Let's not lose hope

We should absolutely take our hats off to TCU, hairyhawk. They were light years ahead of us today. The far better team pretty much from start to finish, and in all phases. We stunk, they were elite. Pretty much sums it up.

Good question, Bay. Could be happening tonight, but my prediction is if we lose the next 2 - at Baylor and at Kensucky - which, honestly, isn't that implausible. (Especially now that UK seems to be turning their season around)

I agree fully with your 6 causal takes for yesterday, Corpus - along with the TCU side of the ledger, which is that they played lights-out and so composed in a very hostile environment. No one should underestimate how hard that was to pull off, and they did it. It's the kind of win that could shape their entire season.

As for your conclusions and self-rebuttals, I'm with you on those too. However, I think we have a real problem with your #5, as it relates specifically to Dajuan:

5. Did this team suddenly lose their ability to hit the floaters and rim shots. Some days they fall some days they don’t. We will get nothing but better in that area.

As I said in prior posts going back to the loss at KSU, Dajuan is downright terrible at finishing near the rim, and his floater shot is very low-percentage (and recently not falling). His floaters are often, to be frank, "prayer shots" - he goes into the lane not entirely sure if he's going to pass or shoot, then flings up a low-percentage floater from 6-8 feet, and often misses. Not good. And then there's his shots near the rim. First of all, I would bet that statistically this season he has made less than 20% of these shots - and he's taken a lot of them. It's always to the right (which is a major "tell" to the D and clearly in the scouting report), and he's ALWAYS way off from the rim - usually 2-4 feet away and flying out of bounds, employing a very low-efficiency high-bank shot technique. I wish your database tracked these shots for him, because I'm telling you, his shot percentage there is abysmal. And yet, because he hit it to win last year against ISU and hit it a couple other times since then, he thinks it's what he's supposed to do. NO. What you are supposed to do, as a taller point guard than Frank Mason was, is study Frank's rim-finishing layup technique all off-season, then work on that incessantly in your training. Lift more weights, get stronger, and go to the famous trainer in Lawrence that Christian and Jalen have gone to, if you need to, but for God's sake work on that crucial missing part of your game, Dajaun. Also work with coaches or trainers employing "punch pads" to rough you up as you go to the rim so you develop that crucial ability to finish the shot through contact - which Frank was an absolute stud and genius at.

There is no reason he cannot develop this as part of his game - it's all about strength, both mental and physical, practice, and repetition. (Though sadly it may not happen until the upcoming off-season, unless the coaching and training staff notices it, fixates on it, and works with him constantly on it in the here and now) We need him to be a scoring threat, and while he does have a relatively pretty 3-ball, he's been off with it of late (after that red-hot night a couple weeks ago) and will always, seemingly, be timid and reluctant to shoot it. But the answer is not low-percentage prayer shots in the form of last-second-judgment floaters and high-bank shots while flying out of bounds AWAY from the rim.

I'll leave it at this for now, since the big playoff game (Bills-Bengals) is coming on, but it's a major problem - especially when Kevin is a very problematic consistent scorer and teams are shutting down Gradey. Combine that with KJ getting into foul trouble (and making truly bone-headed foul mistakes when he DOES get into foul trouble - when he should know he can't be reaching in on shots, etc.) and it limits us to one guy. One guy! Jalen. And that's been the tale of the tape now for 2 straight games - Jalen having to try and carry us while everyone else wilts. That ain't gonna cut it.

Nervous about the next 5 games, at a minimum. If we don't fix what ails us, we could lose all 5.