St. Francis, Sun. Dec. 6, 11am, FS1 & 970AM

Jones a work in progress. Sure wish we'd focus on how much he's improved under this staff and since last year, as opposed to the flaws in his game. While comparisons to Grant and Lamont are not warranted just yet, when all is said and done it wouldn't surprise me in the least if CJ developed in to a very good power forward at this level.
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We should give this more time I suppose. Despite my reservations stated before, he has performed better than most to date. Fair point Monte.
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While I hope he proves me wrong in the end, I stand by my post, he is infuriating to watch. He shows you glimpses of talent and you start to see the potential, then he takes two steps back. We can talk about the lack of coaching in the past but I would expect more consistency especially from an interior player who is in his fourth year at a D1 Program.
 
Decent game yesterday I guess.

I really want Malik Ellison to come back. I want him to get as much experience as he can this year. Yakwe looked ok. Very athletic. Will never be a dude that puts up big numbers but he strikes me as one of those first guys off the bench for a tournament team.

This is a process. We will take beatings this year. Next year we should be much improved. If the 2017 recruiting class can turn out to be as good as I hope, that could be the year we strike. But for now, i just like seeing our young guys improve game by game, which is why I'd like to see Ellison back out there hopefully he heals up.

Sima and Mussini will be solid players for us for the next few years. Mussini is gonna love having Ponds and LoVett around next year cause he won't be harassed nearly as much.
 
And if Santa wants to come back to 114 for the syracuse game he better bring some hot helpers wearing low cut tops showing cleavage
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Ring-a-ding-ding! I know what I want under my tree.
:p
 
I think Ellison's return is important as we need help in the backcourt and handling the ball.

@ Jack, I think of what I have seen of Yakwe he will be very very good. I think he could be a double/double machine eventually. And, I like his defense.

The thing about these freshmen (even the big guys) is that unlike many, they don't get into a lot of foul trouble. That's a good sign as I think it speaks to bb IQ and court sense.

Of course, I think we need to wait to see how we do against BE competition, but I think that they handled themselves OK against some pretty good teams thus far. It will be up and down, but hopefully they get better as the season progresses.
 
I watched Mussini very carefully yesterday and although he had an off game shooting you can see his talent there. His ball handling needs work for any position let alone point guard but I think that can improve. My bigger concern is his defense. He needs to get much stronger but can he improve his foot speed enough to play consistently at this level?
 
We had a huge size and athletic advantage over Fordham, which played a major role in this win. With better ball handling, it's a 15-20 point victory. The athletic advantage disappears when the real games start. The good news is that Yakwe is a big time athlete. He has NBA athleticism. I'm surprised that there isn't more enthusiasm for his potential. He has great timing on blocking shots, and gets off the ground quickly and effortlessly. One poster compared him to Beaver Smith, but I see more Ed Searcy. Beaver was only 6'4, Yakwe is 6'7 and hopefully still growing. I remember Searcy working an hour after practice with one of the assistants on developing a mid range jump shot. You can be sure Mullin will be looking for the same development from Yakwe. He's a lefty, and, as we all know, lefties can shoot the ball (or hopefully be taught to).
 
We had a huge size and athletic advantage over Fordham, which played a major role in this win. With better ball handling, it's a 15-20 point victory. The athletic advantage disappears when the real games start. The good news is that Yakwe is a big time athlete. He has NBA athleticism. I'm surprised that there isn't more enthusiasm for his potential. He has great timing on blocking shots, and gets off the ground quickly and effortlessly. One poster compared him to Beaver Smith, but I see more Ed Searcy. Beaver was only 6'4, Yakwe is 6'7 and hopefully still growing. I remember Searcy working an hour after practice with one of the assistants on developing a mid range jump shot. You can be sure Mullin will be looking for the same development from Yakwe. He's a lefty, and, as we all know, lefties can shoot the ball (or hopefully be taught to).
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It's early but I see the Searcy analogy.
He can jump straight out of the gym.
Too bad Eddie never developed any shot whatsoever.
 
Federico is doing a very good Jason Buchanan impersonation, and that's alright with me.
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Bingo, knew there was a prior PG he reminded me of.
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Sweet-shooting, slow, skinny, undersized combo thrust into starting role after presumed starter is hit with academics.

NIT Champs, here we come.......
 
Fair points about being too hard on Jones. He is clearly much improved and if you told me beforehand he'd be doing as well as he is I'd be happy with it. Credit to the staff but mostly to him for doing the work.

That being said. I think there's a difference between exceeding our expectations and actually being a good collegiate player. He's a junior from a Big East program playing against what we'd (at least in more typical years) consider mostly inferior opposition. His two big games were against Chaminade and St. Francis. And in the Chaminade game he had 5 turnovers. He's averaging about 9 pts & 6 rebs which exceeds our expectations but he's a starter who gets 30 minutes on a young team. That's a huge chunk of time. It's been necessary because we've been so short-handed but I hope that once Ellison and Williams return combined with Yakwe now being eligible, those minutes get spread around among the new guys who we hope will have bigger roles in the days ahead. Unless Mullin sees some untapped potential in him which is possible and if that's the case, I think I'll trust the gut of a legend over my amateur opinion.
 
Federico is doing a very good Jason Buchanan impersonation, and that's alright with me.
Click to expand...

Bingo, knew there was a prior PG he reminded me of.
Click to expand...

Sweet-shooting, slow, skinny, undersized combo thrust into starting role after presumed starter is hit with academics.

NIT Champs, here we come.......
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I'd take that result for this season. Not to mention the championship but the extra games were a big help to that young team that started three freshman, a junior playing his second year and a fifth year senior.
 
Federico is doing a very good Jason Buchanan impersonation, and that's alright with me.
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I see where you are going with this and you get added points for comparing a white guy to a black guy. The one problem I would have is Mussini has a beautiful looking jumper where as Buchanan's was funny looking if not downright ugly.
 
Federico is doing a very good Jason Buchanan impersonation, and that's alright with me.
Click to expand...

Bingo, knew there was a prior PG he reminded me of.
Click to expand...

Sweet-shooting, slow, skinny, undersized combo thrust into starting role after presumed starter is hit with academics.

NIT Champs, here we come.......
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Will go out on a limb here and assume you are kidding about us making the NIT this year.

We are the equivalent of DePaul without Billy Garrett Jr. It is what it is... the pieces are coming into place for next year.
 
I watched Mussini very carefully yesterday and although he had an off game shooting you can see his talent there. His ball handling needs work for any position let alone point guard but I think that can improve. My bigger concern is his defense. He needs to get much stronger but can he improve his foot speed enough to play consistently at this level?
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While he has enough ability to do well when surrounded with good players he is now getting hounded and the shooting performance reflects that. He's in for a rough go of it the rest of the season unless lovett gets cleared.
 
I think Ellison's return is important as we need help in the backcourt and handling the ball.

@ Jack, I think of what I have seen of Yakwe he will be very very good. I think he could be a double/double machine eventually. And, I like his defense.

The thing about these freshmen (even the big guys) is that unlike many, they don't get into a lot of foul trouble. That's a good sign as I think it speaks to bb IQ and court sense.

Of course, I think we need to wait to see how we do against BE competition, but I think that they handled themselves OK against some pretty good teams thus far. It will be up and down, but hopefully they get better as the season progresses.
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Hopefully he develops more on offense but I see him as more of a defensive specialist. Obviously we don't know how he will develop though maybe he does find himself offensively through the years but I never see him being the guy that averages more than 10 a game I think he's gonna be a great defender and rebounder and will contribute occasionally on the offensive end that's just my opinion from the small sample size I've gotten watching him the last two games
 
Its crazy how little respect Jones gets. Just 13 & 9 in a game where we needed every pt and every rebound we got. No mentions of the great passes he has had to Mussini on cuts to the basket (two today and several previously) or the help he gives breaking the press. And trust me we NEED him to break the press. He is not a perfect player, not even close, but if his name was anything else and he was a JUCO brought in by mullin for the next two years everyone would be happy to have him. Instead we pick his game apart.
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Jones doesn't have the best instincts for sure but I like him. I think he is definitely serviceable.

Sometimes it almost feels like to me he doesn't realize how big he really is and what he could do with his body
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He's playing a lot better than I thought he would. You have to wonder why he hardly played last year when we lacked depth. He is definitely serviceable ,like you said.
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He should have and could have been a useful part of last year's team. Like you said, in light of how short our roster was you you have to wonder why Lavin didn't find a way to utilize him more. Just one of many things that made you wonder. No offense to AA, but CJ was and is the superior player. Chris quickly realized that which is why CJ is playing 30 MPG and AA 14 MPG.
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Honestly, Jones got what he deserved last season in terms of playing time. Yes, he has a player's body, but other than a nice play once in a blue moon, he contributed very little. Good for him that he is getting a chance and making the most of it. His numbers are nice so far, but let's keep in mind that this is the part of our schedule where we play an entire roster of guys who would not be recruited anywhere in the Big East. If he puts these numbers up in the Big East part of the schedule, that would be really impressive. I just am not counting on it.
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Beast a big part of a coach's job is player development. We saw no improvement in Jones' game in his first couple of years here. Low and behold, in just a few months under Chris's tutelage, we see a vastly improved player. I'm not saying that Jones is going to be an all big east player, but there was some untapped potential there and fortunately Chris has figured out a way to tap in to it. This is not a case of a kid simply improving over time, or we would have seen signs of it over the course of last season. In a perfect world Jones would be coming off the bench giving us 15-20 minutes of hard nosed ball. Unfortunately we are living in a far from perfect world.
 
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