How long to gel?

[MHettel]

How long will it take this team to gel? That seems to be a real question with a wide range of opinions...

Some here have declared they plan to be patient and have tempered their early expectations due to what is expected to be an extended "getting to know you" phase with this roster of so many new players.

I for one am not as concerned about this, and think there should be some urgency around the early games with no excuses....(Travis Steele makes excuses).

They way I look at it, every freshman EVER steps on the court with 12 other guys he's never played with. Many of them flourish.

Our 3 transfer players have 10 years of college experience and played in 320 career games with a 61% winning percentage while playing with a combined 47 different teammates that averaged at least 10 minutes in a season. These 3 guys will be unfazed at having new faces around them.

Claude and Boum stepped in last year with all new teammates on a team where EVERYONE had a new COACH. Didnt seem to matter.

Im not concerned about this. I think the team we see early will be pretty darn close to the team we see late, notwithstanding the NORMAL changes that occur on ANY TEAM in EVERY YEAR. I think some individuals will emerge or mature during the year, especially the young guys that are getting their first taste of competition at this level. But that is nothing unique to THIS team THIS year.

Counting Claude, 4 of our 5 starters have played 355 career college games. Plug in whoever you want into the 5th starting role.

[Xavier]

How many Xavier freshman have flourished over the years? Especially in the first half of the season?

[Xville]

Disagree. Claude and boum stepped into a situation where most of the team had just played together the year prior and had won a championship (even thought it was the nit)

This year, none of them have played together. Some are freshmen ( top 100 guys not top 10 kentucky or duke type guys), some are transfers, and some are international guys who have to not only adjust to high d1 basketball, but deal with the culture shock of being in the us.

To act like this is just the same ole same ole and something every team every year has to deal with is disingenuous imo.

[D-West & PO-Z]

Disagree. Claude and boum stepped into a situation where most of the team had just played together the year prior and had won a championship (even thought it was the nit)

This year, none of them have played together. Some are freshmen ( top 100 guys not top 10 kentucky or duke type guys), some are transfers, and some are international guys who have to not only adjust to high d1 basketball, but deal with the culture shock of being in the us.

To act like this is just the same ole same ole and something every team every year has to deal with is disingenuous imo.

Agreed.

I feel like we've seen in time and again at Xavier (other than with Steele) that Xavier teams have really improved and play better in March than December.

Plus all the injuries (not even talking about Hunter and Free) and guys needing to work back in and gel together.

Plus the start to the BE schedule is brutal. 5 of the first 9 on the road (where I don't think we will see a lot of wins this year) and one of the 4 home games is against the top 10 defending national champs. I think its very reasonable to see us open BE play 3-6. I think we will improve though and go around 10-10 in conference which I think will get us in.

I think the expectation should always be tourney bid then anything can happen. But I think this is an unusual team setup where so many were lost to draft/graduation/injury that having only 1 guy back who played last year is a lot to overcome and may take some time to gel.

[American X]

You massively discount losing both Freemantle and Hunter. This team has near zero continuity. If Xavier had either of those guys, it would be a different story.

It will take getting through the non-conference schedule and after Christmas break to gel. Purdue, Las Vegas, Houston, the Shootout, and first Big East game at SJU will be just trying to survive. If we get to Big East play with some coherence and get a .500 conference record, then we have a shot at a bid.

[MHettel]

To act like this is just the same ole same ole and something every team every year has to deal with is disingenuous imo.

Well, I thought I knew the definition of disingenuous. So I looked it up and it turns out….that I did.

There is nothing disingenuous about my view. You can disagree with me as much as you’d please.

But I’m not declaring one thing while thinking another.

I don’t think this team will need, or deserves, any built in excuses to rationalize poor play. In fact poor play hasn’t even happened. And I don’t expect it to. Like every team, every year, there will be some degree of assimilating new players. Then it clicks. If these were ALL freshmen with no experience, then I’d take a different position. But 3/5ths of our starting lineup have played with almost 50 other college players. And Claude has a full year of D1 experience.

I think the foreign guys will be just fine as well. They have played for clubs or universities or for their national teams in world events. D1 college ball will be different, but not necessarily more difficult.

Miller implemented his system right out of the gate last year and it was humming from day 1. 13 “new” guys running that system after many had failed in the Steele method.

I’m not saying that some teams (or MOST teams) that are playing together for the first time won’t take a while to gel. I’m saying THIS team has a few unique characteristics that I think will be able to accelerate the familiarity and “identity”.

[Jumpin_Jamal_Forever]

Disagree. Claude and boum stepped into a situation where most of the team had just played together the year prior and had won a championship (even thought it was the nit)

This year, none of them have played together. Some are freshmen ( top 100 guys not top 10 kentucky or duke type guys), some are transfers, and some are international guys who have to not only adjust to high d1 basketball, but deal with the culture shock of being in the us.

To act like this is just the same ole same ole and something every team every year has to deal with is disingenuous imo.

Poor choice of words. A simple difference of opinion does not make one or both parties disingenuous.

[Xville]

Maybe I’m not understanding mhettel’s point then. Seems to me that it is being implied that this situation the team is in, isn’t different than really any other year. I think that’s ignoring some pretty vast differences than prior years. I think that’s disingenuous. If i misunderstood, then my bad.

[GIMMFD]

Even with the experience of all the transfers, they haven't played TOGETHER, and it'll take some time to pick up on each other's tendencies, etc. I think there was a play where Claude whipped a pass into Ousmane with some heat behind it right by the rim, and he didn't expect it to be that hot and couldn't hold onto it.. I think some stuff like that will be common in the beginning. There's just way too many new faces to not have a little bit of a transition period, though as mentioned it does help that Miller's system is much more fluid than Steele's was. I think they'll grow and play some fun basketball by March, there's obviously some limitations, but definitely some flashes of excitement in that first game. It'll be interesting to watch them progress this year.

I will say though, this team will go as Claude goes, he's going to have to fill that Colby Jones role of looking smooth in all aspects to really get things going. If game one was any indication, he could have a monster year.

[XUGRAD80]

If the past is any indication, we can expect Miller to have settled into a lineup and rotation by the end of December. So you could say that is when they will “gel”. But even after that happens I expect them to continue to improve as a team, and as individuals. Hopefully they peak for the season come the end of February and in March.