Liv and Christyn are right now, very good college players with some flaws. By Uconn standards, nothing special, and somewhat disappointing compared to our initial hopes. We heard Liv had put on some badly needed muscle, and there have been a few games this year where she took it to the hoop aggressively, and didn't try to avoid contact. That was encouraging, but came against weaker competition. I suspect against a banger with height she will still have problems with contact.
You raise her WNBA prospects, and that is a good point. While maybe a little stronger, she can get pushed around by bulkier centers several inches shorter in college. That flaw and the resulting inability to finish strong at point blank range, are raising major question marks regarding WNBA or European career options. When she takes it strong to the hole against lesser foes she is a major force, but she needs to be able to do that against players around her height that are 20-30 pounds heavier as well. We need somebody to bang against Boston for example more than someone who can take advantage of inferior competition. This off-season anything less than adding 15-20 pounds of muscle should be considered an off-season failure.
Regarding Christyn there are some similarities to Megan. They could both use their physical gifts to score at will against high school competition. While pretty good at other things, nothing else jumped off the page as an exceptional trait, at least by Uconn standards. I would say both of those players had a little trouble going from a high volume scorer with good but not great efficiency, to fitting into a system where nothing but a high percentage shot is acceptable.
Megan finally found a specified role as an undersized spot up 4, and became a very good three point shooter. Christyn at times looks like she could take it to the hoop or pull up for a mid-range jumper whenever she wants. It may not be a great percentage shot, but she has the ability to create a mediocre one. Put in a system looking for something better than that, most of the time she becomes a spot up three point shooter, and her pure shooting ability isn't that good. In her case I think it is what it is. She struggles with creating offense vs. being an offensive mediocre three point shooter. There will be questions about her on the draft as well. Good physical skills, a smooth looking shot with mediocre accuracy, and ok but nothing special about the rest of her game.
The last class we had that in my opinion overachieved my expectations was Katie Lou and Pheesa. After that we had three classes that in my opinion have been somewhat disappointing. Last year was probably a little overachieving, with Anna being close to my expectations, and Aubrey turning out so far better than I expected. Of course that was a year when we didn't have top recruits and expectations were lower.
This year's class has very high expectations, as next year's class will, and so far so good.
