🏀 KuBuckets Archive

@wrwlumpy If Fran is suggesting it, best advice is to do the opposite because there's a reason why Fran isn't a coach anymore and too many wrong decisions are a big part of that.

The identity of this KU team (and the previous two years as well) is that they are a finesse team. WVU, WSU, Stanford, Temple are all physical teams and these are the teams that have made KU look their absolute worst in the past 2.5 seasons. This team doesn't have the enforcers that they've had with T-Rob, the twins, Cole, D-Jax, Simien. Nobody on KU is going to make opponents pay for going to the rim and nobody is scared of KU right now because there's no reason to be afraid of KU.

KU needs an enforcer in the middle of the defense that can make teams think twice about driving the lane.

@HighEliteMajor That's how a couple of other arenas are down here. Erwin Center (Texas) is circular seating and Ferrell Center (Baylor) is like that as well.

@wrwlumpy There's some other famous alums you could add, mostly from sports with a couple from the entertainment world. Actor Chris Klein from the American Pie franchise and former Price is Right announcer Rod Roddy are alums. In sports, you got 2015 NL Cy Young winner Jake Arrietta of the Chicago Cubs, Cincinnati Bengals QB Andy Dalton, former Chargers and Jets RB LaDanian Tomlinson, former OKC Thunder coach Scott Brooks, current Pitt coach Jamie Dixon and former Heisman winner Davey O'Brien, the award for best college QB, are alums. From the world of fictional alums, you have the Skipper from Gilligan's Island and Rev. Lovejoy from the Simpsons who have degrees from TCU as well.

@wissoxfan83 Wiggins is never going to be a big assists guy because he's a finisher, not a facilitator. His rebounding is partly a product of his stone hands and struggling to corral the ball, he struggled with this at KU as well. It's also partly because of his role on the T-Wolves. He's the guy that leaks out on loose balls and missed shots so they don't put him in a position to get many rebounds as well. He could probably be a 4-5 rpg guy if that was his role but it's not.

As for the team itself, it's a really young team, but they have a solid nucleus that will make them a playoff team in a couple of years if they stay together. Wiggins has superstar potential, Rubio is becoming a pretty good PG now, Zach LaVine is good young player, and Karl Anthony-Towns looks like he's going to be a good one. You also have Kevin Garnett and Tayshaun Prince who are good veteran presences to have. Garnett's work ethic and intensity is a great thing to have for all tge young guys and Prince has won a championship and is a solid on court leader for these guys. This is a good young team with a couple of great mentors that has a bright future.

@Crimsonorblue22 He's got top 5 potential, but if he doesn't put in the work to improve his ball handling which impacts his ability to drive the lane, he'll stay in that second level of star players. By second tier guys, I'm talking Dwight Howard, Blake Griffin, John Wall, Klay Thompson, and guys like that. Still All-Star caliber players, but not guys who are considered the elite of the elite in the NBA like LeBron, Curry, or KD.

So tonight I went to my first Rockets game in a couple of years and the quality of play is definitely far superior to the college game, but I'll still take the college game all day every day because college games just have a much better atmosphere than NBA games. Music constantly playing while the ball is in play drives me insane and that with the overall atmosphere is why I don't go to a bunch of NBA games despite having at least 41 opportunities a year to do so. When I do go, it's usually because of someone on the other team. I've gotten to see LeBron, Kobe, Pierce, and MJ's final game in Houston with the Wizards over the years.

Tonight, Andrew Wiggins and Minnesota Timberwolves were in Houston so I went because I wanted to see how much Wiggins game has grown since he left KU. I'll start with the two big holes he still has in his game and they were arguably his two biggest at KU as well. His handles are still subpar as he had his pocket picked on multiple occasions and he still has stone hands as he fumbled quite a few relatively easy passes to him. Those are the two issues that could potentially keep him from reaching top tier status in the NBA and keep him as a second tier guy.

On to the positives now. He was the leading scorer in the game with 28 points on 9-16 shooting (2-3 from 3 and 8-9 from the FT line). He was also the primary defender on James Harden tonight, but spent some time on Trevor Ariza as well. Wiggins is well on his way to being an elite defender as Harden had 27 points, but it was on an 8-22 (2-10) shooting performance. Wiggins midrange game is developing quite nicely as that's how he got a lot of his points, but he's also able to get to the rim at will as well as the 9 FTA's. Andrew Wiggins is already developing into a premier scorer and with improved handles, Wiggins could end up being a top 5 overall player in the NBA within the next 2-3 years.

The issue isn't that KU lost to WVU. WVU is a very good team and beating top 15 teams on the road is very difficult. The issue is that this core group of players consistently loses to the same style of play repeatedly. WVU, MSU, WSU, Temple, Stanford are/were very physical teams and just flat out bullied KU and KU consistently curls up in the fetal position instead if fighting back. KU got physically dominated again which is ongoing trend with this group and it's a very concerning one because KU is not likely to get lucky enough to avoid a physically imposing team for 6 straight games in March and April.

How do you cheat as much as Haith and still suck so much? His only good year at Missouri was with Mike Anderson's kids and he still couldn't win a tournament game and lost in a 2-15 game.

@jaybate-1.0 There's one other area that to me played just as big role and it was WVU's offensive rebounding. KU might have ended up -2 for the game in total rebounds, but it only ended up that way because of the final couple of minutes when WVU finally backed off. WVU was +7 or 8 for the majority of the 2nd half and they were +10 in offensive rebounding until they called off the hounds. I don't remember the exact number, but WVU got about 15 second chance points and that's not including whatever they got at the FT line from getting fouled after an offensive board.

At the end of the day, this is a finesse KU team that doesn't handle physical play well (3 years of evidence back that up) and Huggy has WVU playing Big East basketball in terms of the physicality of the team. I think most, if not all of KU's struggles against WVU recently can be traced back to physical team bullying a fonesse team.

The context of fools gold last night is accurate. Basically Self was saying that KU was settling for 3's without running any offense (accurate) and there wasn't a ton of effort going after loose balls (also accurate) and KU got lucky and made some shots. Selden's first 3 was a good look, but the next 2 were bad shots that weren't high % looks.

I will also say that Self made a really bad substitution when he brought in Greene for Graham and KU had a backcourt lineup of Mason, Selden, and Greene and that's when the turnovers really started escalating and KU never recovered. KU needed two ball handlers on the floor at all times which meant some combination of 2/3 if Mason, Graham, and Svi on the floorat all times. This was also a game that best suited for Mickelson to play big minutes. Self's biggest chunk of the blame for last night is his substitution patterns. The timid play on defense and the glass is on the players because that was just a flat out lack of effort on the players part. The players let early adversity impact their effort and that's not going to be a fun practice for them because of the effort.

We'll have to wait and see what happens against TCU with how KU runs their offense to see if he does start reverting back to bad ball.

@drgnslayr It was Ellis. Without his efforts tonight, KU loses this game by 25 at least. He wanted redemption for last year and he absolutely played like a man tonight. For all the crap he's gotten the previous 3 years for being softer than Charmin, Perry Ellis has grown up this year.

@jayballer54 You'll find them in the corner curled up in the fetal position.

First of all, I want to give WVU credit tonight because even though they couldn't make a bucket tonight, they did the little things tonight and look like they're going to be a major threat to win the Big 12 this year along with OU now..

WVU ended up +11 in TO's, +8 in offensive rebounds, +26 in FTA and +21 in FT's. The analysis for this games doesn't need to go very deep, KU's players didn't play with any toughness tonight. I'm sure there will be plenty of people blaming Self for that and not faulting the players in anyway, but at what point do the players have to actually take responsibility for how they play? I'm sure there's some things Self could've done differently, but at the end of the day there's only so much he can say and scheme. The players still have to go out on the floor and play and execute and they simply didn't do that tonight. This is a loss on the players much more than Self even though I'm sure there will be some that will argue the opposite.

KU played like crap tonight and Self needs to question their manhood this week leading up to the TCU because I only saw one man wearing a KU uniform tonight.

@DinarHawk How does a zone defense change KU getting their ass kicked on the glass and cut down on KU's turnovers? Those were the two differences tonight. The two biggest weaknesses of playing a zone defense are giving up better 3 point looks (WVU shot 25% from outside so would not have been an issue tonight) and getting fewer defensive rebounding and considering WVU finished with 15 offensive boards, that number would've been higher had KU gone to zone and KU likely loses by more.

KU got kicked right square in the balls tonight and cowered in the fetal position instead of getting pissed off and fighting back, other than Perry Ellis who earned his man card tonight.

Hope this doesn't turn into an Ames or Manhattan situation after WVU wins and they're respectful while storming the court and let KU players and staff leave in peace.

@jaybate-1.0 We don't know if he'll have learned from this game until he's in the situation again. We also saw Mason regress big time tonight with 7 TO's and playing very timidly.

How many second chance points does WVU have tonight? And how many FT's have they made after getting an offensive board?

Even with all of KU's turnovers (Mason has 7 and Selden has 6), I'm guessing that if KU didn't let WVU go +10 on the offensive glass, KU would be winning right now or at least within 5 points right now because WVU has shot like crap all night tonight.

@DinarHawk Self can only say the same thing so many times before it's on the players to calm down. At this point, it's on Mason and Selden to calm everyone else down because Self can't do that for them.

KU is simply playing undisciplined basketball right now. Ellis is the only one playing under control right now. Everyone else is playing really sped up right now.

KU is playing like garbage right now. Getting owned on the glass, making dumb/bad passes, taking bad shots.

How's KU going to respond in the 2nd half to getting kicked in their balls the 1st half?

WVU is +4 on the glass and +5 on offensive boards last I looked, that's a big part of their lead as well.

Looked great first 5 minutes, then Self put in the back court combo of Mason, Selden, and Greene and haven't looked the same since.

Don't like Mason, Selden, Greene combo in the back court against the press. 2/3 of Mason, Graham, Svi need to always be in.

Handling the press very well so far, that's the biggest key for KU and should lead to a lot of easy looks for KU.

Personal fouls per 40 minutes among all 6 bigs:

Cheick Diallo: 9.0

Hunter Mickelson: 7.8

Jamari Traylor: 6.5

Landen Lucas: 5.5

Carlton Bragg: 4.8

Perry Ellis: 2.1

Only Ellis plays defense in a way that he can play extended mintues. The other 5 foul way to frequently to be left on the floor for extended minutes. If the rotation is shortened and guys get in foul trouble which seems probable given their foul rates, Self would have to extend the rotation at that spot because of foul trouble anyway.

Mason is usually the lead ball handler which means Graham is typically playing more minutes without the ball in his hands which also limits his chances to turn the ball over. When Graham is in this role as the off ball guard, he needs to be more conservative and defer to Mason. When Graham is playing lead guard, he does need to be more aggressive as the facilitator of the offense.

Transition defense/offense and rebounding determine this game. If KU starts getting dominated on the glass like OU started doing in the second half, in comes Landen and KU starts playing a lot of bad ball.

We know WVU loves to press and fall back into a 1-3-1 zone defense so on offense, Mason, Graham, and Svi need to be focused and make good decisions to break the press. Ellis, Selden, and Greene could be in for big scoring nights if WVU presses more than they don't and KU is able to break their press. Carlton Bragg and Diallo may not see very many minutes tonight if this game is close because Bragg is a turnover machine at 22% TO rate (2nd worst among the 11 regulars) and Diallo just simply doesn't understand where he's supposed to be in different situations yet.

Jamari is a scary player tonight who's likely to see more minutes than normal because of the anticipated tempo of the game. Traylor has the worst TO% among the 11 regulars (28%), but is also averaging his lowest TO/40 min of his career as well so a little bit of a conundrum there with those numbers. Traylor is going to be very important for his defense tonight and his ability to play transition defense and guard out on the perimeter. I would also expect to see Hunter play above normal minutes as well because of the nature of the game. Landen largely depends on how KU's rebounding and the score of the game because if it's close and WVU is dominating the glass, we will big doses of LL tonight.

Best case scenario is KU does a great job of busting WVU's zone and builds a lead and can get Bragg and Diallo some minutes because it is important, but they aren't to the point of development yet where they're trustworthy in close games in high pressure situations which is the more likely scenario tonight.

@Lulufulu Langford's never been with a team more than 2+ seasons. He did sign a 4 year extension with his team in Moscow in 2011 after he'd been with them 2 years, but struggled to recover from and injury and they cut him a couple of months after signing the extension.

Only change I would make is updating the Jayhawk itself. It's basically been the same for 70 years now with the only change being the updated font of the KU a little over a decade ago. I'm not talking a radical redesign, but something that looks more intimidating than a smiling bird would be good change. Basically, I would like to see KU update their logo to a modern version of the 1941 Warhawk logo. The football program started using the Warhawk logo on their red helmets and the soccer team has used it on some of their kits as well.

@HighEliteMajor Bragg did start the second half next to Ellis, that's why I used the qualifier almost exclusively because he does occasionally play next to Ellis. I've said numerous times my issues with Bragg at this point in his career, if you want to continue to ignore those statements, that's your issue not mine. I'm also well aware of the definition of the C5 and considering that Bragg plays predominantly at the 4, is why I think it needs to be changed to C4.

You keep saying you want Self to take a bold strategy, yet you also want Self to revert back to his old ways of playing 8 guys which is the least bold strategy Self can take. Do you actually want Self to make the bold play of continuing to keep the rotation expanded and playing 11 guys regularly and keeping other teams having to prepare for more players and more styles of play KU can throw at them because that is the bold strategy that you want Self to make. You just don't like the bold strategy because it's different and unproven. You know what is proven with this group of players? A short rotation and 1st weekend exits.

The bold strategy you want Self to employ is happening now and it's an expanded rotation that can play multiple styles of offense. This is an unpredictable group and unpredictable groups are hard to prepare for and hard to prepare increases KU's odds of winning games and championships.

@ralster I don't want Self to shorten the rotation, I want him to keep it the way it is with 11 guys playing at least 9 minutes per game. I 100% agree with @jaybate-1.0 in regards to making opposing teams prepare for everyone, I've been saying pretty much the same thing, just in different words. More diversity in playing styles, the ability to play run and gun up tempo, play grind it out Big 10 style ball, play Self style bad ball just makes KU a very difficult team to prepare for because you don't know how KU is going to attack you. We assumed KU would run with OU to beat them, but it ended up being bad ball that was most effective against OU.

@HighEliteMajor If Traylor is removed from the picture, it is a C2 or C3 because Carlton Bragg is not part of the 5. He subs almost exclusively for Ellis which puts him at the 4 and not part of the C5 which should really be called the C4 because it's 4 guys manning the low post spot.

In wedding ceremonies, one of the common things you see is the pastor talking about how 3 strands of rope are stronger than 2. You see this metaphor used a lot for team building as well. This metaphor also applies to the low post position for KU. The collective 4 guys that man that position are better as 4 strands of rope than removing one and making it 3 strands.

If you only play Traylor in end game situations, he hasn't gotten into the flow of the game, isn't adjusted to how the refs call the game, isn't adjusted to how the opposing team is playing and will look horrible. None of those guys have shown they're good enough to play 10-15 minutes over the years, this year they're all playing 10-15 minutes and KU is playing much better this year than at any point in the past two seasons.

If you start playing ANY of the post guys except for Ellis over 15 minutes on a consistent basis, they get exposed significantly and that's exactly what will happen if the current post rotation is shortened on a permanent basis.

KU does not win a national title by shortening the post rotation and exposing a significant weakness even more than it already is.

I do not care what the numbers say, Cheick Diallo is currently the worst post player KU has. The one stat that Newell doesn't include that would be invaluable is how many minutes these guys actually play alongside Perry. I would assume Cheick and Bragg are the lowest because Bragg usually subs for Ellis and Diallo seems to play alongside Bragg and Traylor the most. People can keep saying that Diallo deserves more minutes, but the kid has no clue what he's doing on the court at this point and that should be plain as day to anyone out there.

Those numbers also don't do anything to disprove what we know about the roles of Lucas, Mick, and Traylor. Lucas is put in to get rebounds when KU is getting the butts handed to them on the glass like OU started doing in the second half. Mickelson is the best offensive minded guy of the bunch, but he is a pansy and gets outmuscled for position regularly. How many rebounds did OU steal from him in that game? Traylor is the defensive guy and is athletic enough to guard on the perimeter and not be the mismatch on switches that Lucas and Mickelson are.

Bragg's game is still too one dimensional on offense (mid range jumper) and he gets dominated against physical teams because he is a bean pole with no muscle mass yet. Diallo is clueless on both ends of the floor right now. He's selfish when he gets the ball jacking up terrible shots, he's frequently out of position on the offensive glass. On defense, he has zero help defense skills right now and he puts himself too far under the basket to get rebounds at this point.

The argument isn't the ceiling of Bragg and Diallo because there's nobody that believes their ceilings are lower than the other 3 posts. The argument is CURRENT ABILITY LEVEL and Diallo is nowhere near the other guys right now. Bragg is improving, but the consistency of his play just isn't there yet and that's what's holding him back now and more minutes will not make him a more consistent player.

None of the strengths of the C5 are so great that they mask their deficiencies effectively enough to make any of them worthy of major minutes. Traylor plays the most at 15, Lucas is at 13, Bragg is at 11 (mostly for Ellis at this point who averages 29 mpg), Mickelson is at 10 mpg, and Diallo at 9 mpg.

Self's strategy at this point is putting his best offensive big (Mickleson) out there to start the game to build an early lead, then give Diallo some minutes to apply what he's been doing in practice into game situations, and then go to Traylor and Lucas to ice the game by providing defense and rebounding. There will be games here and there where someone gets hot or KU is so desperate for that skill (like rebounding against OU) that the C5 will be tightened significantly for a particular game, but for the most part it will be a position filled by committee the rest of the year because none of the players have the CURRENT ability level to play 25+ mpg without getting completely exposed on their weaknesses.

If Self does what HEM is suggesting by dumping the C5 for a C2, KU will get completely exposed at that position. We all know each guy has a major hole(s) in their game that anchor that spot, playing them all under 15 mpg minimizes their deficiencies and maximizes what they're good at and if one of them happens to catch fire in a game, then they can play more minutes in that individual game, and then go back to the committee the next game.

The C5 isn't about KU playing off of opposing teams weaknesses by playing a certain big, it's about Self limiting the ability of the opposing team to exploit KU's weakness at the 5 by being able to throw different players that have different abilities and skill sets at opponents.

Which KU would be easier to defend, a KU that plays Mickelson and Diallo exclusively at the 5 with Bragg exclusively subbing for Ellis or a KU that plays Mickelson, Diallo, Traylor, and Lucas at the 5 with Ellis, Bragg, and Traylor at the 4? I know if I was an opposing coach, I would salivate at the prospects of KU having no defensive prowess at the rim with no rebounding over having to prepare for guys that collectively are competent at everything on both ends of the floor.

This isn't a case of KU being desperate to find scoring at the 5 and not having it like last season when Cliff's lack of development killed KU's offense. Even if Bragg or Diallo were to emerge tomorrow, they would still be at best be the 4th or 5th scoring option for KU behind Ellis, Selden, and Mason with Graham being the only guy they would conceivably jump in the priority of need of scoring from that spot.

@Crimsonorblue22 It was in the University of Hawaii's arena so that may not be an option.

@Crimsonorblue22 The issue with these games are they're played in places that aren't designed for basketball games. The Pitt-Gonzaga game was called at halftime this year because the court was too wet and deemed unsafe. There was another one that was cancelled entirely because it was on a ship and the weather didn't cooperate. That's the issue with playing in armories, on the deck of a ship, and wherever else they've played. If the game is played in an armory, they need to dehumidify the building or move it off base and play in a proper facility that can fit a few thousand soldiers.

@DoubleDD So you're saying Graham didn't go to a prep school to get out of his App St. commitment because they wouldn't release him from his LOI after a coaching change?

I've never said a school has to release a kid from an LOI because there is no rule saying that schools have to so. It is however a common practice that if a school changes coaches and a kid asks for his release from an LOI, that the school grants it and it typically reflects poorly on the school when they don't do so.

In Graham's case, he had already signed his LOI to App St., App St. has a coaching change and Graham starts getting better offers than App St. and asked for his release and App St. denied his request. Not every player has this option because not every player can reclassify down a year which is what Graham did and signed with KU the following year.

If Cal leaves UK, it's not going to be a surprise to see them lose at least one recruit and it would be in UK's best interest from a PR perspective (which UK is all about) to grant the release of that kid.

@Lulufulu Duke at MSG is KU's Champions Classic game and is 4 days after KU plays Indiana in Pearl Harbor in the Armed Forces Classic.

WVU is going to be a game where we could see a Mason, Graham, Svi trio in the back court some against WVU. Three ball handlers on the floor is a zone busting line up.

@BeddieKU23 Here's the difference between Selden and Oubre as far as their draft status goes. Oubre and Selden project to different positions in the NBA with Oubre being a 3 and Selden will be a 2 in the NBA because of his size. Selden could very well end up like Keith Langford as guy more suited as a 3, but isn't long enough to play the 3 in the NBA.

Another factor is that Oubre was further away from his ceiling than Selden is and that possibility of developing and reaching that ceiling has a bigger risk/reward pay off than drafting someone who's already playing much closer to their ceiling like Selden is which makes Selden viewed as a safer pick and safe picks are generally taken lower in the draft because the risk/reward pay off isn't as high.

If Selden stays for year 4 and shows his ceiling is as high as his recruiting ranking out HS suggests it is, then he could very well end up in tge lottery because he would be a very high ceiling player who doesn't need as much development becayse he's already playing close to his ceiling.

@wrwlumpy I'm disappointed you didn't include a burning couch or John Denver's "Country Roads, Take Me Home."

@Crimsonorblue22 App St. didn't release Graham, that's why he reclassified and went to prep school for an extra year.

@jayballer54 If a player has signed an LOI (all of their commits have), the school has to release the player from the LOI for them to go elsewhere. If they want out and UK won't let them out, they could go to prep school for another year. This is how KU ended up with Graham, he committed to App St., they changed coaches and didn't release Graham so he went to prep school to get out of his App St. commitment.

Svi and BG have different skill sets that are complementary to one another. BG is a shooter that is largely dependent on others to get him open looks off of screens, pick and rolls, pick and pops, and such. He can take less athletic guys off the dribble like we've seen him do quite a bit in the non conference this year, but against similar and more athletic guys, he needs others to get him shots. He is what we've seen a lot out the 3 spot over the years under Self.

Svi has good enough handles to be the secondary guy next to the lead guard. He can also create his own shot and drive and dish and get others open looks.

This year, Greene is better suited to sub for Selden and Svi is better suited to sub for Mason and Graham. We've also seen Svi and Greene on the floor together this year as well including against Tech.

Not a pretty game, but not unexpected given how exhausted these guys were after Monday. Fortunately this dud of a performance came against a weaker Big 12 team. Every team will have 2-3 dud performances per season along with 2-3 games where they have great performances, that's just reality.

Self did a nice job of subbing pretty frequently tonight and keeping fresh legs in as much as possible, but most of those guys still looked tired out there. Hopefully KU is fully recovered by Tuesday night because that game at WVU is going to be another mentally and physically taxing game with WVU' pressure defense.

@wissoxfan83 Trimble hit a buzzer beater.

Lon Kruger didn't expose anything. Bill Self is Bill Self and he went to his comfort zone in crunch time. He's done it dozens of times in the past and will continue to do so in the future.

@DoubleDD I disagree with you and your reaction is to try and make a bet off of something 5 years in the future. That's fine if you think Hield won't pan out, but basing that opinion on the odds simply because the odds say he won't pan out or that he wasn't a OAD is a very flimsy leg to stand on.

What specifically about Hield's game will keep him from staying in the league like you think?

@DoubleDD You're too blinded by your homerism to make rational judgements on players, so it's not possible to have rational debates with you. My opinion on Hield is on this site (different thread) and it's not all star good and it's not out of the league in the blink of an eye like you think.

@drgnslayr Andrew Wiggins can be a 25+ ppg scorer in the NBA and I think Hield is a guy who will be in the 10-12 range because he's a very good shooter. I just don't think he has the quickness to be an elite NBA 2 like Wiggins can be.

@DoubleDD So if a player isn't an all star, they're a nothing player that gets forgotten about? That's the two options you've presented. I don't think Hield is either category. I think he'll be a good NBA 2 that's a career 10-12 point scorer because he's a good shooter.