Colorado University Athletics
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Brooks: Boyle’s Buffs Seek To Shake ‘Slightly Above Average’ Status
December 15, 2016 | Men's Basketball, B.G. Brooks
Three non-conference games remain to tune up for Pac-12 opener
BOULDER – Mid-term exams are all but over, with fall semester grades due soon at the University of Colorado. Men's basketball coach Tad Boyle already has posted the Buffs' 10-game grade, which he's hoping can be changed. Soon.
"If I gave our team a grade right now it would be a C-plus – slightly above average. And that ain't going to get it down the stretch or in the Pac-12," Boyle said after practice the other morning in his office.
He continued: "Now, we're capable, and there's times we've functioned very well offensively and defensively but we can't do it consistently . . . to me, if there's anything consistent about this basketball team it's that we've been consistently inconsistent. That's the best way to put it."
That's how Boyle is putting it for public consumption on a university website. The way he's putting it to his team has a bit more of a sharp edge, and there's good reason for it to be cutting.
Boyle isn't an unreasonable coach who demands more of his players than they are capable of delivering. Fact is, he might demand more of himself. Outcomes such as the 79-71 loss last Saturday night at Brigham Young gnaw at him; he shouldered as much responsibility for it as was placed on his players.
"We're all in this together," he said. "One thing I can't stand is coaches who blame their players after losses. The players do what they're taught to do; if they don't do they haven't been taught. Then I've got to do a better job teaching, so I take responsibility.
"Now, do the players have to make plays? Absolutely . . . that goes without saying. But that's just the way I'm wired, I take everything so personal when it comes to Colorado basketball – our fan support, our wins, our losses, everything.
"There's nobody to blame but ourselves, nowhere to look but in the mirror. As a coach I look in the mirror and I make these guys look in the mirror. It's not always fun what you see."
What Boyle and the Buffs see in their mirrors eight days before Christmas is a team that has frequently underachieved in compiling a 7-3, totally C-plus, record. Facing forward, they see three non-conference games remaining – Saturday vs. Fort Hays State (noon, Coors Events Center), Monday at Air Force (7 p.m.), Wednesday vs. Eastern Washington (6:30 p.m., CEC) – and a New Year's
Day Pac-12 Conference opener at Utah that will be on them before they can wish one another a Happy New Year.
BETWEEN NOW AND THEN THE BUFFS have issues to address, most of which surfaced in the eight-point loss last weekend in Provo. The list starts with rebounding (of course, you knew that) but offensive inconsistency and late-game execution are also bunched near the top.
BYU out-boarded CU by 15 (46-31), which is the stuff of nightmares for Boyle and after this week's practices should be for his players. The reason for the board discrepancy? Simple, said Boyle: "(BYU) wanted the game more than we did – the 50-50 balls, obviously the rebounding. (It's) always indicative of who wants it more – always.
"You don't get outrebounded by 15 and say 'we wanted the game more than they did' or just as much. It doesn't work like that."
Then there was the absence of late-game execution in Provo. Though by no means perfect down the stretch four nights earlier against Xavier, CU – mainly Derrick White – performed well enough to upset the then-No. 13 Musketeers 68-66.
But in the final stretch against BYU, CU counted a White 3-pointer with 44 seconds left as its only field goal in the last 8:52. Recalled Boyle: "It was a tie game (61-61) at the 8-minute media timeout, and at the 4-minute media timeout we're down nine (73-64). They wanted it more and quite frankly down the stretch they executed better than we did. Their offense was better than ours."
Which is puzzling . . . . Preseason scouting reports on CU usually began with the loss of 6-10 Josh Scott then sharply turned to an offense that shouldn't suffer greatly with the return of perimeter marksmen who made the Buffs the Pac-12's top 3-point shooting team (38.9 percent) last season.
And along with the returning 3-point firepower, White and Xavier Johnson would be added to the mix. Then Dominique Collier suffers an early-season broken foot and Josh Fortune enters a late-fall funk. Things balance out, sometimes not for the best.
At BYU, CU made seven of 29 3-point attempts. "XJ" and White went 5-of-12 from beyond the arc, the rest of the Buffs 2-for-17. Fortune missed all eight of his field goal attempts – six of them from long range. CU finished at 24 percent from long distance, lowering its seasonal 3-point percentage to 33.8.
Of the Buffs' 22 errant treys at BYU, Boyle counted 17 that were "wide open . . . like being on the free throw line from the three-point line – nobody within three feet. Four (shots) were when a defender was closing out and we kind of had to get it off – not bad shots but contested. Just one (3-pointer) was a bad shot."
His story's moral: On some nights none (or not many) of the wide open shots will fall and the offense will falter. But on those nights good teams compensate by controlling the game with things within their control. Rebounding being one, defense being another.
"One's got to be exemplary if the other one is below average," Boyle said. "That's the biggest thing I'm trying to get across to our team – control what we can control. It's a great basketball lesson but a great life lesson.
"Can we control (all shots falling)? No, not as a player or a coach. You'd like to think you can. We can control taking care of the ball, not turning it over, boxing out, going to the offensive glass, sprinting the floor – those are the things we have to control."
Through 10 games, the Buffs are limiting opponents to 38.3 percent shooting from the field and are plus-5.1 in rebounding. But in its two most recent games (Xavier, BYU), CU is minus-20.
"That's a fact, Jack," Boyle said. "There's no way to explain that other than just getting out-toughed."
THE BUFFS AREN'T BEING INTRODUCED to new material; even Boyle has called his defense/rebounding mantra "a broken record." And even freshmen such as guard Bryce Peters, who has all of 21/2 months of work under Boyle on his resume, acknowledges that this team is "super-talented . . . we've got a lot of experience, a lot of older guys. We have too much athleticism to not be one of the best defenses in the Pac-12, really in the nation. We need to get better as a unit."
Peters, whose 15.6 minutes a game is tops among the three freshmen playing regularly, says his CU coaches have told him he needs to turn up the aggression – particularly on defense.
Most incoming freshmen are greeted with that demand, said Peters: "It's a mindset . . . we've all grown up playing offense mainly."
When this week and exams end, the Buffs move into a holiday break period that features hoops and little else. "Personally this is my favorite time of year . . . it's all basketball," junior wing George King said. "This is the perfect time for us to really dial in, focus on the things we need to. There's no excuse not to."
Boyle is hoping for quality practices before and particularly after a short Christmas break, although with three games in five days he's also hoping that improvement is discerned in those three contests.
"Practices are where we have to make hay and great strides," he said, "but hopefully we'll get better in the games. We're going to get better now, we're not going to wait."
Boyle wanted to exit a recently concluded four-game non-conference stretch with a 4-0 record. Instead, the Buffs emerged 2-2. He's not ready to label the final seven days of non-conference work as a period of soul-searching, preferring to call it "a good reflection time. What have we done well? What have we not done well? This is a time to reflect on where we're at. And right now we're a slightly above average college basketball team."
Asked if his coach's C-plus grade for him and his teammates was justified, King answered, "Yes, sir, absolutely . . . simple as that." And if this is not a time for soul-searching, added King, it's at least a time for serious introspection and establishing the overall identity Boyle wants.
"It was time for those things back on November the eighth or eleventh or whenever we started," King said. "And it's time for it today. It's unfortunate that we're still talking about it but that's we need to do.
"People are still preaching it and have been since the summer, since last year really. It's unfortunate, yeah, especially right now. The next thing you know we're going to be in league play (and) you don't want to go into league play still trying to do the foundational things."
No, you want to launch the Pac-12 season with your identity – Boyle's ID for the Buffs – established and your offense rolling toward consistency. Come early March a C-plus won't be a passing grade.
Contact: BG.Brooks@Colorado.EDU
"If I gave our team a grade right now it would be a C-plus – slightly above average. And that ain't going to get it down the stretch or in the Pac-12," Boyle said after practice the other morning in his office.
He continued: "Now, we're capable, and there's times we've functioned very well offensively and defensively but we can't do it consistently . . . to me, if there's anything consistent about this basketball team it's that we've been consistently inconsistent. That's the best way to put it."
That's how Boyle is putting it for public consumption on a university website. The way he's putting it to his team has a bit more of a sharp edge, and there's good reason for it to be cutting.
Boyle isn't an unreasonable coach who demands more of his players than they are capable of delivering. Fact is, he might demand more of himself. Outcomes such as the 79-71 loss last Saturday night at Brigham Young gnaw at him; he shouldered as much responsibility for it as was placed on his players.
"We're all in this together," he said. "One thing I can't stand is coaches who blame their players after losses. The players do what they're taught to do; if they don't do they haven't been taught. Then I've got to do a better job teaching, so I take responsibility.
"Now, do the players have to make plays? Absolutely . . . that goes without saying. But that's just the way I'm wired, I take everything so personal when it comes to Colorado basketball – our fan support, our wins, our losses, everything.
"There's nobody to blame but ourselves, nowhere to look but in the mirror. As a coach I look in the mirror and I make these guys look in the mirror. It's not always fun what you see."
What Boyle and the Buffs see in their mirrors eight days before Christmas is a team that has frequently underachieved in compiling a 7-3, totally C-plus, record. Facing forward, they see three non-conference games remaining – Saturday vs. Fort Hays State (noon, Coors Events Center), Monday at Air Force (7 p.m.), Wednesday vs. Eastern Washington (6:30 p.m., CEC) – and a New Year's
Day Pac-12 Conference opener at Utah that will be on them before they can wish one another a Happy New Year.
BETWEEN NOW AND THEN THE BUFFS have issues to address, most of which surfaced in the eight-point loss last weekend in Provo. The list starts with rebounding (of course, you knew that) but offensive inconsistency and late-game execution are also bunched near the top.
BYU out-boarded CU by 15 (46-31), which is the stuff of nightmares for Boyle and after this week's practices should be for his players. The reason for the board discrepancy? Simple, said Boyle: "(BYU) wanted the game more than we did – the 50-50 balls, obviously the rebounding. (It's) always indicative of who wants it more – always.
"You don't get outrebounded by 15 and say 'we wanted the game more than they did' or just as much. It doesn't work like that."
Then there was the absence of late-game execution in Provo. Though by no means perfect down the stretch four nights earlier against Xavier, CU – mainly Derrick White – performed well enough to upset the then-No. 13 Musketeers 68-66.
But in the final stretch against BYU, CU counted a White 3-pointer with 44 seconds left as its only field goal in the last 8:52. Recalled Boyle: "It was a tie game (61-61) at the 8-minute media timeout, and at the 4-minute media timeout we're down nine (73-64). They wanted it more and quite frankly down the stretch they executed better than we did. Their offense was better than ours."
Which is puzzling . . . . Preseason scouting reports on CU usually began with the loss of 6-10 Josh Scott then sharply turned to an offense that shouldn't suffer greatly with the return of perimeter marksmen who made the Buffs the Pac-12's top 3-point shooting team (38.9 percent) last season.
And along with the returning 3-point firepower, White and Xavier Johnson would be added to the mix. Then Dominique Collier suffers an early-season broken foot and Josh Fortune enters a late-fall funk. Things balance out, sometimes not for the best.
At BYU, CU made seven of 29 3-point attempts. "XJ" and White went 5-of-12 from beyond the arc, the rest of the Buffs 2-for-17. Fortune missed all eight of his field goal attempts – six of them from long range. CU finished at 24 percent from long distance, lowering its seasonal 3-point percentage to 33.8.
Of the Buffs' 22 errant treys at BYU, Boyle counted 17 that were "wide open . . . like being on the free throw line from the three-point line – nobody within three feet. Four (shots) were when a defender was closing out and we kind of had to get it off – not bad shots but contested. Just one (3-pointer) was a bad shot."
His story's moral: On some nights none (or not many) of the wide open shots will fall and the offense will falter. But on those nights good teams compensate by controlling the game with things within their control. Rebounding being one, defense being another.
"One's got to be exemplary if the other one is below average," Boyle said. "That's the biggest thing I'm trying to get across to our team – control what we can control. It's a great basketball lesson but a great life lesson.
"Can we control (all shots falling)? No, not as a player or a coach. You'd like to think you can. We can control taking care of the ball, not turning it over, boxing out, going to the offensive glass, sprinting the floor – those are the things we have to control."
Through 10 games, the Buffs are limiting opponents to 38.3 percent shooting from the field and are plus-5.1 in rebounding. But in its two most recent games (Xavier, BYU), CU is minus-20.
"That's a fact, Jack," Boyle said. "There's no way to explain that other than just getting out-toughed."
THE BUFFS AREN'T BEING INTRODUCED to new material; even Boyle has called his defense/rebounding mantra "a broken record." And even freshmen such as guard Bryce Peters, who has all of 21/2 months of work under Boyle on his resume, acknowledges that this team is "super-talented . . . we've got a lot of experience, a lot of older guys. We have too much athleticism to not be one of the best defenses in the Pac-12, really in the nation. We need to get better as a unit."
Peters, whose 15.6 minutes a game is tops among the three freshmen playing regularly, says his CU coaches have told him he needs to turn up the aggression – particularly on defense.
Most incoming freshmen are greeted with that demand, said Peters: "It's a mindset . . . we've all grown up playing offense mainly."
When this week and exams end, the Buffs move into a holiday break period that features hoops and little else. "Personally this is my favorite time of year . . . it's all basketball," junior wing George King said. "This is the perfect time for us to really dial in, focus on the things we need to. There's no excuse not to."
Boyle is hoping for quality practices before and particularly after a short Christmas break, although with three games in five days he's also hoping that improvement is discerned in those three contests.
"Practices are where we have to make hay and great strides," he said, "but hopefully we'll get better in the games. We're going to get better now, we're not going to wait."
Boyle wanted to exit a recently concluded four-game non-conference stretch with a 4-0 record. Instead, the Buffs emerged 2-2. He's not ready to label the final seven days of non-conference work as a period of soul-searching, preferring to call it "a good reflection time. What have we done well? What have we not done well? This is a time to reflect on where we're at. And right now we're a slightly above average college basketball team."
Asked if his coach's C-plus grade for him and his teammates was justified, King answered, "Yes, sir, absolutely . . . simple as that." And if this is not a time for soul-searching, added King, it's at least a time for serious introspection and establishing the overall identity Boyle wants.
"It was time for those things back on November the eighth or eleventh or whenever we started," King said. "And it's time for it today. It's unfortunate that we're still talking about it but that's we need to do.
"People are still preaching it and have been since the summer, since last year really. It's unfortunate, yeah, especially right now. The next thing you know we're going to be in league play (and) you don't want to go into league play still trying to do the foundational things."
No, you want to launch the Pac-12 season with your identity – Boyle's ID for the Buffs – established and your offense rolling toward consistency. Come early March a C-plus won't be a passing grade.
Contact: BG.Brooks@Colorado.EDU
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