tom in salem
Well-known member
Curious-what's up with the change in avatar?
Humboldt St
- Thread starter tom in salem
- Start date
Curious-what's up with the change in avatar?
Final thoughts on this exhibition....
Other than Obekpa, our front court is frightening...downright frightening. Dom has to step up or we in trouble. Obekpa has to stay out of foul trouble and give us 30-35 mpg--which is a crazy expectation for any big man. Losing KT is devastating.
Jones set some good screens and boxed out well,but he literally lost every pass, rebound, and loose ball with a defender either contacting him or the ball. His jumper, as always, looked great and he has a pretty quick release, but we need someone to go get the ball. I suspect he and Dom will be a platoon against man-to-man and zone defenses.
Dom made at least a half-dozen bad freshman mistakes. He did look good taking the ball to the rim against bigs against man-to-man D and that figures to be something we'll need to rely on. He' s still a complete liability against the zone. His handle is disgusting.
Amar may just save our season. I don't say that because he is that good...I say it because we have NOTHING at either forward position. You all know I hate relying on freshman, but he looked solid and was much bigger than I expected. I also dislike big men shooters, but he took care of the other stuff first and doesn't live on the perimeter. He's a little slow afoot for me and I saw him reach on D a handful of times, but he seems like a better option than Jones and will likely be our backup PF and C. At the very least he boxes out, hustles, and has good hands.
I am disappointed ADR didn't get off the bench. That says a lot, and I see why the CTK coach recently had those things to say about Lav. If ever there was a year we needed 10 minutes from a big it is this year.
The perimeter defense overplays every single drive to the basket, while Pointer and Jones are horribly slow to rotate to help inside. CO and Amar both step up and cutoff the lane well.
Lavin won't have any problem cutting this rotation down to 8-9 guys.
I wish Lavin would give Balamou a real chance. He has such great court awareness...twice today he signaled Jordan to throw him a wide-open alley-oop he took great angles to create...both times Jordan didn't see. He took a bad pass and turned it into a beautiful assist under the basket and he created a wide open look for Amar from three (rimmed out).
Jordan's first half was as bad as you can imagine. He looked like he was playing his first college game. He was much better in the second half.
Other than Obekpa, our front court is frightening...downright frightening. Dom has to step up or we in trouble. Obekpa has to stay out of foul trouble and give us 30-35 mpg--which is a crazy expectation for any big man. Losing KT is devastating.
Jones set some good screens and boxed out well,but he literally lost every pass, rebound, and loose ball with a defender either contacting him or the ball. His jumper, as always, looked great and he has a pretty quick release, but we need someone to go get the ball. I suspect he and Dom will be a platoon against man-to-man and zone defenses.
Dom made at least a half-dozen bad freshman mistakes. He did look good taking the ball to the rim against bigs against man-to-man D and that figures to be something we'll need to rely on. He' s still a complete liability against the zone. His handle is disgusting.
Amar may just save our season. I don't say that because he is that good...I say it because we have NOTHING at either forward position. You all know I hate relying on freshman, but he looked solid and was much bigger than I expected. I also dislike big men shooters, but he took care of the other stuff first and doesn't live on the perimeter. He's a little slow afoot for me and I saw him reach on D a handful of times, but he seems like a better option than Jones and will likely be our backup PF and C. At the very least he boxes out, hustles, and has good hands.
I am disappointed ADR didn't get off the bench. That says a lot, and I see why the CTK coach recently had those things to say about Lav. If ever there was a year we needed 10 minutes from a big it is this year.
The perimeter defense overplays every single drive to the basket, while Pointer and Jones are horribly slow to rotate to help inside. CO and Amar both step up and cutoff the lane well.
Lavin won't have any problem cutting this rotation down to 8-9 guys.
I wish Lavin would give Balamou a real chance. He has such great court awareness...twice today he signaled Jordan to throw him a wide-open alley-oop he took great angles to create...both times Jordan didn't see. He took a bad pass and turned it into a beautiful assist under the basket and he created a wide open look for Amar from three (rimmed out).
Jordan's first half was as bad as you can imagine. He looked like he was playing his first college game. He was much better in the second half.
Per St. John's twitter:
There it is a triple double for Chris Obekpa! 22 points, 10 rebounds and 11 blocks
WOW!! He has flaws in his game (still goes for the block a little too much, leading to easy putbacks), but if he plays anywhere near like he did today, that will be huge. Plus, knocking down the FTs (which I don't think was a fluke, since he's changed his form from the ground up) means the hack-a-Obekpa won't be enforced when he goes underneath. That will lead to more easy baskets like you saw today.
Lavin said he can average a double-double. I think that's a bit high, but he can come close.
There it is a triple double for Chris Obekpa! 22 points, 10 rebounds and 11 blocks
WOW!! He has flaws in his game (still goes for the block a little too much, leading to easy putbacks), but if he plays anywhere near like he did today, that will be huge. Plus, knocking down the FTs (which I don't think was a fluke, since he's changed his form from the ground up) means the hack-a-Obekpa won't be enforced when he goes underneath. That will lead to more easy baskets like you saw today.
Lavin said he can average a double-double. I think that's a bit high, but he can come close.
The turnovers were ridiculous especially since 8 of them were Jordan's. Shooting 52% AND hitting 31 FTs is a nice stat. It means you are that much more efficient offensively. Exactly Harrison's game and why some don't give him enough credit. but who'd have ever thought to see a game where Obekba schooled Harrison on the FT line? The knocks are mostly valid but credit is also due. Obekpa put in work it is very clear and he's physically and mentally taken a big leap.
I never said he was right. In fact, I took him to task in a different thread. All I said in my post was that I see what he was talking about now. There is no way Lavin wants to sit ADR. ADR is forcing his hand with his awful conditioning.
Worth repeating...our front court is terrible. Losing KT is going to cost us dearly unless Dom steps up and develops the mindset to be a rebounding machine.
Obekpa was outstanding, he plays like that against better teams and he'll be draft material this year.
But---putting up that shot with 31 seconds left at the Humboldt end so that he could get the rebound and notch a triple double was poor sportsmanship IMO. Even the announcers were dumfounded at it.
tom in salem
Well-known member
,What are you talking about?
AWESOME. Best ever.
Pretty much agree with everything you said. Don't want to hate on Jones but he previously had some nice PT against lesser competition. I really wanted to see him play big and aggressive today. Balamou you and I are completely on the same page. I was mystified last season why he got buried when he never gave us a bad minute. He could be this team's Joe Panik
tom in salem
Well-known member
Lavin won't have any problem cutting this rotation down to 8-9 guys.
Marillac, are you serious?
Branch is the 6th man.
After him we're toast.
Marillac, are you serious?
Branch is the 6th man.
After him we're toast.
Solid. It doesn't show in the box score, because he holds his box outs so long on the defensive end for guards to rebound. That might be a Euro thing, because I felt he had 3-4 boards he should have grabbed on his own.
He's a big, big kid. I had no idea. He didn't do anything spectacular at all, but was steady and hustled. He could be a weapon in the pick and roll. I like that he didn't live on the perimeter like some of our past bigs. He'll likely be our 7th man and the primary PF and C backup. If you didn't know these guys you would have thought 5-6 others were freshmen before you guessed he was. That is good for him.