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Will Iowa State make postseason play?

Will we make postseason?

  • Yes NCAA Tournament

  • Yes NIT

  • Not at all

Results are only viewable after voting.
ruxCYtable said:
He averaged 4/4 against the shittiest teams we'll play all year. Is he really even a loss, other than depth? Honest question, maybe he's a great defender, I don't even know.
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His length inside is definitely a loss. He is more of a rim defender than anyone they have.
 
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AuH2O said:
A college coaching staff isn’t going to have much to do with a guy improving shooting, and it sure as heck isn’t going to happen in season. It’s almost completely about a guy putting in crazy amounts of work in the off-season. There’s a reason under the same coaches some guys improve and some don’t.

But what a staff needs to be able to do is figure out how to get their good three point shooters more good looks, their guys that can attack the rim more matchups and sets that give them space to attack and finish or kick, their guys with post moves some mismatches and kick opportunities, etc.

Obviously the more offensive skill you have the easier it is. If MM is getting a bunch of good looks from 3 or mismatch opportunities in the low post but just missing, so be it. If Gilbert or Tamin are getting opportunities to get switched on to by a big and attack but not finishing, so be it. But that isn’t happening very consistently at all. But if the offense ends up with the guys the defense wants shooting taking the shot, that’s not good offense. No team has five shooters, most have 1-3.

ISUs offensive makeup is pretty typical. One elite shooter, one good shooter (Tamin), two guys that can get into the paint extremely well (Gilbert and Tamin), and a couple guys that are decent around the rim.

TJ is an elite recruiter, great at getting guys to buy in, great at defensive strategy and coaching. Just need the offensive coaching to come along. ISU is only a few games in with the first offensively skilled roster TJ has had. It’s not there yet, but it will improve. Even great coaches have flaws that they need to work on. MC is an awesome coach, but he isn’t good at clock management.

Hate to be “Trust TJ” guy, but I trust he’s going to figure it out.
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Really like TJ and he's the right fit but I think this season is going to be a good test to see what can happen as the year goes on as other teams know his deal. He's brought in some great freshman on paper...transfers...are mid-major transfers diamonds in the rough or were there legit reasons they started at mid-majors?

He was able to jump on teams early in the last two seasons with getting after them but as time went on it wore off a bit, then the 2022 NCAA tourney matchups were favorable. There were signs of it last year; the defense was still good but OU in Hilton, for example, knew right where to skip the ball to and cast from the perimeter.

Perhaps he's been trying to get through to some players and let them fall on themselves this past weekend to use this week as a bit of a reset.

One positive is vs. ATM it looked like they were going to get rung up by about 15 with how things were going and they still gave themselves a quasi-chance of pulling it off vs. a team that even without two starters still had plenty of athletic advantage.
 
Tourney recently seems to be all about Quad-1 wins. Here's the current NET rankings on CBS (not sure the "official" ones are available for 2023-24 yet) for the Big 12:

Houston 1
Texas 7
Kansas 9
Baylor 17
KSU 19
WVU 24
ISU 25
TCU 27
OSU 42
TTU 62
CIN 63
UCF 66
OU 70
BYU 84

and for other relevant teams:

VCU 54
DePaul 155
Iowa 38

I believe Quad 1 is 1-30 at home, 1-50 neutral, and 1-70 away. It's early and these of course change throughout the year, but as it stands we don't/won't have any non-con Quad 1 wins even if we win out. Possible VCU and Iowa become Quad 1 if they have good years. Let's optimistically say all that happens, so after non-con wraps up we are 11-2 with only one bad loss (Q2 to VT). In the conference schedule there are currently 13 Quad-1 games:

@ OU (Q1): Win
vs Houston (Q1): Loss
vs OSU (Q2): Win
@ BYU (Q2): Win
@ TCU (Q1): Loss
vs KSU (Q1): Loss
vs KU (Q1): Loss
@ Baylor (Q1): Loss
@ Texas (Q1): Loss
vs TCU (Q1): Win
@ CIN (Q1): Win
vs TT (Q2): Win
@ Houston (Q1): Loss
vs WVU (Q1): Loss
vs OU (Q2): Win
@ UCF (Q1): Win
vs BYU (Q2): Win
@ KSU (Q1): Loss

Let's optimistically assume we win one of those games in my forecasted five-game Q1 losing streak. That puts you at 21-10 overall, 10-8 in the Big 12, roughly six Quad-1 wins depending on how things play out for VCU and Iowa. That's an easy in for the tourney. I've also got four home losses here, some of those could be wins assuming we're real tough at home like usual. But we could also easily lose to Iowa and go 8-10 or worse in the Big 12 with no quality non-con wins, I don't think that's going to cut it this year.
 
8 wins in the Big 12 will get this team in the Tourney no matter the non-con. ISU has a very good chance of winning out now in the non-con, but even if they have 18 wins going into the Big 12 Tourney they have a good chance of an at large bid. The Big 12 will be the best conference, or at least the second best conference, in college basketball. It only takes 5 or 6 Q1 wins to get a 9 or 10 seed.

West Virginia last year....6 Q1 wins....7-11 in the Big 12......19-14 going into the Tourney and they were safely in as a 9 seed. Of course they beat ISU twice last year for two of those 6 Q1 wins, but there will be plenty of opportunities in conference play.

Now, ISU needs to take advantage of those opportunities, but 8-10 can get them in if a few of those 8 wins are against high NET teams like KU, Houston, TCU, maybe others in Hilton or on the road.
 
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I think this team will do well at home playing to the crowd and may struggle on the road. Due to this I think we should get in the NCAA with some good home wins over teams like KU. However, I think ISU will most likely be in the range of a 9-11 seed.
 
I think we'll be alright. It's never as bad or as good as it seems. I would like to believe we will not shoot that consistently poor as we did in the three Orlando games against the good competition we're going to see in the Big XII again. My best guess is that those three games will be among the worst shooting percentage-wise from the free throw line and from the three point line. I hope that's the case. Milan has a good stroke and will continue to shoot well. He should shoot every time he gets a decent look. I'd like to believe Gilbert, C. Jones and Pav will be good enough. They just need to stay confident as shooting is really about confidence and your mind can't be too doubtful. Anyone who's been in that position - even if just high school basketball but you felt the indecision / weight of the shot creep in knows it's about having confidence and an irrational belief in yourself. You have to WANT the shot and be selfish when shooting it. I hope those guys keep wanting the shot as our offense and ceiling is only so high if these guys can't stretch the D and force the opposition to come out and guard them. It's easier to defend a driver like Gilbert when he's not looking at the rim and hunting his shot from 21 feet.

Back on topic, this team has great defense to rely on, great hustle and effort and I think they've got too much talent not to find a way. I wouldn't be surprised to see this team get hot and rally off a lot of wins and be safely in the Tournament and make some noise. Those first few games against lesser competition were more impressive offensively than the prior two TJ teams. Although, those teams did have bucket makers who could get hot in Brockington and Kalscheur (occasionally). We'll see...
 
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How did I miss this thread?
I vote yes, NCAA tournament bid.
Not a play-in game.
 
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