Ashton Pankey, PF - MANHATTAN

 From the first article listed earlier:

But Pankey struggled at times with his confidence and consistency. Head Coach Mark Turgeon went so far to say Pankey played "brain-dead" at times. "Ashton's got to figure another way to help us. We can't sit around and sulk and pout," Turgeon said to the Baltimore Sun. "We've talked at length with Ashton about it. We need him to play well for us to win a game like that. We're trying with him. We just keep plugging."

He acknowledged the struggles with his confidence; against Virginia, he played six minutes and had notable difficulties

The comments by the Coach are concerning.................
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Yeah those comments are concerning. If in fact those exact words came from the coach its pretty pathetic IMO.
 
 is turgeon a stud recruiter or ate their fans delusional?
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I've always thought their fans were a bit delusional, but I like Turgeon. I think he'll lure some very good to great players there once he gets going. Not sure if he'll get the Harrison twins to go there, though.
 
Terps fans are delusional - I should know, I am one! Just kidding of course. I present my sober assessment of Ashton here. I'm a Bronx guy too, so I'm a little bit partial to Ashton:

With all the promising bigs coming in for MD last year and this year's class, Pankey still would have seen solid minutes as probably the first big off the bench, eventually ceding some time to Shaq Cleare as the 2012-13 season goes on.

I do think Ashton's mom is not feeling well lately (meaning it's legit, not the "family member ill cause it's not workin' for me" syndrome)

That being said, Stoglin (not liking school that much), Mychal Parker (not grasping systems well), and Ashton (too many bigs, inconsistent play) were the subject of the transfer rumor mill a lot of last season. The weed got Stogs and Parker suspended for next year, and Ashton may have simply needed to be there for his mom.

In my opinion, I liked what I saw in Ashton last season considering the multiple leg injuries, and liked what I could see Ashton's game becoming. He's agile, pursues rebounds hard with a nose for where the ball will be, and runs the floor well. Ashton's athleticism on D has always been his calling card, and on offense, he showed signs of a decent 8-12 foot jumper. Ashton sometimes wore his emotions on his sleeve, and many fans did not take to his body mannerisms on the court. That's not to say he didn't play hard about 80-90% of the time, but just that he's hard on himself and shows it. He seems like a solid guy (I've tweeted quite a bit with him the past 2 years).

I think Ashton could make an excellent backup C/PF, and if he plays hard all the time and gets his 20-25 minutes/game, can contribute on the glass quite a bit. I'd take a chance on Ashton since he has 3 years eligibility left w/ his medical redshirt of 2010-11 season.

Also, I'd like to see Ashton consider my alma mater Manhattan over Iona or Fordham - not a shred of D (sorry Baldi - u know it's true), and excessive losing would sway me away. Steve Masiello is intense about defense - Ashton would be a good fit there as well as St. John's. But make no mistake, I consider Ashton a Big East caliber player.

Oh, and a blog I'm doing for fun with a couple of Terps fans talks briefly not only about Pankey, but the supposed reappearance of Volodymyr Gerun, a 6'9" PF from Ukraine that was bandied about in the summer of 2011. When asked, Turgeon, on the job for all of 3 months, said he didn't know who he was - this right before Alex Len got on campus. Same type of thin, agile, fundamentally sound Ukraine kid as Len that is developing good in the Ukraine program. I hope Lavs starts working that circuit with St. john's having a similarly strong international presence like Maryland. I will not be surprised to see MD land a Chinese big in the years to come with the MTECH (MD Tech Enterprise Institute) International Incubator going full force in Beijing.

http://ontheinsideoftheshell.blogspot.com/2012/05/volodymyr-gerun-mds-new-pf.html  
 
 is turgeon a stud recruiter or ate their fans delusional?
Click to expand...
 

I've always thought their fans were a bit delusional, but I like Turgeon. I think he'll lure some very good to great players there once he gets going. Not sure if he'll get the Harrison twins to go there, though.
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On a serious note, I really do not get the ":delusional" part. much like St. John's the past 30 years, MD and SJ's have had to scrap and claw at the Georgetowns, Cuses, Dukes and Carolinas to get anything. It's a knowledgeable and loyal fan base with an admitted inferiority complex by most accounts - Gary doesn't beat 7 #1 teams without it. Turgeon is working his arse off recruiting to bring in more top to bottom talent than Gary usually brought. I just hope these guys have the fight in them that Gary's players brought into games.
 
I feel bad for Norm. Where were all these local transfers when he was coaching? LOL I remember it was heavily rumored, and later confirmed by the player himself, that Russell Robinson was very close to transferring back to New York after his freshman year.

Momo, Pankey, Gordon....

Had Norm been retained one extra year (hard for me to even type that), he would have probably won enough with the seniors to get another year and he would have landed Momo and Pankey (if he was still around now).


 
 
I still firmly believe that we would have seen a far, far different Hardy and Brownlee had Norm and Co. still been in charge... 
 
I feel bad for Norm. Where were all these local transfers when he was coaching? LOL I remember it was heavily rumored, and later confirmed by the player himself, that Russell Robinson was very close to transferring back to New York after his freshman year.

Momo, Pankey, Gordon....

Had Norm been retained one extra year (hard for me to even type that), he would have probably won enough with the seniors to get another year and he would have landed Momo and Pankey (if he was still around now).



That's some nightmare you had. Hope you can get some sleep. Have a pleasant dream-that Steve Lavin is our coach and he is doing a great job recruiting and that things are really looking up for the Redmen.


 
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