Well, what does Cal do now?

[ace on the river]

UK is about 11-12 without Oscar, yeah go ahead and bench him and see what happens. Collins looked good for 1 game and you guys want to bench a guy who has been going to war for us for 2 years. Has Oscar played as well as he did last year no. Has he had some bad games ,yes. Would benching one of the only 2 players on your team worth a damn be madness, yes! Bench Oscar and you go 1-6 down the stretch. Use your eyes folks Cal forces ball to him when he double and triple teamed every time, how can teams get away with this, because our 3-4 spot players suck, and our two guard CJ is too slow to get open and misses the shot even if he does. Finally maybe Oscar doesn't look as good because the team he is playing on isn't as good. Last years team would beat the brakes off of this club

we may very well go 1-6 with him playing too

 

[SPECT imaging]

Dribble drive offense with the fancy outside weave and man to man defense is the wrong system for this roster. Cal will not do this, but the path forward is to emphasize the strengths of the players. Probably too late in the season for sweeping changes anyway. The "tweak" if you could call it that would be a 3-2 offense with Tshiebwe and Onyenso on the blocks and Wallace running the point, with a matchup 2-3 zone defense and Tshiebwe in the middle of the back line. Tshiebwe is a below the rim player who can't defend, but he is a scorer and the best rebounder in the country when used right. You hide Tshiebwe on the back line of a zone. Cal has screwed the pooch with Onyenso, who is the rim protector we badly need. Playing Tshiebwe and Onyenso together is not Cal's style, but it would work because Tshiebwe and Onyenso run the floor so well. Reeves should be used differently. He is not a dribble drive player. Fredrick certainly isn't. Livingston is, but Cal won't play him more than 15 minutes. The best player on this team is Wallace.

Did Arkansas run an extensive outside weave before breaking our players down in the lane? No. The Hogs just drove right into the lane and broke us down for layups without screwing around and turning the ball over on the perimeter. The fast pace wore down our players. That is a tell. I do not remember a time when other teams wore down Kentucky. All my life, it has always been the other way around.

But what do I know?

 

[HenryMuto]

Need to go zone but Cal's pride won't do it. Last night Chris Mack talked about how he had a Xavier team where he had the same issues and had to go zone for parts of games.

 

[JonathanW]

I don’t think Collins is a good on-the-ball shot blocker. He is a great help-off-ball shot blocker. But his man puts body against him and he’s too weak.

I’ve been saying all season we need to play Onyenso more. Even if it means moving Oscar to the 4.

 

[UKortho]

I don’t think Collins is a good on-the-ball shot blocker. He is a great help-off-ball shot blocker. But his man puts body against him and he’s too weak.

I’ve been saying all season we need to play Onyenso more. Even if it means moving Oscar to the 4.

He does seem to miss opportunities given his length and athleticism.

 

[Short-Dawg-69]

The only thing Cals going to do is cash that check.
And spew off at the mouth something stupid.

 

[BlueWorldOrder74]

I didn’t read the thread, don’t have much time, but wanted to say two things….

- Cal wouldn’t be at as big a crossroad (as you say) had he been developing the bench all season. He didn’t because he don’t. Nothing new. But UO and DC could be much more serviceable when Oscar is being eaten alive had he been giving them some minutes all season.
- Teach, coach, and use a zone defense. Not just for one possession to placate someone. But honest to goodness zone defense for stretches. Would have helped Oscar quite a bit. But, too late now, and he won’t anyway.

Cal. He is just too stubborn. He’a turned into Jimmy up in Syracuse. Only thing left to do is start picking his nose.

 

[Catman100]

Every time a post begins with "Cal should do this......."

We really should move on to another post. Cal is not going to change.

 

[rolaid]

IMO we got to stick with Oscar but in a zone defense - he’s too timid on D worried about fouls in man. On offense do not post him unless inside charge arc - he cannot score mid post- spread the floor tell Oscar you screen and clean up hit a occasional jumper
The zone should do 2 things …limit fouls on key players - limit straight line scores at rim
If the opponent is killing is from deep then adjust back to man but damn they are all shooting over 50% against our man

 

[kyjeff1]

I think we can all agree that Cal just has not done a good enough job coaching. But I think this roster has severely missed the mark on so many fronts. Oscar is wilting. CJ is injured and scared. Toppin turned out to be overrated. Livingston is a multi-year player. Cason isn't really a PG (not yet at least). Wheeler is big flaws. Reeves is proving that while solid, there's a reason transfers didn't start at Kentucky..

When it comes to roster changes, at some point you just have to stick with what's working "well enough" than try and get someone else going. The mistake was that we should have been playing Ugonna, Collins and Thiero more in the early going. But it might actually be too late now. It very well might be better to stick with Oscar in hopes that a few more 15/15 games get us into the tournament, than roll the dice with trying to get Ugonna up to speed.

It's still Cal's fault, but this team just isn't that good, and I think even Cal was a bit surprised at just how far off they are.

This thread is mainly focused on what Cal should do when Oscar is struggling like he did the last two games and how Cal should fix our rim protection problem.

We all know Cal has to 'run what he brung' so to speak and either way, you don't bench Oscar permanently. You fix his faults and you use Ugo and Collins in situations like we saw Tuesday night.

Oscar had a bad game, he was a complete non factor, he couldn’t score and he gave up straight line layups, I mean, he moved out of the way. That’s a problem. In this scenario, you have to sit him IMO.

 

[kyjeff1]

You pay someone $9 million/yr they should know how to coach a zone, 1-3-1, 3-2, box and 1, or triangle and 2. My grade school coach taught us plow boys how to play them and he didn’t make a fraction of what Cal makes.

Yeah, the Cal era is on fumes right now.

His style worked for a good portion of his tenure here, but it’s over and all we can do is hope he doesn't do anymore damage on his way out.

From what I gather, he thinks he's doing a great job and everyone else is to blame. He looks at everything through a narcissistic lens and that is a recipe for disaster.