Texas Southern Game Thread
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@BShark Duke is not good and it brings me much joy
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Love seeing Joe Dooley on the bench.
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@Kcmatt7 said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
When does the MJ>McCullar talk start? Because I’m almost there myself
Depends on which end of the floor. MJ is the better offensive player, but McCullar is the better defensive player. Really might just come down to what KU’s needs are on a given night who should get the crunch time minutes.
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Also, didn’t realize Shaq’s son was on TSU.
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@Texas-Hawk-10 they talked about him in pregame, basically said shaq wasn’t treating him special. I didn’t notice him playing. Is he the one that had heart surgery?
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Now all we have to do is translate this to Thursday - just a little step up in the opponent come Thursday. Let’s see how MJ handles/plays against Seton Hall - - See if Joe can continue a upward swing , competition little stiffer
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I don’t like our starters playing 30 minutes in this game, even with McCullar out. Yesufu doesn’t bother me playing those minutes because he had to play multiple roles tonight, but definitely would’ve preferred Harris and Wilson being around 25 minutes.
It’s also concerning that in a game like this, Clemence, Ejiofor, and Udeh played a combined 28 minutes and only took 3 shots. It’s looking more and more like tge 5 spot is going to be an even bigger black hole on offense than when Landen Lucas was playing.
Hopefully this was Rice’s coming out party and he can be the spark off the bench KU needs, but the 5 spot should be an even bigger concern after tonight’s lack of offense behind KJ.
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I’m still scratching my head trying to figure out how this team can score more than 57 points per game
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Rice just said he didn’t have covid, just kidney stones. More to the story.
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@Texas-Hawk-10 said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
I don’t like our starters playing 30 minutes in this game, even with McCullar out. Yesufu doesn’t bother me playing those minutes because he had to play multiple roles tonight, but definitely would’ve preferred Harris and Wilson being around 25 minutes.
It’s also concerning that in a game like this, Clemence, Ejiofor, and Udeh played a combined 28 minutes and only took 3 shots. It’s looking more and more like tge 5 spot is going to be an even bigger black hole on offense than when Landen Lucas was playing.
Hopefully this was Rice’s coming out party and he can be the spark off the bench KU needs, but the 5 spot should be an even bigger concern after tonight’s lack of offense behind KJ.
I noticed in this game , that there were times when Ernest & Zuby were on the floor they didn’t even begin to look at the basket - -looked like they just wanted to get the ball out of their hands as fast as they could , our 5 spot is gonna have to get something done. - -I DID notice tonight like had been mentioned - -did KJ get a single rebound ?-- I’m not sure , been brought to our attention before about that but tonight stuck out to me for sure
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@jayballer67 none of our bigs seem to have the timing and judgment to know how to both rim protect and rebound. Right now they try to block almost everything but do so in a way that takes them completely out of position for any rebound. Zuby seems like the only one who knows when to start fighting for rebounds as he actually tries to get position when the shot goes up. The rest wait for the shot to hit the rim, then try to fight if they haven’t already flown out of bounds trying to swat it but it’s already too late at that point.
I still think Udeh is the best bet there but he needs some serious practice time and coaching to figure some of those fundamentals out.
Kj plays because he at least doesn’t wreck the flow of the offense and can switch enough to cause some havoc on defense. Plus he always plays his tail off.
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@Texas-Hawk-10 said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
I don’t like our starters playing 30 minutes in this game, even with McCullar out. Yesufu doesn’t bother me playing those minutes because he had to play multiple roles tonight, but definitely would’ve preferred Harris and Wilson being around 25 minutes.
It’s also concerning that in a game like this, Clemence, Ejiofor, and Udeh played a combined 28 minutes and only took 3 shots. It’s looking more and more like tge 5 spot is going to be an even bigger black hole on offense than when Landen Lucas was playing.
Hopefully this was Rice’s coming out party and he can be the spark off the bench KU needs, but the 5 spot should be an even bigger concern after tonight’s lack of offense behind KJ.
Looked to me the goal was to get rice and joe going and unfortunately the bigs outside of kj just aren’t there yet to allow the game to flow when they are out there.
Seems like it’s been a while since our bigs were this raw.
But of course we complained all last year that Dave was terrible and could never be the five on a truly great team but then he goes and basically dominates the final four. So what do we know?
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We saw last week that KU needs MJ Rice as an offensive threat. You can’t survive the entire season with only two solid scorers. You need three. Wilson, Dick and Rice is much better than just Wilson and Dick to open up the floor.
Throw Yesufu and McCullar in as secondary options and that’s a functional offense.
Only thing left is finding some rim protection from Udeh or Ejifor. But that may come with time.
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It really is amazing how horrible big men are as freshmen. I don’t know if it’s just that they finally play against guys their own height or if pre-college coaching for bigs is non-existent. Sure, they make a big dunk or impressive block once in a while, but otherwise they’re like a chunk of gravel stuck in the machinery
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Pre college coaching for most is not great, for all players. A coach told me, a past player that had good coaching said he was so far ahead just because of that.
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Very, very happy the MJ got lots of run. Very happy.
Even happier that he came to life offensively. Smooth. Defensively ALL the frosh need some work.
It was a pretty laid back, no pressure game. No complaints. Even Joe looked like he belonged out there! (Ha)
Almost even shed a tear for Dave Armstrong. Almost.
How does everybody feel Nick Bahe? Who’s he gonna partner up with?
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@Kcmatt7 said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
@DanR that is the rumor. Seems more like he is a “when it’s good it’s good when it’s bad it’s bad” kind of guy to me
It’s odd because he seems pretty composed on the court.
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MJ had 19, good to see him score even if it was overmatched competition. It feels important to get him to where he could potentially be the off-the-bench scorer with Yesufu. Joe with his 2nd positive game in a row as well. Perhaps these two will be trending up now.
MJ had 1 hustle play in the game winning a 50/50 ball. Not much else, I focused on his D and ball movement because it’s not just scoring that will get you minutes here. It looks like he’s really behind on the details and hasn’t had a ton of practice time due to injury/etc. The next step for MJ is seeing what he can do against P5 competition. I hope he gets some burn Thursday.
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@Texas-Hawk-10 said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
I don’t like our starters playing 30 minutes in this game, even with McCullar out. Yesufu doesn’t bother me playing those minutes because he had to play multiple roles tonight, but definitely would’ve preferred Harris and Wilson being around 25 minutes.
It’s also concerning that in a game like this, Clemence, Ejiofor, and Udeh played a combined 28 minutes and only took 3 shots. It’s looking more and more like tge 5 spot is going to be an even bigger black hole on offense than when Landen Lucas was playing.
Hopefully this was Rice’s coming out party and he can be the spark off the bench KU needs, but the 5 spot should be an even bigger concern after tonight’s lack of offense behind KJ.
The main issue is KU simply did not have many scholarship players to go to off the bench. With Bob, Kevin and Cuffe (not that I think he is a factor but still he is on the roster) hurt KU had 6 scholarship guys at guard/wing. So we basically only had Rice on the bench. I think the guard and wing minutes were managed about as well as they could be. The only way to get them lower would have meant playing Jank before garbage time.
With the post I also would have liked to see a bit less KJ but they did also slide him to the 4 at times to help buy rest for our wings as well. It was a difficult balance, hopefully Kevin can go against SHU.
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@Crimsonorblue22 said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
Rice just said he didn’t have covid, just kidney stones. More to the story.
Kidney stones are a lot to deal with, and kinda crazy at his age.
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@Crimsonorblue22 said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
Pre college coaching for most is not great, for all players. A coach told me, a past player that had good coaching said he was so far ahead just because of that.
Prep schools are a good idea for most high level kids. Coaching and competition levels are much better than you get playing regular HS ball.
Two of our signees this year are at prep schools. Chris is at one of the best in Montverde and Elmarko is going to South Kent School. Sounded like distance from home was important for him. Would imagine his mom moves to Kansas during his time here.
Sunrise definitely helped Gradey. MJ was at Prolific and Oak Hill so he bounced around a bit.
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@rockchalkjayhawk said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
Defensively ALL the frosh need some work.
I feel like Bill would bench Gradey more at times if he could get away with it lol.
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@BShark collegiate also had a good coach
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@DanR said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
It really is amazing how horrible big men are as freshmen. I don’t know if it’s just that they finally play against guys their own height or if pre-college coaching for bigs is non-existent. Sure, they make a big dunk or impressive block once in a while, but otherwise they’re like a chunk of gravel stuck in the machinery
It’s all of those things combined.
In HS, other than on the AAU circuit, you’re unlikely to see another big man that is both as skilled as you are (if you are a legit D1 prospect) and also as big as you. The overwhelming majority of HS players will never even sniff D1, so even D1 level guards will only see a handful of matchups each year during the HS season that really test them. But those are at least quality tests because if you’re 6-2 or 6-3, you will see guys that are similar in height. If you’re 6-9, not so much.
Most HS coaches are not very good. The better ones are strong fundamentally, but aren’t very advanced. Probably only the best 0.01% of HS coaches can really teach a D1 prospect what they need to know to succeed at the next level. Everyone else you just hope they don’t screw the player up with bad habits or fundamentals. Even the top HS coaches don’t have the time to cover the advanced stuff because you may only have one or two guys that can actually get that stuff. The majority of your HS players need to learn the fundamentals. A D1 player that only has good fundamentals and hasn’t moved on to more advanced stuff will look lost on PnR, rebound positioning, crossing actions, etc. And everything is faster, so those fundamentals will get sped up.
And coaching bigs is harder, anyway because most HS coaches were not big men, so you have a guard teaching a big guy. Our best big man development at KU happened under Danny Manning, which is not an accident. Since then, our guards have developed more quickly, but that’s no surprise on a staff full of guards. Most big men have never been coached by a good big man coach until they arrive in college.
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Telling MJ quote?
“It’s a process,” he said after Monday’s win. “Whether I like it or not, it’s a process. Where I’m trying to go, I’ve got to be mentally strong, so it’s just preparing me.”
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@rockchalkjayhawk was this in post game? Or, with kennetra?
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@Crimsonorblue22 said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
@rockchalkjayhawk was this in post game? Or, with kennetra?
Post game on Monday at some point. I don’t think it was with Kennetra though. I saw that. He seems pretty composed.
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@rockchalkjayhawk did you hear him say he didn’t have covid? Weird, hmmmm
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@Crimsonorblue22 said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
@rockchalkjayhawk did you hear him say he didn’t have covid? Weird, hmmmm
Yup, the weirdness gets weirder!
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@DanR said in Texas Southern Game Thread:
It really is amazing how horrible big men are as freshmen. I don’t know if it’s just that they finally play against guys their own height or if pre-college coaching for bigs is non-existent. Sure, they make a big dunk or impressive block once in a while, but otherwise they’re like a chunk of gravel stuck in the machinery
Wooden had to teach Bill Walton how to tie his shoes when he arrived at UCLA. I kid you not. Also… Walton would show up to practice in pajamas. You can’t make this stuff up…
I know he earned the title “the crazy redhead” but it speaks for the generalization about bigs.
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I know Texas Southern is a cakewalk… but we are already seeing gains after the Tennessee loss.
Buckle up, JHawk fans!
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@drgnslayr This team is definitely experiencing adversity which is good for their development at this point. The loss followed by the injuries really is forcing guys to step it up. We will see who rises to the challenge and that will dictate how the rest of the season goes.
But no one can rise to a challenge until it is presented. This is the fun part!
