“There was no effort to play game-ready lineups. They didnt coach the game to be game-ready, and it was more of a show for a crowd than anything” This game definitely was taken very seriously by the staff. It’s was not a show for the crowd game. I’m not saying you are wrong, just trying to understand what you mean.

And let's just focus on offense to illustrate the point, but obviously it only compounds when you add defense, transition and situational work. On offense let's say your playbook consists of 10 sets (thats a low number, but to keep it simple, let's say 10). Out of those 10 sets let's say you have 5 plays. So in all thats 50 plays. I came from the same coaching tree as that Duquesne staff. (I lived with one of their current assistants for a month while I was looking for housing in Akron). They taught me a lot of what I know about play design and building your playbook. You have to have at least 2 counters for every play you have. Your opponents watch film and if you arent able to adjust in-game then your plays are useless no matter how good you run them. So now you have 50 plays and (at least) 2 counters for each play...so 150 different looks/actions. When you are prepping for the season you cant move on to any counters until they learn how to run the play it originates from. So already that cuts your playbook down to 1/3 of what theyll eventually be capable of doing. Let's say you have an even 100 hours available for just offensive development. Setting aside the largest portion of that should be for skill development, let's say you put it all into play development. If you gave equal time to all 10 sets, you would have 10 total hours to teach 5 plays. 2 hours per play. Obviously this is ove we the course of the last 3 weeks so we are talking about ~7 minutes per practice. If you go the route of choosing to give them all 50 plays, theyre not going to run them very well with only 7 minutes of practice each day for 3 weeks. So then let's say you decide to cut out half the plays because you rarely call them (mostly situational). Now youre up to a whole ~15 min. Not bad, but not great with just 3 weeks of work. So now you get to this exhibition game. You have about 15% of your playbook and the team runs those plays probably inconsistent at best. You could choose to only run the plays you know that they run well. That gives you the best chance of winning right? Well, what it doesnt give you is what is most important...film to show how defenses that vary from your own will expose tendencies you've had in practice. So you want to get as much film in as possible against those looks that youve put in. Whats the best way to get in a lot of film in a game that is maxed out at 40 min? Run a lot of plays. Dont back it out when the game is close. Dont think about what needs to be done to counter what the defense is doing. Just run plays. Data. You need data. The game was 82.5 possessions. That's not only WILDLY above the pace that MY normally plays, but its also above the pace that any team played last season. That is by design, but also goes against your own philosophy. Chris mentioned below but they also werent making substitutions and lineups based on game-ready situations. There were a few times where a PG came in for a post, or a post for a wing, but they didnt change their style of play when making those subs...they just wanted to see what that lineup looks like. Making this team the most ready it can possibly be IS taking this game seriously. That does not mean they cared even a tiny bit about the score or the situation other than to give them the data they need to continue teaching.

And I’m sure you covered it at some point, but was his loss this late in the calendar going to end up being a big deal for MY?

There was a lot of talk about when Frazier left that maybe he was taking with him the defense, but this is precisely why you don't have an OC and DC like football. No matter who leaves the philosophy will always be the same

And we don’t have the talent to dominate the 9th best team in the A10. That is at least a little depressing…

In their conference. That, again is the national media's generally uninformed guess. There's been plenty of b'ing & m'ing on here about where they put the Hokies in the ACC.

I bet Duquesne scored 15 or so off turnovers. And they were mostly the sloppy kind of turnovers. Turnovers were the big issue in the first scrimmage, too.

Better clean it up !! This is going to be "Mike Young Team" So many accolades on here to be top 10 team and on ! Are we setting up to have another disappointing sport? Have to prove it on the court and keep things simple and make it fun for the team!

Yeah, he had five. But even if he had zero, we still would have had 14. Besides turnovers, I think the main issue today was Neo trying to do too much. He's adjusting. New system. Different type of competition. He didn't do a good job of letting the game come to him. I was surprised he started at PG today. I figure when the real games start it will be Hammond. And the other issue was I think Tech probably had to play Lawal at the 5 too much because both Gurdak and Hansberry were in foul trouble. Dorn didn't dress, I assume because he has to sit out the first game, so they wanted to give all his minutes to Gurdak. ** Edited by Chris Coleman at 10/25/2025, 9:03:15 PM

It was really physical 4 technicals in first half alone. Wonder if euro ball isn’t as physical or not allowed to play defense like the duques did today. Neo was very uncomfortable it looked to me.

The way the Duquesne staff approaches the season is to put in a very small amount of sets with the majority of the time going to the heavy lifting actions theyll do. So they are more proficient early on than teams who are looking to reach their ceiling at the end of the year. This is because at Akron (and Duquesne for the most part) we played in a 1-bid league. So the quality wins you pick up are front-loaded...not back loaded like VT and the ACC. They also have a huge advantage in experience. John Hugley is in his 187th year of college basketball after being All-ACC as a r-Soph three years ago. Three of their other 4 starters were with Duquesne last season, including 2 of which have been at Duquesne their whole careers and bow theyre a junior and a senior. Has nothing to do with talent and everything to do with who had the right concoction of circumstances to be good on that particular day. If it were a pick up game VT wins. If it were a game that mattered, VT wins. It was neither of those and VT happened to lose and the only people who care are fans who are reading too much into it

about quality wins tho is this..I hear you on the opportunity to get some in the back of the schedule, the ACC slate. But I feel like the way the system is setup for programs like us is - the ACC is not the SEC of B1G, there simply aren't as many Q1 opportunities as those two leagues get (last year)..so we HAVE to win some of these OOC games in Nov and Dec. I don't know where Providence is gonna wind up in the NET, St. Joe's, Colorado State, St. Mary's (if we see them), S Car, Mason..but I feel like we have to win several of those for the "resume" and when chemistry takes a month to form, when we don't get those W's. Talk me off the ledge please on the scheduling front when it comes to having an at large-worthy resume. I just don't like how the system leading to Selection Sunday at larges is setup where it favors programs like ours that -tend- to be on the bubble every year at best.

OOC, and cutting corners so that youre your most prepared early on with little room for growth during the season When the season starts it gets a lot harder to teach. You can refine, but the majority of your teaching is done through film If you lay a proper base and then add to the base, your capacity for growth increases because all youre doing is adding to the basic knowledge youve already taught For example... Let's say you put in an action where the primary read is a dribble handoff and empty the strong side so its essentially just a 2-man game. If youre looking to be your best at the end of the year, you will periodically add the counters to this as the season goes along. You stay ahead of the film work other teams do and get easy looks as you add on. Its easier for the players because they know the basic action by now and theyre just adding a counter. If you are Duquesne, you add the action and the counter so you can be good early on, but you might run a lot less actions so you dont overload your players. So Duquesne might have had 20 plays yesterday, but if 10 were actions and 10 were counters then they would be more prepared to win that particular game. VT could also have 20 plays, but if theyre all basic actions that will be added onto later, then you'll have a higher ceiling than Duquesne, but be more susceptible to losing any one game. VT should have a solid 80% or so of their teaching done by the time the first big game comes around. Should that be 100% if you want to give yourself the best shot? Sure. But you would then sacrifice growth for the conference games where the quadrant per week is much higher.

explanation has made me feel a little bit better.

Thx for the response. Understood.

When they needed a basket late, they took out Hammond and his 22 points. In a real game, you most likely don't take out your leading scorer.