It's Time To Look Ahead

[Hankster]

My thinking is that Vital now has much more experience, is a decent defender, is hard-nosed with the loose balls, creates steals and does a lot of the little things and therefore would earn the starts early in the season particularly since Alterique is essentially still a freshman and Mal will actually be a freshman. I have no doubt Alterique is a better player and I wouldn't be at all surprised if his 15-20 minutes off the bench turned into the starting job in short order. You could certainly be right though. I would guess KO would base it on practices and Alterique's health prior to the season starting.

I agree. Even though the Jury says Alterique is a better player, I am thinking it's Vitals position.......for now. We can pick apart each player. However, Vita grew in front of our eyes. You cannot reward Vital by sitting him at the start. You are right, lets see what the practices are like. Tough call for Ollie.

 

[UConn990411]

Am I the only one hoping to see them start a small lineup that includes Jackson and Larrier?

Having a big lineup is nice when you have the personnel, but that probably won't be the case next year. Not to mention Ollie's had some success with smaller lineups...

 

[80shusky]

Am I the only one hoping to see them start a small lineup that includes Jackson and Larrier?

Having a big lineup is nice when you have the personnel, but that probably won't be the case next year. Not to mention Ollie's had some success with smaller lineups...

I think that is what we will see. Jackson start at the 4 with Diarra and Durham getting minutes there too along with possibly Polley.

 

[UconnFanDC]

Alterique is the real deal. There should be no excuses with the backcourt next year we will have a junior year Jalen and 2 other dynamic ballhandlers. We are set at small forward with Vance and Larrier. The frontcourt scares the out of me. We desperately need a legit post rebounder scorer and we could also use another three point shooter.

Too early to count on what hasnt yet to be seen against competition! We've been down this road over last few years!

 

[Mooch82]

Does anyone have an idea as to where Diarra is with treatment for his knee? Is it an issue that can be managed with pain meds/PT or is this something that he will always be dealing with? Is he expected to be full go next season? Feel like his injury has been the biggest mystery and hard to tell if we can really count on him for next season.

 

[boog204]

On paper, a lineup of:

Gilbert
Adams
Larrier
Vance
Enoch/Durham

is nice. You will, for the first time in ages, have two guys who can definitely be triple threats (pass, drive, shoot) and create for themselves and others. Larrier, I didn't see enough of him to justify can be a third guy in that convo and Vance isn't far behind. I love this lineup. Should be three or four guys who can shoot it a bit and on paper we'd be athletic and fast. Praying the days of struggling to get to 60 are behind us.

Now the questions... Is Gilbert's shoulder always going to be a problem? As someone who hurt their shoulderwhen he was 12, and STILL has lingering issues following multiple surgeries, etc, I know that shoulders do not heal very well. We only need to look at Ricky to see that. He hurt his shoulder his senior year of high school, twice more his freshmen year, and after that was always a bit tentative. The high flying freshmen Ricky vs. G-Town only reappeared in his last game; a damn good one at that.

Is Larrier going to be the Larrier of old? We obviously did not see much of him, but it was clear that he was talented. Will his athleticism be compromised and will he play with confidence? See Durham.

Durham: Will he be stronger and more confident athletically? Every once in a while you see this burst of quickness and explosion and you think he could Donyell 2.0. But then other times, he looks so stiff and tentative because he (naturally) is afraid of pushing it too much.

Enoch: Will he be "the greatest offensive big man" at UConn, or will he be all show? Will he learn how to play even adequate defense instead of being an absolute sieve?

 

[QDOG5]

I feel like people never realize that our players don't get shots at the rim because our spacing and offense are so bad, and we have no inside-out game. Teams that move the ball well and have a free flowing offense get looks at the rim very often, if Durham or Carleton can be a threat to pass as well from the post/elbow, AG, Jalen, Makai, etc. will get many more looks at the rim.

Maybe AG, Jalen, Makai, etc. can pass to Durham or Carleton so they can get some looks at the rim. You're asking our 6'9" and taller guys to get away from the bucket to pass to our 6'3" and under guys in the paint. That's inverted. I'm tired of seeing our bigs set multiple screens up top with no potential to screen and roll and then have to try to crash the boards from 18 feet out. Everyone wonders why we can't get top rated bigs. It might be because they watch UConn games and decide they don't want to stuff their stat sheet with SM (screens made).

 

[boog204]

Maybe AG, Jalen, Makai, etc. can pass to Durham or Carleton so they can get some looks at the rim. You're asking our 6'9" and taller guys to get away from the bucket to pass to our 6'3" and under guys in the paint. That's inverted. I'm tired of seeing our bigs set multiple screens up top with no potential to screen and roll and then have to try to crash the boards from 18 feet out. Everyone wonders why we can't get top rated bigs. It might be because they watch UConn games and decide they don't want to stuff their stat sheet with SM (screens made).

The high screen with a non-threat big is the reason that never works. A defense will do a hard hedge and double Jalen every time Amida screens because they want Amida to have the ball on the move 19 feet from the hoop. Nothing positive will ever happen. When you have a legitimate threat making the screen, the defense has to adjust accordingly. That's why it was so effective in '14 to have DD as your screener. Why we INSIST on running the same crap is beyond my understanding.

 

[QDOG5]

The high screen with a non-threat big is the reason that never works. A defense will do a hard hedge and double Jalen every time Amida screens because they want Amida to have the ball on the move 19 feet from the hoop. Nothing positive will ever happen. When you have a legitimate threat making the screen, the defense has to adjust accordingly. That's why it was so effective in '14 to have DD as your screener. Why we INSIST on running the same crap is beyond my understanding.

Amen brother. Simple basketball. UConn needs to do some big on big screening in the low post area and every big man should have a baseline move and a paint move from both sides of the paint. It ain't that difficult.

 

[SouthBayHusky]

How do we know this?

Is he a 'rebounding machine' due to his skills or his body looks like one?

I'm only asking because I've never seen him play although I've heard the hype.

Don't know how his game will translate a college level but from what I saw from tape he looks to be that bulldog with lots of energy crashing the boards. He's also another hardnose New Yorker scraps like Vital. Anyway, I'm hopeful if his knees are ok

 

[80shusky]

Does anyone have an idea as to where Diarra is with treatment for his knee? Is it an issue that can be managed with pain meds/PT or is this something that he will always be dealing with? Is he expected to be full go next season? Feel like his injury has been the biggest mystery and hard to tell if we can really count on him for next season.

I thought I saw somewhere that he was practicing lightly. If I can find it I will post it.