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Is anybody else concerned about team chemistry with Rivers joining the team? I'm just not getting the warm fuzzies as far as his attitude goes. Is it just me? He comes off pretty egotistic, bless his heart. We've had some pretty big egos before, but nothing quite this blatant. A fair amount of appropriate cockiness is one thing. This seems quite another. Krzyzewski is a master at handling this sort of thing. Sure hope he's given this some thought.
Love, Ima

Ima Facultiwyfe wrote:Is anybody else concerned about team chemistry with Rivers joining the team? I'm just not getting the warm fuzzies as far as his attitude goes. Is it just me? He comes off pretty egotistic, bless his heart. We've had some pretty big egos before, but nothing quite this blatant. A fair amount of appropriate cockiness is one thing. This seems quite another. Krzyzewski is a master at handling this sort of thing. Sure hope he's given this some thought.
Love, Ima

I've had the same thought, I must admit. Sure hope we're wrong.

ArkieDukie wrote:

Ima Facultiwyfe wrote:Is anybody else concerned about team chemistry with Rivers joining the team? I'm just not getting the warm fuzzies as far as his attitude goes. Is it just me? He comes off pretty egotistic, bless his heart. We've had some pretty big egos before, but nothing quite this blatant. A fair amount of appropriate cockiness is one thing. This seems quite another. Krzyzewski is a master at handling this sort of thing. Sure hope he's given this some thought.
Love, Ima

I've had the same thought, I must admit. Sure hope we're wrong.

I know one thing about K. If you aren't a team player, no matter how good you are, you sit on your ass. If Rivers puts himself before the team, he will ride the pine. Also, he will have to deal with more experienced players on his team, and hopefully learn from them. IF they don't feel his vibe as a teammate, he won't be have many opportunities to be cocky. I think the upcoming trip and games will be good for everyone, I have no doubt that K will put the team on the floor that works best. I also have no doubt that he will be preaching humility, he's always been excellent at that. He has said in so many words so many times that you can't brag until you are a champion.

I'm not worried about team chemistry because Austin Rivers has proven himself to be a good teammate when surrounded by other talented players. Go over to the USABasketball website and check out his statistics from last summer's U18 FIBA Americas Championship:

http://www.usabasketball.com/photos/10_mu18_stats.pdf

Rivers averaged 20.2 points per game, while attempting 12 shots per game. Or look at the box score for the Nike Hoop Summit:

http://www.usabasketball.com/mens/hoopsummit/stats.html

where Rivers scored 20 points on 11 shots. For comparison, last season Nolan Smith averaged 15.3 shots per game and Kyle Singler 13.75 shots per game. Rivers will be fine because he will be on the court alongside extremely talented players such as Seth Curry, Andre Dawkins, Ryan Kelly, Mason Plumlee, Miles Plumlee and Tyler Thornton. I expect Rivers will be our first option on offense but he will not be a "me first" ball hog.

Comforting words BG, but I'm thinking more along the lines of dorm living day to day with the likes of nice people like Dawkins, the Plumlees, etc. who haven't "nicknamed" themSELVES or asked for a jersey number that would make them stand out from the rest. How willing is Rivers to be a friend? Can he take a joke? In the pros, guys don't have to be friends. Each goes his way after a game. The camaraderie of a college team matters a LOT. I hope I'm just being a worry wart, but I haven't seen that side of him.

Love, Ima

More words of comfort...trust in Coach. I don't believe he's at the point in his career where he is of so gambling a nature as to take on a problematic 'project' player in need of much humility. The confidence in his own ability, I believe, will turn out to be a very good thing.

I too have some reservations about what Austin may bring to the team as far as attitude and ego, but you guys are spot on with this: Trust Coach... If anyone knows how to manage people at this level and age, it's Coach K. Still concerned, but less freaked out because of who we have at the helm.

As smart and accomplished as he is, I still am not convinced he knows how to coach in this "one and done" era. As great a mind as he is, he still has to adapt and adapt quickly to this.

Motivating is his strong suit. But it's easier to motivate a pride of lions who are all on the same page in the NBA or a passel of college players who all buy into the Duke system and love learning and being together for the long haul than it is this mixture of guys with varying goals.

He didn't do it very well last year (probably his worst coaching year ever), but if anybody can learn to do it he can. However, when does he just get tired of it? Just sayin'. I know, I know. I'm just somebody's grandmother for heaven's sake so don't take me too seriously. I just worry. It's my job!
Love, Ima

Ima Facultiwyfe wrote:He didn't do it very well last year (probably his worst coaching year ever), but if anybody can learn to do it he can.

I'm not sure it is fair to label last season a "bad coaching year" seeing as Coach K rebuilt the whole offense around Kyrie Irving and then lost the superstar after eight games. However, perhaps you are right and the "bad coaching year" label is justified because Coach K made the decision to build the offense around a one and done freshman. I'll have to sit around and ponder your wisdom over a couple of Brown Ales.

Ima Facultiwyfe wrote:However, when does he just get tired of it? Just sayin'. I know, I know. I'm just somebody's grandmother for heaven's sake so don't take me too seriously. I just worry. It's my job!
Love, Ima

We always take you seriously! And besides, I'm just somebody's grandfather for heaven's sake.

Bob Green wrote:

Ima Facultiwyfe wrote:He didn't do it very well last year (probably his worst coaching year ever), but if anybody can learn to do it he can.

I'm not sure it is fair to label last season a "bad coaching year" seeing as Coach K rebuilt the whole offense around Kyrie Irving and then lost the superstar after eight games. However, perhaps you are right and the "bad coaching year" label is justified because Coach K made the decision to build the offense around a one and done freshman. I'll have to sit around and ponder your wisdom over a couple of Brown Ales.

Ima Facultiwyfe wrote:However, when does he just get tired of it? Just sayin'. I know, I know. I'm just somebody's grandmother for heaven's sake so don't take me too seriously. I just worry. It's my job!
Love, Ima

We always take you seriously! And besides, I'm just somebody's grandfather for heaven's sake.

I always take both of you seriously!

Ima, I hadn't thought of this as a "bad coaching year" until you mentioned it. IMO Coach K does a brilliant job of treating each season as its own entity and building around the strengths of that particular season's roster. It's not the first time he's had to start from scratch in mid or late season, and it certainly won't be the last. The only "hindsight is 20-20" issue I have with last year's team was letting Kyrie return for the tourney. I think it disrupted the flow a bit - the team never really had a chance to re-gel with him in the picture. JMO. With that being said, I don't think anyone was going to beat AZ on that particular day.

I think K did a fine job of coaching last year as he lost, arguably, their best player and a PG, at that, and had to switch players' roles. They adapted wonderfully and Nolan was ACC POY. When KI came back after many, many thoughts he would or was done, what seemed like a tough decision (it wasn't because K was going to play KI as soon as he could) was made and Arizona played a mind-blowingly awesome game. We had no answer to stop Derrick Williams, period.
We've had these types of games before when another team just plays out of their minds to beat us. I'm not so concerned at all with Rivers as I am as to which big man is going to play like one each and every night out. I personally think Ryan Kelly could be the answer. Just my .02 I still peruse over here from time-to-time.

Chuck "preparing for Champions Tour qualifying this fall" Taylor

To me, the only question about the job done last year surrounds bringing Kyrie back for the tournament after being out for so long.

Please don't take this the wrong way (I'm not trying to be ugly ), but your concern seems to be colored by what has been said about Rivers - particularly by our rivals down the road. That being said, color me unconcerned. One of two things will happen - he'll fit in and be a team player for the year he's in college, or he'll sit on the bench for the year he's in college. Most of what you hear is blown way, way out of proportion. I bet you don't hear about any of the charity work he's done, just that he wants to beat bron-bron. You don't read about his assists, just how many 3's he hit. As far as being friends with other members of the team, the only thing I can point at is twitter accounts - I follow all our players and I frequently see tweets between Rivers and the other guys (well, primarily his classmates) where they talk about where they are together, what they did, where they are eating, etc.

Now I'm not saying he doesn't have an ego, and it may very well be as big if not bigger then any other player under Coach K. But can you imagine if JJ or Laettner had a twitter account prior to enrolling at Duke? Or internet blog entries, or videos that go viral the minute they hit the internet? Odds are we'd have the same type of post popping up.

To me a bigger concern for next year is how young the team is and who is going to step up and be a leader. Hopefully some of that will be sorted out in China.