Love coach Barnes and he can coach as long as he wants here, but he's a sweet 16 coach. Looking pretty good and giving us hope only to look like crap on offense and underachieve when it matters. New team, same old song.
Admittedly, I've only had a chance to really sit there and watch two whole games. My early eye test says these things...
Kennedy Chandler - The most legit 5* we've had in a few years. Kid can play and he competes hard.
Vescovi - Solid season and much better off the ball with somebody that can get in the lane as expected. He's a talented kid but just limited athletically at times.
Fulkerson - Expected a lot more from him so far. He's had a long history of coming and going at this point though.
Olivier - Same story different season. Great preseason and disappears in the game.
Powell - Needs more run. I'd much rather him be out there than Bailey.
Zeigler - Love the kid. Competes hard but his size will be hunted against teams like TX Tech.
BHH - I puckered up when I heard the reports from camp. It's early but looks like another post bust for Barnes as of now. Hopefully that changes. If he transfers out after this year, we have to look internally as to why we can't keep or improve a post player.
Uros - Seems like a good kid but he shouldn't be playing more than 3 minutes a game.
JJJ - I'd love for him to be a 12 PPG player, but that's just not him. Great mix of skills though. He fit in against Tech when most of the team didn't.
Bailey - Small and takes questionable shots. I'd rather see what Powell and Mashack can do at this point.
Just based on last night's game. Here is what I see. A guard led team with more minus athletes than plus athletes. Two teams have given us fits this year. Tech and Nova. What can they do? Switch everything with long athletes. If our best group has 3-4 guards out there, that's fine, but we have to be an above average 3pt team if that's the case. We need something, anything, from Fulkerson and BHH to take a step forward. I'm not a basketball expert. I follow the game and played the game, but the one thing that continually drives me nuts on the sets for Barnes is the C getting camped out at the top of the key often. What purpose does that serve? If you're playing a non-shooting big, he needs to be picking for Chandler to get in the lane and then rumbling in behind for the lob or dunker spot. Surround that with Vescovi, Powell, Bailey, Zeigler, etc. and you shouldn't be able to keep Chandler out of the lane.
Granted, last night we shot awful.