Danny Sprinkle would love to put the Penn State loss in the past and move on, but what he doesn't realize is that's the moment fans were certain this season was doomed. There was a glimmer of hope until that point. Once you lose to Penn State and fail to improve, barely, if at all, from last season, it's a bust. Sprinkle tried to explain away the loss in his post-game presser, but it fell completely flat.
Sprinkle spoke at length about the frustration of losing, especially at home. But his excuse was that his players seemed to be tired. "I felt like our energy was off; we looked like we were in quicksand. We looked tired all night long."
This is a rough way for a head coach to answer why a team wasn't good, since it basically blames the players. While they certainly do deserve some share of this, it's dismissive leadership by Sprinkle. Whose job is it to motivate players and help them find the gear they need, or to play the ones who have it? The head coach. It's also not the reason this season has been a bust. It's not a good look for him or his team to blame it on "tiredness."
Danny Sprinkle was frustrated with his team's play against Penn State
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He didn't fully excuse himself, so it wouldn't be fair to say otherwise. He did take some of the credit, but he also continued to come back to the same point: "You have to find a way to win that game at home. We have to play smarter. We can't have some of our best players playing like that, from an energy standpoint and production standpoint. I need to do a better job of getting them in different positions and spreading some shots around because when some guys are playing tired, we're taking way too many (not clean) shots."
There's some ownership there, but it's flat. His responsibility is to help the team pass better when they are tired? Sure.
To make matters worse for Sprinkle, he doubled down on Zoom Diallo being sluggish. When asked why Diallo was having an off night, Sprinkle answered, with this quote, "It's just kind of one of those games, itwas just hard for him out there. He looked tired. Him and Hannes looked really tired. They just did...I thought Zoom looked exhausted...He is young. It's just it was just one of those games, man. He just didn't have that juice."
It's interesting comments from the Washington head coach to call out his team for playing tired, specifically a couple of his stars. However, maybe that's the juice they need. Maybe he's frustrated because he sees what they are capable of, and they weren't giving it against Penn State.
Those two missed a lot of shots and a lot of easy shots. Diallo and Steinbach combined for 9-27 from the field. That's rough from your two stars, and there clearly is frustration from Sprinkle. Fans are starting to wonder, though, if Sprinkle is able to get the max potential from his players. Is the loss to Penn State not a "tired" problem and more of a coaching problem?