Does seem like tradition that one of our new players develops a hand injury every summer.
However he just has his wrist taped and still carrying the plate so I don’t see a huge issue.
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Cinci is a bunch of poodles better tell your boy to get them ready.
Bandaogo plays like he’s 6’7 against us.
They will be. Wes has been trying to close the gap that John Brennen created between Houston & UC.
Houston won by 38 & 37 in Brannen’s last year.
Wes is slowly but surely making it more competitive again.
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Both games last year were close. But UC still lacked the athleticism. Now they have a lot more talent to run out there. I think if we get to play 2x again that UC can win at home, especially if it’s early in conference play.
Wouldn’t you prefer it later in conference play?, Houston is returning 7 of our top 9. We have to adjust to uzan and find where the freshmen fit but that will be long figured out before conference play. UC on the other hand has ton to figure out especially versus top caliber teams, you guys dont even have a strong identity yet. wouldn’t end of the season be way more advantageous
I think Houston will be a well oiled machine the further into the season. I’d rather get them before usable inevitably finds his groove
Uzan had a 33 offensive rating against UC and had more TO than points in 24 min. I’d rather uc find that weak link early and exploit him with pressure
That said it also depends how well Dillion Mitchell adjusts. He cooked Houston last year in 1 game but was a dud in the next but it may take him time to adjust.
If we can get 16 & 10 from him at the 4 spot I’ll feel better about our chances.
Dud is putting it mildly, his second game was way way worse than his 1st game (at home with UH playing on 2 days rest) was good.
i dont get your talk of uzan as a weak link… if youve been on this forum youll see that he wasnt my top choice at all because he isnt a top scorer but he is not a weaklink…
he is a great iso defender, there is almost no film of anyone just beating uzan is straight iso … almost all points on him were with picks and him overhelping someone and giving his guy too much space …which will both be easy fixes for sampson
he is a top level passer overall, but specifically an elite level pick and roll passer…
“exploit him with pressure” he isnt a freshmen, he will be on his 3rd year starting on above average big 12 teams… you lost to him twice last year on teams worse than houston. he had “bad shooting” stats vs cincy, but his team won… ironically shead also had bad shooting stats vs UC and we still won (6-25 and 2-11) saying you’ll pressure shead or use that to just him as a weaklink makes little sense
there are 4 major development areas i think will be big for uzan, all should be resolved before any conference game:
- learning our defensive system- should have figured out by conference play especially since everyone on the team should have carried him along
- his shooting- this is an offseason thing, you arent going to figure out how to shoot midseason- he’ll have it or he wont
- his physicality ( he doesnt get to the line at all for a guy who mostly drives) also an offseason thing, you arent going to find physicality mid season
- team chemistry- should be estabilished in the non con
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Returning so much talent is why I think Houston is underrated, which is crazy as high as we are rated. I think the talent with all the continuity is huge.
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also we are using the word cooked, way too easily now lol…16pts in a loss isnt cooked.
texas played 2 stretch 4, the 1st game the game plan invloved focusing the D on disu (the bigger threat) and also using 4 guard lineups, to better defend the 5out…half of his points were him being defend by dunn/sharp/cryer in the post… he had 1 nice bucket on jwan but it wasnt some full game of his cooking on our post players… and he got rebounding becuase again he was rebounding agaisnt dunn/sharp/cryer…
he wont have the benefit of a disu at cincy (not that it helped once we adjusted the 2nd game), we can leave francis in the game and have him defend bandogo without issue …jwan and tugler can focus on mitchell…and having arcenuax (6’7)/Mccarthy(6’6) on the team now makes 4 guard lineup more feasible without sacrificing d and rebounding
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So you are essentially saying we know how efficient Uzan will be in the first quarter of the season. Not sure about this one.
I do see your take on Mitchell. He wasn’t cooking anyone despite the fact our focus was much more on Diasu and their PG.
exact numbers? no ,but youll know the general gist by the 14th game, from the volume and percentages… yes
if he starts the season shooting 1 a game at 28-34% vs if he is shooting like 4 at 32-42%… youll know thatll be a weapon… there are extremely few scenarios of non shooters becoming shooters by the 15th game
uzans shooting improvement has to come in the offseason. you are not going to have 2/3 hours a day to put up 1000 shots when the season and school starts …or tweak your mechanics
for example - looking at it from a technical point… to me uzan shoots the ball way to low, he shoots it from his chest out…and its easy to alter or force him to rush it or even partially block it… and thus he needs a lot of space to shoot
to be effective at his level he needs a way higher release point above his head
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but to my main point: whatever shooting form he starts with at the start of the season, is likely going to be what he finishes the season with… you arent changing your shooting form mid season
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To one of your points, I think Cryer started slowly last year because he was focused on improving his defensive skills.
If Uzan has that piece already, my hope is that his offensive skills in the CKS system will blossom early.
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Ok glad you at least mentioned shooting form. I will agree to an extent there.
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First look at coach Elvin.
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Uzan average 2 ppg in 2 games against UC. He had as many TO as points.
He isn’t why UC lost to Oklahoma.
Dayday & jizzle both outplayed him in both games
Jizzle put up 16 on him in the 2nd game.
Forgive me if my view of uzan is bad but he was an absolute offensive turd against UC. Houston could have done better but if Sampson likes him I trust it.
you missed my point… i wasnt saying he was the reason they won…
im saying he was their pg last year and your pressuring plan didnt work then why would it work now… i was addressing your weaklink point … your defense didnt make him crack as the pg of a worse team (that beat you) last year, why would it be a crack on a better team
6 points over his average and 3 rebounds over his average against the number 1 defense with 4 of those boards being offensive.
He scored the same amount of points as aziz, lahkin, & reynolds did combined. And outrebounded those 3 combined too.
Obviously it was 1 game. And I said he was a dud in the 2nd game. But UC hasn’t had an athletic 4 since Tre Scott, which is the last year that we beat Houston.
I like our chances this year at home more than any other year. Not saying we win. But we have a deep team with a little bit of athleticism
And we have a few gamers too. But I do think we will miss John Newman.