Qudus Announcing Decision on the 30th

[Ewekon]

Pitt picked a bad time to get semi good. They have the conference and a young team on which to sell recruits. They have an outside shot at 20 wins and are pretty much an NIT lock. UConm cannot say any of that at this point. Then you have Gtown (Qudus is an academics guy) with Ewing.

Quite frankly, I'm a-scared here.

 

[Chief00]

I don't buy the "all 5 schools still have a shot." Hearing this is down to GTown and UConn, with an small outside shot for Pitt.

Confirmed

 

[Austin316]

Pitt picked a bad time to get semi good. They have the conference and a young team on which to sell recruits. They have an outside shot at 20 wins and are pretty much an NIT lock. UConm cannot say any of that at this point. Then you have Gtown (Qudus is an academics guy) with Ewing.

Quite frankly, I'm a-scared here.

I agree. Even if we don’t land him I am sure Hurley and Co. will be all over the transfer market. The coaching staff that we have might be able to shy some talent away with the likes of Kimani Young (previously Minnesota w/ NYC ties) and Kenya Hunter (previously Nebraska, Georgetown, Xavier NC State and Duquesne). There are always talented grad transfers that hit the market and with post-season expectations questionable I know these guys will be ready to pounce on someone that wants to come to the basketball capital of the world over their current situation. Between what the previous staff recruited and what our current staff has recruited in the last 4 years we have a massive recruiting network.

 

[Towney007]

I think we're in a good spot.

Most precisely I think it's between playing for Ewing and a really great situation at UConn. I just think people ludicrously underrate the appeal Ewing has to bigs.

 

[gtcam]

Agree with that. They have two outstanding freshman guards and freshman forward plus lots of other pieces. Just need that dominant man in the middle and Ewing surely is telling him he'll make him an NBA player in his own image.

Watched Gtown again last night
Akinjo is starting to get real comfortable and becoming a stud
The announcers were saying that Ewing is still in the hunt for a big that he can keep for a few years and will fit with the guys he has that are young

 

[superjohn]

Watched Gtown again last night
Akinjo is starting to get real comfortable and becoming a stud
The announcers were saying that Ewing is still in the hunt for a big that he can keep for a few years and will fit with the guys he has that are young

Akinjo was terrible last night.

 

[CL82]

All out grind next two weeks. Continuing the wildly successful dam break. Trust the grind.

 

[auror]

Akinjo was terrible last night.

1/10 on one hand, 8 assists and only 1 turnover on the other with 7 rebounds.

They're still asking him to do too much, but his 3 point shot has gotten steadier.

As he gets older, craftier, and stronger, he's going to be very nice. Well if this 4/33 stretch from 2 doesn't shatter his confidence.

 

[yukonfan4]

assuming it's between us and gtown, with pitt having an outside shot, what do you think our actual odds are? 50% at best?

not trying to be negative. that would mean:
us- 50%
gtown- 49%
pitt- 1%

we win!

 

[superjohn]

1/10 on one hand, 8 assists and only 1 turnover on the other with 7 rebounds.

They're still asking him to do too much, but his 3 point shot has gotten steadier.

As he gets older, craftier, and stronger, he's going to be very nice. Well if this 4/33 stretch from 2 doesn't shatter his confidence.

He's good but I watched the game and he's the reason they lost. Didn't pass the ball the final 7 minutes of the game. With the ball and a chance to win he put his head down and drove 2 straight times getting blocked both times for the loss.

 

[RayIsTheGOAT]

I don't have a great feeling about Wahab choosing to come here. Objectively, I would choose to play in DC in the Big East for Patrick Ewing if I'm a big center that needs 3-4 year development. Obviously would love to have him, but I'm just being realistic. I hope Qudus values playing time, because we have plenty of that to offer compared to Gtown...

If we do indeed miss out on Wahab, I'm not sure Mitchell is a great fit for Hurley's style. I would lean towards Hurley looking at the situation and wanting to get a high end grad transfer over Mitchell and then go fishing in 2020 again for another freshman center (if there are good options out there for 2020). And I'd love to have a good center grad transfer next year to balance out our youth.

 

[UConn Dan]

View attachment 38329

That you chief?

 

[tcf15]

Re: Akinjo ... sorry to bring KO up again, but I'm curious what Kevin Ollie's plan was with a back court of Gilbert and Akinjo. Don't think you'd really be able to play them together and they'd would have both been here together for at least three years.

 

[RayIsTheGOAT]

Re: Akinjo ... sorry to bring KO up again, but I'm curious what Kevin Ollie's plan was with a back court of Gilbert and Akinjo. Don't think you'd really be able to play them together and they'd would have both been here together for at least three years.

I don't mean to beat a dead horse but I think it was evident that there wasn't any coherent plan in general.

Both guys are very talented, and it's nice to have 1 tiny crafty PG but you're right, I dont know how they'd coexist. Their games wouldnt really complement each other.

 

[dennismenace]

We need more grind.

 

[Ewekon]

All out grind next two weeks. Continuing the wildly successful dam break. Trust the grind.

I will use "wildly successful" when the dam breaks for Wahab. Very succussful; sure thing.

 

[dennismenace]

Pitt picked a bad time to get semi good. They have the conference and a young team on which to sell recruits. They have an outside shot at 20 wins and are pretty much an NIT lock. UConm cannot say any of that at this point. Then you have Gtown (Qudus is an academics guy) with Ewing.

Quite frankly, I'm a-scared here.

I think you can make the case that Hurley has established himself as a very good coach who is on the rise.
Not sure Patrick E. has established himself yet as anything other than an exceptional player. As far as the academics perhaps if he was going to be a liberal arts major he might prefer Gtown but if he were after a business education I think Uconn would be considered a superior choice. Consider Okafor who was an exceptional student and graduated in three years with a sky high average. He had a reputation for thinking things out pretty well. Uconn is an exceptionally very good school in many fields of study. I think of Gtown as
a pre-law, pre-med and government studies type undergraduate school. Just my opinion.

 

[upstater]

I don't mean to beat a dead horse but I think it was evident that there wasn't any coherent plan in general.

Both guys are very talented, and it's nice to have 1 tiny crafty PG but you're right, I dont know how they'd coexist. Their games wouldnt really complement each other.

We always had multiple PGs. If one goes down, you're screwed.

This was Ollie's biggest personnel problem, IMO. When Alterique went down, you were left without a pure PG.

You always need at least 2 top PGs on the team. If one goes down and you only have one, you're screwed. They don't need to play together more than 5-10 minutes anyway.

 

[yukonfan4]

I don't have a great feeling about Wahab choosing to come here.... I'd love to have a good center grad transfer next year to balance out our youth.

welcome to the positive spin zone:

getting a grad transfer like nico carvacho is actually the best way to go.... he would certainly be more productive than wahab next season and also preserves an all out grind for a 4-5 star center in 2020 (think kofi without the drama)

if we don't get wahab, i'm 100% down with this backup to our backup plan, that actually turned out to be the best plan all along, i hope.

and let's add coulibaly too just to be safe

 

[Chief00]

I think we're in a good spot.

Most precisely I think it's between playing for Ewing and a really great situation at UConn. I just think people ludicrously underrate the appeal Ewing has to bigs.

Agree, that should not be underestimated nor should the appeal Ewing may have with some coaches, parents and even mentors. Where Chief grew up John Thompson and Patrick Ewing were known and respected.

 

[Ewekon]

welcome to the positive spin zone:

getting a grad transfer like nico carvacho is actually the best way to go.... he would certainly be more productive than wahab next season and also preserves an all out grind for a 4-5 star center in 2020 (think kofi without the drama)

if we don't get wahab, i'm 100% down with this backup to our backup plan, that actually turned out to be the best plan all along, i hope.

and let's add coulibaly too just to be safe

Carvacho has long been my grad pick. I expect he will go through the pre draft process to get a read on 1st or more likely 2nd round chances. He is a good player no doubt.

What is allowable contact with possible future grad transfers? May we contact him now or not until he announces his intentions?

Long way from CO to CT.

 

[UConnStats]

welcome to the positive spin zone:

getting a grad transfer like nico carvacho is actually the best way to go.... he would certainly be more productive than wahab next season and also preserves an all out grind for a 4-5 star center in 2020 (think kofi without the drama)

if we don't get wahab, i'm 100% down with this backup to our backup plan, that actually turned out to be the best plan all along, i hope.

and let's add coulibaly too just to be safe

Probably not safe to assume we can get the best grad transfer big in the country.

 

[RayIsTheGOAT]

We always had multiple PGs. If one goes down, you're screwed.

This was Ollie's biggest personnel problem, IMO. When Alterique went down, you were left without a pure PG.

You always need at least 2 top PGs on the team. If one goes down and you only have one, you're screwed. They don't need to play together more than 5-10 minutes anyway.

The issue isnt about how many point guards you have. We all agree you need multiple point guards in case of injury and such.

The argument is about whether or not relying on 2 undersized point guards with pretty much the same skill set, year projection, need for the ball in their hands etc. is a good plan. If one can play off the ball, maybe it works. Or if one can accept not starting.
Maybe it would've worked, who knows.
But it feels like a combination of Gilbert, Gaffney, B Adams, Vital, Bouknight give you 5 different types of guards with different sizes and skillsets.

 

[HuskyHawk]

Re: Akinjo ... sorry to bring KO up again, but I'm curious what Kevin Ollie's plan was with a back court of Gilbert and Akinjo. Don't think you'd really be able to play them together and they'd would have both been here together for at least three years.

You mean like the back-court of Adams and Gilbert that is similarly dysfunctional? KO's biggest recruiting problem was roster construction. He brought in guys that weren't really complimentary to each other and then struggled to find lineups that worked.

 

[Yankees32123]

Last big man we lost to Georgetown was Jessie Govan.... who's averaging 20 and 8 his senior year.