🏀 KuBuckets Archive

Only a KU fan would complain about being 10-0 and ranked #1, right?

Here's my beef - Act like you're a good team. Heads up. Shoulders back. Do NOT get out-rebounded. Out-HUSTLED.

Walk on the court with your hands on your hips - stare, no GLARE at the opponent until you see their knees quiver just a little. Defy them to stay on the court with you.

For the ones stupid enough to actually stay on the court and attempt to play the game - Run. Them. Into. The. Ground.

You can do it - we've seen it multiple times 15, 20, 25 point runs. Do it from the start.

@drgnslayr might say play with a chip on your shoulder. Or show some SWAG. Just quit coming out looking like a high school team that's playing their first away game.

Since we have a lot of new players, I understand it will take some time to get on the same page. Chuck finally showed up and now deserves more court time when offense is needed, which is all the time with this team. Q's dismal play against South Dakota shows he isn't going to help any time soon. In 21 min. Q had 6 pts. on 3/9 shooting, 0/3 from 3 and 3 TO's. I know Chuck struggles on defense, but hitting six 3's should earn him a start at the 2 position against AZ ST. Why start Q when he either doesn't get it or doesn't have the Alpha drive it takes to play for KU?

@stoptheflop

Moore is by far the worst perimeter defender Self has ever had. But if he can make shots like he did last night on a somewhat consistent basis he is really needed in this offense.

@BeddieKU23 Charlie also made several very good defensive plays that resulted in them not scoring last night. Still, Charlie's defense is like so many other elements of this team ...a work in progress.

@KUSTEVE

He did have a few good defensive moments. I have no expectation Charlie becomes a good defender until his technique changes. But when he makes shots like he did last night that alone evens out anything else.

@nuleafjhawk It's a sausage factory. They're still sorting out roles, and responsibilities, and some are definitely getting it easier and quicker than others. It's ugly to watch at times. Dotson has been great. Garrett has been tremendous defensively, and he looked better offensively last night. Lawson has been the glue ....the go to. Mitch was amazing last night, I thought. I was hoping he'd hit that 3. Grimes ...well, he looked better. But he still doesn't look good. Vick was fantastic at times- invisible the rest of the time. Charlie and Dave pulled themselves off the scrap heap, and both shined. KJ probably put himself on the scrap heap. So much talent... so many moving parts. It's simply going to take time- it might take the whole conference schedule for us to play that perfect game we all know this team can do.

@BeddieKU23 He's got an old man body, with the skinny arms and legs, and the goosh pot. It doesn't appear he is able to bend his knees. Guards just blow right by him. But that kid can really shoot, and we're going to need someone who can keep us going offensively off the bench.

@KUSTEVE - Good description of Moore's body. And he looks 12 years old. More on the substance, that kid can really shoot ... last night. Do we believe 6/9? Or the prior 3/23 from 3?

That said, we don't really have another choice.

This is one of those years where I suspect the set rotation will not happen. Self is forced to go match-ups, hot hands, etc. No one really stands out right now, though I think McCormack might change that up a bit (assuming SDS doesn't return).

He can shoot it (the one thing he is good at usually) so it was extra frustrating that it wasn't going down for him before. He can be the 2nd best 3 pt shooter on this team imo.

@KUSTEVE

Agree he has physical limitations but I was hoping during the year off the staff worked on technique and ways to make him average defensively. When his shot is on that's a great weapon to have for this offense and the value he can provide stretching the defense is something we need to see more often. Hoping this is the first of many games he has like this

I mentioned this on the thread last night. I think back to some of our really good teams, (my KU memories only go back this far) 1985-86, 96-97, 2002-2003, 2007-2008 and those teams did what you said they did. There was a take no prisoners mentality and they destroyed lesser teams. Part of this is age as some have pointed out.
I'm not seeing offensive skills on this team like past years. Of course we're seeing a super solid inside game with Lawson which we haven't had in a player since Perry Ellis. So it's just a different team that has survived, and is getting tougher. Saturday will show us something too about this group. I suspect they'll be laser focused.

@BShark

All the players have been saying all along the Moore is the best 3 point shooter so it was nice to see his shot finally translate from practice to an actual game.

Jeremy Case was good in practice.

@BShark Ouch.

Uh, Moore shot 35% his freshman year at Cal, and Bill Self said in the post game interview that he wasn’t surprised at all. Conclusion - Charlie is a better shooter than what he has shown (outside of last night of course).

@BShark

Case did no have a full season starting for a P5 team to show for either.

@BShark Case shot 3s at a 35.7% rate after his freshman year.

KU has yet to lose a game. Yet they have yet to play a good HCBS game. Yet Kind of scary.

The Word of the day is Yet. mmmmm

@wissox I would tend to agree with you about the great teams blowing away their competition as a tell for future greatness. If you look close enough at this team without looking at the final scores, there are signs of potential greatness. You don't pull off 27-0 runs without having something going on. They're just babies in the system ... they've just begun. Still, they have learned one important lesson: they will fight, compete, and win. I think the blow outs will come with this team, but it will take the conference schedule to get them to that point. I think we will be at that elite level just at the right time.

@KUSTEVE Yeah, that 27-0 blitz was breathtaking. Wofford as has been documented is pretty good. We blitzed SD the other day too. Almost had a 40 point lead after seemingly leading by 5-10 points the whole game.

Of course when you beat Tenn who beat Gonzaga who beat Duke, you know there's some greatness going on. MSU is going pretty good too, and while the final result was close, we manhandled them too.

Calipari just makes it up as he goes along. He is in a press conference, preparing Big Dumb Nation for their upcoming loss to UNC, and he discusses the "time he beat KU by 50", which never happened. No doubt he is referencing his national championship year, when they did beat us by 32, and then beat us again for the national championship. Of course, we never hear him explain that he hasn't beat Kansas since. It's at 4:47 :

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@KUSTEVE I remember the time that we beat THEM by 50+. That 150-95 game was the greatest game I ever heard. (Heard, because we weren't on TV there for a while.......)

It's about time we had a repeat of that game.