Growing pains of the freshmen
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Paraphrase Matt Tait’s speculation before last night’s game
“I have no doubt that Mason could play 35 minutes if he needed to. So why not let him run wild for 20 minutes and see if that allows KU to build a big halftime lead.”
But Mason played less than 4 minutes in the first half after collecting 2 quick fouls. And when he went to the bench, KU was down by 2 points. So Frankamp didn’t get any chance of redshirting. Or maybe Coach Self saw the tendencies of Mason, and considered Frankamp probably would be required to backup Mason even if Tharpe were available.
Conner played quite a bit point last night. He obviously was not a driving PG, and generally tried to avoid the on-ball pressure. I wish he’d embraced the PG role and made himself more available as an outlet and facilitator. But I think he still sees himself as a scoring threat rather than a facilitator who helps others score.
Last night we finally saw the BIG lineup we all anticipated. It was pretty exciting to see. I think Selden was an adequate emergency PG, but ULM isn’t an elite team and none of our PGs were pressured as they would when facing a top team like Duke. But there is a lot of potential in that lineup and I’m sure we will see the big lineup again in the future.
I think after just one game, the issues are mostly mental. Our freshmen are thinking too much or not thinking at all. Maybe Coach’s quote on Tyshawn is very applicable here, “can make plays you can’t coach, then he can make plays you wonder if he’s ever been coached.” Mason might be a case of not thinking at all, and Selden and Frankamp might be thinking too much.
One last note, I think Frankamp should have redshirted had that option been available. His passes lacked zip and he can really use some Hudyizaton.
