MSU Red Cedar Message Board

small hands is one theory.

My theory is too many 3 point shots and not enough guys crashing the boards on offense or defense.

That and the small lineups.

If you look at MSUs starters and guys who get minutes they are on the short side.

Green and Roe are the only guys who get big minutes and they are 6'7" and 6'8" if I am not mistaken. It worked last year because they played Raymar at the 3 alot and he was 6'8" but now MSU is just flat out a small team.

When they had Suton, Morgan, Roe, and Green in the playing rotation they were a big team and could punish teams on the glass. They have gotten smaller and haven't replaced Suton and Morgan as far as minutes and size goes.

Its called intangibles . We lack in toughness, grit, moxy, and defensive strength. These are all staples of Izzo ball when he has the right lineups. THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE HEIGHT OF THE PLAYERS.

I don't know. If you look at Izzos teams that rebound it seems like they always have taller guys who can rebound especially at the 3.

The championship year they had Mo-Pete and J-Rich (although J-rich had limited PT as a Freshman) and the next year they also had Richardson.

The last couple of years they had Raymar.

Having a tall 3 who can rebound seems to be a huge plus for MSU.

Right now they have no-one to rebound at the 3 so Izzo is playing another guard instead (like Appling or Summers).

I would love it if Summers would box out and rebound the ball. Granted he isn't as tall as Morgan, Richardson, or Peterson but he can jump and if he plays inspired he could get more rebounds.

I think help is coming the next couple of years with the guys they have coming in but this year rebounding is going to be a struggle I am afraid unless Izzo goes bigger and they move Green or Roe to the 3 (which they already experimented with but didn't work) MSU could be in trouble this year.

The only chance MSU has with a smaller lineup imo is pressing and playing more up tempo. That is the only advantage they would have going small. They have to run more and take advantage of the speed they have when they go small

Position for position..........I know this may be difficult to comprehend. We are not that much smaller than in years' past. In fact, some lineups we are bigger.....but lets not muddy up the true problem with rebounding; positioning , anticipation, and toughness. HEIGHT HAS VERY LITTLE TO DO WITH OUR REBOUNDING.
........Unless, of course, you are an idiot like Heisman and visualize a lineup with all guards.

We are batting like 10% on loose balls, and 5% on 50/50 balls. Gotta swallow those up.

Perhaps retain Ash-Liz as a consultant?

Considering our little dresses have more 'stains' on them than Lewinsky could even bare from getting toyed with most of the season... those are pretty respectable stats.

Don't forget the 08-09 Team had Suton and Morgan. I think Naymick was also on that team. All three became really good rebounders. MSU misses all three of their D skills.

Is this just Big 10 games? Because we've only played the lower half of those teams so far. But yes when our two best rebounders are Roe and Green and Green spends a lot of time no where near the paint we need Summers and Appling to try and get some boards down low.

I'm assuming those stats are for ALL games, since if they were for just B10 games, you'd have as many teams with minus rebounding as ones with plus.

Almost every single big man we've ever had was a poor rebounder as a freshman or sophomore. Do you remember the first years for Naymick, Suton, and Gray? They led the universe in rebounds dropped or thrown away. We had a running gag where we'd yell "nice rebound" only after the ball got into the point guard's hands.

So the problem is that our best size and potential rebounding is young, inexperienced at angles, and with poor hands. Our best rebounding skills are from relatively small players (Green, Summers).

There's probably no answer. I want to see the big guys play more...even if it doesn't fix things now, it sets us up better for a year or two from now.

I wasn't considering Morgan a "big man". He was always a good rebounder.

Suton in his freshman year averaged 3 rebounds in 15 mintues per game.
His senior year he was averaging 8 rebounds in 27 minutes.

Also worth noting that his freshman year we were running more, and there were more possessions and rebounds in general.

I love looking up this stuff...too bad it takes so much time.

Did you realize Morgan played more minutes per game (not including sitting games out with injury) his freshman year than any other year? Weird.

We need a big football type like Trannon to help out the team in rebounds. MD could be asked to canvass the team since the FB season is finished.

I agree. I think that they play well, when they have a big man (Nix/Sherman/Payne) plus Roe and Green. On D Roe can guard the 3, while Green guards the 4, then on offense, Green can play the 3 and Roe the 4. It gives us decent size for rebounding and then we can also, go down low more on offense. One real problem with this team is they have trouble with entry passes into the post, Green is a good passer passing the ball into the post, problem is most times he's the only guy with post skills on the floor.