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Willard's Timeouts

400SOAVE

All American
Jan 24, 2009
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SHU was on fire yesterday. They were on the roll. They were on a big run where everything was going right on both ends of the floor.

With 12:38 left in the second half, Whitehead hit a 3-pointer to put the Pirates ahead by 19, 61-42.

So what does Willard do? He immediately calls a timeout.

End of the run. End of the rally. Momentum killed.

The Pirates proceed to play like total krap for extended parts of the rest of the game. Coincidence? I think SHU fouled on something like 10 of Creighton's next 12 possessions. And they suddenly could not score.

Why does Willard do that? They were 38 seconds from the next media TO.
 
Regarding timeouts, what kills me sometimes about them is when a player calls one instead of trying to make a play, when keeping a timeout is more valuable than calling one. But who's to say I'm right? I'm not on the court.
 
Some posters love to harp on the "Vocal Minority" on the board. For the millionth time, just because we won doesn't mean there can be no criticisms made of the game and how it was played or coached. Do you think the coaches go home and never talk about a game after it was played because they got a "W"?

It seems like the hype train gets rolling here after every win. Willard's "elite" status gets confirmed, and the man is beyond reproach. I'm just waiting for the next COY thread to get posted.

400 didn't make a disparaging statement about a coach or player (which would still be okay in my mind as this is a fan message board). He/She asked a legitimate question about coaching decisions.

Nothing wrong with the question at all.
 
I don't remember that at all, I thought creighton called timeout then.
 
Willard calls a time out in that spot (right before the twelve minute or eight minute media time out) in just about every game this year. So I wasn't surprised.
 
SHU was on fire yesterday. They were on the roll. They were on a big run where everything was going right on both ends of the floor.

With 12:38 left in the second half, Whitehead hit a 3-pointer to put the Pirates ahead by 19, 61-42.

So what does Willard do? He immediately calls a timeout.

End of the run. End of the rally. Momentum killed.

The Pirates proceed to play like total krap for extended parts of the rest of the game. Coincidence? I think SHU fouled on something like 10 of Creighton's next 12 possessions. And they suddenly could not score.

Why does Willard do that? They were 38 seconds from the next media TO.
I'm not sure what run you are describing, but when IW hit the three you mention, the Pirates had missed 5 shots in a row with a pair of DG FT's in the 3+ mins prior. CU had trimmed the lead from 22 down to 16 when IW made it a 19 point game. Is that the run his TO stopped? After the TO, I think the sloppy play was more related to what DG was doing. I really like DG, but yesterday he wasn't playing his best. The two attempts before and the two after IW's three were DG misses. He never got back in the game after that sequence.
 
Some posters love to harp on the "Vocal Minority" on the board. For the millionth time, just because we won doesn't mean there can be no criticisms made of the game and how it was played or coached. Do you think the coaches go home and never talk about a game after it was played because they got a "W"?

It seems like the hype train gets rolling here after every win. Willard's "elite" status gets confirmed, and the man is beyond reproach. I'm just waiting for the next COY thread to get posted.

400 didn't make a disparaging statement about a coach or player (which would still be okay in my mind as this is a fan message board). He/She asked a legitimate question about coaching decisions.

Nothing wrong with the question at all.
Nothing wrong with the question, as long as it makes sense. I don't think it does, read my analysis in my other post.
 
So if he does it all the time, I wonder what has happened in the past all those other times he called a time out? Worth checking out, especially if I'm Willard. A sample of one instance doesn't say very much. Other than gut instinct, hard to prove cause and effect of calling a time out. But maybe 400 has something there. In my mind, there are just so many variables in a game, to isolate any one decision as a reason behind the level of play that follows is a hard thing to do.
 
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Bluebeard, up until that TO, the entire second half consisted of mostly SHU runs.

If you agree with a TO at that point, so be it. Perhaps Willard wanted to give the players two TOs in a short period?

It's just very unusual. Willard has been doing it since his first year at SHU. Perhaps he also did that at Iona?

The only other coach who I've seen do that in years was during a game earlier this season when Wojciechoski called a TO after a Marquette score. I immediately thought of Willard.

It's funny because people have commented but nobody has stated the reason he calls TOs after a score.
 
This is funny. Watching the game, I immediately said, "great timeout" when he called it at that moment. The offense was starting to look stagnant (only one field goal in the 4 minutes prior to Whitehead's triple). It was a good timeout to settle them down and refocus on the task at hand. Creighton was on a 10-4 run before Whitehead made that shot.

Unfortunately it didn't work as our offense remained stagnant as we were sitting on the lead and hoping the clock just wound down, but it wasn't a bad idea at all.
 
Bluebeard, up until that TO, the entire second half consisted of mostly SHU runs.

So five missed Pirate FG's to you during which CU scored 8 points, is a SHU run? I just don't get why you think the " entire 2nd half consisted of SHU runs up to that time", it wasn't. Willard wanted to talk to the team, his TO had nothing to do with stopping a run, as you stated. That's just not true. Read the play by play if youn't believe it. You are trying to point out something that Willard did wrong, that caused the team to start playing badly. They already were playing bad at that time.
 
This is funny. Watching the game, I immediately said, "great timeout" when he called it at that moment. The offense was starting to look stagnant (only one field goal in the 4 minutes prior to Whitehead's triple). It was a good timeout to settle them down and refocus on the task at hand. Creighton was on a 10-4 run before Whitehead made that shot.

Unfortunately it didn't work as our offense remained stagnant as we were sitting on the lead and hoping the clock just wound down, but it wasn't a bad idea at all.
I think he pulled Gordon at that timeout as well. I thought that it was a great TO because we stopped sharing the ball and Creighton was playing better. I think Coach wanted to talk defense there.
 
This is funny. Watching the game, I immediately said, "great timeout" when he called it at that moment. The offense was starting to look stagnant (only one field goal in the 4 minutes prior to Whitehead's triple). It was a good timeout to settle them down and refocus on the task at hand. Creighton was on a 10-4 run before Whitehead made that shot.

Unfortunately it didn't work as our offense remained stagnant as we were sitting on the lead and hoping the clock just wound down, but it wasn't a bad idea at all.
We were playing poorly before the TO as you say. Offense was not humming at all.
 
Some posters love to harp on the "Vocal Minority" on the board. For the millionth time, just because we won doesn't mean there can be no criticisms made of the game and how it was played or coached. Do you think the coaches go home and never talk about a game after it was played because they got a "W"?

It seems like the hype train gets rolling here after every win. Willard's "elite" status gets confirmed, and the man is beyond reproach. I'm just waiting for the next COY thread to get posted.

400 didn't make a disparaging statement about a coach or player (which would still be okay in my mind as this is a fan message board). He/She asked a legitimate question about coaching decisions.

Nothing wrong with the question at all.

Coach is having a good year. Why continue to harp on the negative? Willard totally out coached McDermott yet OP finds it necessary to zero in on a negative. Why?
 
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McDermott is a very good coach. Milliken loves killing us. Harrell Jr played awesome in the second half after not playing in the first. Watson still went for 14 and 6 (I believe).

Yes our Offense went down the tubes a bit... But CU is a solid team with a good coach playing at home... They finally stood up to us and made it a game.
 
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This is funny. Watching the game, I immediately said, "great timeout" when he called it at that moment. The offense was starting to look stagnant (only one field goal in the 4 minutes prior to Whitehead's triple). It was a good timeout to settle them down and refocus on the task at hand. Creighton was on a 10-4 run before Whitehead made that shot.

Unfortunately it didn't work as our offense remained stagnant as we were sitting on the lead and hoping the clock just wound down, but it wasn't a bad idea at all.

I do recall that now, and I had this exact same thought, and shared it with my Dad at the time, and my Dad agreed too. And I agree, it was more about settling Creighton down at the time, as they had started making the run and speeding up the game which is something we did not want to do with such a big lead.
 
Interestingly, Dave Popkin (whom I consider very knowledgeable about basketball) immediately said what a good decision that timeout was, especially with the TV timeout coming up in 38 seconds. I suppose that's what a message board is for - an outlet for fans' opinions - but so many opinions, like this one by 400, supposes knowledge, either of basketball or of this team's inner workings in particular that he simply doesn't have. Why not just trust the coach to do what only he knows has to be done in that moment? You'd be so much happier in life ...
 
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Boston, why don't we shut down the message board so people won't comment and start a discussion.

We'll start a board and allow only certified D1 coaches to comment. We'll also allow only people who are actually part of the team. That way only inner knowledge will be discussed.

That fact is that Willard has been calling these TOs after a score the entire six years he's been here. It seems to be part of his coaching style.

There must an overall reason, and also a game-specific reason.

Boston, I assume you will no longer comment on this board unless you are one of the SHU coaches or players.
 
I will admit that occasionally the coaches substitution and timeout patterns baffle me. However, in this case, I believe that a timeout was warranted. The play in the four minutes before IW made the three were very ragged and the team seemed to be losing focus. Better to take the timeout and settle them down then continue playing like that.
 
My reaction to that time out was that it was specifically geared towards IW. He sits during the quick time out. Then he misses roughly a minute of playing time beginning with us on defense. We then go into the agonizingly long media time out. Net result is IW gets 5 or 6 minutes rest and only misses less than a minute of pt.
 
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Boston, why don't we shut down the message board so people won't comment and start a discussion.

We'll start a board and allow only certified D1 coaches to comment. We'll also allow only people who are actually part of the team. That way only inner knowledge will be discussed.

That fact is that Willard has been calling these TOs after a score the entire six years he's been here. It seems to be part of his coaching style.

There must an overall reason, and also a game-specific reason.

Boston, I assume you will no longer comment on this board unless you are one of the SHU coaches or players.

A lot of us are a little wary of the anti-Willard rants that ruined this Board at the end of last season. Most of are not Willard fans; however, we just want to enjoy the Season without the constant spewing of negativity and venom. Yes, it's fair game to question his strategies and coaching on this Board. However, we may have found your criticisms agenda driven since it followed such a solid win and coaching performance. However, you have the right to post your opinions and so do we.
 
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Coach is having a good year. Why continue to harp on the negative? Willard totally out coached McDermott yet OP finds it necessary to zero in on a negative. Why?

For one thing, questioning an in-game strategy is hardly "zeroing in the on the negative". Zeroing in on a negative, to me, would look like someone posting "Why would Derrick Gordon ever shoot a 3 in the Creighton game, he shoots poorly from 3".

Even that could be phrased in a way that sparks a discussion about his form or positioning in the offense, but it would be focusing in on something that is obviously a player weakness, while ignoring that DG does a million good things that make his contributions more than outweigh his weakness. (This was not an attack on DG, I think he is helping "next-level" this team).

All coaches have "go-to" things they do with respect to substitutions and time-outs. There is nothing wrong with questioning the wisdom of that kind of decision whether the Coach is KW or Coach K.
 
A lot of us are a little wary of the anti-Willard rants that ruined this Board at the end of last season. Most of are not Willard fans; however, we just want to enjoy the Season without the constant spewing of negativity and venom. Yes, it's fair game to question his strategies and coaching on this Board. However, we may have found your criticisms agenda driven since it followed such a solid win and coaching performance. However, you have the right to post your opinions and so do we.
I WANT to be a Willard fan. And I completely agreed with past criticism and was very skeptical that he was gonna change my mind. I WAS always happy to see the players speak highly of him. They are never gonna bad mouth the coach, but the praise can be more muted. And I know the two colossal collapses under his hand, hell I will never forget them. But he is doing a good job, and as I watched Saturday, I saw a well coached team and a good coaching performance, great plan, great execution.
 
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Boston, why don't we shut down the message board so people won't comment and start a discussion.

We'll start a board and allow only certified D1 coaches to comment. We'll also allow only people who are actually part of the team. That way only inner knowledge will be discussed.

That fact is that Willard has been calling these TOs after a score the entire six years he's been here. It seems to be part of his coaching style.

There must an overall reason, and also a game-specific reason.

Boston, I assume you will no longer comment on this board unless you are one of the SHU coaches or players.
400 - I don't know what your last sentence means, but let me clarify my comment (and I'm doing so as a former college coach). There are so many reasons for decisions like TO's that fans don't understand because they are not close to the team, either in that game or as a program. My guess is that he saw, as I did and probably as you did, that we had been ragged and tired and losing the spread, leading up to that big basket. This is the best time to call a TO when the flow is positive to reestablish what they're trying to do both on O and D. Your assumption is that Creighton went one a mini-comeback BECAUSE we took the TO. No logical connection. All we know is that it happened AFTER our TO. no doubt I am reacting to the steady flood of negative criticism toward KW. I've got my doubts like many posters, but I think we ought to avoid constant nit-picking.
 
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