And UK and LSU and Mississippi State for that matter.

Anyway, Arkansas brings its 1-3 conference record and a double digit home loss with it to Memorial Gym this weekend. Fun times.

My daughter and granddaughter want to go.

Absurd

1) We played tough as hell in the first half. UTjr is really good and we had the halftime lead and it wasn’t a fluke. That was our top end play.

2) Noah Shelby - Absolute flamethrower with zero conscience. I’m telling you, the lack of a conscience is what I like best about the kid. I was talking to this guy who’s best friend was a high level agent and he asked his agent friend what is the common denominator between your top earning clients. Without hesitation he said, “short memory.” That stuck with me and it’s true. Not much drives me more crazy than to see a good shooter pass up a wide open shot because he missed a couple. Shelby appears to have that IT quality. With that said, he needs to hit at a little higher rate and continue to develop other parts of his game but I’d trade him for Stute immediately and be fairly confident we would improve as a team because of it.

3) Lee Dort - I’d imagine he is still struggling with running sets properly and being in the right spot defensively, but he’s a beast. I would cut QMB’s minutes in half and give those directly to Dort to have him ready for next year.

4) Filet Manjon’s defense was fantastic to me. Nobody can stay in front of ZZ, but Filet’s on ball defense and overall defense was top tier. Quite frankly, we defended well as a team relative to UTjr’s ability but gave up 12 offensive rebounds and they converted on those second attempts more times than not.

5) Robbins was really good other than the 3 three pointers. I thought we had moved past his jacking days. Those are wasted possessions when he shoots a triple.

I know some may disagree, but I think we have played better basketball over the last 4 games. The talent issue isn’t going away but if we continue to play Shelby, and the roles continue to be more clearly defined, we should continue to improve.

**I still think Stack is gone but I’m going to try to enjoy the rest of the season and am fairly confident this team will provide us a few fun moments the rest of the way.

Long overdue.

https://www.clarionledger.com/story...-ncaa-chris-lemonis-tony-vitello/69799563007/

I caught up with 2024 offensive lineman Luke Masterson. He's one of Vanderbilt's targets, and I feel good about Vanderbilt's chances here. It is early, but Vanderbilt has made a great impression on him.

In the article, he talks about his visit a few weeks back that had three other offensive linemen there. In addition to Masterson, Page's Ronan O'Connell, Middle Tennessee Christian's Jesse Perry, and CPA's John Wayne Oliver also visited that day. O'Connell and Oliver are going to be big time prospects. Perry and Masterson already hold offers from other SEC programs. That was an impressive group to get on campus together.

What happens if this season pans out exactly as we all think it will (5-13 or worse in the conference) and they keep Stack? The level of apathy is at an all-time high right now. Anyone that’s left will surely be out at the end of the year if they finish poorly. The obvious answer here is a coaching change, but let’s say Candice and CDD decide to keep him. How does the program recover from that?

Excellent job here by Joey.

I caught up with Kahnen Daniels of Mississippi. He was being recruited by Norval McKenzie when he was at Vanderbilt, and Norval offered Daniels shortly after getting to Georgia Tech. Daniels has spoke to new RBs coach Jayden Everett. He also visited for the Tennessee game.

I just got permabanned on twitter. For what? I haven’t a clue. Feels like I’m having a worse day than they are.

The team has overperformed vs expectations vs two ranked teams the previous two games. If I were to simply look at our performance in SEC games this would appear to be a middle of the pack team , slightly under .500 in conf play.

The worst case scenario is this occurs and is enough to extend his reign of mediocrity.

Here we go again.....

Starters

QMB- 2 points, 7 rebounds, 0 asst
Smith- 3- 4- 2
TT- 0- 2 -0

Total- 7- 11- 2

Bench

Robbins- 22 -7 - 4
Manjon- 24 -4 -3
Wright- 13- 3 -3

Total- 59 -14 - 10

Robbins also had 1 steal and 6 blocks.

Stack continues to know more than any coach in the history of basketball, because everyone else starts their best players.

Yeah,I know, Robbins, Manjon, and Wright wound up playing a lot more minutes. But, we also found ourselves down 8 points starting scrubs over the best players on the team. We got away with it, barely, against the worst team in the SEC. That's going to be an early 15 point deficit against good teams, and we won't catch up.

I'm over the Stack experiment......

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I'll probably post this Sunday or Saturday.

Vols win by 25+ in Thompson-Boling tomorrow night

Dear Jerry (or whoever monitors this board on behalf of you or the Athletic Department),
This is just between you and me because the title of this thread will keep everybody else away. I am the last of a dying breed, and my job as your defender is getting harder with each passing game. To recap:

The majority opinion: You are a bad recruiter. You might be a good pro coach, but you don't know anything about the college game. Your substitution patterns defy logic, and you are giving too many minutes to the wrong guys and not enough minutes to the right guys. (Specifically, Liam should get 27 minutes, not 23 minutes.) You don't use your timeouts wisely (or at all). You need to play the young guys more so that they will develop, be happy, and not transfer. You are stubborn and arrogant and thin-skinned. You don't care about the fans; in fact, you belittle them. Memorial Magic is gone, and you are the reason why. Your job is safe because the AD is lazy/gutless/incompetent, and you know it.
Hey, don't shoot the messenger; I'm just telling you what is out there.

My defense has been: Your player development and your X's and O's. Your pro sets make it an easy transition to the pro game, and the players and their families appreciate that. You are sometimes the smartest guy in the room. You are at practice every day, and I can argue with a straight face that you know and want what is best for the players and the team. You meet with the players and assistant coaches and discuss with them your substitution patterns. The team is playing hard, is competitive, and will get better and surprise people down the stretch. Okay, some of this is me giving you the benefit of the doubt, but I'm trying the best I can to present a defense.

Let's pretend for a minute that I'm your lawyer (or uncle or pastor or teacher). I'm on your side. I want you to succeed. So, hear me out. Even the smartest guy in the room can be wrong at times. Don't tune out your critics. Don't surround yourself with yes men or people who are scared to give an honest opinion. Don't be stubborn. It's okay to make a mistake, and it is admirable to admit making a mistake.

Be humble. "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble."

Respectfully submitted,

Uncle Momalo

Last upload of the night, from Bucees in Crossville, TN actually.

More instant analysis of tonight’s game, on the floor of Thompson-Boling, here:
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Per KenPom, we scored 68 points in 64 possessions tonight.

The only other team this season that's averaged more than a point per possession against Tennessee was Arizona, who's 5th nationally in offensive efficiency.

8-8. with 15 games left. (Just a shame we lost to Southern Miss and Grambling. Mix in a win vs VCU or NC state where we had chances and how does 11-5 right now look. So frustrating)

5 of these final 15 vs ranked teams (4 of those at home)
I think we will win some games because we do seem to keep games somewhat close. that alone should result in a few wins.
Still going to be under .500 for the season unless we somehow go 8-7.

Here are some stats:

286th in points scored
181 in Points per game
233 in FG %
281 in FT % (that is a fireable offense right there)
219 in 3 pt %
47 in rebounds - good there
226 in assists
132 in turnovers
135 in assist/turnover ratio
19 in blocked shots (thanks Liam)

3 players in double digits, 2 barely with Stute at 10.4 and Wright at 10.1. Stute has 6 of last 7 under 8 points

We really just lack an identity. Liam is a stud but we have no true go to scorer like we have had so many times in the past. Game to game we have no idea outside Liam who is going to be our next top scorer. One game its Thomas then he's quiet for 5. Next game it's Lawrence then he's quiet for 5 games. Then Manjon scores 24 out of nowhere.

I am curious to see the attendance on Saturday vs a top 15 team. Normally Memorial would be rocking but it's very apparent the level of apathy right now with this fanbase.

Nm

A good question