we ever shot these kinds of percentages, we paid dearly for it.
Having said that, I have confidence that it will improve as the season progresses. This is 100% speculation, but I would guess guys are still getting acclimated to the level of conditioning required. You can put up 1000 free throws a day in practice, and make 95% of them, but in a live game when your legs are fatigued and your sucking wind, it doesn't help you much. I think with more game experience we'll get better. But if not, that is a serious problem.
Spamming isn't appreciated here, either.
He's challenging his players. I don't believe he thinks he has a team full of wussies.
I agree it's inexcusable to be this bad from the stripe, but saying there are no tough guys on this roster is definitely not true. Anyone who made it through Buzz's boot camp and is a D1 basketball player is one tough son of a gun. Inexperienced, yes. Soft or weak, no. This team has a lot to work on, and I trust Buzz will eventually get things right. However we are all frustrated and calling out a team the way this forum did is unethical and frankly completely unnecessary.
this is truly the golden age of hot #taeks
Honestly, I'd be happy with more than 10 wins, no huge blowout ACC losses, and one unexpected ranked opponent knockoff. Basketball is in serious rebuilding mode this year.
Tell us how you really feel!
I find it interesting that the people who most often call a player weak or claim the player lacks toughness are also the people who won't even attend the game.
ha..I've been to every home game this year with the exception of 1. And missed a total of 6 home games last year. Nice try, way off base here though, guy. How bout this, we'll link up at the next game and you can enlighten me since you've been to every game since the Ricky Stokes era.
I avoided several home games the past two seasons. Keep up your optimistic outlook, though, it's winning you a lot of friends.
So, just so I am clear, you attempted to call me out for not going to games, yet you've been avoiding games since things took a turn for the worse 3 years ago? Got it. Also, I genuinely appreciate the advice on friend winning on internet sites. I'll be sure to use that next time I feel my self worth is tied into "upvotes" and "downvotes" on an internet site. Maybe you can share more of your secrets when you decide that the team is good enough for you to come to the games again. VTGuitarMan is correct. I probably should've used different wording immediately after the game and I apologize, but for you to make the assumption that I do not attend games and I'm basing what I say off of a box score, is completely off base and irresponsible at best. Anyways, have a good day.
Wrong, I called you out for the language you used out of frustration and overly emotional lack of perspective. I just added the lack of attendance part knowing it would bring a comparison of 'toughness' expected from a player and that of an overly critical fan.
As far as winning friends & influencing people, that was not based on internet upvotes or downvotes. That was based on having anyone take anything you say seriously, so that a rational discussion could ensue.
This entire conversation is going as well as JVZ at the Charity Stripe this year.....
Found this interesting/shocking when looking at team stats this morning
Virginia Tech FG%: 24th Nationally
Virginia Tech 3Pt%: 10th Nationally
Virginia Tech FT%: 345th Nationally
I won't claim to understand basketball well enough (my playing days ended in rec league as a youngster minus the occasional pick up game in McComas) to point to a reason for this disparity (first thoughts are a small sample size and Van Zegeren leading the team in free throw attempts as the main factors) but I still found it shocking.
Some research I've seen (though it was based on MLB and NFL) says that ability to win close games is largely random with variance due to sample size, but if this trend keeps up it wouldn't be surprising if we are an exception where failing to close out tight games is the norm.
I wonder if the NCAA would frown upon us if we just started taking our FTs from the 3 pt line?
Or the option to decline the bonus in favor of an extra possession (at least until we got into the double bonus)
Now there's a winning idea!
To show that youth plays a part, but that even experienced teams can struggle from the charity stripe is just to look across the state.
VCU joins Tech in the over 300 club so far this season shooting free throws. They are shooting 62% as a team.
They of course make up for this by being 10th in the country in Turnover Margin. Tech is 106th in Turnover margin.
As for some actual in depth look at our free throw situation, here is what I see so far.
Our total number of attempts after eight games is probably the biggest part of the problem. We are currently 182nd in Free Throw Attempts so far this season. That shows that over half of Division 1 teams are getting to the line more often than we are. Considering we are playing a four guard set, that is ridiculous. The number of ball handlers that you have on the court should drive up the amount of times your team creates free throw opportunities.
So far only two Hokies have attempted more than 20 free throws this season. Those being JVZ with 30 and Devin with 25. Devin is shooting a much improved 76% from the line, JVZero on the other hand is at a mind numbing 30%.
Considering how few times the team has been to the line, when your leading attempt guy goes 9-for-30 from the stripe its going to impact your average significantly. JVZ represents almost 20% of our the season so far. 30-153.
Due to how Tech has played all the guards on a steady rotation, no guards seem to regularly get to the stripe enough to get a rhythm other than Devin. We have eight players averaging more than 10 mpg, six at more than 20 mpg.
So far here are the number of attempts/percentage for the team:
JVZ - 30 / 30%
Wilson - 25 / 76%
Hudson - 19 / 42%
Hill - 19/ 63%
Bibbs - 17/ 65%
Muller - 16/ 56%
Pierce -12/ 75%
Smith - 10/ 70%
The rest of the team has nominal attempts. Not one member of the team with more than 10 attempts shooting over 80% says that the entire team needs work in this area. For a Point Guard (Hudson) and a Shooting Guard(Muller) to be under 60% is very poor.
As I stated in my writeup yesterday after the game, I would prefer to see Buzz put Bibbs in some isolation attempts to get him driving the ball to the basket more than we have seen so far this season. If Wilson is going to remain the primary driver, than he needs to force fouls much more often than he is doing so far. He needs to work on creating contact while protecting the ball as he goes up. Too often we have seen him lose his handle in the lane or allow the defense to create a jump ball situation with how exposed he leaves the ball.
All of this said, unfortunately there is no magic wand for fixing this problem. It takes time and execution, it takes running someone ragged in practice and then calling for 1000 free throws each to simulate tired legs and end of game situations. We have seen a start to improvement in that some of our worst shooters are at least using a form, albeit not really working yet for JVZ in how they approach each shot. Last year and even the beginning of this season, each attempt would be completely different than the last. Now thats not as much the case. Unfortunately we are not deep enough as a team for Buzz to make hard decisions on benching someone for lack of production anywhere on the court. Regardless, Buzz has publicly addressed Free Throws and Turnovers as two of his most focused areas of improvement, so we know the coach is seeing it just as well as we are.
Having a big man that gets fouled a lot and can't hit his FTs will throw the team's percentage off. I'm bringing this up because I was watching the Penn State game it was tough to watch us constantly miss.
Looking at the stats, the team shot 4-14 from the line in that game. JVZ was 0-7. Taking out JVZ the team was 4-7, which is a small sample size but one guy shot 50% of the teams FTs. JVZ getting to the line at a high rate but also missing at a high rate will bring the teams overall percentage down quite a bit.
by the middle of the acc season this year you will start to see the true team, because by then they should have a good enough understanding of what Buzz wants on both ends of the floor to get it done, our team is going to be much better than any of us are used to very shortly, just be patient guys next years recruiting class is huge, think where we'd be right now if we had Montrezl Harrell too, that's a scary thought