I put together a little spreadsheet comparing the Wolves' November 08 with this year's Turkey Month splits. You can read it by clicking here. At this stage of the season the last thing I think we all want to see is a replay of what happened in 08/09. How can the Wolves avoid this nightmare scenario of a string of relatively competitive losses eventually wearing on a young team before cascading off the edge of a cliff? I think the answer to this question begins and ends with slowing down the team's pace, which currently sits at the top of the league. If you have a team that isn't efficient, doesn't shoot all that well, and has a back court that is somehow worse than Foye/Shaddy, the last thing you want to do is make that poorly-oiled machine go faster.
The pace issue is even more pronounced when you place it in the context of 08's much slower squad. This year's team has about 4 3/4 extra possessions per game than Witt's gang. This means that they’re giving up 2.29 points per every possession gained by a quicker pace while only making up 0.8 pts per extra possession on offense. That's problematic and at some point fans will have to start asking questions about the systemic nature of what is going on out there on the court. Rambis appears to be quite a stubborn guy and it will be interesting to see how long they continue to go for fast paced ball when it does not appear to be in their best interests to do so. My guess is that Rambis needs to take a page out of Rummy's handbook and go to war with the team he has, not the Army he wants....or something like that. This season has many more nice individual stories than did the 08/09 disaster, but as a whole, it's remarkably (and unfortunately) similar.
Anywho, I thought I'd throw open the spreadsheet for anyone to take a look-see and to see what y'all had to say about it. How can this team avoid slipping into Wittsville?