Hunter Erickson in the Starting Lineup

[The Miami Ute]

He’s relegated Mongolian Mike to the bench. Maybe Mike plays better coming off the bench but I’m not exactly holding my breath.

[//r00t4Utes]

Not a fan personally. I’m OK with the benching, just not the choice of starting Erickson, let him be the veteran spark off the bench.

[//r00t4Utes]

IMO, if you want shooting, you start Mason. If you want ball movement with defense and some shooting, you start Jake Whalin, and he gives about the same size as Mike S.

[The Miami Ute]

Mike just hit a 3…

[The Miami Ute]

And another one…

[Rick Walker]

Mike may be a good 6th man

[The Miami Ute]

He’s gotten microwave hot…11 points off the bench in just a couple of minutes.

[The Miami Ute]

This team…SMDH…how can a major college basketball team be so bad at FTs? Only 6 for 16 this half.

[Rick Walker]

I’m 100% confident I could out shoot this team at the charity stripe… most of them anyways

[Utopia]

10-24 for the game. The frontcourt was a combined 6-17.

Smith in the postgame presser: “We gotta be able to shoot FTs better than we did. I’m confident that we will do that. I know they’re trying.” Complete nonsense. This isn’t an aberation, it’s consistent with the talent/skill-level of the players we have (i.e. the players Smith recruited).

Career FT% of the frontcourt that shot 6-17:
Lovering 45%
Ausar 60%
Wahlin 55%
Keller 50%
Lohner 62% (not a Smith recruit)

So every Smith recruit is a career <60 FT%. All but Wahlin have also played for other schools and shot poorly there too, so it isn’t really attributable to just bad coaching by Smith; it’s moreso bad talent evaluation by Smith and recruiting low-skill/potential players.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: this frontcourt is pitifully underskilled. Not a single big that can create and finish their own shot or can make anything beyond a layup/dunk (some of them even struggle to make layups). Smith loves Wahlin, who is shooting 43% FG. That is a pathetic FG% for someone 6’10” shooting mostly layups. The only one I see any potential in is Dawes and he has been riding pine lately for some reason.

Smith is in his fourth year and has yet to recruit a single big with decent offensive skills (Brandon Carlson was a Coach K holdover).

[jshame17]

Question Uteopia,

From my perspective, this is a common theme across all basketball and is the result of the AAU take over. I’ve seen hall of fame players talk about how no players today at any level, have a pull up or mid-range game. They all chuck 3s or look for dunks. That overall skill has fallen off a cliff.

Like all things, once corporate greed injects its influence, things get destroyed for flash and making money.

What’s your take of this issue and is what we are seeing a Smith issue or broader basketball issue?

[Utopia]

I’d have to see some advanced statistics, but I highly doubt there is any significant overall decline in FT% and that it would be linked to the AAU influence.

Utah is currently ranked 340/364 in FT% (348th in 2024, 218th in 2023). This is a Utah problem. Players can still shoot, Smith just isn’t getting the ones that can.

The disappearance of the midrange game is mostly due to the influence of analytics, which have deemed midrange shooting inefficient and has emphasized 3PT, layups and FTs. You only need to make 33% 3PT to equal 50% 2PT and there are a lot of players that can easily shoot 33% 3PT. You cannot be a successful team in today’s game unless you have decent 3PT shooting (especially so in the NBA). The 3PT shot used to be called “the great equalizer”, but now it is a necessity — a primary weapon.

There are far more bigs today that can shoot 3’s than there were 15+ years ago and most players that can shoot 3’s also shoot a good FT%. Most teams today have a stretch-4 type player…but not Utah. Brandon Carlson had this skillet, but he wasn’t a Smith recruit. Carlson’s “3&D” skillset is the reason he is now on a NBA roster.

What has been corrosive about AAU is the emphasis on individual scoring talent (the 1-on-1 show-off mentality) and not developing an all-around/team-game skillset. That’s the difference between US and European players — players like Jokic and Doncic don’t get produced in the AAU system. US-grown players want to be social media celebrities and NBA teams, agents and brands want flashy “wow factor” superstars that they can market.

[The Miami Ute]

Great post. Please contribute more at your convenience.

[Kellso]

Years ago I coached a 13u comp team. They hit 68% in game FTs. They were not happy about it. I can’t imagine what a college team feels about a sub 50% FT game. As a coach I would be sick.

[chinngiskhaan]

I will beat this drum until I die: No college level basketball player should ever have a career FT shooting percentage below 70%, and no team in any game should shoot below 70% from the line. Its the same damn shot every damn time. There is no excuse for missing. I’ve been able to hit 85-90 out of 100 consistently since I was like 14, and I haven’t played in an actual basketball game (even pickup) for 5 years, and haven’t played organized ball since 2006. The only reason for ineptitude at the free throw line is a lack of practice. In games, missing free throws is a lack of proper conditioning, and a lack of FT practice. Everyone on the team that can’t hit 8 out of 10 with the mfing eyes closed needs to be putting up 500 a day until they get there. I don’t care how s**tty your mechanics are, if you do it enough times you should be able to figure out how to make it go in consistently.

I’m 100% confident I could learn to hit 75% of my free throws kicking them aussie punt style if I had a year to work on it.

If I were a HS basketball coach, I would not allow anyone on my team to get minutes if they couldn’t put in the effort to learn to hit 75 out of every 100 foul shots they took.

[Hahnenwk]

I agree about the free throws. They can’t give away ten points a game.

[Charlie]

Men are bigger and stronger on the BB court than the women, however, the lady utes shoot FT better than the men. How could there be a reason? Our ladies were 78% at the FT last year. To solve this problem have a mid week free throw contest between the men and women, the winner each week gets preference over the basketball resources for the following week. Do this and problem solved. Make it about something the players and coaches care about.

[The Miami Ute]

That’s a good idea Charlie. You have to wonder how much practice, if any, the MBB does on their FTs.

[Hahnenwk]

So Hunter had his game and got his start. Big mistake. The Shark will start most of the season or Smith doesn’t deserve to come back.

[GameForAnyFuss]

It was actually hilarious to see Hunter get the start and lay one of the biggest eggs I’ve ever seen. Meanwhile, Shark comes off the bench and fills up the stat sheet. Exact opposite of the previous game.

Maybe the solution is to have them alternate starts and just expect whichever one comes off the bench to have a great game.

[The Miami Ute]

I wish someone would do some research and see how many more games Utah would have won over Smith’s career if the team averaged 75% from the line. The one game that will stay with me until I die is the 3 OT loss to Zona last season where the team only shot 47% from the line. I was at the game last night, and I heard enough grumbling from the crowd around me about the free throw shooting to perceive that it’s well on its way to becoming a meme.

[Utefanbybirthandchoice]

What would you complain about if they made 76% of their free throws. You never have anything positive to say.

[Utefanbybirthandchoice]

What would you complain about if they made 76% of their free throws. You never have anything positive to say.

[The Miami Ute]

LOL. It’s better to complain about obvious issues than to be a fanboy with blinders on who has nothing original or worthwhile to say. You strike me as a guy that, if the Utes shoot 40% on FTs for a game, you’re happy because it wasn’t 39. Here’s a recommendation, instead of hanging on my every word, how about you put some original content on this site.

[utefansince79]

Hunter seems to get on fire a few times each month. Hopefully will have a few of those 80% from behind the arc games in the Big12. Most times he misses most of them but does work hard out there which I appreciate.

That epic game against Arizona last season where missed FTs doomed us was crushing in that not only did we eventually go down after 15 extra minutes, but we had nothing in the tank for ASU a few nights later which was a game we should have won comfortably.

[The Miami Ute]

I don’t want to harp on a subject, but Utah followed their 47% FT rate versus Zona with a 46% versus ASU. And, one thing we forget, is that a lot of these missed FTs are the front ends of 1 and 1s, meaning they’re leaving a lot more money on the table than what the stats show

[Gilly Boy 94]

not trying to bag on the kid……but this is a very clear indication of where the utah bball program is. how things have digressed over the years.

[The Miami Ute]

Digressed or regressed?

[Author]

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