Hard to be too critical of what we've been doing so far this season, minutes-wise, but are these wild lineups and a legit 10-man rotation really going to benefit us when it comes tournament time?

Tonight we had played at least 9 (but I think it was all 10) guys by the 11:20 mark in the first half.

Gotta just shake off that second half and forget it, but there is a difference between "being able to play 10 guys" and methodically "playing 10 guys" every night. It just seems like it's gotta be hard to get any sort of consistency and rhythm on offense when guys are coming in and out ad nauseam.

TjgtAg08 said:

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Hard to be too critical of what we've been doing so far this season, minutes-wise, but are these wild lineups and a legit 10-man rotation really going to benefit us when it comes tournament time?

Tonight we had played at least 9 (but I think it was all 10) guys by the 11:20 mark in the first half.

Gotta just shake off that second half and forget it, but there is a difference between "being able to play 10 guys" and methodically "playing 10 guys" every night. It just seems like it's gotta be hard to get any sort of consistency and rhythm on offense when guys are coming in and out ad nauseam.

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Sometimes it is about preserving the players health and trying to find who is hot. We really need 3 players to get hot each game. If it is just one (Wilcher tonight), the defense can adjust pretty easily.

Completely agree regarding preserving health, this entire season was and is a war.

BUT, the idea of preserving health is only a valid one if you stop preserving it at the end and let your best players play the most, because they should be the freshest.

The "hot hand" idea definitely has merit too, except Wilcher was hot in the first half and played 1 minute in the second until it was over. Now, that could be a defense issue, but we didn't even try Wilcher in the second half.

What stands out to me most regarding the 10-man rotation is how quickly it happens, even in mid February. Playing 10 guys in the first 8 minutes of the game just strikes me as odd.

I'm hoping that down the stretch that rotation tightens up and the allocation of minutes becomes more unbalanced, at least in the first half of the first half.

Because if it doesn't, all the talk from Buzz about preserving health and the wear and tear of the non-conference was malarkey.

Edit: I'll walk back a little bit of what I said after seeing the minutes (it finally showed on the ESPN app). A lot more unbalanced (in a good way) than I'd imagine.

Still will be something to watch.

You are ultimately correct but this is not quite tourney time.

Buzz will shorten the line-up / greatly reduce playing time and I bet add Garcia as a starter. Pretty clear to me that he hasn't set the tournament lineup or rotation quite yet. Seems he is seeing who is hot at the right time and who is not (Carter....yes talking to u).

Has to be a 8 player lineup IMO. Ride some guys hard and live & die by Wade. For this team to make Elite 8 or even Sweet 16.....Wade needs to show the hell up for his last chance at the dance.

TjgtAg08 said:

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Completely agree regarding preserving health, this entire season was and is a war.

BUT, the idea of preserving health is only a valid one if you stop preserving it at the end and let your best players play the most, because they should be the freshest.

The "hot hand" idea definitely has merit too, except Wilcher was hot in the first half and played 1 minute in the second until it was over. Now, that could be a defense issue, but we didn't even try Wilcher in the second half.

What stands out to me most regarding the 10-man rotation is how quickly it happens, even in mid February. Playing 10 guys in the first 8 minutes of the game just strikes me as odd.

I'm hoping that down the stretch that rotation tightens up and the allocation of minutes becomes more unbalanced, at least in the first half of the first half.

Because if it doesn't, all the talk from Buzz about preserving health and the wear and tear of the non-conference was malarkey.

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Buzz tends to play a lot of people on the first half and then narrows down the playing roster in the second half according to how the other team is playing.

The only issue tonight is that Jans made better adjustments at half.

TjgtAg08 said:

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Method Man said:

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Nobody would still be playing Carter and Hefner

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I think those 2 and Manny can play a little bit, maybe 8-9 min each, and maybe Manny gets cooking or Hef hits a few 3s and plays a little more, but having 2 of those 3 on the floor at the same time for any reason other than massive foul trouble is really hard to understand.

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combined they will end up with maybe ten good games total a season and the rest will be a disaster.

Method Man said:

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Nobody would still be playing Carter and Hefner

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And I'd keep Manny on a short leash as well.

We got a dose of our own game last night. Being forced to the baseline and the weak side help down low hurt us. MSU was very effective at stripping the ball on drives last night as well. Just a stinker of a game all around. Bounce back on Saturday!