Mens basketball Assistant Coach Josh Postorino answered questions from the UDPride staff as well as questions submitted by UDPride fans a few weeks ago. Some of the questions were tough yet Coach Postorino took each of them head-on and gave honest answers and explanations to the Flyer contingent.

Why don’t the Flyers hedge when screened?

We play screens many different ways; hedging is one of our options. But the way that we play ball screens changes with each team you play. There are many factors that go into playing them a specific way – who sets the screen, how quick are they, do they step back and shoot after screening, who uses the screens and what are his strengths and weaknesses, does the screener roll hard to the hoop, and at what moment in the possession are they setting the screen. So to answer your question, we do hedge occasionally depending on the factors in the game.

What do you think of Mark Jones as the point guard of the future and what are his strengths and weaknesses and how is he addressing those weaknesses?

I really like Mark Jones and I think he can be a very good college basketball player. The main reason for that is his work ethic. He is a smart player who always thinks team first and individualism a distant second. The bottom line with Mark Jones is that he wants to win in a bad way and will work very hard at accomplishing that. I am not going to get into specifics about his strengths and weaknesses because I can tell you that he working on both as you read this. He has really started to improve his play these last few weeks and has begun to react to the game and not think his way into making plays. Mark Jones is learning what is takes to win college basketball games. I am excited about that.

What are the criteria for recruiting for the Flyers and how are those criteria weighted? For example, do we look for athleticism, grades, toughness, attitude, specific skills and leadership. I know you can’t have it all so what weighs the heaviest and in what order?

I think the order of recruiting criteria changes with the team’s needs each year. Although, grades do come first because it would be a waste of our time to recruit someone who is never going to play for us. We look for all those characteristics that you listed and many more. I think character is a big issue with college athletes today and with so few live chances to see a kid play and to get to know them sometimes it is hard to judge. Character encompasses a lot of different issues – leadership, toughness (coaches love tough kids, mentally and physically), attitude, family, friends, etc. We really want “basketball players.” If you can assemble guys that really know the game and are basketball players at each position, along with some character, you have a chance to be a pretty special team.

In several of our losses, it appears that we were bullied (OK, only second half of Villonova). Fast players pressing and bodying up, especially on our guards. Which A-10 teams will be able to play this way and what will we have to do to overcome this?

I don’t agree with you that we were bullied in our losses but we did have mental lapses on our toughness on both ends of the floor. If you forget to box out a possession and someone comes in and dunks an offensive rebound that is a lapse in being mentally tough during the game. We will bang with everyone on our schedule. When a team plays a tight man, which is bodying up, we will have to remember to be 2 way players. That means back cutting, playing in straight lines, not going sideline to sideline but baseline to baseline, setting good hard screens, setting your man up for the screen. Many teams play this way in the A-10 and we have to do all these things to combat that. We attack people defensively much like they try to attack us. Hopefully, in every game we can come out the aggressor.

Will the addition of Moises Alou make the Cubs in the NL Central next year?

What a great pickup for the Cubs. The Cubs are always my favorite in the NL Central every year. But it was an excellent off season pick up for the Cubs and he will make a huge difference in the season next year. They made a lot of different pickups. They picked up Fred McGriff’s option and signed him again, they signed Delino DeShields, picked up Chris Stynes at 3rd, hopefully Bill Mueller is healthy and can play that position, and also Alex Gonzalez at short stop. I am very excited about the Cubbies this year, like always, and hopefully they will be able to put it all together and make a run at it because all us Cubs fans out here are in dire need of that.

How do you get the team’s mind back into the game when they have a mental breakdown like the high turnover games against Marquette and Villanova when there were a lot of unforced mistakes and poor decisions?

It is not so much getting your mind back into the game; I think it is getting back to playing well. I think the team is thinking about the game and worried about what is going to happen in the game, but it is more getting the team back playing well whether that takes a time out or whether that takes a good play call to settle the team down, pound the ball inside, score, try to penetrate and get to the free throw line.

There are certain things you have to do and a lot of times when you turn the ball over against the press you have to call a time out and settle everyone down and say, “Listen, this how we are going to break the press. Be solid with the basketball, elbows out, stay low to the ground and break it and play aggressive.” If you don’t play aggressive and if you are on your heels at this level of basketball you are not going to be too successful.

What is your take on the Flyers apparent inability to consistently to put away teams in the second half?

I don’t think the Flyers have in inability to consistently put teams away in the second half. I think, again, it happens and it is college basketball. You see it every single day on the television and throughout different leagues, whether you are at home or on the road. You are dealing with 18 – 22 year old kids that aren’t consistent all the time. It is not going to be a consistent game all year unless you have NBA caliber players and even then sometimes it happens differently. But the Flyers have put away some teams this year in the second half, specifically the bottom tier teams in the A-10. We have consistently put them away. We have lost a couple games down the stretch like Villanova. We weren’t too happy about that but, again, we had mental toughness lapses and that is a problem and we have worked very hard to get better at it. Practice is also very important. We can create adversity in practice so that we get used to reacting positively to it. Then when we get into a game and a team makes a 7 – 0 run on you when you were up 7 with 4 minutes to go and they tie it up with a minute and a half to go you can rely back on that.

What is your take on Brooks’ career at UD what does Brooks have to do to take his game to the first team A-10 level?

I think Brooks has had a great career here at UD so far. He had a very successful freshman year. He was a big part of a team that went to the NCAA tournament. He came back his sophomore year and had an injury or two and that happens during a career. He struggled all year with it, couldn’t work as hard as he wanted but has bounced back. This year he is having a very solid year for us but as far as what he has to work on, he has to work on all parts of his game just like everybody else. Brooks is not a player that if he doesn’t work at his game he is just going to have the natural ability to get better. He has to get the shots up, he has to put the ball handling work in, he has to put the time in the weight room. And Brooks is a hard worker and will do those things and hopefully he will have a big summer. I think he has to concentrate on having a big summer in the weight room, a big summer on the basketball floor so he can finish out his career at UD next year very successfully. Brooks is going to keep playing solid for us the rest of the year.

Does the staff continue to recruit a player who has failed to qualify?

It depends on the situation. If it is early in the year and he has been close, of course we will definitely keep recruiting him depending on his talents and what we need and who we have signed so we are not against recruiting an individual who has failed to qualify. Now if it gets late in the year we may see that it would be a waste of our time and money. The player really has to sit down and look at his options then, whether it is the JUCO route or prep school or Prop 48; there are a lot of different options. But we will continue to recruit someone if they fail to qualify up to a certain point where the cutoff deadline is there or they are just not anywhere close to qualifying.