Game 1, 2025-26: Marshall (11/3)

[Plano Minuteman]

Way too much slop to pull this off. But definitely some exciting signs:

Carbuccia looks able to get to whatever spot on the floor he wants. Great catalyst for the offense. Hopefully other guys will be able to leverage his talents.

Banks is a better pure scorer than anyone we had last year, including Sool.

Bettiol was very active, albeit very mistake prone. Love the activity though.

[eldonabe]

I mean Marshall is a decent squad and we kind of suck again. Kind of expected a loss to be honest.

Tough to rank teams early but Massey has Umass at #240 and Marshall at #121 - umass was favored by 5.5 Points.

[MakeMullinsGreatAgain]

It's only one game but what Frank said in his post game press conference sounds like the same old excuses. Last year he complained a few times about how young they were and how teams they were playing had 23/24 year olds while we had a starting PG that was 17 yrs old - last night what was his complaint??? Said its tough when you're playing a team with 6 grad transfers - a kid in his 7th year - average age of 24 years old and two of our main guards just turned 18 - says its not easy playing against grown men??? I'm sorry - is Marshall playing with different recruiting rules??? If Frank thinks the Freshman he keeps offering are going to stick around for 3-4 years he's nuts! The reason he has been able to get these higher ranked Freshman is because teams like Marshall and others know its basically year to year and having older, stronger and more experienced roster is so much more valuable than getting the highest ranked Freshman class in the MAC/A-10. I know things won't change next year - already have 3-4 Freshman coming in and I'm sure the other kid from WMA will be coming too - he was with Martins son last night so I'm sure he's trying hard to convince him to come to UMass

[Floyd]

Way too much slop to pull this off. But definitely some exciting signs:

Carbuccia looks able to get to whatever spot on the floor he wants. Great catalyst for the offense. Hopefully other guys will be able to leverage his talents.

Banks is a better pure scorer than anyone we had last year, including Sool.

Bettiol was very active, albeit very mistake prone. Love the activity though.

Those were my impressions as well. Carbuccia has great quickness on his first step. Banks will be a big time scorer, you can see his pure shot. Bettiol is better than I thought, he can definitely help this team. Once they settle in and combinations work their way to better groupings, I think they can be decent

[InnervisionsUMASS]

Tough to win when you miss that many FTs and easy looks inside. As is the norm now, they look like a new team trying to figure it out. Long season to go, we'll see how this plays out.

[MikeUMA]

It looked like game 1 for both teams. A little sloppy, a little disjointed...

A little sloppy? 46 combined turnovers.

[MakeMullinsGreatAgain]

did anyone hear an official attendance? I know I was WAY off with my 4500 - looked to be about 2000 - maybe 2500 - no students at all - maybe 200

EDIT - ESPN updated it - 2,256

[Juice Stand]

^ Probably one of the smallest opening night crowds in a long time. There was no buzz in the building last night and the sloppy play didn't help. You could hear audible groans after all the free throw misses.

[SignMan]

FTs
Parker 5/5
Rest of team 16/31

Jack would had them stay on the Court and practice FTs for 45 minutes

[MakeMullinsGreatAgain]

^ Probably one of the smallest opening night crowds in a long time. There was no buzz in the building last night and the sloppy play didn't help. You could hear audible groans after all the free throw misses.

refs didn't help either - UMass was already in double bonus a little over 7 minutes into game - no flow at all

[69MG]

Has anyone heard why Brown didn't play? I was expecting him to be a 15-minute guy backing up both guard positions. He played a lot in both exhibitions.

[Juice Stand]

^ There was a little buzz when we jumped out to a 4-0 lead, but the refs squashed that by standing around at half court for a few minutes chit-chatting and then going to a review.

I don't blame the refs for getting us into the bonus early. Marshall was very physical. Moving screens, grabbing jerseys. I'm surprised that Banks' jersey didn't rip completely off a couple times. Not saying that Marshall was playing dirty, they weren't, they were just trying to get away with contact and holding any time they could.

[Juice Stand]

Has anyone heard why Brown didn't play? I was expecting him to be a 15-minute guy backing up both guard positions. He played a lot in both exhibitions.

Yeah, I found that odd as well. Placide got in the game before him, which surprised me.

[m626t]

FTs
Parker 5/5
Rest of team 16/31

Jack would had them stay on the Court and practice FTs for 45 minutes

Asking for a friend...when was the last Minuteman team that shot a decent % of free throws?

[inthescoop]

Has anyone heard why Brown didn't play? I was expecting him to be a 15-minute guy backing up both guard positions. He played a lot in both exhibitions.

Yeah, I found that odd as well. Placide got in the game before him, which surprised me.

Placide also came in, made an immediate impact on the offensive end, and then never got back into the game. That also surprised me.