Post game thread
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KUSTEVE said:
Where are our ball hawks??? Devonte…31 minutes 1 steal. Legerald Vick …no steals. Newman…no steals. Svi and Garrett had 3 steals apiece, but our transition offense was almost non-existent. Heck, Liangelo Ball stole more from a store in China than our whole team did last night. This team is way too athletic to not get out and run. Man oh man, talk about cakewalking a game…
Garrett might be the only guard interested in playing defense. Hopefully that rubs off on the others…
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For all the talk of Devonte being a “leader” I actually see this team as leaderless. Devonte is an offense first, shoot first type of player that is better as a second option. Currently we have no inside offensive game, nobody we can throw it to and get a bucket. We will have games like this and will lose against better competition. Coach has his work cut out this year.
Preston needs to start before Big 12 play.
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Personally, I think you saw Self’s preferred lineup to start the second half - Graham, Vick, Garrett, Preston, Doke. That’s what I think he sees as our best lineup. We’ve seen that before some, when he goes with a lineup out of the locker room.
Marcus Garrett over Newman and Svi? Watch the first two minutes of the second half. Garrett starts the half with a disruption steal where the ball intended for his man goes out of bounds, then in the third possession, gets another steal by intercepting the pass from his man. He also gets a sweet defensive rebound with a textbook block out (which @drgnslayr would love). Then he converts an assist off an inbound look for an easy hoop. Two minutes, four distinct actions by Garrett that win coach’s (especially Self’s) affection.
I think we should watch this very closely. Preston gives us two bigs, and regardless of all of this 4 out/1 in stuff, we know Self prefers going conventional. We also played markedly better as a team in this stretch. Self may start Newman and Svi, but the way the PT develops will be very interesting. Garrett played 23 minutes to Newman’s 22 and Svi’s 24.
Garrett’s the kind of guy that chops wood for you. His contributions are dead consistent. His defense is very solid.
And the beauty of this is that we can play with two bigs and we can play with four guards – not a simplistic, thrown together four out/one in deal that was so horrible in 2014-15. Self has got this mastered.
I suspect this team will lose some head scratchers. But if we can avoid an injury to Doke and Preston, so Trayl … er, Lightfoot can remain in the role of 3rd big, I think we trend strongly heading into March.
@HawkChamp Thanks for the reminder there … the biggest difference in my mind is in the post. This season we have Doke, who Self was starting over Lucas. If you want some idea of value, that’s a pretty good guide. We also have Preston over Bragg – and Bragg was diminishing to the point he didn’t play vs Oregon. While we don’t have Mason/JJ, we do have a team that may be built a bit better for March. Not sure who would win head to head, but I’m such a Frank Mason fan it’s hard for me to be impartial.
@jaybate-1-0 You are directly on point. I think that the ball going in the hole masks other deficiencies. Self sees Newman and Svi, I believe, as lacking in other areas. If they aren’t scoring, then they have diminished utility. We’ve seen that with Svi. It’s why Vick is a better player. I love the “debounding” thing. You need a trademark. Rebounding under expectations. Doke should just dominate.
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We can always look forward to football…
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I’m not surprised the defense looks like it does even against inferior competition. Fort Hays made shots too which compounds the issue. They shot out of their mind for a while.
What worked for Self on defense in the past doesn’t work today under today’s rules. We changed our offensive philosophy with personnel but not our defense.
Garrett will get a ton of minutes if he defends like he has.
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nuleafjhawk said:
We can always look forward to football…
Now that’s funny.
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@HighEliteMajor Yep…Self agrees…
“I was disappointed in their effort,” Self added of Newman and Mykhailiuk. “We didn’t start them the second half. We wanted to play Marcus (Garrett, seven boards, three points, 23 minutes) to give us energy. Marcus made four plays the first two minutes that Svi and Malik either don’t make or can’t make from an activity standpoint. I thought it was good for those two to see Marcus out there doing that.
“The reality is,” Self said, after a game in which Devonté Graham scored 27 points on 6-of-10 three-point shooting and everybody else was 3 of 21 combined, “when you’ve got a couple of guys who are supposed to be two of your better players that don’t compete and others who don’t understand ball movement and where to be, you are going to look bad.”
I mentioned this in the game chat…
“We’ve got some issues guarding the ball. They just go around Malik and Svi too much and Billy (Preston, 11 points) and Mitch (Lightfoot, no points, three rebounds, 16 minutes). That’s four of our eight guys they just attack them off the bounce. We’ve got to do a better job guarding the ball.
Except I didn’t bring up Mitch. I don’t think he matters as much to the long term success of this team.
“Marcus Garrett did things neither one of them (Mykhailiuk, Newman) right now can do,” Self said. “You don’t play with activity and that is our whole thing with Svi and Malik is to play with activity. You don’t play with activity and people minus Devonté go 3-for-21 (from three). That is a formula to get your (behind) handed to you.
“It was a good learning experience. It was good we played poorly to be honest, to start the season, so we can get our guys’ attention in the next couple of days.”
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So what were the positives? We know the Defense is pooo. The effort was inconsistent in a non-meaningful game.
If Self was explaining what a perfect recruit is, boy Marcus Garrett sure looks like he checks a lot of boxes. He might even become a starter before too long. The next week against better competition should give us an idea whether he’s what we think he is. So far he’s become my favorite hawk already.
Preston has a ton of offensive talent. I thought he had a pretty good game. His FT’s need some work but I was not concerned with him overall.
The lob to Doke is money. Should be game planned 5-6 times a game. Graham is really good at setting that play up.
Graham can really shoot the rock. We know Malik and Svi can as well but they struggled mightily.
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@BigBad I don’t see that at all. DG set up Doke numerous times, and played quite well, imo.
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@BeddieKU23 Garrett has some of that 2008 in him. He REALLY gets after it.
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Unfortunately I could not watch the game. I cut cable and I cannot get ESPN3 and most of the streaming providers do not seem to have ESPN3 either.
Anyway, Svi had 8 rebounds, 5 assists and 3 steals; had he made 2 or 3 of his 7 3-point tries (made 4-6 from inside the arc) we would be saying he had a nice game…going strictly by the numbers. His 8 rebounds (7 DR) are just 1 less than Doke and more than anyone else in the team. Take the 8 assists by Graham and Svi has more assists than the rest of the team combined, his 3 steals are tops on the team tied with Garret and as many as the rest of the team combined. He must have been playing some defense to get those defensive rebounds and steals and involved in offense to have 5 assists. Yes, his shooting from the 3 was way off but other aspects of his game do not seem that bad, at least looking at just the numbers and we know his outside shooting will be better in the future.
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Going to be very interesting to see what happens with Newman’s 'tude, if you are right and Garrett becomes Self’s de facto glue three.
Svi will struggle with not starting, but he will be able to manage the adjustment, because he has already fallen farther from expectations than most players ever do in a career and hung in. Newman? I’m not so sure.
My right hemisphere agrees with your outside-the-cardboard thinking; i.e., that Garrett is the guy that fits best with Devonte, LaGerrie, Preston, and Azuibuke, and that Self is already steering the ship that direction. It makes sense in the abstract and in the 4-1 vs. 3-2 real world of hard choices. This team just lacks a Josh Jackson to play the 4-1 and rebound credibly against anyone but the Darby O’Gills (which the lesser half the schedule will offer, but which the greater half of the schedule will not).
Small was all for awhile, but big appears the beautiful redux in this season’s version of Bill’s basketball pretty-a-porter offerings from Haut Hawk.
If you were right, then its two teams this season. Team A (3-2) for Final Four Grade Opponents. Team B for the Darby O’Gills. I resisted this early, but I am trying to embrace the paradox a little early to get ready for still more flexibility later.
To lend further support to corrugated extracurriculars, its pretty clear, though early, that, even when Preston finally fits in, Self does not see him as a sufficient force on the glass to go girlieman, debounding trey-boy at the 3. Thus, Self needs a board-smith on one wing to help Slim Billy with glass vaccing on the back side. For sure, opponents great and lesser will either be trying to ball screen with their centers to get Azuibuke unstuck from the paint, or at the very least forcing him to guard their post ball side, so he has at least to turn to board. No one will want Azuibuke back side rebounding; that would be curtains. So: Self is likely anticipating that and feeling that Slim Billy is not into backside garbology as an intro course in D1 Hoops. Hencely and thusly, Marcus of Garrett, who seems to have come out of the womb grasping shooting refuse seems ideally suited to be enrolled by Dean Self in an honors garbology curriculum. Apologies to Professor Irwin Cory and most Deep State apologists trying lamely with double talk, conflation, and other one-eyed, memetic games to mask a much indicated (and loathsome) pedophocracy.
ON THE OTHER DRIBBLING HAND…
As much as Self loves tradition and the high-low with three out and two in, he took the the three point drug the last two season, and it is as addictive as crack speed balled from a bent spoon solution mixed with 1/3 Antler’s Meth, 1/3 nicotine, and 1/3 heroin.
Self is also strapped with two memory monkeys on his metaphorical back.
First, his role models Coach Wooden and Coach K won rings both playing big, and playing small, and Bill has only won one playing big. The embargo seems to have made matching their total wins unfeasible, so that leaves winning one small to at least conceptually join them as masters of the basketball universe.
Second, who is more likely to a fully accomplished player at his position this season: 6-4 Malik Newman at the 3 a couple of season into his D1 career, or 6-9 Billy Preston at the 4 and a true freshman? A betting man has to bet on a physically and mentally more mature perimeter player blossoming before a diaper dandy in the high crime area of a D1 free throw lane. Self’s withholding of Preston from combat even against XTReme Cupcakes is a signal that launch pad gantry high as Preston’s ceiling is, Self sees sneaker sushi instead of a lean, mean Space X rocket ready for repeated launch and recovery. This is of course, my left hemisphere weighing in.
Good thinking has to bring both hemispheres into some integration.
Self is preparing at this time for that fact that things could play out either way, and he wants to be ready to play both ways, as circumstance dictates, or commit to one way as injury and development dictates.
The above implies considerable internal division in the old coach, not just in @jaybate 1.0.
But if ever there were a coach up to this challenge, it would be Mr. Both.
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Malik will be fine! He had some great games in Italy and scored 17 against mizzou. Might take some time after laying off a year.
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No doubt he will shoot the rock.
Consistency and rebounding…these are what he has yet to prove.
We’ll see.
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HighEliteMajor said:
I suspect this team will lose some head scratchers. But if we can avoid an injury to Doke and Preston, so Trayl … er, Lightfoot can remain in the role of 3rd big, I think we trend strongly heading into March.
LMAO, that was great.
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JayHawkFanToo said:
Unfortunately I could not watch the game. I cut cable and I cannot get ESPN3 and most of the streaming providers do not seem to have ESPN3 either.
Anyway, Svi had 8 rebounds, 5 assists and 3 steals; had he made 2 or 3 of his 7 3-point tries (made 4-6 from inside the arc) we would be saying he had a nice game…going strictly by the numbers. His 8 rebounds (7 DR) are just 1 less than Doke and more than anyone else in the team. Take the 8 assists by Graham and Svi has more assists than the rest of the team combined, his 3 steals are tops on the team tied with Garret and as many as the rest of the team combined. He must have been playing some defense to get those defensive rebounds and steals and involved in offense to have 5 assists. Yes, his shooting from the 3 was way off but other aspects of his game do not seem that bad, at least looking at just the numbers and we know his outside shooting will be better in the future.
Svi was 0-7 from three. I posted the box score earlier in this thread.
Svi was bad defensively. Trust me.
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JayHawkFanToo said:
Unfortunately I could not watch the game. I cut cable and I cannot get ESPN3 and most of the streaming providers do not seem to have ESPN3 either.
Anyway, Svi had 8 rebounds, 5 assists and 3 steals; had he made 2 or 3 of his 7 3-point tries (made 4-6 from inside the arc) we would be saying he had a nice game…going strictly by the numbers. His 8 rebounds (7 DR) are just 1 less than Doke and more than anyone else in the team. Take the 8 assists by Graham and Svi has more assists than the rest of the team combined, his 3 steals are tops on the team tied with Garret and as many as the rest of the team combined. He must have been playing some defense to get those defensive rebounds and steals and involved in offense to have 5 assists. Yes, his shooting from the 3 was way off but other aspects of his game do not seem that bad, at least looking at just the numbers and we know his outside shooting will be better in the future.
Svi had a really bad 1st half. Missed shots, turnovers, you name it. Very similar to some of his games in conference play last year.
After he didn’t start the 2nd half he was better but the game was already over by the time he started getting rebounds and filling out the stat sheet. Coach called him out for his effort.
He did have a nice jumper early in the 2nd half and a couple drives to the basket that we need him to continue to show. His perimeter shot was off and besides 1 ill-advised attempt every one of them was a wide open miss.
He’s better then he played last night. Had a nice steal on the baseline. Really had to search for positives because it was clear he didn’t play well and for a senior effort shouldn’t be a question
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@BeddieKU23 Nice avatar.
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I’m all aboard the hype train on this kid!
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And yeah I will also add I had no issue with most of the threes Svi took. He just needs to hit more of them. Those looks will be there for him.
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Marcus might average 3-4 points a game but might make 10 plays that impact the game in a positive way for this team. We don’t seem to have anyone else that wants to do that consistently. Vick does but he was mighty quiet last night for most of it. I expect the light to come on for most when its the difference between wins and losses
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@JayHawkFanToo When you enroll with Sling or any other cable cutting sertvice, then you can watch ESPN 3. ESPN 3 has Sling listed as a provider.
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Most of Svi’s stats came in the second half towards the end when he and Newman were in there for mop-up duty. Svi had a really nice take to the hole during that time for a basket but when you put in context that it was against the end of the bench for FHS it seems way less impressive.
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I’d like to compare our results in these preseason tuneups in other years as an indicator of success. We’ve had a few years with some relatively close matches in these games. One year against Washburn comes to mind. We didn’t beat them by too much. But I’ve never connected the dots between exhibition results and season results.
Once upon a time these exhibitions were against better competition in the form of the Australian travelling All-Stars, or the RussianKGB All Stars. Those teams sometimes won these games actually and provided a much more realistic look at what our team was capable of.
While I don’t think this was true last night, sometimes teams experiment in this games with lineups and different sets. Ethan Happ, a preseason AA from UW didn’t attempt a shot in one of these games the other day. As the Badgers go to guy this year, he will be shooting plenty this season! Gard was trying to work newer players in to give them experience. I like to think that there was some of that happening last night.
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I’m not going to draw hard line conclusions about last night’s game. I don’t think they’re going to bench Newman anytime soon. I know for a fact Svi will make a 3 pointer. If we play the same way against Tucky, then we panic. Until then, we press on.
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KUSTEVE said:
I’m not going to draw hard line conclusions about last night’s game. I don’t think they’re going to bench Newman anytime soon. I know for a fact Svi will make a 3 pointer. If we play the same way against Tucky, then we panic. Until then, we press on.
An internet message board is no place for reason and logic sir!
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@BShark LOLOL…
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On a serious note I am very interested to see how the team looks on Friday.
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@KUSTEVE HA!! LoL@ Ball stealing more, that’s a great one!!
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Let’s all cut cable and skip watching all the games this season and see how it goes with the commentary and analysis. It will be just like the Mainstream Media. We can just take the talking points emails from the Deep State and talk about whatever they tell us to talk about until wikileaks posts the emails and we have to do limited hangouts and move on.
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@jaybate-1.0 @HighEliteMajor Both your posts are filled with insight as per usual. Thanks! In retrospect, maybe we didn’t do that terrible after all. After the game, I just felt exasperated because I thought that if we played that way against Kentucky that we would get our asses kicked by a bunch of freshmen. That’s no Bueno.
But yah you guys, now that you mention it, there is no way Bill Self was gonna show his cards this early to Kentucky to game plan for.
He let those guys slog through this one. Correct me if I’m wrong though, didn’t KU (with freshmen Wiggs, JoJo, Selden, Frank) beat the tar out of Ft Hays state in '13? And our upperclass guys got out scrapped last night. Plain and simple. They better turn it up 5 notches for the Kentucky game.
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Of course, Self undercut the team.
What are the chances he sits Malik and Svi for a walk-in vs. UK?
ZERO!
Self would stick with them unless the walked off the floor and quit the game.
But that doesn’t alter poor performance before Self undercut the team with a walk on.
We’ve got three starters—Malik, Svi and Azuibuke—that are the kind of players that need to play in a committee at each position, because of inconsistency.
Alas, KU is to thin for committed at 2 of 3 of their positions.
This is why I ran up the small caution flag.
These guys need to be 30 minute men every game.
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All excellent comments and observations. We need our full compliment of 8 players. I think all get major PT, with Mitch being the guy who might be in 10-12 and the 5th perimeter guy might range that low. Could be game to game.
Newman is fine. Just a streaky player. I don’t know enough about him yet to have any worry. He was good in Italy I thought, as @Crimsonorblue22 mentioned. He’s just seems streaky. It’s good to have guys like that. EJ was like that. One game he’ll be our high scorer. The next, he might score 5 and not contribute a lot. Looks like his freshman season was much the same. That’s probably the type of player he is. But we can handle that.
I think Svi is not much different than last season. Complimentary. An impression is that he’s underwhelmed with the three ball after all the talk of him being the best shooter in practice for years. But he has shot 40% the last two seasons. 40%. That’s good. I won’t fall in the trap of assuming Garrett really vaults these guys – I don’t think anyone is assuming that. But I don’t think Self will be shy about playing the lineup he thinks is best, regardless of Newman being the big time transfer, or Svi being a senior – he never has been hesitant. Garrett is just very easy to be comfortable having on the court.
Much like the Duke game during Mason freshman season gave us some good insight into Self’s thoughts on Mason, the UK game might be the same for Garrett.
Svi was bad defensively, as @BShark mentioned. It was pretty stark. We know Bill Self, don’t we? That’s why this Garrett thing has me so intrigued. It is very hard not to love defense. And when Self gets t’eed off at the team, he’ll go with the defense. When Svi makes his shots, all is right in the world. Some matador stuff becomes less important. But when he’s 0-5 at the 15 minute mark in the 2nd half, I bet he’s done for the night with what we have.
We should just be very excited about this perimeter. We just came off a season with Mason and JJ, and now we get this? It’s unreal, really. I said we had the best perimeter in the game last year. This season? Maybe. Vick and Graham should give us offense every night, and solid performances. They’re our solid top two on the perimeter.
Billy Preston might be the real X factor. Needed post presence to bolster Doke. Preston needs to do what the coach says. Go full boar, full effort, kick a** mode. Sometimes that’s hard to create, when the player hasn’t ever had to do that. In the end, that may define our season.
And can I say, can we all say, Self has transformed into an offensive coach? Not a lot of complaining anymore from this poster. Self has evolved. He’s adapted. No rigid dogma now. Ah, for the good ole days.
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I saw the 0-7 line from the 3 and hence my caveat that IF he made 2 or 3 as per his last seasons average he ends up with a line of 18 points, 8 rebounds, 5 assists an 3 steals, a very good line any way you look at it.
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Yep. I saw that Sling Orange now carries ESPN3, but it does not carry any of the Fox Sports channels which are on Sling Blue; only 1 stream allowed on orange, more if you get both packages. You have to get one of the more expensive packages from Direct TV Live to get ESPN3. YouTube TV looks good although I am not sure it carries ESPN3 and I have yet to get an answer from them, it does allow 6 accounts and 3 streams but you have to use Chromecast that requires you to use your phone or tablet or laptop instead of a remote which I don’t really care for; it is also missing TNT and TBS that carry a lot of the NCAA games. Not really an optimal solution yet but heading in the right direction.
I installed and outdoor antenna today and I am feeding the signal through the existing cable wiring to 8 TV set and getting 50+ stations on the sets closer to the antenna and 30+ on the ones farther away and behind several splitters. I will add a pre-amp and it should give me 50+ channels on all sets. The only thing I miss so far is the ability to record some channel while watching another, other than that I have not missed cable much yet.
Consolidated was pretty crappy when I talked to them, they would not consider any deals and actually wanted to raise my rates even after I told them I would cut cable. Customer support did not seem to have the authority to make any deals and did not seem to care much anyway; a far cry from the original Everest which had an outstanding customer support department.
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No disputing his line would have looked good.
If you can find a replay you will have a different tune about his game whether it was scoring 8 or 18. He had by far the worst game individually I thought.
I’m certainly not alarmed but I expected more from him. We know what what kind of shooter he is, just an off game. His defense is a significant weakness that the staff needs to continue to work with him on. He had some inexplicable turnovers as well that stuck out. He’ll get better it was just an exhibition game
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Great post by the way.
It’s very interesting that he calls out two of his upperclassmen and praises a freshman. Usually the role is reversed. He’s usually trying to motivate his star freshman so I view it as a significant comment from Self in regards to Marcus. He seems to trust him being on the floor already.
I also loved your comment about the lineup that may ultimately be our best- Graham, Vick, Garrett, Preston, Doke. We might sacrifice some mismatch advantages putting more shooters on the floor but that 5 right there might be better in the long run on a per minute basis especially on the defensive end.
We have 7 really good options. We are extremely spoiled if Svi and Newman are coming off the bench.
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@HighEliteMajor Good point about the Kentucky game…it will tell us a lot about how confident Self is with Garrett. It’s one thing to play him in place of an upperclassmen against Pitt State… We all know he usually goes with experience vs. the big boys. Will in interesting for sure.
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I mentioned before that Garret might well end up being the steal of this class and I think I am starting to see it more so now…but then, I though Lightfoot would be the breakout player last season.
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…which goes to show that number alone don’t tell the whole story.
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At what point do you get to your 7th three pointer, after already missing your first 6, and think, taking this shot is the best way to help our team? We’re going to need Svi big time this year, he’s gotta be more consistent. Svi usually ends up a lot of possessions when he’s in the game, so we need him to be on. He took the most shots on the team but played the third most minutes. RCJH
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Exactly right. Garrett had 3 points in the game but was from an overall standpoint was the best player on the floor outside of Devonte. Garrett missed a few perimeter shots that looked good but didn’t go down. His 3 points could have been 9 and given him close to a double/double.
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As much as I like Garrett, I really, really like the ball going in the hoop. So there’s a balance there. Talking about shots not going down, remember the epic rim outs that Ellis had his freshman season? Finally broke out vs. ISU in the Big 12 tourney. Mason made us cringe. I remember him just driving straight into players near the rim (at Florida is a big recollection there). It would not be surprising to me if Garrett was just weak most of the season offensively. One of the those guys that if we get some decent offense, we’re just fat and happy.
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We don’t need Garrett to be a scorer often, we need him to be a utility guy that does everything else. We have scorers with Graham, Vick, Newman, and Azubuike in the paint. Garrett just needs to fill up the other categories and he’ll be fine this year.
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I remember what you said about Perry, he had the technique down path but could not finish and then at the ISU game everything came together and he was gold from then on.
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We are going to need solid point contributions from at least 2 players not named Devonte. These players need to put up consistent scoring numbers. These two players need to take this on as part of their responsibilites.
We will also need to nail players down on rebounding expectations.
If we don’t do some of this… relating to accountability… I’m afraid we will have a pretty good team, but will be marred with some bad losses because everyone was hoping Devonte alone could save us.
Players like Svi will have to change their mentality. He is no longer a secondary player. He has the most-experience on this team besides Devonte. Svi will HAVE TO step up this year if we plan to make much good happen.
We also need more from Lagerald. He doesn’t have as much experience as Svi… but he has massive upside and needs to tap into it this year.
I hope this is the year Bill finally ends this hurtful concept that players have to wait their turn. I don’t know if this is something he instills in players, but it is clear we have had this mentality during his entire tenure at Kansas. If you remove a few superstars, like Wigs and Josh, it has always been that seniority was earned, and the expectations seem to just fall mostly on our upperclassmen. This is vital as we move towards possibly recruiting a higher percentage of OAD and TAD players. If we are only really counting on Svi and Devonte this year… OUCH!
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@drgnslayr 13 straight conference titles… 7 elite eights. You don’t get that kind of consistency without developing your players. So while I agree that the young guys need to be accountable, I don’t know that Self is preventing them from being that. It would seem earning your playing time is a pretty great motivator to hold yourself accountable.
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The knock on Coach Self is that his system is so complicated that veteran players have a distinct advantage that only extremely talented players like Wiggins, Jackson, Oubre, Embiid can overcome…unless the cupboard is bare which does happen but not often at KU
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You’ve distilled it: who is the third scorer?
The first two are Devonte and Vick IMHO.
Choices are:
Svi: he was supposed to be the guy, but is he? Got the gun. Proved it last year. But can he become a turbine generator, instead of a downed high voltage line that sparks sometimes, but electrocutes you others.
Malik: he was supposed to be the guy, but is he? Got the sweet stroke. Self says so, and Self is rarely wrong on who can ding it. BUT…the Self Legacy is full of Sweet Stroke Artists that could not become defensive craftsman and still have the legs to ding it the last ten when the men of steel come out of the phone booths. Malik has the tools to play defense, like Travis Releford, but does he have the will of steel to lock down a Blue Meanie that makes a lot of elbow-temple contact, and still toss grenades down the drain pipe?
Garrett: he was not supposed to be the guy. He CANT be the guy, but if he has to start for defense, and Preston/Azuibuke don’t get all Wayne Simeon on the low blocks, then he HAS to be the guy! Garrett is a good kid. He doesn’t deserve the difficult comes easy the impossible takes a little longer experience.
Preston: he’s got score all over him. He’s got drive the lane or trigger in a full body tattoo. He’s got b2b turn and bank stenciled in his jock. He’s got lob’n jam blue toothed to his dunk hand! But he is young and big men in diapers are rarely dandies, once the blue meanies start working them over. Who that has seen Preston play thinks he would survive a Morgantown mugging with 15 pts and 9 reebs this season? It’s possible, but this team needs a definite third point smith.
Azuibuke: Next season, YES. This season, only every other night at most. Unless he goes all Embiid on our heads. I’m not living in fear of my head…yet.
If Self were to unleash Preston vs UK and Billy gets 15 and gets + 5 on his man in scoring, then we know he is our man, and we can hunt ring. If not, it’s wait and see between Malik and Svi.
If Azuibuke were to turn into AzuiNUKE, and alternate dunking with a jump hook? Boom! then we aren’t just hunting ring, we are skinning and eating ring.
Rock Chalk!
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3rd scorer? No doubt in my mind it’s Doke.
