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2016-2017 UMBC Retrievers Thread

31K views 222 replies 25 participants last post by  umbc32244 
#1 ·
I figured the new coaching staff being announced would be a good topic to start the new thread.

Obviously, they all have good resumes, and I can't be too surprised he brought two of his staff from LRU with him. But what I'm really impressed with is the new DOBO, who started an AAU club in Houston, which will open up a very good recruiting pipeline.
 
#35 ·
There are limits I believe as to how many kids can travel with the team, so you generally don't see more than two if you have a full complement of scholarships. While I'm not a 100% on this I remember vaguely hearing this somewhere.
 
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#38 ·
It's the quiet before the storm. No, they don't tweet much, that's always been the case. I don't even think there was any publicity to the Midnight Madness, or Retriever Rally, or whatever it was called...they used to stream it live, I don't know why they didn't do it.

As for the John Feinstein event, that does look interesting, and a good fundraiser (something well needed), and if I still lived in Baltimore I would go.
 
#40 ·
Updated 2016-17 player photos were posted. I will say that they need to work with the photographer to be consistent on camera distance because every player seems to be shot from a different distance and it's creating some weird effects when you look at all the photos as a group.

11 days to the first exhibition!
 
#44 ·
I went to the Black and Gold scrimmage on Saturday and got to see the new guys play.

Rodney, Jairus, and Sam did not play. Rodney and Jairus seem to have minor dings. I didn't see anything about Sam to know why he's out.

The teams were set up like this:

Gold: Sherburne, Curran, Jabbie, Grace, Wincowski, Gerrity, Ervin
Black: Darley, Maura, Grant, Lamar, Park, Brent

They played 10 minute quarters and had three refs (all of whom I recognize from our regulation games).

The first half surprisingly was a blowout as Gold beat up Black 49-31. Hand checking is going to be a problem initially as the refs were clear to the players that the NCAA is requiring them to call a foul if a defender puts his hand on a ball-handler.

Gold won the third quarter 20-19. Black won the fourth 16-13 on a missed 3-pointer at the end.

Jourdan had 22 for Black and Max Curran had 19 for Gold. Wincowski had 15, Sherburne 13, Darley 11, Brent 14, Grace 10, and Gerrity had 12.

Take aways:

* Wincowski played as well as I have ever seen him play. He ran point and looked composed, took the ball to the hoop, and showed a lot of what Aki liked about him out of HS and what we saw against Wake as a freshman. I am looking forward to seeing how he plays as we go through his sophomore season as I think he looks to be a contributor this year.

* Sherburne and Darley looked solid and probably won't improve significantly from a statistical perspective. I could see them scoring about the same but being more efficient because of the increased depth.

* Max Curran looks like he is going to be very good. I wouldn't be surprised if he's an all-Rookie pick. 6'9" and athletic with a very good shot from mid-range and beyond. He's going to have trouble being a power forward against stronger guys but his length will give him an advantage on offense.

* Jourdan's shot looks better. I don't know what the coaching staff have done to improve it but he certainly looks like he's got a more consistent motion. His best asset is his attacking style to get to the basket and that's not going to change.

* Brent is still looking for confidence. He missed numerous wide open shots from behind the arc. He has the skill to be a very effective shooter off the bench but he just seems to need to get his groove back that he had as a freshman.

* Arkel Lamar is a pretty big guy for a freshman. He's not tall but he's strong and will probably be the center for rebounding when he's on the floor. He has a jumper so he's not totally limited to defensive contributions.

* KJ Maura is an enigma. I hear he's a great distributor and playmaker but he's also small and light. I would be shocked if he's really taller than 5'6". But, he's an excellent free throw shooter. My guess is he is the late game PG (moving Lyles and Rodney to a 3-guard lineup) so that if he gets fouled, he is an almost-certain 2 points at the line.

* Gerrity has improved and gotten stronger but he's still raw. I don't see him breaking out this year. As a big, he's probably behind Curran and Lamar right now based upon skill set offensively. Had some good rebounds and a couple of key blocks.

* Ervin is probably the odd man out in the back court at this point. His shot is a mess but he knows the offense so he has value if there are injuries or foul issues. Plus with the pace that Odom wants to play, depth is key.

* It will be interesting to see how much Grace and Jabbie play. Ben is probably one of the smartest guys on the floor from a hoops IQ perspective. He knows the offense and defense schemes. Jabbie probably had 10 points in the first half and to some degree was why the Gold team smoked the Black team. I don't know if he'll play that much. I think he's a good teammate and a great guy to have on the team but he could play more at lower levels.

* David Park had a pretty quiet day and I think is probably a work in progress. I think he's got potential but I wouldn't play him over Will, Joe, Max, and Arkel ... Not to mention Sam and Nolan.

There's no way to extrapolate what I saw on Saturday into anything meaningful for the season. Especially without Rodney and Jairus playing.

Hood College has 10 freshmen and three sophomores so that game is going to be impossible to draw any conclusions from either unless we win 120-30.

If Coach Odom is able to continue the offensive prowess we saw with Lyles in the lineup and instill some defensive discipline that's been missing since 2007-08, I think the team could be a .500 basketball team. I think to make any predictions beyond that goal is premature.
 
#46 ·
Thank You for this recap! I wanted to go this weekend but some other events came up that blocked my plan. I have been out of commission this off-season as I tried to re-set my password and it just was not working. You guys will remember me as UMBC2015Graduate.

Definitely looking forward to this season. The first 4 games are winnable games but we will see. Hopefully those injuries are not too serious. Happy to hear about Max Curran. I am looking forward to seeing Arkel Lamar as he did have the Big East recruiting him and an offer from St. Johns. Is he a Chase Plummer kind of guy in terms of size?

I think this year's non-conference games are pretty darn weak but it is Ryan Odom's first year. I won't complain over more chances to win. Looking forward to Virginia Tech and JMU.
 
#48 ·
Great to hear!!! Nice to have a tough physical player that can rebound. This is what I was hoping with Lamell Washington and his frame.

Also, does Max Curran seem like a potential replacement for Will Darley, given his ability to shoot? It interesting how you have him starting over Gerrity/Schwietz.
 
#51 · (Edited)
I think we need to consider a new host for this show. With all due respect to Paul, who I'm sure is a very nice fellow, that was very hard to watch/listen to. I really wanted to get to know our new coach. I did; but I think UMBC can do better.

We went out and hired Coach Odom to elevate the status of the program through winning. I'd like to see us invest in presentation of the program across the board.
 
#53 ·
Paul Mittermier does all sports, not just basketball. While I do like these videos, I'd like to see more than just interviews. Show game highlights with footage breakdowns, hype videos, etc like the one on the AE site. Now that everything can be put on YouTube it should be less difficult, especially once you get a full green room in the new arena next year.

As for who's ready to play, I'm interested in seeing Sam Schwietz once he gets healthy. I was impressed when I saw him against Northern Colorado last year, and even though he missed most of conference play last year after his concussion, I still think he can still compete.
 
#55 ·
Just to give some perspective on our OOC opponents, here are where they were picked this season by the coaches of each conference. Hood and Messiah are in the same D3 conference (Middle Atlantic Conference).

Opponent Coaches' Rank
UMES (MEAC) 8th
Delaware St. (MEAC) 12th
Kennesaw St. (A-SUN) 6th
Navy (Patriot) 8th
Duquesne (A-10) 14th
Mount St. Mary's (NEC) 4th (tie)
Richmond (A-10) 8th
Towson (CAA) 2nd
Citadel (SoCon) 9th
James Madison (CAA) 5th
Virginia Tech (ACC) 10th

Hood D3 T-7
Messiah D3 9th
Hood and Messiah are not very good, even in the context of a D3 school. Hood was picked higher than Messiah despite having nine freshmen.
 
#59 ·
With Hood being picked near the bottom of a D3 conference and having nine freshmen and two sophomores, if we don't win by 30+ this is going to be a rocky start to the season.

I would much rather see us win 75-35 than 105-75. Show us there's some defensive intensity. We know the offense is there because the team is deeper this year and we have a full season of Lyles to enjoy.

I want to see that we can disrupt the opponent's plans when we need to get a stop and I think the best way to show that is to just smother Hood today.
 
#62 ·
So I went to the game and it's going to be very tough to draw any conclusions that can predict how we will do over the course of the season.

I thought the first half was very disciplined, efficient, and effective; especially on defense. We held them to 17 points and I think about 26% shooting. Offensively, we moved the ball and made open perimeter shots.

Coming out of the halftime break, it's easy to understand how a team that isn't used to winning and full of new players and a new scheme could take their foot off the throttle. We started turning the ball over with sloppy play and weren't quite as aggressive on defense. As a result, we were actually being outscored by Hood at one point in the second half. Three quick 3-pointers helped us salvage a 44-44 second half score line.

As far as player impressions go:

Jairus is still the same silky smooth guy despite a taped thumb and his middle and ring fingers taped together. Will can be Jekyll and Hyde; when he's confident he can be a conference POY caliber player. When he starts making mistakes, he's incredibly hard on himself. Joe played well but would probably like a couple of his looks back.

Ben Grace played very well, hitting four threes and playing defense on their PG. Obviously, with a healthy Grant, Maura, or Elliott he's not starting but he looks like he's lost weight and come into his senior season ready to contribute leadership.

I thought Curran displayed athleticism I hadn't predicted, taking a couple alley-oops for back door dunks, which is something we haven't had since House graduated.

But what can we tell from this game, especially without three guards who will all absolutely contribute this year? I think we have to look at the differences from the bench. I absolutely respected Aki Thomas as a person and as a representative of UMBC. He recruited some very good players but never really got them to click together because of his coaching.

Ryan Odom's staff were very different than I recall coming from Coach Thomas' bench. They were seeing things happen before the players. They were calling out ball screens and defensive switches before the players realized them. But the second half of the game today shows they have work to do.

I think the second half, in a way, is a good thing. There wouldn't have been much to learn from a 96-34 win (or something like that) whereas a 44-point half by an outgunned D3 team is definitely something to work on before Sunday.

My guess is that Ervin, Brent, and Jabbie don't get a lot of crunch time minutes this year. Ervin and Brent are still having some confidence issues. If Malcolm gets his groove back, he will definitely see playing time because he is a talented shooter.
 
#64 ·
While I didn't get to watch the game, here are some notes:

1) I know we are a shooting heavy team (especially from 3) but I would have liked to see more driving to the basket and drawing fouls. This is after seeing us only having 7 free throw attempts and making only 3 compared to Hood's 16/20.

UMES:

2) Used a full court press to cut the deficit against GWU on the road. Bakari Copeland had 21 for UMES in 25 minutes before fouling out. Here is what the UMES coach had to say about UMBC.

“The UMBC team is a very scrappy team,” Collins said. “They shoot the ball as well as George Washington does and they can shoot it one through five. We are going to have our work cut out. Hopefully we’ll have the home-court advantage and our fans come out and support us.”

http://www.easternshorehawks.com/sports/m-baskbl/recaps/111216aaa.html

I think tomorrow could be a high scoring affair for both teams like last year.
 
#66 ·
UMBC 2-0 for the first time since 2007-2008 after beating UMES 77-73.

Few Thoughts

1) Free throw shooting was overall solid (25/34) vs. 6/10 for UMES. A big difference factor down the stretch.

2) Does anyone think we were shooting too many 3's in the first half?

3) Bakari Copeland, UMES's best player, got into foul trouble which helped UMBC build a solid lead before getting close again.

4) Darley and Lyles were great offensive sparks for the team tonight. I cannot say enough about those two.

5) Odom's style is definitely very fast paced - saw some great ball movement to create open shots for others.

6) As many eluded, working to break the press will be the next task at hand.

7) Kudos to KJ Maura for controlling the ball for most of the game and really being a scrappy defensive player.

8) Arkel Lamar led the team with 8 big rebounds and a block. He is listed as 6 foot 5 inches, but definitely plays bigger.

On to the next match against Delaware State. Hopefully if I get out of work on time, I will be able to go attend.
 
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