In lieu of tomorrow’s game with the Dayton Flyers, my good friend (as far as you know) Kevin Secaur, @UDFlyers, and I exchanged thoughts and hugs about the contest. I answered some of his questions over on Blackburn Review. It’s a good site, I enjoy it. I suggest you follow Kevin, both in real life and on twitter. He is really cool to follow. He has good comments, and he leaves the curtains open when he showers. Let’s get to the conversation.
Dayton has struggled with some pretty awful teams so far, culminated by the fact they nearly lost to Savannah State. What’s going on?
Chris Wright has had a lot of hype, as you mentioned earlier. How do you think he’s filled it?
I think Wright’s problems are two-fold. 1) The fan base had unrealistic expectations for him. Chris verballed to Dayton during his junior year of high school and was immediately hailed as the Basketball Jesus. He was the Chosen One, tabbed to return UD to its glory days of the ’60s and ’70s. That’s a lot to put on the shoulders of a 17-year-old kid. 2) Instead of downplaying the hype, Wright and the university have embraced and (in the opinion of many) unnecessarily encouraged it. I mean, have you ever heard of a player holding not one, but two, press conferences to announce that he will NOT be turning pro? I think Wright and his handlers could have handled things a bit better.
So, has he lived up to the hype? Not completely. However, CW is a really nice college basketball player, one that pretty much all Dayton fans are glad chose to be a Flyer.
This Flyers team hasn’t shot the 3 ball very well, outside of Paul Williams, yet, they shoot very many threes. Is it as frustrating to watch for you, as it is for me?
The Flyers play a lot of people. Does Brian Gregory’s rotation madness work?
The short is: No. And Gregory’s insistence on playing 11 or even 12 guys in past seasons has been absolutely infuriating to watch.
The longer answer is this: In a somewhat shocking turn of events, it seems that BG has actually tightened up his rotation at least early on this season. Wright and Johnson will (and should) play 30+ minutes a game. Four guards will all see significant minutes, and UD rotates three bigs pretty regularly. That’s a solid nine man rotation with freshman Devin Oliver getting playing time on a situational basis.
Dayton is 6th in offensive rebounding rate as of today. Who does the dirty work on the glass? Also, who rebounds well?
Chris Johnson might be an appropriate answer to both questions. Rumors are swirling wildly about his relationship with several Caucasian coeds. Yes, I said several.
Seriously, the Flyers rebound by committee. Wright leads the team with 8.4 boards a contest, but Devin Searcy and Johnson have the most offensive boards. Also, Dayton has been known to miss a lot of shots, and I heard that’s a key piece in the offensive rebounding puzzle.
Before 2005, Dayton hadn’t won in Cincinnati since before Ohio was a state. Now the Flyers have beaten Cincinnati twice in a row on the road. Although the game is only “semi-away,” do you still have worries about Dayton remembering they are playing an hour south and self combusting?
Seriously, Dayton has to win at Xavier sometime. Right? Right?
How many “Brian Gregory looks like Jon Stewart” jokes have you heard?
Since you don’t do predictions, what do you think the biggest key for victory is? Go Herbstreit on me.
Big ups to Kevin. Look for the preview in a little bit.
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