StingersUp2005
New member
05’ grad here living in Folsom and while not many like us, I’ve been an avid fan of Hornet basketball. Many of all don’t want to have this conversation but it’s worth bringing up. Last year’s team compared to this year’s team. Again all of this is not meant to be personal, just facts and a fun comparison.
Top scorers
Holt > Williams
Watching Holt, I took him for granted. He might be the best big man to ever come of out of sac state. Scoring wise averaged the same numbers as Mikey but way more efficient. 53% from the field, was an elite shooting big at 35% from three, led the big sky in free throw attempts and makes. Was top 5 in scoring, rebounding, and blocks. Currently putting up great stats and starting as a rookie in a top 5 league in the world (NBL). Don’t get me wrong, Mikey is a pure scoring high school sensation, but is a very inefficient basketball player. 37% overall field goal, 27% from three on 15+ shots a game. So far he has games this year where he shoots: 6-21, 7-23, 5-19, 2-14, 4-15, 2-11. Assist to turnover ratio ain’t pretty either. 4.5 assists to 4 turnovers as a leading point guard is below average. Great player overall, just needs more college experience. Also, having a dominant big is so much more rare/valuable than a dominant scoring guard.
Roster construction/depth
This is where both teams struggles in. Other than the two previously players mentioned (Holt, Williams). No one else can on either roster could be a consistent scorer/playmaker. With that said, major fan of Prophet Johnson, love the way he plays and rebounds, was easily our best get out of the portal. But let’s take a look at last years roster and where they are at currently:
Nunn: at Fullerton, apparently injuried, was starting at the start of the year
Neal: averaged 8 at sac and went to USC, struggling for minutes but again on a top 50 team in the nation.
Brewer: at Idaho state starting as a sophomore l averaging 10 points and recently just dropped 18 on sac this past weekend and won.
Chudi dioromma: playing extremely well given restricted minutes on a 10-5 Arkansas state team.
Williams/Wricket/Wilson: dominating division 2 basketball and will most likely end up back on a division 1 roster next year
Pitre: starting at Tennessee state, currently top 5 in the nation in offensive rebounding plus is averaging 7pts and 7rb
Beatty: playing his roll on a A-10 team at La salle.
Kovatchev: at Florida, buried deep on the bench, but on a top 15 team in the nation.
Comparing the two teams:
This matchup would actually be very interesting. In last years team, you have a lot of size but not much experienced guard depth. In this years team, they have an absurd amount of guards but absolutely no depth in bigs. Last years team was ranked #4 in big sky for defense (crazy right
), but ranked #10 in offense. This years team ranks #9 in defense and #9 in offense. Both going into conference only had 1 division 1 win. Last year against Air Force this year against Presbyterian. Both first year head coaches. Start of conference last year they won their opening game against Portland state, this year 0-2. But the biggest difference in my opinion and why it makes last years team better. Is that they probably had 1/20th of the NIL budget. I don’t know how much they had last year and who would’ve got paid, presumably Holt. But this year seemingly has an unlimited budget, yet is producing the same if not worse basketball. Very selfish play style that ultimately will be hard to win games.
Trust me I get the Bibby move. Good for the city and brings in a flashy name to campus. But if your goal is to build a program I think you had a better core last year as well as presumably a more experienced staff. Biggest flaw of last years team was their youth. Majority of the roster had freshman and sophomores, they would be in close games but end up losing due to experience. but one thing I can say is that they played hard, and a good style of basketball. This years team is all over the place, getting dominated inside, no defense, selfish players. It’s a hard watch. I do wanna mention, if Cherry is healthy I believe we win more games, how many more, I don’t know. But again that’s basketball and circumstances happen. Kovatchev broke his leg early on and Pitre was out all year.
If you told me last years team (on paper) would be the more effective basketball team, I would’ve laughed in your face. But when you look at the stats, the data, players, I can’t help but look at last years teams core, and feel like we missed out. I truly think that last years team would beat this years team given the size mismatch alone. Love Lavrenov as a freshman but he’s seemly out of position as any 6’6 center will struggle against any average 6’10 big let alone Holt and Dioramma.
One thing I also want to mention and is the reason I made this post, is that when Bibby came in. I had conversations to a lot of the former players and they mentioned when he was announced, a majority of the players wanted to stay because they loved the school and the community. But to my surprise they told me that Bibby wouldn’t even return their calls/text. Almost acting too big and cool. In my opinion we were foolish to let Dioramma, Pitre, Brewer, and Neal go. I find it hard to believe that a new coach wouldn’t even evaluate the former roster to see if they have any potential players…
Top scorers
Holt > Williams
Watching Holt, I took him for granted. He might be the best big man to ever come of out of sac state. Scoring wise averaged the same numbers as Mikey but way more efficient. 53% from the field, was an elite shooting big at 35% from three, led the big sky in free throw attempts and makes. Was top 5 in scoring, rebounding, and blocks. Currently putting up great stats and starting as a rookie in a top 5 league in the world (NBL). Don’t get me wrong, Mikey is a pure scoring high school sensation, but is a very inefficient basketball player. 37% overall field goal, 27% from three on 15+ shots a game. So far he has games this year where he shoots: 6-21, 7-23, 5-19, 2-14, 4-15, 2-11. Assist to turnover ratio ain’t pretty either. 4.5 assists to 4 turnovers as a leading point guard is below average. Great player overall, just needs more college experience. Also, having a dominant big is so much more rare/valuable than a dominant scoring guard.
Roster construction/depth
This is where both teams struggles in. Other than the two previously players mentioned (Holt, Williams). No one else can on either roster could be a consistent scorer/playmaker. With that said, major fan of Prophet Johnson, love the way he plays and rebounds, was easily our best get out of the portal. But let’s take a look at last years roster and where they are at currently:
Nunn: at Fullerton, apparently injuried, was starting at the start of the year
Neal: averaged 8 at sac and went to USC, struggling for minutes but again on a top 50 team in the nation.
Brewer: at Idaho state starting as a sophomore l averaging 10 points and recently just dropped 18 on sac this past weekend and won.
Chudi dioromma: playing extremely well given restricted minutes on a 10-5 Arkansas state team.
Williams/Wricket/Wilson: dominating division 2 basketball and will most likely end up back on a division 1 roster next year
Pitre: starting at Tennessee state, currently top 5 in the nation in offensive rebounding plus is averaging 7pts and 7rb
Beatty: playing his roll on a A-10 team at La salle.
Kovatchev: at Florida, buried deep on the bench, but on a top 15 team in the nation.
Comparing the two teams:
This matchup would actually be very interesting. In last years team, you have a lot of size but not much experienced guard depth. In this years team, they have an absurd amount of guards but absolutely no depth in bigs. Last years team was ranked #4 in big sky for defense (crazy right
), but ranked #10 in offense. This years team ranks #9 in defense and #9 in offense. Both going into conference only had 1 division 1 win. Last year against Air Force this year against Presbyterian. Both first year head coaches. Start of conference last year they won their opening game against Portland state, this year 0-2. But the biggest difference in my opinion and why it makes last years team better. Is that they probably had 1/20th of the NIL budget. I don’t know how much they had last year and who would’ve got paid, presumably Holt. But this year seemingly has an unlimited budget, yet is producing the same if not worse basketball. Very selfish play style that ultimately will be hard to win games.Trust me I get the Bibby move. Good for the city and brings in a flashy name to campus. But if your goal is to build a program I think you had a better core last year as well as presumably a more experienced staff. Biggest flaw of last years team was their youth. Majority of the roster had freshman and sophomores, they would be in close games but end up losing due to experience. but one thing I can say is that they played hard, and a good style of basketball. This years team is all over the place, getting dominated inside, no defense, selfish players. It’s a hard watch. I do wanna mention, if Cherry is healthy I believe we win more games, how many more, I don’t know. But again that’s basketball and circumstances happen. Kovatchev broke his leg early on and Pitre was out all year.
If you told me last years team (on paper) would be the more effective basketball team, I would’ve laughed in your face. But when you look at the stats, the data, players, I can’t help but look at last years teams core, and feel like we missed out. I truly think that last years team would beat this years team given the size mismatch alone. Love Lavrenov as a freshman but he’s seemly out of position as any 6’6 center will struggle against any average 6’10 big let alone Holt and Dioramma.
One thing I also want to mention and is the reason I made this post, is that when Bibby came in. I had conversations to a lot of the former players and they mentioned when he was announced, a majority of the players wanted to stay because they loved the school and the community. But to my surprise they told me that Bibby wouldn’t even return their calls/text. Almost acting too big and cool. In my opinion we were foolish to let Dioramma, Pitre, Brewer, and Neal go. I find it hard to believe that a new coach wouldn’t even evaluate the former roster to see if they have any potential players…
