I'm comfortable saying unless KU plays significantly worse then it did against Kentucky we will win as you said comfortably.
Nice breakdown of the games against common opponents.
BeddieKU23
31745 posts
Lots of good stuff as always.
This years Cuse team is feeling the full force of its sanctions from years ago. Big name school lacking big time talent. They look good when they don't leave the Northwest region of NY.
Their rebounding and blocks have been inflated by playing in the Carrier Dome where its extremely difficult for opposing teams to simulate what it feels like to be playing in such a massive arena. Its similar to how teams struggle in the NCAA tourney when they put the Final 4 etc in a big dome for seating purposes.
Maryland played them to a 2pt game where they simply got suckered into turning the ball over and playing little defense. Maryland shot good enough to win but they were so careless with the ball. They also let Cuse get 4 guys into double figures which Cuse is going to have to pray happens in any game they play against P5 competition because they can't shoot period.
Great points about how Self's Hi/Low is tailor made for breaking zone defenses.
Crimsonorblue22 said:
@BeddieKU23 what would we have done w/young? Certainly not 20 shots for him?
He would have made our perimeter an embarrassment of riches beyond what we already have. Young is thriving in a system catered to his style and he has the keys to the car while he's there.
He certainly wouldn't get the usage he's getting at KU, shots, assists etc. The best for him is showcasing what he does well in order to minimize what he can't overcome physically
Will be nice to kick his butt twice though
Crimsonorblue22 said:
Heard maston from Baylor broke his hand.
Out til January at the least
dylans said:
Dok’s got no stroke. That’s what’s holding him back. He’d be a top 5 pick if he could knock down a mid-range jumper, top 2 if he could hit a three.
Ding ding. Pretty much
I really enjoyed your blog. I loved the detail, I can imagine that was time consuming. Please post here more often
JayHawkFanToo said:
Young is the difference between OU being a Conference top or bottom half team. I would like to see Garret on him and see the freshmen Duke it out.
Garrett already knows him well from HS ball. Held him in check too. Good Call there
I would just assume as the season goes on that guy might be Marcus. I'm just astonished how well he defends everything at this point. His IQ on making life difficult for offensive players just seems so out of place for a freshman.
I think Lightfoot's defense other then blocking some shots is still a big liability from what I've seen so far. I hope he continues to work on his defensive awareness and becomes more cognitive of his responsibilities especially on switches and attacking ball screens.
We know Preston isn't a Reynolds type.
We have no clue what Cunliffe will do but at 6'6 and a heck of an athlete maybe he's useful. His rebound numbers were pretty good at ASU before his departure.
De Sousa would be the perfect candidate for the "garbage guy". Big body but we have no idea how quickly he will handle joining the team midstream.
I come back to Marcus. Wish we had 5 of him on defense
BShark said:
He has two more games today and it's been pretty easy to find his stats so I'll be sure to post them. It's been more difficult to find stats for McCormack as he doesn't have a twitter account and while I follow Oak Hill accounts they haven't been too active about it.
Yeah Big Dave is on a loaded team so I expect a lot of 12 & 7 type lines from him. With Keldon Johnson & Will Richardson Dave plays a complimentary role
I don't think Coleman is much of an NBA prospect but I have noticed the difference he makes for Texas
justanotherfan said:
It's amazing what a NBA caliber PG will do for a team. OU probably finishes in the top half in the conference if he had been there last year.
Definitely. Without Woodard for most of the year last season they were a mess. Will be interesting to see how he does in the meat of the schedule especially facing KU (the school he could have went to)
BShark said:
BeddieKU23 said:
Looks like Grimes continues to put up big numbers
Yeah, in the 21 point game he also had 12 ast and 10 reb.
STUD
Coleby putting up some impressive numbers so far this year. He certainly could have been a viable backup to Doke this season if he stayed.
Young had 32 and 10 last night. Scoring and finding people is what he does. This team is all about what he can do for them
Good lord he's something else. Hope he's rewarded around All-Star time
I think Self is worried about Wear and Tear on his guys especially as the season progresses.
Me too. Wichita is still without arguably their best player and it looks like their rotation is seeing some movement too. I would put money on Wichita winning a return game later this year if they met
ND is still a quality team but they found Michigan St to be a bad matchup on the road. ND did make a big run to make it a single digit game in the 2nd half but then Sparty put the gas back on
We definitely have the components of a Nova type team this year.
I think we are already starting to see what year 2 of an perimeter oriented offense looks like under Self and to date the results look very promising.
JayHawkFanToo said:
I know, we are on the same page. At this point several players like Doke are flying well under the radar and just beginning to get noticed and others still living off their HS ranking. The final list will be quite different.
Definitely.
Doke is a case where it might take him having a dominant Big-12 or NCAA tournament to move the needle with him.
Looks like Grimes continues to put up big numbers
Seton Hall looked good winning.
Michigan St put it to Notre Dame. ND is down a bit this year. MSU looked every bit of a top 3 team
Nice post!
Definitely a long team however they are not any good. This is a 10+ loss team in the ACC conference type team.
Kentucky's length bothered us and they had 7-8 NBA guys. Cuse has 1 NBA prospect on its team, Battle and he's a 2nd round type currently.
I'm also interested to see how we handle a longer team 2nd time around, we are more prepared since Kentucky and have game film to prepare against Cuse against common opponents.
We know Self always prides himself on breaking down a zone defense and with a team full of shooters we sure look prepared to continue making teams look bad
Of course its still way early. I was simply pointing out I don't put much stock into the site. If Vick is good enough by seasons end to end up in the first round that's great for everyone involved.
In my opinion ESPN probably has him ranked appropriately at the moment but he has the chance to move up the most of any hawk. If he averages 16 a game on 50% shooting from 3 he's going to get a ton of press going forward. He's improved a good deal from last season and I'm anxious to see if he continues to shoot the ball, rebound and pass the ball at the level he's currently at.
Kcmatt7 said:
@BeddieKU23 Well since Draftexpress was basically bought by ESPN and turned into an Insider, that's what we get.
Yup Givony works for ESPN these days.
If Vick goes 19 this year, boy has he improved
Really good post. The way we have shot the ball at home they should be very scared of us. The one thing to worry is our last neutral court game we missed everything under the sun.
You can force Syracuse into high scoring games especially if you have weapons which we do. I think we will methodically score early until the game settles and then we will see our guys picking apart this defense.
I have not seen the talent level so bare at Cuse in many many years, at least 10-15 in my opinion. They took a bounce around transfer, a Euro who wasn't heavily recruited, saw their starting PF transfer to Seton Hall and returned only 2 players who played significant minutes off last years squad. Does that sound like a typical Syracuse team?
We are 25-30 points better then this team. We'll see if we play like it
I would put very little stock into NBAdraft.net but Vick is certainly playing at a level that could see him land somewhere in the first round if he kept it up
positive update for once!~
drgnslayr said:
BeddieKU23 said:
Saturday will be a test. How we get points against the zone on a neutral court having to play at a slower tempo will test these guys.
You said the key... tempo!
Welcome to the 4-guard offense! We don't have to play a slower tempo game this time. If we get Cuse playing our quick pace, we should stomp them. Don't give them time to set their zone.
I suspect this will be a game of waves. We will probably build a big lead, only to have it reduced because we start slowing down and play to Cuze's pace.
If our 4 guard offense listens to their coach then they will be in attack mode and will try and keep the tempo around the same as its been. Putting Vick or Garrett in that high post in limited looks this year has looked deadly. Vick is more of a threat to score from that area right now but you have to love the BBIQ that Marcus brings to the floor. Guys just have to be smart, drive and kick and make shots
I think the proof of this team bouncing back from a "bad game" win against Kentucky has been the games since. We've embarrassed teams, not just beat them.
Doke is getting the ball more.
The team is sharing the ball at an impressive rate(20 assists per game), Devonte is continuing to improve on his decision making as a PG.
We're an active defensive team (which wasn't an issue against Kentucky).
Lightfoot has received some valuable minutes
Garrett has shown he's a lockdown defender and high level rebounder/passer.
Newman is starting to assert himself on both ends.
Svi & Vick are scorching the nets.
Lots of improvement since the 2nd game. We'll see how the next 5 go
I have also enjoyed the easier games to start the season. Under the circumstances where everyone in our Top 7 was taking on a new role this has been beneficial in a lot of ways. We beat Kentucky on a neutral court playing by far the worst game we've played yet. It's usually a good sign if your team can have one of its "bad" games and still prevail.
We've improved since then, a good deal I think.
Toledo, South Dakota St, Texas Southern all have good offenses that will do well in their leagues and they were all completely shell shocked by our offense. We put a ton of fear into those teams to make everything and when shots didn't fall we exposed each and every one of them.
Syracuse is going to have to pray that they can slow the tempo down to a crawl and shoot out of their mind from the field. If they don't, they don't stand a chance. We can talk up Cuse's zone but how do they score? Battle is good, Howard is inconsistent. Brisett will be good in time. They have a couple tall guys, Chukwu was a guy we went after as a transfer but he's nothing special, just tall. They don't match up well with us, we are too quick and have too many offensive weapons for them.
We should beat Omaha by about 50 mixed in with the better games coming up
BShark said:
Vick and Garrett should look nice in the high post against that zone.
bingo
BShark said:
Promise I'm not overreacting to about 1 1/4 worth of games. :joy:
His defense was horrendous last night outside the charge he took and the block in the 2nd half. He's got a long ways to go on ball screens and switching rotations.
I'll be watching his defense over the next 5 games to see what he does against better
Saturday will be a test. How we get points against the zone on a neutral court having to play at a slower tempo will test these guys.
Syracuse isn't good, they have one standout player (Battle) and a point guard who scores but isn't very efficient from the floor (Howard). This isn't your typical Cuse team by any stretch. The talent level is the lowest its been in a long time there.
Washington is terrible. We won't have trouble with them.
Arizona St is surprising. Guard heavy squad just like us but they don't have Doke. Holder & Evans are two gritty Seniors. They play right into our strengths though and with the game in Allen I think we'll pull away from them.
Nebraska is about on par with Washington.
It will be nice to play P5 teams and see if these guys continue to scorch the net against them mixing in neutral court and road games along the way.
Definitely, I think the sweet spot for Silvio would be expecting a Jr year out of him. But he's already 19 and has a mature physically ready body so its going to be all about development and playing time for him before he leaves. He can make jumpers and is an above average athlete (I'm probably selling that aspect short) so we are talking about someone who can play the modern day 4 position (maybe similar to how Perry Ellis was roaming his Sr year). I think he could definitely play the 5 here as well as he rebounds and does defend the rim.
We might not have the same kind of firepower to run a 4-1 next season. Next years squad looks to be a real wildcard right now
We see the 6 and 9 game suspensions as common results so I think people are throwing those out because that's often what you see in extra benefit cases. He's already missed 5 for the issue so if anyone is guessing correctly they are just assuming after this game or after that game for when he might be coming back
If Billy gets some leniency in this situation as other KU players have gotten in the past when they make their decision they can use the games he's already missed during the de-facto suspension towards the final # of games especially since KU has withheld him once they found out about the issue.
The thing that matters the most is how much money we are talking. A 6 or 9 game suspension would likely indicate that Billy received "x" amount of benefits from whoever and that falls within "x" criteria for games missed. Of course the NCAA tends to make up their own rules as they see fit but if this is a simple case where Billy accepted a car then the value of the car or for example money provided to purchase it becomes the most important factor in how many games he's supposed to miss.
If this is more complicated then that well I would assume that looks bad. A Dodge Charger isn't cheap, some players have been ruled ineligible for the year if the $ amount is such an amount. Enes Kanter of Kentucky in 2011 comes to mind of one player ineligible for the entire year for accepting 33 grand while playing overseas.
Part of the reason he's trying to enroll early is the fact that De Sousa will have completed 8 semesters of HS by end of the December so he can't play for IMG anyway. He'd have to sit until the fall to play again and it sounds like he doesn't want to do that if he can join early. It sounds like they don't expect him to be here 4 years so Silvio isn't worried about losing the half semester he would forfeit. If he doesn't play this season much for whatever reason he certainly has a leg up towards next season.
If Duke is the # 1 team in the country I feel good about our chances.
I think what they are now is what they are in March. Maybe a slightly better version by that time. They are good don't get me wrong, they have talent 1-5 and 1 solid bench contributor to lean on.
However I see a PG who can't shoot outside the paint, I see their senior leader that is still an nuclear warhead just waiting to be set off, a freshman big man who's being exposed a bit trying to play alongside another freshman big who's stealing the spotlight from him. They don't defend unless they are going to be a primarily zone defensive team. Trent is solid for a freshman guard who I think is the key to them succeeding going forward. Let's not forget this team has one veteran (psycho) and a bunch of guys who have little experience. Of course every team has its faults but I see a lot of them in this Duke squad and I'm not sure it changes much over the season
Lulufulu said:
@BeddieKU23 No way. Id put any other former Jayhawk that got a DUI or that beat up their girlfriend way way way above what Preston did.
I agree there have been situations involving players where the act has been much greater then Preston's situation. I suppose I should have asked the question differently.
Wasn't his comments more geared to when he'd be available to play as opposed to when he'd join the team and start practicing?
It sounds like he'll be with the team earlier then the Texas game if all goes well with paperwork etc.
It's a good question to ask. Listening to Self's comments yesterday about the offense it seems the 4-1 is here to stay with this group no matter who's eligible to play. He notices that playing 2 big's is not as good as playing his 4 guards.
If that's true then the impact that Silvio will be asked to provide is going to be minimal. If Lightfoot, potentially Preston & Silvio are backups to Doke then we may never see Silvio in meaningful minutes the whole season.
Self will have greater lineup flexibility to go bigger if needed. That could be useful in situations where we face teams that can punish us for playing 4 guards. If he's good enough he'll find a way into the rotation and certainly his reputation would seem to support that he's talented enough to do so. If not he's a useful practice body, a useful player to put in at end of game situations where KU has the lead and wants to rest its starters.
I really like Malik's game. You can see he's still trying to fit himself in with this team. I expect we get some games this season where he plays to his reputation. If 12 pts and 4 boards is the baseline we get we can't really complain. If he can give us more we benefit
Good point about Malik, he was a major concern coming in.
It's not the same situation but I hope that Preston is thinking about how much missing these games has impacted his goals for after the season. He already was a longshot to be drafted in the 1st round. We'll see what happens I suppose
Cunliffe is important because he's another perimeter body that can give the starters rest going forward. Imagine getting into January/February and guys are playing in end of game situations where KU has a big lead. Or imagine the Sat/Monday turnaround where guys legs will get tired. It's going to be nice having another perimeter body. If he can contribute on both ends its gravy.
If Preston does get to play he's the key to the post situation. If you can rotate at least 2 bigs behind Doke we have on paper the best of both worlds. We can continue to play 4-1, we can rotate bigs in case of foul trouble and potentially go big in situations where we face bigger teams (TCU, Baylor, A&M) going forward.
I wouldn't be surprised if everything you said was the truth. Even though KU's compliance might have provided all the details I'm sure the NCAA would still do its own investigation which takes time.
FarmerJayhawk said:
CJ Giles walking out on child support and beating up his GF certainly qualifies.
Forgot about that one. Which is why I asked.
If our 7 guys maximize their potential as the season goes on I think we are the best team out there.
If 1 of the 3 additions could become a consistent rotation player the potential is scary. 8 guys who can impact the game is probably the best we can hope for. The 9th and 10th guys are not going to play enough consistently to expect a lot from them.
I would love to see us continue the 4-1, that way you have fresh big men for Doke and 2 perimeter options off the bench. I can't see us going away from what's working unless it starts unraveling
FarmerJayhawk said:
Billy is gone, almost no matter what. I think he'd rather play in the G League than compete with the likes of Dedric and Udoka, not to mention Silvio, for PT. Which is kind of a shame. He could be an absolute monster with a year's time under Self and co. I don't see how he gets picked anywhere close to the first round unless he just blows up.
What use do we have for a player with both feet out the door already?
Shouldn't we just survive the season without him and figure it out? Sometimes a players character should matter. We obviously don't know Preston but from the surface it doesn't look good. We could certainly be in a situation where he causes more harm then good?
Given the environment (NCAA-FBI-lingering) has a KU player made a more bone-headed decision under Self?
I know we've had plenty of bad situations over the years but this one feels like it takes the cake? Anyone disagree? What else has baffled us fans over the years
That should apply especially since KU held him out as soon as they found out. It would seem very unfair to slap more games on without counting the games he's missed since KU was aware of the issue.
I can't see the first game counting because that was a Coaches decision suspension.