Question
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Interesting they thought Young was a PG. I thought he was a scoring guard much in the mold of his brother.
The loss of Taylor was a big hit, one that seemed to be swept under the rug. Watching Texas, they don’t have chemistry with all the young players and as you mentioned guys are being forced to play a position they don’t excel at. I also think this bunch isn’t that great defensively other than Allen’s ability to block shots. They want to play Shaka style defense but there doesn’t seem to be 5-6 guys that have bought in. West Virginia makes them look like an AAU squad trying to pressure.
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Good thing you mentioned West Virginia. Definitely the same squad as always just less talented. Temple tried to give them the game and they still couldn’t win. I don’t see a guy on their team that consistently wants to score unlike last year where you had Devin Williams & Paige who stepped up for them. They lack that guy this year and it will show in games.
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@Texas-Hawk-10 I disagree but we will see
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I will go a bit counter grain here: I think KSU is FAR better than last year. I know its early, and maybe this number will regress to its true avg for the season as the season grinds on: but this year KSU is 44% trey, while last year for the season, they were a dismal 30%. Last year they looked fugly on offense. We knew they were a scrappy team, that wont change.
But watching a couple of their games, they honestly look a TON smoother (in the 2 games I saw), were pass-pass-passing around the perimeter quickly to beat a zoneD, and even Iwundu and DWade hit open 3s. They were 7for8 on 3s in just the first half of that game.
Personally, IF (big IF), they can play that disciplined and defend like they do, they may be battling OkieState for top 4 in conference. I have KU, IowaSt, as top 2.
I almost started a new topic about KSU and how impressive they looked, but didnt only because I havent seen enough of their work this year. It’d be premature. They do return a ton of guys from last year, guys who will do what Weber wants, and he is a fundamentals type coach, but is no better at recruiting than Gregg Marshall. So, be wary of KSU just like you’d be wary of WSU.
Jamie Dixon is a MOST welcome addition to the Big12, now at his alma mater of TCU. They will contend right away mid-pack. Not cellar dwellars. Maybe even a better purple, as they are in football.
Brad Underwood is also a very respected addition to the BigXII at OkieSt. He is a KSU grad (and KSU fans really wanted him in place of Weber), under the excellent lineage stemming from Jack Hartmann, and is a contemporary of Lon Kruger, who is doing well at OU, but has a major re-load going on at OU this season.
Jack Hartmann was a football and basketball player at OklaSt, learned under Henry Iba, then went to KSU to coach. Also learning from Iba was Eddie Sutton at OSU, whom Bill Self then played for. Know that the lineages are linked, and when you see tough playstyles, I do try to consider and credit where that playstyle is coming from. For example, why does Self coach the way he does? What exactly did he learn from Sutton, L.Brown, and from other styles like Izzo’s and Krzyzewski’s and Roy’s? The OklaSt footprint is heavy in the BigXII right now.
Stated another way, I expect worthy adversaries and great basketball out of OU, OSU, TCU.
It remains to be seen if Shaka Smart’s style will translate into bldg TX into a top contender, same applies to TxTech.
Prohm at ISU’s accomplishments remain to be seen against tougher foes. And I do think KSU will be a better, more capable opponent this year.
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@ralsterIf you go to the ESPN site - - pull up the Men’s basketball, go under teams & pull up K-state under stats - -it shows them shooting right at 38% on 3pt shooting - - tied for 5th best in the big 12. - other stats on them - - 8th in scoring - - 7th in rebounding - - -7th in asst, - - - -5th in steals - - tied for 7th in to’s - - tied for last in free throw% - - that to me is not a good recipe for winning or improved - - that will not cut it in the big 12 - -and definitely NOT TOP 4
Also have to disagree with Iowa St being 2nd - -they play NO DEFENSE what so ever- - -just like always they only want to play one end of the floor. I think going to be more like KU , Baylor, W Virginia, Iowa State, Oklahoma, Okla St, KSU, Texas TCU, Texas Tech. - - -you could easily turn around W Virginia and Iowa State maybe Texas and K-State switched but definitely feel it’s KU - - Baylor this year. - - ROCK CHALK ALL DAY LONG BABY
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@jayballer54 Oh yeah, great point. That was my impression last week, but as the season goes on, I completely agree with your rankings: KU, Baylor (really caught my attn), WVU, ISU/OSU/OU/KSU, then TCU/TX, then TxTech.
Lets see how the stats accumulate in the next month. That 38% may exactly be that “regression to the mean”. Of course, as everyone knows, I really dont want to see KSU-Weber contending for anything, haha…
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1- KU
2-BAYLOR
3=WVU
4-CLONES
5-OKIE ST
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Quick and dirty assessment of the other 9 Big 12 schools.
Oklahoma - 4-1 with no impressive wins and a loss to Northern Iowa on their record. UNI is usually solid, and they have only two losses on the season (both to a very good Xavier team due to a strange scheduling quirk). OU looks like a middle of the pack type of team that will probably be holding their breath on selection Sunday.
Oklahoma State - 5-1, but got blasted by UNC. Granted, UNC is probably one of the five best teams in the country, but they still got beat by 30. They will probably also be holding their breath on Selection Sunday, but I think they are better than Oklahoma right now.
West Virginia - 4-1, very good defensively, had an impressive comeback against Temple in their only loss (down by 20, lost by just 4). I think they will have trouble scoring all season, but their defense will keep them in lots of games. They are a tournament team.
Texas - 3-2, no identity right now. Smart is pushing his defensively philosophy, but doesn’t appear to have buy in from his players just yet. They should be better than this, but they are not. They have talent, so they could always figure it out. I need to watch them again to get to the bottom of this. Right now, they are not a tournament team.
Texas Tech - 5-1, no wins of any note. Only loss is to Auburn, a team that is probably going to be pretty good this year under Bruce Pearl, despite their loss to Purdue (a Big 10 contender). Tech has been building depth and talent. They should be back in the dance this year again.
Kansas State - 5-1. I am taking a wait and see approach with KSU. I need to see how they handle the game at Saint Louis before making a judgment. Hanging with Maryland got my attention, although I am still not convinced the Cats are any good.
Iowa State - 5-1, and as good as that record would indicate. They could have knocked off Gonzaga, and they have a convincing win over Miami, too. They are a tournament team unless Monte Morris goes down. Probably a top 5 seed.
Baylor - 6-0, this is potentially Scott Drew’s best team in Waco. Wins over three ranked teams already, it’s arguable that their resume is better than KU’s at this moment (beat Oregon and Michigan State by double digits, came back to knock off Louisville). That Xavier game over the weekend should be interesting. They could be a top 3 seed.
TCU - 6-0, with a rematch with Washington looming. TCU could be .500 in the conference this year, which likely makes them a tournament team. Big congrats to Jamie Dixon on getting this team over the hump. They look like a serious team and they have more talent and depth than ever.
Predicted conference finish:
- Kansas
- Iowa State
- Baylor
- TCU
- Texas Tech
- West Virginia
- Oklahoma
- Oklahoma State
- Texas
- Kansas State
The crazy thing is, I think that 9 of those teams still have at least a chance to go to the tournament. Probably only 7 teams will go dancing, but just about everyone will get a shot entering conference play.
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If KSU finishes ahead of Texas in the conference that is the biggest indictment of Shaka that I can think of.
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@justanotherfan Baylor is definitely a legit final four contendor, though I would argue the 2009-10 Baylor team with Ekpe Udoh, Lacedarius Dunn and Tweety Carter was his best.
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That team was salty af.
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But as I recall Baylor has a coach who looks like a deer in the headlights any time he plays us or other top notch competition.
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@justanotherfan Good analysis I agree with it.
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@wissox Yes as I have stated before I’m just not sold on Scott Drew getting them to the next level of play.
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The above variations in people’s top 4 or top 5 rankings tell us how much fluctuations we may have, as there’s many unknowns from coaches, to buy-in, to new players, experience.
I really think TCU could be a force under Dixon, but when?
Im interested to see what OU is like down the stretch, they lost a lot, probably the most, but their coaching and system are stable, and fundamental based.
Weber’s team has the benefit of returning chemistry and some improvements in the players individually. They didnt seem to labor much against an opposing zone D in the stretches I saw, and their own D was typical for them. Their offense looked like they have been working on it as a team effort. Lets judge them against better foes.
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The dangerous thing about Scot Drew or Baylor, is if their most experienced players, or even Drew himself, simply get motivated or ticked off about the conf season fade-outs. But just as someone posted above, the BigXII is well-rehearsed against Baylor’s version of zoneD, which is nothing like Syracuse’s version of it. Self’s teams, ever since the 08 guys, specialize in busting zones, and are usually well-equipped to do it, from a playstyle, personnel, and philosophical standpoint.
Beating WVU’s press is also requiring of a certain playstyle and attn to detail and some caveats to avoid. Mostly, KU has it figured out. The Wiggins45KUloss reflected a very young (frosh + soph) KU team. If WVU has ANY dropoff from last season, that game is 2-3 times easier for KU compared to that Wiggs season. And what we do to WVU’s offense with our own D, will be just as key, if not more so.
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I would have agreed with you, but that comeback against Louisville (a good team with a HOF level coach) has me wondering if that is an old opinion that isn’t necessarily valid anymore. If you’re going to cave in, a neutral site game against a top 15 team when you’re down 20 seems like the best time to do that. Baylor didn’t, so that’s either a testament to some great coaching, or its a testament to having an overwhelming talent advantage over a top 15 team. Either premise is scary.
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@wissox As much as Drew is fun to make fun of, he is a very solid coach that has had that Baylor program in the top 25 the majority of his tenure there. And what he took over, well it was probably one of the worst gigs in CBB at the time. On probation, 7 scholarship players and recruiting restrictions… He turned THAT into Baylor’s first NCAA tournament bid since 1988. And has taken them 6 times, soon to be 7. Or, rather, more times than all other Baylor coaches combined. And he has done it in only 13 years compared to the 60 years other coaches have had.
Scott Drew IS Baylor basketball. His job should be damn near as secure as Bill’s.
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He’s really good, but also appears to have a ceiling (EE) so it’s possible that Baylor could get big for their britches and look for better. That said, they care a lot more about football and they could EASILY end up like KU football after we fired Mangino (Drew level football coach imo).
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@Kcmatt7 is Linsey their starting pg?
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@Kcmatt7 I’m not an expert on coaching, and really not qualified to seriously judge Scott Drew’s coaching ability, so my comment was a little snarky. So would it be safe to say that Scott is a great recruiter? I’ve always thought he was anyways. I’ve always been of the impression that talent is responsible for their relative success more than his coaching.
I do admit that Scott has turned Baylor into kind of a Wisconsin of the south. Longtime laughingstock turned into something respectable. I remember with great shock the first time they beat us down in Waco (sometime around the early 2000’s) and just being in shock we’d lost to Baylor. Not even sure if Scott was coaching Baylor then, may have been the guy who lost control in a bad way, Bliss I think?
So anyways, yes, Scott has done some good things, thanks @justanotherfan for pointing out the same.
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@Crimsonorblue22 Lecomte, a Belgian transfer from Miami. sat out last season. Putting up very solid numbers. He’s a little quick guy. Like 5’11 in shoes. 13 ppg and 6 apg. Only 2 turnovers per game.
The thing they have, as usual, size. Motley is an animal and Lual-Acuil seems to be the surprise of this season. He is averaging 4.2 Blocks per game.
Biggest disappointments have been Lindsey and Wainright. Wainright shooting absolutely terribly. Lindsey not getting many shots off.
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@justanotherfan I’ll stay with mine lol. Until Iowa State can show that they are interested in playing defense for the full 40 minutes instead of just scoring, until then I’ll stay with Baylor over them for sure. As far as K-State is concerned I also caught my eye with them losing to Maryland only by one BUT was brought to my attention they are a shell of a team ( Maryland ) to what they have been in the past. Soooo and that’s the ONLY team that’s come close to any resemblance of a team - -their non-con is a JOKE. Oklahoma is some what a mystery to me at this point - -still think they will get it straightened out TCU I agree I think Jamie Dixon was a really good catch for them as a Coach, have always liked him - - their Non Con has been so so, BUT UNLV and Washington are teams they would of been incapable of beating last year - - so showing progress for sure, they are going to do fine -a lot better then in the past. - - -ROCK CHALK ALL DAY LONG BABY
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@wissox I actually think Scott isn’t THAT BAD of a coach - -what hw walked into is kind of like what Beaty walked into for Ku football. - - It was a disaster. - - Scott has had them winning I believe over 20 for multiple season now, getting good recruits - -& getting better - -Motley is an animal. He HAS turned their program back around, we will have to contend with them this year for sure- - for sure NOT saying they will take it from us but the game in Waco ought to be special. I think this year again will be tough in the Big 12 maybe not like last year BUT again think it’s going to boil down to who can steal, some wins on the road, looking forward to it - - -ROCK CHALK ALL DAY LONG BABY
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JUST only a little side note - -YES I know how some people feel about the CB but just saying, found it kind of interesting that we have collect the last couple of predictions for Trae Young, I think Quade Greene committing to Kentucky was huge for us, sure still might get him here but generating a little more interest. I think he will end up at Oklahoma hope I’m wrong. Their are some that think he STILL will go to Kentucky - - -maybe - -maybe not I don’t think there is ANY way he lands there now. - - He states in zags blog today that he had had conversation with Coach Cal lately and that Kentucky had more then the one guard before and had made it work before. - - BUT that it definitely made him take notice of who they had recruited.
Planning on making an early January decision and was wanting to take visits to schools to watch games - -we shall see - -chances are better now then before - -ROCK CHALK ALL DAY LONG BABY
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@jayballer54 Hmmm. I havent really paid attention to how our other Big 12 schools are doing except here and there. I thought KSU had a very light schedule to start the season. I guess it says something if they beat Maryland. I still like our chances to sweep the purple kitties this season tho.
TCU, I did not see that coming at all. BUT, new coach, new what ever. They could be good this year. again, I still like our chances to sweep them.
Texas!? Yah, I thought they would be better than they showed so far. Im not going to sleep on them though, Its always tough for us to win at their place.
Same thing with OSU. We may have them beat in spades as far as talent and depth and experience, but OSU has our ### at their place. I dunno why.
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@jayballer54 I decided to look at up, it’s not quite 20 years. He started 03-04 season. Had 4 really rough seasons and has made the dance 6 times with 2 elite 8’s and a sweet 16 since 2007-08.
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Wainwright is bad. Freeman looks like he could have a decent year, he is one that KU backed off of.
I think once Prohm gets in his guys, ISU will be interested in playing D. Their backcourt is still all Hoi no D kids.
Also yes Green to UK was great for us.
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@Lulufulu last few years AT texass has been very very good!
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I agree with you on KSU. I gave seen a couple their games and they seem to be playing together a lot better than most teams this early in the season. I understand that their schedule to date has not been tough, except for the Maryland game, like you, I will wait until I see how they do against tougher competition.
Many posters seem to equate good coaching with good recruiting and consider Weber a poor coach because his subpar recruiting, I disagree with that, many also consider Calipari a poor coach, even when it comes to recruiting he is in a class all by himself, I also disagree with this. In my opinion, they are both good coaches, one a great recruiter at an elite program, the other a poor recruiter at a middling program. I understand that in today’s environment a being good recruiter seems to trump coaching ability and obviously an elite program needs a coach that does both; however being a poor recruiter does not necessarily make you a poor coach and vice versa. By the same talk, Scott Drew is a well above average recruiter but a below average coach; other than KU and at times Texas, he has had the most talent in the conference and really not a lot to show for it.
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Baylor is a very good team. I would even say that if KU played them this week that they would have the advantage over us. Not saying they would win but right now they are a more complete team.
3 things have made a huge difference in their season so far.
Lecomte is a better PG and shooter then the 2 previous Junior College guards they had running point. He’s quicker, can create his own offense and defenses have to respect his deep range.
Motley in the starting lineup puts their best player on the floor more- Last year he was a 6th man type. Not many guys his size with his skill around the hoop.
Acuil Jr is a defensive force, long, disruptive and does enough dirty work on defense to limit Motley from foul trouble. I’m generally shocked how good this Juco kid has played so far. Motley & Acuil makes them the longest team in America.
Until KU figures out its post mess Baylor will be a very tough match-up in both games. Again I’m not saying they would beat us, not in Allen at least but the return game might be the toughest game of the year in conference play
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From reading through this thread the first thing that came to my mind… Where is OU?
Lon is a solid coach and a respectable recruiter.
I know they are going to be down some because of losing Buddy… and perhaps another player or two.
I never see Lon as a bottom feeder in the Big 12. He will scratch and claw and get his team playing some ball. Somehow.
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Recruiting is part of being a coach. It’s not all of it, but, it’s a big part because you play the players that you recruit as a coach. Weber hasn’t won a lick with players he recruited and that has to be a factor when talking about him as a long term coach at any program. One can say it’s hard to recruit to Manhattan but minus the history, it’s not any more difficult than Lawrence. Both are in the middle of nowhere Kansas which has proven to be a hurdle for both programs. So until Weber does something, anything of note with players he recruited I don’t think it’s fair to say he is a good college coach.
Fwiw the success of most Weber teams is directly related to their fools gold percentage. So we will see how that holds up against conference competition because right now Weber is hiding this team behind an absurd schedule.
It doesn’t matter if Cal isn’t a great in game coach (I think he is better than given credit for) because no matter how you slice it the guy makes final fours and wins 28+ games a season consistently.
I could definitely see us losing in Baylor in a very high scoring game. Motley + Acuil is a lot to handle down low. Best option at this point is probably Josh on Motley.
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Interesting, the last few years playing @ Baylor they have played us in low scoring games. Their Zone seems to slow our offense a good bit. At home I can see us exposing their zone because KU is always a good 10+ points better in Allen.
The one equalizer for us this year is the talent of Jackson roaming the middle of that zone. Major advantage for us having a do it all stud. .
A lot will change between now and February when we play them twice in 18 days. I expect KU to be a much improved team
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If they win (presumably in Waco) I was figuring it would be because Motley and Acuil are unstoppable for them offensively. But yeah, lots of time for Self to get stuff fixed.
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OU has some good games coming up, @ Wisconsin, Wichita, Auburn, even Memphis. We’ll know more about them soon.
A very young team that Woodard & Lattin are trying to lead. 7 of their 10 guys are new to the rotation for the most part. Dante Buford was suspended for the 1st 3 games and has only played 4 minutes total. I thought he was a guy they would rely on heavy for versatility in the lineup.
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Baylor and their coach? I got a chuckle reading one of the above posts, someone employing the word “snarky” in regards to usual assessments of Scott Drew. For several seasons, actually since he pulled that little pissant corridor stunt at AFH, I have been calling him Dreadful Drew. However, finally I must admit to the now glowing fact that the guy can recruit and coach. His progress this season, to date, is simply magnificent, already having knocked off 3 ranked teams and with a very special comeback victory after a huge deficit to Louisville. His squad this year will be very dangerous to deal with. At this stage of the season, I’m compelled to rank the Bears #2 in our league.
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I’m going to scout them tonight. First time this year.
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@BeddieKU23 I don’t think young will go there, not great and no fans. I think he wants more.
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@BeddieKU23 Going to have to get one of their bigs in foul trouble or we could be forced to play big. In fact, I assume that we will just play big against them until we get a guy in foul trouble.
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Do you trust our bigs to not get in foul trouble first? We got a bunch of hack happy fellows this year.
But back to your statement, we will have to play big in that game. Doke’s improvement is really important over the next 2 months. He’s going to be a huge factor in how KU goes about beating them.
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It’s very appealing for him to go to OU though. Home school, style of play fits him, PG spot opening with Woodard leaving. Little competition standing in his way.
If he wants more which very well could be the case then your right he’ll end up somewhere else. Not sure if that somewhere means KU or UK. Hope its KU, Self and his entire staff have really put a lot of time into this kid. They followed him all summer, they went full staff to his game the other day. It’s clear that Self really wants this kid and it would suck to lose out on yet another target that the staff spent a lot of time on. Young is one of the best shooter’s I’ve ever seen on the HS level and looking at next year’s projected squad we will need him.
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@BeddieKU23 I don’t trust our bigs at all. I actually plan on them getting in foul trouble. But I don’t really care if Landen gets 3 fouls in the first half. Just make sure we get at least one of their bigs in foul trouble at the same time.
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Motley is the most likely guy that would end up in foul trouble. He’s been in foul trouble against KU in the past. Most importantly taking him out of the lineup really takes away their identity in the post. Maston is a good backup/6th man type but not the talent Motley is.
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I respectfully disagree. I divide coaching into two areas, the actual on the court, X and Os coaching and the recruiting. This phenomenon is prevalent mostly in Division I college since recruiting is less important in the lower division and in the NBA, the General Manager has a lot more influence on who is part of the team than the coach.
Now, most elite programs have personnel that does the bulk of the recruiting and the HC is what we might consider the closer. Without the recruiting personnel doing the ground work and identifying prospects, the HC is not nearly as successful. KU has two outstanding recruiters in Roberts and Townsend and both have been selected as top recruiters by publication at various times; Snacks…not so much. Without these coaches, KU would not recruit nearly as successfully as it does; no question that Coach Self closing the deal goes a long, long way. No question that recruiting -wise KU has a big advantage over KSU.
As far as recruiting to Manhattan/KSU and Lawrence/KU not being that different, I just have to ask…have you been to Manhattan? First, no question that KU has a huge edge in history and tradition, second AFH is the Cathedral of Basketball and considerably better than the Octagon of Boredom; 16,000 Jayhawk fans will always be leaps and bound better than 12,000 KSU fans and the accommodations for basketball players are arguably the best in the country; huge advantage KU. Next, Manhattan is a nice country town literally in the middle of nowhere and with little appeal to elite prospects, the closest big town, if you can call it that. is Topeka which is one hour away and provides very little over Manhattan; as they say, how do you know when you are in Manhattan? When you smell it your are near, when you step on it…you are there. Lawrence, on the other hand is a more cosmopolitan town and basically a suburb of Kansas City, a real big city with a lot more appeal to elite prospects; from my home in Olathe it takes me roughly 20 minutes to downtown Lawrence…big edge to Lawrence over Manhattan.
I am not even going to address the coaches a we know KU has a gigantic advantage in that area as well.
This is of course just my opinion and I would like to know on what you base your premise that they are not that different.
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@BeddieKU23 said:
It’s very appealing for him to go to OU though. Home school, style of play fits him, PG spot opening with Woodard leaving. Little competition standing in his way.
If he wants more which very well could be the case then your right he’ll end up somewhere else. Not sure if that somewhere means KU or UK. Hope its KU, Self and his entire staff have really put a lot of time into this kid. They followed him all summer, they went full staff to his game the other day. It’s clear that Self really wants this kid and it would suck to lose out on yet another target that the staff spent a lot of time on. Young is one of the best shooter’s I’ve ever seen on the HS level and looking at next year’s projected squad we will need him.
Self told him he would play huge minutes too.
@JayHawkFanToo said:
I respectfully disagree. I divide coaching into two areas, the actual on the court, X and Os coaching and the recruiting. This phenomenon is prevalent mostly in Division I college since recruiting is less important in the lower division and in the NBA, the General Manager has a lot more influence on who is part of the team than the coach.
Now, most elite programs have personnel that does the bulk of the recruiting and the HC is what we might consider the closer. Without the recruiting personnel doing the ground work and identifying prospects, the HC is not nearly as successful. KU has two outstanding recruiters in Roberts and Townsend and both have been selected as top recruiters by publication at various times; Snacks…not so much. Without these coaches, KU would not recruit nearly as successfully as it does; no question that Coach Self closing the deal goes a long, long way. No question that recruiting -wise KU has a big advantage over KSU.
As far as recruiting to Manhattan/KSU and Lawrence/KU not being that different, I just have to ask…have you been to Manhattan? First, no question that KU has a huge edge in history and tradition, second AFH is the Cathedral of Basketball and considerably better than the Octagon of Boredom; 16,000 Jayhawk fans will always be leaps and bound better than 12,000 KSU fans and the accommodations for basketball players are arguably the best in the country; huge advantage KU. Next, Manhattan is a nice country town literally in the middle of nowhere and with little appeal to elite prospects, the closest big town, if you can call it that. is Topeka which is one hour away and provides very little over Manhattan; as they say, how do you know when you are in Manhattan? When you smell it your are near, when you step on it…you are there. Lawrence, on the other hand is a more cosmopolitan town and basically a suburb of Kansas City, a real big city with a lot more appeal to elite prospects; from my home in Olathe it takes me roughly 20 minutes to downtown Lawrence…big edge to Lawrence over Manhattan.
I am not even going to address the coaches a we know KU has a gigantic advantage in that area as well.
This is of course just my opinion and I would like to know on what you base your premise that they are not that different.
I have been to Manhattan and Lawrence (of course). I think to most coastal kids neither is that attractive.
I will agree that recruiting is 90% the coaching staff. Now there will be some kids that it is their dream school but the coaches put in a lot of work.
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Right, I would play Young big minutes too if he was on our team. I want that 3 point threat on the floor as much as possible.
There are concerns on how good Trae will be defensively. He needs to add weight/muscle mass and he’s not a great athlete although he is sneaky in the lane. If Trae had the athletic ability of Duval, he’d probably be the #1 player in the class because I don’t think people realize how hard it is to guard Young with his ability to shoot the ball. Matt Coleman touched on this before saying Trae was the hardest to guard because of his shooting
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I think the key with going after a PG… is he a play maker? Can he control a game and his players? Does he read defenses, smell out mismatches? Can he dribble through a WVU press?
Hitting the long ball is an asset, don’t get me wrong… but will the guy run the show like we need him to?
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I would say yes to all of those questions. I’ve seen about half a dozen of Trae’s games, most of them this past summer when he led the loaded Mokan team to a Peach Jam title. That team had Michael Porter Jr- top 5 kid we were after once and other multiple D-1 kids on the squad.
He’s definitely a play-maker, actually that part of his game gets kind of unspoken about because of just how great of a shooter he is. Think Steph Curry range, release and precision. He can and will take ill-advised shots but what kid doesn’t.
He is a leader, very good handles, can get where he wants at anytime. The knock on him is he is light and isn’t an elite athlete and may struggle some as a freshman as a defender against more seasoned guards.
He can get where he wants though because he’s quick. Has underrated floor vision and from the games I watched he was very good at making guys around him better- he got Porter Jr his shots and others quality looks. I would not worry with the ball in his hands.
One of the things that makes Trae unique for his 6’2 frame is that he can play both guard spots- we use Devonte in the same role, similar height. Both are not above the rim athlete’s but get by with being really good at what they do.
As far as comps I would say he’s Tyus Jones (Former Duke PG that led them to a title with Okafor) with in the gym range (like Steph Curry). I’m not saying he’s as good as either player right now but the Jones comp (athletic ability, leadership, quickness, shooting) seem close.
We don’t want this kid going somewhere else.
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I feel like if KU gets Young, we are in for some very real growing pains as that would be three likely starters (Young, Newman, Preston) that have very sticky hands. The potential however if that team clicked and played team ball would be through the roof.
