Pope/shu observation

[Kitaman]

The kid is better than I thought (or at least against us). He can take 5 steps to the basket and make it look like 2. He caught one pass that was nearly thrown out of bounds, regrouped then spun to the basket for a shot. I came away impressed and think he will have a pretty good future as a PF.

As for Jordan Theodore I just think he was just itching to show up Napier. He won't play like that again for a while. Napier better take note though, this is his lot from this point on.

Lastly shu gained confidence at the half, and kept it throughout the 2nd half. They 'knew' they could beat us and executed accordingly. Are they the better team? Not to me, but as with all BE games this proves that UConn intimidates no one in the league.

On to Rutgers (with our coach)!

 

[HuskyBballFan]

As someone who's seen a lot of Seton Hall games this year, I can tell you that Pope and Theodore's performances last night were not an anomaly, at least for this year. Theodore used to be an out of control point guard with no jump shot, but he has greatly improved in both those areas this year. And Pope clearly needed a full year to recover from his nearly fatal health problems that happened after his sophomore year. He can't jump over a phone book, but he has great touch around the basket and a nose for the ball.

 

[upstater]

He's like a dancing bear in the lane.

But this is college basketball, not a circus. You'd expect a zebra to notice the difference.

 

[huskymagic]

The kid is better than I thought (or at least against us). He can take 5 steps to the basket and make it look like 2. He caught one pass that was nearly thrown out of bounds, regrouped then spun to the basket for a shot. I came away impressed and think he will have a pretty good future as a PF.

As for Jordan Theodore I just think he was just itching to show up Napier. He won't play like that again for a while. Napier better take note though, this is his lot from this point on.

Lastly shu gained confidence at the half, and kept it throughout the 2nd half. They 'knew' they could beat us and executed accordingly. Are they the better team? Not to me, but as with all BE games this proves that UConn intimidates no one in the league.

On to Rutgers (with our coach)!

Pope is solid but he is not the reason why they handled us last night. Jordan Theodore was a beast last night for the hall. He absolutely manhandled Napier and Boatright on the defensive end, and offensively he was scoring at will in the second half. Fuquan Edwin was also really good for them. That guy has skills as a wing player. Theodore looked like he was a Mcdonald All American the way he was playing out there.Napier and Boatright both better take note that they need to get in the weigh room get stronger and tougher, and be stronger with the ball. Neither of them looked like they could break the zone last night.

The big issue was the lack of toughness UConn showed last night and the awful defense by everybody excluding Giffey who played with heart and sometimes Olander. Thats a problem when those 2 were the toughest players last night for UConn. Oriakhi and Drummond need to start playing some defense and banging down low like they mean for us to win a title. They were both soft last night and avoided contact. Forget about box out drills, just go out there and be a bully and punish people like Jeff Adrien and Thabeet used to do. This team is playing like a finesse team ala Kansas teams or North Carolina teams. Giffey has impressed me all year and I think he should get more minutes at the 3 if not starting because he is playing solid and is contributing.

 

[sparkdog]

Please put TO back in the starting lineup.