UConn in the NBA April ‘25

[superjohn]

Nuggets fire coach Malone, GM amid 4-game skid

The Nuggets, in fourth place in the West, fired coach Michael Malone and said they will not extend GM Calvin Booth's contract.

www.espn.com

They fired their GM Calvin Booth too.

 

[REB1094]

Andre has been sent to the end of the bench after starting 40 games this year. Didn’t even take off his warmup yesterday

Watch him at the 25 second mark. The only guy on the bench that gets up for Giannis’ play

The ultimate teammate!

 

[Deleted at users request]

Andre has been sent to the end of the bench after starting 40 games this year. Didn’t even take off his warmup yesterday

Watch him at the 25 second mark. The only guy on the bench that gets up for Gianni’s’ play

The ultimate teammate!

Side note, absolutely incredible to see an NBA team piss down their pants this bad at a simple 2-3 zone.

 

[ctbro1999]

Castle with another solid game. Only took 7 shots (made 5), but went to the line 12 times and dished 8 assists. Once he gets a real whistle and not the rookie whistle, he's gonna be living at the FT line. Though upping his FT% some would be good.

 

[Kenny11]

Castle with another solid game. Only took 7 shots (made 5), but went to the line 12 times and dished 8 assists. Once he gets a real whistle and not the rookie whistle, he's gonna be living at the FT line. Though upping his FT% some would be good.

Is there a stat for and-one's available? He has to be one of the leaders in the nba.

 

[caw]

Castle with another solid game. Only took 7 shots (made 5), but went to the line 12 times and dished 8 assists. Once he gets a real whistle and not the rookie whistle, he's gonna be living at the FT line. Though upping his FT% some would be good.

I'm actually a bit surprised his percentages are so low. He's such a gym rat you'd think he'd improve by now. Then again he has shown quite a few moves he didn't show in college. I have full faith he will improve over the summer.

 

[ctbro1999]

I'm actually a bit surprised his percentages are so low. He's such a gym rat you'd think he'd improve by now. Then again he has shown quite a few moves he didn't show in college. I have full faith he will improve over the summer.

I think this coming offseason is going to benefit him a lot. Looking forward to what he can do in his sophomore campaign!

 

[caw]

Another 21-5-3, two steals and a block night for Castle in a win. Pretty bad three point shooting night and bad from the FT line but he had a heck of a fourth quarter to carry them back on both sides of the ball.

Clingan had a solid 10-9-4 with two blocks before fouling out in a loss to the Jazz.

 

[Mike Honcho]

Another 21-5-3, two steals and a block night for Castle in a win. Pretty bad three point shooting night and bad from the FT line but he had a heck of a fourth quarter to carry them back on both sides of the ball.

Clingan had a solid 10-9-4 with two blocks before fouling out in a loss to the Jazz.

I'm a dubs fan and that was a brutal loss, but Castle made some huge plays down the stretch, including an outstanding pass for an assist with under a minute to go to beat Draymond, who had just made the decision to double him.

 

[REB1094]

Took turns cooking 4 different defenders in the first half, clutch 3 to tie it in the 4th, clutch steal, catches DPOY front runner draymond Green out of position for a beautiful pass into a go-ahead layup

Give this man his ROY award!

 

[Edward Sargent]

Wondering what is happening with Adama. He was waived after a knee injury but did he have surgery and is he looking at other teams?

 

[Dibbie]

Took turns cooking 4 different defenders in the first half, clutch 3 to tie it in the 4th, clutch steal, catches DPOY front runner draymond Green out of position for a beautiful pass into a go-ahead layup

Give this man his ROY award!

Dayum he’s great!

 

[ctbro1999]

Took turns cooking 4 different defenders in the first half, clutch 3 to tie it in the 4th, clutch steal, catches DPOY front runner draymond Green out of position for a beautiful pass into a go-ahead layup

Give this man his ROY award!

Lol that 1 sequence late in the game where he basically stole the ball twice in a span of 3 seconds.
I'm impressed by the way he's able to break down his defender 1 on 1 from the perimeter and take it to the hoop. Not sure we really saw much of that while he was at UConn. Though our offense doesn't run much iso so it makes sense why we didn't see it.

 

[caw]

Lol that 1 sequence late in the game where he basically stole the ball twice in a span of 3 seconds.
I'm impressed by the way he's able to break down his defender 1 on 1 from the perimeter and take it to the hoop. Not sure we really saw much of that while he was at UConn. Though our offense doesn't run much iso so it makes sense why we didn't see it.

I think the NBA rules also are to his advantage. Some of his hesi stuff and off arm pushing would be called as travels or offensive fouls in college. His year at UConn, I think, helped him a lot in terms of learning how to cut and pass to the open man and defend. His one-on-one stuff is a more advanced version of what his highlights were in high school. He seems to have learned some from CP3 also, in terms of some of his passing this year. You don't see many players who you watch and think "I'm not sure another player in the NBA can do that." He is one of them.

He needs to work on his FT shooting first and then next work on finding a few spots where he can be automatic from outside of the paint because he can get to any spot on the floor.

 

[ctbro1999]

I think the NBA rules also are to his advantage. Some of his hesi stuff and off arm pushing would be called as travels or offensive fouls in college. His year at UConn, I think, helped him a lot in terms of learning how to cut and pass to the open man and defend. His one-on-one stuff is a more advanced version of what his highlights were in high school. He seems to have learned some from CP3 also, in terms of some of his passing this year. You don't see many players who you watch and think "I'm not sure another player in the NBA can do that." He is one of them.

He needs to work on his FT shooting first and then next work on finding a few spots where he can be automatic from outside of the paint because he can get to any spot on the floor.

Thing that most impresses me right now is his ability to get by his man from outside despite not having a great 3-pt shot. His defender usually is playing off him a little knowing he's not a great shooter from 3 but despite that he's still able to attack and get to the rim lots of times.

If he ever develops a 35%+ 3-pt shot where his defenders need to faceguard him at the 3-pt line, that'll make him even more dangerous on drives. Combined with getting a better whistle and getting that FT% up towards 80%, he's a legit 25+ PPG player.

 

[NJHusky]

His body control and change of pace is crazy....we say a bit of it last year, but he's doing it better and against NBA players.

Imagine if we had him on this years team.......

 

[3rdbass]

His body control and change of pace is crazy....we say a bit of it last year, but he's doing it better and against NBA players.

Imagine if we had him on this years team.......

He was showing this by the time we got the NCAA tournament and especially the final four games. He just had to defer to a lot of good scoring options on last year’s team. That 2024 was just that good. I’m not too surprised how he is doing since he was always a great athlete and the NBA is more of an open game which allows his dribbling penetration to really show. I’m a little disappointed that his 3 pt shot hasn’t improved but I have hope as he has a good release.

 

[Gurleyman]

His body control and change of pace is crazy....we say a bit of it last year, but he's doing it better and against NBA players.

Imagine if we had him on this years team.......

It won’t be long before you read lots of things like “goshdarn - how good was that 2024 UConn team if Stephon Castle was the fifth option?”

Alabama didn’t even guard him.

 

[aceboon]

I've been a fan of the play-in but this year it's just unnecessary, you can lock in the top 8 of the West right now. I'd hate to see one of the teams in the 7-8 spots have an injury to a star playing either of the Kings/Mavs in an extra game.

 

[3rdbass]

Lol that 1 sequence late in the game where he basically stole the ball twice in a span of 3 seconds.
I'm impressed by the way he's able to break down his defender 1 on 1 from the perimeter and take it to the hoop. Not sure we really saw much of that while he was at UConn. Though our offense doesn't run much iso so it makes sense why we didn't see it.

He did it in spurts during the season but it really jelled in the final four games.

 

[3rdbass]

It won’t be long before you read lots of things like “goshdarn - how good was that 2024 UConn team if Stephon Castle was the fifth option?”

Alabama didn’t even guard him.

That 23-24 team was arguably the most talented UConn team besides the 2003-2004 team.

 

[caw]

Castle has been fantastic as a rookie but I do think Clingan would be challenging him for ROY if he had been in a better situation to start the year. The Blazers (IMO) trying to increase Ayton's trade value and playing him so much hurt them a lot both in terms of Clingan's development and any chance they had at the playoffs.

Clingan has 35 games as a starter at about 24 MPG: 7.6 PPG, 9.8 RPG, 1.6 APG, 2.1 BPG and 0.7 SPG.

The standout is the 2.8 STOCKS per game in 24 MPG. That is outstanding and if he held those numbers for the year he would be third in the league behind Dyson Daniels (3.73 in 34 MPG) and Walker Kessler (3.0 in 30 MPG).

Even as things stand (in total) he is tied for second in STOCKS per minute behind Johathan Issacs, tied with Daniels, Adem Bona and Ausar Thompson.

His rebounding is also quite good even in total (and probably better as a starter), as he has a Rebound Percentage of 17.8% and an ORBD% of 14.2.

 

[ToolzieFan]

 

[HuskyInfinity]

Goodness this photo makes him still remind you that he is still just a calf. If you think what he’s doing right now is incredible just think it’ll be unreal what he will do when his S&C catches up to his frame.

 

[ihatepants]

Once he gets a real whistle and not the rookie whistle, he's gonna be living at the FT line. Though upping his FT% some would be good.

I don't think he's getting a rookie whistle anymore. He's top 20 in the entire league in FTA/36min, and top 10 if you go by just guards.