Last game against Michigan seemed an awful lot like last year with only 5 players seing significant minutes (mostly due to Lauderdale foul trouble, though). Aaron Craft seems to be the only bench player Matta trusts at the moment.
Thomas seems to have fallen out of favor lately. Too much jacking the orange up as soon as he gets it perhaps?
Jordan Sibert seemed to be getting some chances for increased minutes before the B1G 10 schedule picked up, but quickly ended up with his butt stapled to the bench after some boneheaded freshman mistakes.
http://scores.espn.go.com/ncb/boxscore?gameId=310120130
Check the minutes yourself. The team can't afford do repeat last year. It will killl them in March. Matta seems to be falling into a 6 or 6.5 man rotation, and its got me nervous.
Am I the only one?
I agree. Sibert needs to get out there. He can spell Craft and allow Buford to play while DL sits. An 8 or 9 deep rotation has to start happening.
I can't say I'm nervous. I'd rather have a good enough bench to warrant using it and though OSU has fallen short in the Dance in past years, I personally don't recall fatigue or foul trouble as a consistent root cause so I'm willing to roll the dice by playing the best players heavy minutes when it's possible and necessary to win.
Matta has seemingly been consistent in using a short bench that only gets shorter as conference play ratchets up. I wouldn't read too much in Thomas playing just seven minutes though. His minutes will likely settle into the 10-15 minute range as we saw in the first three conference games with ebbs and flows depending on matchups, Lauderdale's production and/or rare foul trouble.
As for Sibert, I just don't see him playing 8+ minutes in many close games unless out of necessity due to fouls or injury. Matta might work him in here and there but that's about it. He's proven he wants his horses out there as much as possible. I certainly see where you are coming from but I'm not scurred.
Thomas shooting threes worries me (26%). When he gets himself under the basket and rebounding (best offensive rebounder they have on a per chance basis) then he really adds value to the team. Sibert must look fantastic at practice because what we've seen on the floor has just been struggles.
When Thad has sat guys, it's usually because he doesn't trust their understanding of the system (sometimes O, sometimes D, sometimes both), so maybe he's seeing something with Sibert in practice that he doesn't quite trust in a game situation. Thomas will get his minutes. I generally don't worry about fatigue in a 40-minute game for guys that young, except for big men, who do a lot of leaning and jockeying in traffic for position, so a short bench doesn't bother me too much, except that it says a lot about Thad's level of trust with the reserves.
The only thing that concerns me is if both Dallas and Sully get in foul trouble in the same game. We have no depth inside, especially with Weatherslamdunk getting bounced for grades.
I think Matta talked about this maybe last year or mabye the year before. He plays more guys during non conference to see what he has then wants to keep a 7 or 8 man max rotation through conference / tournament