Carlsberg Open 2008 - Game Results

UM Round #2 Results

UM's campaign in Carlsberg Open 2008 is now at and end. Whilst UM did well to advance into the 2nd round, the much higher standard of teams in the 2nd round really showed up and highlighted our team's weaknesses and lack of practice.

UM lost all 3 games played in the 2nd round, losing to Tham Training, YSL and Carlsberg teams.

The games highlighted our weaknesses this year in the following areas:-

1. Lack of commitment;
2. Unacceptably high turnovers;
   
3. Poor fast break execution - both primary and secondary
   
4. Poor man-to-man help defense;
5. Poor shooting percentage;
6. Poor boxing out on rebounds;
7. Slow to react to loose balls;
8. Lacking in guard "size" - frequently resulting in being "over/mis-matched" when playing man defense;
   
9. Poor zone press defense;
10. Poor (non-press) zone defense;
11. Poor execution of set offenses;
12. Lack of creativity in free flow offense - players often unsure "where to go/what to do" on half court offense
    

The games were further made more difficult by several players missing each game, so that we never had a full team in any of the games in the 2nd round and had as few as 7 players on the last game against Carlsberg. If we want to defend our MASUM championship this year, we will need a higher level of dedication and commitment from our players. If they only attend games/practices when they are "free" and have nothing else on, then we will not be successful.

At the same time, I wish to thank those players who attended the games without fail, especially those that sacrificed other commitments in favor of UMBT.

Almost all of the weaknesses highlighted above are due to lack of practice. This is both bad and good. Its "bad" in that it shows we have not had enough team practices in the last 1 1/2 semesters. Its "good" because it means we can improve and eliminate those weaknesses through commitment to attending practices going forward.

Chinese New Year is upon us and most players will be going back to home town by today or tomorrow. Consequently, no practice again this weekend. Can't be helped.

To all players and coaches : Happy Chinese New Year ... enjoy yourselves, watch the shooting DVD distributed previously, do the Air Alert Jump program and come back ready to re-commit to basketball team and individual practices.

Gong Xi Fa Cai !!