Talkin' to Takayo: Road Split, Noah and Nolan, Khamari's Growth and Charleston Preparations
Here's what the UNCW coach had to say on his Monday radio show
Following the weekend trip to the northeast, UNCW coach Takayo Siddle joined radio play-by-play voice Mike Vaccaro for another edition of his radio show on Monday afternoon.
As the Seahawks approach the midway point of CAA play, there was plenty to discuss in the big picture, as well as Siddle’s breakdown on splitting the road trip vs. Northeastern and Stony Brook.
Oh, and UNCW visits Charleston on Thursday night for the rivals’ second matchup of the season — just 12 days apart.
Here are the highlights from the conversation, and as always, you can catch the show live at Buffalo Wild Wings, watch via YouTube or listen on 95.9 The Breeze at 7 p.m.
At the 20-game mark, is it a challenge to manage your team’s bodies while you’re on the road so much?
It is the mind and the body. I think more so the mind because, like I told you on that day in between the Thursday —Saturday game, if we even went over to the gym and moved around for 10 minutes, it'd be too much for them in their mind.
So yeah, it has been a challenge, but I think we have a pretty good routine right now.
You’ve spent a lot of time in the film room and doing walkthroughs at the hotel. Is that by design?
Yeah, it's by design. As you go through the season, you're trying to figure out a good routine at home, a good routine on the road. I think we've put together a really good routine for the guys, but my main thing is on the Thursday, so getting ready for our Thursday game, Monday, Tuesdays we pretty much, we get after it. We get after it an hour, 10 minutes (or) 30 minutes, and then we taper off the back end leading into the game and we really focus on them recovering and getting the proper rest that they need and then that's at home on the road.
But it's so important that you have to let them have small wins and so what makes them happy is resting and sleeping and eating, so we try to make sure we take care of that and get 'em that proper rest and make sure we get 'em the proper stuff to fuel their body.
Having a veteran team, are you able to trust what the players are asking for on that sort of thing?
Talking to them and getting their opinion because their opinion matters more. So, me just kind of knowing certain guys, and I've been around those guys for a while, and I can tell when they need some rest.
I can tell when they're worn down, so just having a feel for the guys and me being a former player, just understanding the grind of it right now, the most important thing for us is making sure they get the proper rest.
What's the grind like for you? And again, you come off of a game, get ready for another one right away. What's the grind like for you?
Well, getting prepared for a Thursday game, it's a little different than getting prepared for a Saturday game.
Mondays are typically all about us and just making sure — whether we're coming off a win or a loss — making sure that our mentality and our approach to everything that we're doing is in the right spot, and so it's really focusing in on us and honing in on us, which makes me play catch up, have to play catch up as we're leading to our opponent on Thursday.
On the one day in between, if Friday is tough, it's tough on a head coach. You’re staying up all night just trying to just get as much information on your next opponent as possible, so you have to sacrifice some sleep for sure. For me, I don't worry about our Saturday opponent until we finish playing on Thursday. So, after that Thursday game, I'm rewatching our game and then that Friday we're talking about us a little bit and then I'm going into the prep against Charleston or whoever we're playing, and that's and that’s an all-day thing. So it's tough. It's tough, but it's fun. It's fun; it's rewarding after you win, but it definitely wears you down.
Friday after a win, Friday after a loss. What's the difference there?
So, it's normally .. I'm up to about one, two, three o'clock. It takes me a little while to decompress and then I do my little routine, my postgame stuff and then I am able to sit down and watch the game that we just played so I won't get behind.
I have to knock that out the same day and I'm usually probably sleep around three o'clock, but then that turnaround is really quick. Having that whole day on Friday is so important, so I'm getting up at six o'clock and we're starting our film for the next opponent, and I know what I got myself into, so I'm prepared for it mentally, but it's taxing for sure.
Was it tough, going from the Charleston game at home to the atmosphere on the road at Northeastern?
Yeah, we talked about it. The external factors going into that game were a little bit different than the Charleston game, so we talked about that a lot.
We talked about it being empty in there. We talked about it being a little cold in there. Locker rooms are not nice. We talked about all the external factors, but the main thing was for us to go up there and play good basketball and get better, and I think we absolutely did that. Yeah,
UNCW had 16 assists on 29 made baskets. Why was that the case?
They were so gap-heavy and they know that our two better players are drivers. I knew they would try to really pack the driving lanes down, and if we were willing passers, then we would have a lot of assists because we would get rhythm shots and I thought our guys did a really good job executing a gameplan.
On guys passing up good shots for better shots in that game…
Yeah, I continue to harp on it. Team basketball, team basketball is what's going to get us to where we want to get to and I think our guys are really understanding that over the last couple games we've had 16 assists, we've averaged over 12 over our last six games or something like that.
But playing team basketball, being willing passers and making the right basketball play is something that we harp on, and we've been doing a really good job of it lately and we need to continue to pour into it.
On the all-around team aspect of the Northeastern win…
Yeah, everybody's starting to buy into their role.
I think the two sophomores, Noah and Nolan, I think they're really impacting our team in a major way with their energy. They're fighting on the offensive glass like crazy, they're diving on the floor for loose balls, they're starting to make some shots. Those two guys are really developing the way that I want them to right now, and you sprinkle in Shemar, I thought he gave us some really good minutes. We put him in a late-half situation, and he executed it perfect. We had some fouls to give, and he fouled at the right time every time guys came in and contributed to that win.
On Nolan Hodge getting more comfortable…
Yeah, he had been going through a slump, but he stayed with his work, stayed positive I think more than anything. He got his energy in check and his toughness in check and that's kind of lifted the other part of his offensive game.
So, I'm very pleased with what he's doing right now with the way he's been playing. His minutes have gone up. He's now in our late-game and end-of-game lineup, which is huge for him when you talk about experience and then his counterpart, Noah, he's fighting like crazy.
I'm very proud of those two guys and I told them a long time ago, they're the future of the program and they have to develop at a rapid pace throughout this year and I think they're starting to hit their stride right now.
On the defensive performance vs. Northeastern, allowing 54 points…
We were locked in. We knew that they had a key player and the big boy Doherty, we had to lock in on him, but around him they had a good supporting cast and the main thing for us was making sure that we didn't let them impose their will inside the arc because 62 percent of their points came from inside the arc and we wanted to make sure that we took care of that.
So, it came with our pick and roll defense, that was huge. It came with our post defense; that was huge. So, we really locked into what we needed to do on the end of the floor. I thought really scrappy pressure was really good. Full court, half court, we really were disruptive in the game.
On being able to slow down Doherty to stop Northeastern…
Whether it's assisting on baskets or making baskets, he accounted for 34 percent of their offense and 34 percent of their points. So, we knew he's a big part of what they do, and we had to keep him in check. I thought Khamari McGriff did a really good job on him.
On getting some extra rest at the end of Northeastern for the starters…
I wanted to rest them more. I wish I could have because I think going into the game on Saturday, I could see some fatigue out of the high minute guys a little bit, but we were able to get some minutes out of some those other guys. But if I can rest those guys, that means that we have some good going out on the court.
On the Stony Brook game…
You know what, Mike? I thought we played really hard. We had 22 offensive rebounds and we won just about every 50/50 ball. We were flying around, we were playing hard — really, really hard. We played well enough to win the game, we just had some undisciplined plays that put us in a bind, and they capitalized on them, so all the credit goes to them, but I didn't sense that much fatigue overall.
I just thought maybe mentally it wore us down a little bit because we made some mistakes that we normally don't.
On Stony Brook’s size causing problems…
They were clogging the lane up with those guys and our threes, they stopped falling in a key spurt in the game and we were having to force it into the paint to try to get closer to the rim and they were just clogging it up and they have size at each position, and they went to some zone; that stymied us a little bit.
Yeah, it was difficult. It's always difficult to play against those guys, but like I said, we did enough to put ourselves in a position to win and sneak out of there with an ugly win, but they capitalize on our mistakes.
His assessment of how they were attacking the zone, getting the ball in the middle…
Normally we make the shots that we were taking. Some of 'em went in and popped out. We had open threes where KJ went and he got hot at one point and then he had some open threes that he didn't make that he normally does. We had open looks, it just didn't fall for us. But like I said with saying all of that, we were still up late with a couple chances to just seal the game off, and they made plays — they made some big plays.
On giving themselves a chance to win with the rebounding effort…
Shots weren't falling, but we were really intentional about getting on the offensive glass. I thought we outworked 'em; we had 83 attempts. That's a lot of shots. We had 25 second chance points, so we made our adjustments.
They capitalized when we made mistakes. They capitalized late and give them credit that (Tyler Stephenson-Moore) No. 14, he hit some tough shots. (Aaron Clarke) No. 5, he hit some tough shots. So, all the credit goes to them, and I think that having a tough loss like that, I think it'll help us down the road.
On going on the road in conference play, and having teams gunning for you…
Everybody. Everybody's gunning for us and each other.
This league is tough just looking at it before I came over here. It's crazy that we started off like this after we finish up with Charleston, six out of our first nine games in conference have been on the road. It's tough, it is tough. And I don't know how many people in our league and we're trying to figure this out. I don't know how many people in our league are dealing with that type of schedule on the front end or the back end, but luckily six out of our last nine will be at home and we'll be able to play in front of our crowd and obviously that's going to help us.
But winning on the road is challenging, and we've done that more times than not.
On the value of playing so many road games, and now, coming home for six of the final nine games…
There’s no environment that we're going to be spooked by. No adversity in the game that we're going to fold on. We're going to be ready for every situation, even when we get ready to go down to Charleston. Our crowd here was tremendous when we played them. They're going to have a really good crowd, but our guys will be locked in and focused on the possession that's in front of them.
Player of the Week: Khamari McGriff
He's getting better, Mike. He’s always in the gym, always in the film room. We're on him really hard. He does a lot of extra stuff to get himself ready for game night and he's gotten better over the course of the year.
If you can remember, he's had some games where he didn't play very much. He's started and I would go in a different direction, but he handled it the right way; he just kept dialing into his process. He's gotten better; he's gotten so much better over since he's been here since we first got him where he couldn't even walk straight, and then now throughout the season with this end-game experience, he's really grown, and I always say his best basketball still ahead of him.
On Khamari’s response when he was removed from the starting lineup in practice…
He's a great kid. He is raised the right way for sure, but he's bought into our culture, he's bought into what we are doing. He trusts us completely, so I should have expected that same, the response that he gave us, I should have expected it and just kind of led him into playing the way he's playing right now.
On what Khamari and Ahmard Harvey as providing in the post…
They’re starting to give us everything that we need. Obviously, we have to shore up the defense with that position, but from an effort standpoint, being able to do certain things: get on and off ball screens and have great energy, they're giving us everything we need.
On Ahmard’s progress with conditioning as he gets back from the injury…
Yeah, he’s getting more minutes. It's all really just his conditioning is really, really low right now and we have to continue to work on that with him, but he's going in there and he's talking on defense. He's grabbing some offensive rebounds for us; he's doing everything that we were asking him to do.
On what KJ Jenkins is bringing to the starting lineup…
It increases our offensive firepower from the start. It gives us a threat to go alongside of the outside threat to go alongside of Trazarien and Shykeim.
So, I love having him out there. He's really, really grown in this new role and I like what he's doing right now.
On KJ’s improved defense…
His defense has improved. He is competing and fighting a little harder defensively have to clean up some blow-bys, but he's a willing learner and somebody that cares about winning, so he'll continue to get better in that area.
On the bench and what he’d like to see develop down the stretch…
I like what Nolan's bringing to the table; he's playing really like a starter. I love what Ahmard’s bringing to the table coming off the bench. Shem has given us really good minutes.
I'd like to see Donovan get going. He was such a huge part of what we did last year; he hasn’t had a great year so far, but I love to see him get going this back half of the year and I’d love to see Nick get going a little bit. Those guys are giving me everything for the most part, but I like to see their production go up a little bit and then when we get Maleeck back here and here soon, he'll be in with that group. So, that'll make us a little bit more explosive. But those guys are doing all they can.
I'd like to see Donovan get going a little bit more.
Donovan is getting shots. When you break it down, is there anything that you see?
Like I mentioned, I talked about Nolan and how he was struggling a little bit and he got himself going; Same with KJ, they all had the same issue.
I think Donovan, everything else, the defensive side of the ball, communicating, making all the toughness plays, having great energy. I think he's lacking in those areas and it's affecting him on the other end in a major way.
If he can get those areas in check — which I know he will — if he can get those areas and check, I think he'll really light it up this back half of conference season.
Take us through the early stages of preparing for your next game vs. Charleston…
It's going to look a little different this week —especially today — than it did last week.
I think the best thing for us to do right now is just throw that last game in the trash and we won't even talk about it. I thought, like I told you, we played with great force, I thought we played extremely hard, we competed extremely hard, but the mistakes that we made that were so, I don't want them to be detrimental to the rest of our season.
So, I think it's probably important that we just throw that one in the trash and talk about these last 10 games that we have and the mentality that we need to have going into it. We have a great opportunity, great opportunity to finish really strong, so many great opportunities that's in front of us. We all need to just give everything that we have to UNCW and only worry about us winning — I think that's the most important thing. So, we'll hit on that a little bit and then we'll move on.
We'll move on and dive into Charleston personnel and get ready to go down there for a dog fight.
Along the lines of deflection stats, are there any numbers that you’re tracking that don’t show up in the traditional box score?
We chart 50/50 balls, that's something that we chart. We chart hockey assist, things like that. But 50/50 balls would be, and deflections would be the two stats that I'm always asking about to see where we are with those things. It kind of lets me know how hard we're playing. I would probably say those two things.
How many times would you say you’ve won that 50/50 battle?
I don't know. We have it stated in a computer … I know of our last six games, we've won every 50/50 battle.
On the second unit setting the tone on 50/50 balls…
They do a really good job upping our toughness; they're competing at a high level. They're throwing their bodies everywhere.
Noah's with the first group now, but he spent a lot of time with that second group, and he was really setting the tone when it came to the toughness plays. That's something in our program that it's one of our standards. We have five standards that we talk about and dominating the effort plays is one of them.
On how much he uses analytical tools like KenPom and Synergy…
I’m a KenPom guy and before we get ready to play any of our opponents, that's the first thing that I do is I crunch the numbers and try to study their numbers a little bit and KenPom can tell you a lot before you start watching film on 'em.
And also, when I do evaluations on our team throughout the year, I'm always looking at KenPom just to kind of see where we stack up in the conference, see where we stack up in the country. And I'm a big KenPom guy; not necessarily a Synergy person. I used to be, we use Synergy for certain things, but I'm more of a KenPom guy than anything.
Is there anything in particular you’re looking for in the analytics?
No, I'm just looking through their numbers to see what really stands out to me, what they do well, what they don't do so well. Those are the two things, just helps me kind of come up with the identity a little bit quicker before I start watching 'em.
Getting ready for an opponent you just played and beat recently — is that a plus or minus?
Well, I think going into this game, I don't think it really matters. I think both teams will be up for it.
We're just coming off a loss, so we better be pissed off and we beat them last time we played 'em; I know they'll be ticked off. It's a rivalry game, they're going to be ready for us. It's going to be pumped up in Charleston for sure.
So, this one's a little different. We will be ready for this one, but you ask me next week after we play Campbell, when we get ready to play 'em again at some point at their place, yeah, I will be nervous about if we're going to be up for it, going to Buies Creek and there'll be a lot of things I'll be worried about going to a game like that, but I think we'll be dialed-in now. It's just making sure we control our emotions and channel 'em the right way.
Do you still watch the same amount of tape when you’re playing a team this quickly?
I'll watch our Charleston game when we played 'em here. I'll watch that probably for the fourth time. I'll watch it again in the midst of watching it right now. Just really, really breaking it down just to see what adjustments we need to make, what adjustments they can make against us and then I'll watch it again before we play 'em.
Then I'll watch their last two games against Hampton and Campbell. Watch those games and try to get the guys ready as best as we can, but I won't go back. I mean, I’ve watched all of their games in conference play leading up to 'em when we played 'em last time. So there really isn't a lot of film for us to watch.
On making adjustments, knowing Charleston will counter what UNCW did well the first time…
Yeah, the things that we did to hurt them, they're going to counter. He's a really good coach. The things that they hurt us with, we know we have to clean those up; we didn't do everything perfect.
There were some things that they were doing that really hurt us and vice-versa. But as coaches, we have to have a counter and be ready for what could happen in the game.
How tough of a guard is Ante Brzovic?
We all need to pray. He's really good; he's a tough cover. He gets from Point A to Point B so quick; there's no wasted movement, no wasted dribbles.
He's different because he can play on the perimeter, he can shoot, he can drive it, he can pass it, he can post. He can do so many things, I don't think we can necessarily stop him from getting his points. We just have to make everything tough for him and we have to keep everybody around him in check.
On adding Campbell to the league…
Yeah, I mean I think it's good for our league. I think having another one of our rivals coming to the league, we normally play them every year that game right before Christmas break, so having them in the league is certainly something that we're looking forward to. We don't like them, they don't like us, and I know we'll be ready to go.
On the Campbell games now carrying a bigger meaning…
It does mean a little bit more; that's why we need all of our fans to come out.
I know we have a few tickets left, but we need to go ahead and buy those up and we need to pack it and show them what a really good atmosphere looks like and hopefully we can put it on 'em really good.