Adjustments Coming For Commodores, But What Can Stackhouse Do?
Vanderbilt head coach Jerry Stackhouse has some work to do and he knows it. He said as much on Saturday in his post-game comments regarding the season-ending injury to his star Aaron Nesmith.
The first-year head coach went as far as to say he welcomed the opportunity he now faces in finding a new offensive approach for his squad going forward this season with Nesmith, who was the team and SEC scoring leader prior to his injury.
So what exactly can Stackhouse do with this team without his best player? That's the tricky part and the reason and part of the reason why he was hired as the head coach.
His NBA background should prove helpful in finding something the COmmodores can hang their hats on offensively for the remainder of this season.
“I welcome it. I welcome the opportunity to try to figure something else out,” Stackhouse said. “I thought we started to figure some things out, some things that we could do with the personnel that we had.
“Now we’ll look through our personnel again and see where our main strengths are and try to build some offensive rhythm with the guys and their strengths – maybe a little more slicing to the basket and things like that as opposed to being a perimeter-dominated team.”
The Commodores had little time to prepare for life without Nesmith before facing the Aggies Saturday afternoon, thus the results we saw were somewhat predictable. Let's face it, Saben Lee is now the best player on this roster, and while he is a good piece, he's not the centerpiece Nesmith was offensively.
Regardless, Lee has now become the number one scoring option for the Commodores, and the number one target for opposing defenses.
Whatever changes Stackhouse and his staff can implement, they will include trying to produce more scoring from the rest of the roster not named Lee and getting their new star more opportunities that he got Saturday against the Aggies.
The Commodores will unveil their new offense tomorrow night as they travel to Arkansas to face the Razorbacks in a 7:30 pm tipoff that can be seen on the SEC Network.
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