Posts made by HoraceZontal

@jayballer67 I agree. KJ looked earthbound. Like a bird that couldn’t fly.

@rockchalkjayhawk yes, I agree, Diggy’s impact is felt also with Dejuan being able to go harder at the end of games because he’s had some rest.

@dylans that’s what I was referring to. I thought it was early second half, but perhaps late first. He clearly was affected — slower and earthbound. And that was for the rest of the game. Tigger without his bounce is very sad.

@Bosthawk I saw what you saw. KJ definitely got hurt (leg or ankle) maybe 5 minutes in to the second half and slowed noticeably. The lack of boxing out and offensive rebounding is frustrating, but I found myself wondering if Coach Self gave him orders to get back on D instead, to slow the fast break. Glad we won. The second half was a tough watch.

@kjayhawks. Good point — optimistic and revisionist. Lunardi also predicts we win the championship, Self is COY and Hunter is POY.

From ESPN’s Lunardi, a very optimistic take: It has not been a great few years for the consensus No. 1 team. A season ago, Kansas was banged up and made “only” the Sweet 16. A season before that, North Carolina didn’t even make the tournament. You get the idea. Being the hunted in a sport with so much parity is probably a disadvantage. Yet here again are the Jayhawks, with as much power and pedigree as any program in college basketball. For me, the road to San Antonio begins in Lawrence, Kansas.

@BShark I love your excitement about him. It’s infectious. I look forward to finding some film.

@patoh3 finally, a policy at his reading level

Thanks for the link to the tourney site. Good to see the highlights. As a bittersweet bonus, I finally got to see Billy Preston go on a run.

Returning? Really? I’d be shocked, but very happy.

I’m not sure what thread this should be in, perhaps a Cal-specific thread. I was sickened by it so of course wanted to share my nausea with all of you. From ESPN: ““You may think I’m crazy, but I told my staff I only want to have eight or nine guys,” Calipari told Robinson, who is now executive director of the National Association of Basketball Coaches. "They’re leaving anyway, and why would I develop a kid for someone else? Why would I do that?””

I’m referring to the VCU tourney game

I know we’ve already moved on, in life as well as this thread, but … wasn’t that the game we lost due to the Morii not being able to back up their pre-game shit talking and related antics?

Just read from Mike Vernon that we got Griffen! Fantastic

@approxinfinity that sounds great. I’m on board for that!

@approxinfinity. If I may: “…leading the army we hope to have”

@wissox there are a few places. Here’s one: https://247sports.com/season/2024-basketball/transferportal/

@BeddieKU23 yes, that’s horrible. Really feeling bad for Duke today. And Kentucky, while I’m at it. And Missouri (very sad).

Given our remaining targets, would it possibly be to our advantage if Kugel did not arrive?

2018

since Self joined us, he’s had only one year out of the top 25 in Adjusted D, according to KenPom

@wissox some relationships just need the right setting. Here’s hoping Lawrence is it.

@approxinfinity I’m looking forward to checking out the new New Kid in Town

I imagine Self would “vigorously” coach someone who obtained a court injunction forcing the team to take him back. I’m a coach (not basketball and not at this level) and my inner sadist gets excited just thinking about the possibilities.

Sally Jenkins proposed Dawn Staley in a piece published in the Post today. That would be an inspired choice, and a living hell for Staley, I suspect.

At least Ben’s an “Ex-Blazer”. Sad to see the story, no matter what actually happened. He was a favorite. I’ll never forget the snoopy dance.

The Nos are stacking up. Very enjoyable.

The Ringer projects Furph as the 34th pick, noting basically the same strengths and weaknesses we experienced this season. Hopefully, he comes back to get stronger and address deficiencies. I like him, especially how hard he plays.

87% from the foul line. That would be a nice change.

@mayjay yes, Allen’s chapter in Coach K’s book of cheating is “How to Cheat While Lying Down on the Court”

@jayballer67 one of my favorites from Rupp Rafters: “No other coach in the history of NCAA BB has wasted this much talent”

@wissox the way Drew got his ass handed to him by Wilcox of UMD in the tourney I think he was done with college bball. It’s too bad though. It would have been great to have home one more year.

@bskeet I agree completely and would add that Harris’s presence on the team allowed Self to slow walk Remy and in essence force him to play better D before getting significant PT. And dollars to donuts Harris helped Remy with how to do that. Harris is a solid team player. But, as you point out, he has limitations and needs to be paired with complementary players to be at his best. And this year, sadly, he wasn’t.

@Jayblaze great re-frame! I wish it wasn’t necessary, but since it is … I’m on board. I just hope we can field a team of solid players who actually will be playing next year — on our team.

@BShark so actually you were who I wanted to hear from in my initial post. Thanks for chiming in! And for the good news, fingers crossed

@Crimsonorblue22 love the vision of him and Furphy in opposite corners shooting 3s

@dylans ha! Good one!

Anybody have an idea of our chances now that he decommitted from Indiana?

I don’t disagree. Like you, I wish he were more mobile and a dominant defender. But his passing is excellent, he’s improved his rebounding (with a few off games recently), and he really does shoot the ball with nice touch. And he’s a tough competitor, I think. I can’t imagine where we’d be without him, even if we still had the two bigs who left.

KenPom on the difference between his rankings and the AP rankings. An interesting read: https://kenpom.substack.com/p/lets-talk-about-memphis

Thanks for that. Great to see Frank and Perry (and Wayne and …). That may be the only footage I’ve ever seen of Bragg playing.

@bskeet that is awesome. Thanks for posting.

@HoraceZontal and Merry Christmas everyone!

@Crimsonorblue22 I’m sure he’d like to be playing, but he’s making 12.1M this year. And if the analysis is correct, at least there’s a reason beyond Pop just not liking him. It’s the coaching opposite of something that folks often complain about with HCBS: that he doesn’t play the young guys enough early to the point of maybe losing some games now so that they and the team are better later.

Another comment indicated that Pop may be holding Devontae out with the idea of trading him soon. Hopefully he gets to a team that will give him some PT.

Re Devontae and the bench, I was curious as well. I did some poking around and found this thoughtful analysis from a Reddit thread:

“Samlet 5 days ago IMO Spurs know they’d be a better team with Graham getting all the non-Tre minutes at point guard. But the Spurs are prioritizing winning in the long term. So they believe getting Branham reps at point guard (after the Sochan experiment was uh… interesting) is more important than having Graham be the 30-40th ranked point guard he is, and getting guys some easier looks and us a few more wins, but then our guys aren’t getting as many creation reps.

I personally would rather have 48 minutes of real point guard play so our guys can play in a functional offense, but I understand why PATFO is prioritizing Branham with our upcoming roster crunch.

Next year we likely have two top-10 draft picks coming in. So we have Wemby, Devin, Keldon, Sochan, Collins, Tre Jones, our top-5 pick, and the Raptors pick who likely have 8 rotation spots pretty secure.

There are only so many minutes and reps to go around. So it’ll be important to know as much as we can about Branham by the end of this season, so going forward we know whether to keep prioritizing his development (~25 min a game) or if he’s looking more like a 15 min./game bench player.

The Spurs feel like that’s more important than giving Graham 20 minutes/game and getting a better offense/a few more wins, but then not giving Branham (along with our other young players) as many reps and then as a result not knowing as much about their capabilities.“

Marcus, Oubre and Embiid started last night for Sixers. I wonder if that’s happened before — 3 (or more) Jayhawks starting for an NBA team.

@BeddieKU23 Really good observations all the way around. Two additions: 1. I was hoping Harris would have taken a step up (like McCullar), but I haven’t seen that so far; he’s still solid and I like him, but I find myself wanting/expecting more; and 2. El Marko looks like he belongs as a starter now, a far cry from even 5 games ago; I no longer cringe when he has the ball; his speed is apparent and I expect he’ll figure out how to use it as the season progresses.

@BShark great clip. Thanks for posting. Yes, Nick really did look lost (or maybe slow?) in the switching D. It was a noticeable contrast with the others.

@kjayhawks thanks for posting that. HCBS at his very best.

Grady showed up, hit shots, learned to play some D and actually played hard for KU, including a few layouts that I thought he might not get up from. He was 100% with us for the year it made sense for him to be with us. He left what it no longer made sense for him, when he knew he’d be a lottery pick. Do I wish he’d stayed another year? Sure. Could he have used another year before going pro? Yup, maybe two. Would we have better odds against UCONN tonight were he starting? You bet. But to take issue with his decision seems misplaced to me. It’s his life. He should do what he thinks is best for him, not us. KU is quite high on my list of life interests, but for this issue I am but a single fan hair on the fan tail of the Grady’s life dog.