Man, jsloan, you certainly know how to stir things up, and you've done it so radically that for the first-last-only time I have to agree with sawx on something. And rather than gut opinions and vaguely remembered recollections, the stats always are where to look for real info.
Sky is always the limit, but no UConn player has reached the exalted level of Renee's final level in college off of less than 20 minutes as a freshman. Saniya's kind of a unique type, but I would project more realistically for Saniya as possibly something on the level of Tiff Hayes, which is pretty good, but even she got 26 mpg her freshman year.
Note that other than the big minutes difference between Saniya and Renee, if you extrapolate from Saniya's current 19.4 minutes to Renee's 27.9 minutes, you'd find that they are pretty equal in ppg, Saniya would average about 1 more rpg, and Renee would be about 0.4 apg ahead. Saniya's shooting percentages are better for FG%, 3-pt FG%, and FT%. Renee was hugely ahead in steals, and Saniya is better on the blocks. What it all adds up to is two quite similar freshman players (extrapolated statwise), with the vital difference that one got a lot of minutes, and the other is averaging less than 20.
But there are other huge differences. Renee kind of assumed the role of PG on the 2005-06 team, though it was a shared responsibility with sophomore Ketia Swanier. She was vitally needed to fill that position. Like Renee, Saniya is really a guard who can switch easily between the SG\PG roles, but she is on a team with a PG named MoJeff who well fits the standard role of PG that Renee kind of skirted between with the SG role in her years at UConn, much like DT did in her final two years at UConn. Being the PG puts the ball in your hands all the time, and Saniya will likely not play a major PG role for her first three years at UConn.
Now where I would differ from most posters is the degree to which Saniya ever hit that fabled "freshman wall" and how deeply she plunged into some horrible hole of freshmanitis. Early in the year when she was getting lots of minutes (23 mpg at one point), she reached a peak of 7.9 ppg, 2.6 apg, and 2.o apg marks at her tenth game, whereafter she went into some fantasy tailspin that left her at her current 5.9 ppg, 2.2 apg, and 1.9 apg while getting about 20% less minutes than earlier. So, factoring in the less minutes, her tragic plunge off the freshman wall has left her with about 1 ppg less in her last 13 games and a better assists ratio. Yes I know her coach is asking her for more production, but he asks that of every player, especially young and impressionable freshmen.
So, I'm thinking that the wall Saniya hit might have been made of nice fluffy snow and not some tough bricks, though others can paint it up as some deadly Berlin-type edifice. The future is bright for Saniya, and jsloan, maybe pvdoggy will be asking for some of what you've been smoking three years down the road, or maybe not. There are some odds against Saniya, but she's a tough kid that has already shown in her life that she can get through some rough stuff. I'm not betting against her just yet.
