Reply to thread

Message: [QUOTE="Hey Adrien!, post: 5129919, member: 5787"] Excellent post. Back in January 2023, UConn's roster looked a lot like our roster now in the sense that there was little certainty entering the season. Sanogo was already a beast under the basket and we knew Andre Jackson was an exceptional defender and athletic freak X-factor. However, the transfers were still a work in progress: Newton was panned here for his inconsistencies, Alleyne lost his starting job, Joey was cold. The homegrown impact underclassmen (Hawkins and Clingan) were still getting their feet under them. People forget, UConn was BAD during this time. 2-6 bad. This year, there are similar uncertainties across the roster: we know what Karaban brings, Diarra is Diarra and Samson is Samson. Tarris has shown flashes of brilliance, but he's got projectability and I'm super giddy about him. Mahaney is a career 37% three-pointer shooter, so he's been bad, but he's got Joey potential and more. Then, there's the underclassmen. McNeeley has a shot to be our 2nd best player, Nowell can work his way into the starting PG role. There's potential there and both freshmen are just getting started in their development. The sophomores barely played last year and now Ball is thrusted into a starting role. While he's scored double-digits in every game this year, he's working on his defensive rotations, but the effort is there, he just needs to work on his vision and situational awareness. I've liked what I've seen from Stewart as the first forward off the bench. There's versatility on offense and he's not going to shoot 18% from three all season and his defense will keep improving. Ross has the same three-point percentage, but he's like an over-eager puppy...he'll keep getting reps and maturing his game on both ends. Singare, Abraham too, the underclassmen group this year is DEEP and there's so much potential. It's only going to get better. Per KenPom, UConn is 193rd in D1 experience. Memphis is 2nd, Dayton is 7th. Baylor is 14th. Texas is 22nd. Gonzaga is 17th. Xavier is 3rd. Butler is 25th. Bottom line, UConn is closing out the 2024 portion of their schedule against veteran and experienced teams so they are getting battle tested early...but like Hurley said in 2020, [I]you better get us now, because it's coming[/I]. [/QUOTE]

Verification: First name of men's bb coach