LongviewLobo01
Premium Members
- Joined
- Oct 22, 2013
- Messages
- 927
I was looking at the roster tonight in anticipation of the upcoming basketball season and it just amazes me at what has happened to this team. Rick Barnes has his work cut out for him to say the least. There are just nothing but question marks up and down the roster.
Where is the offense going to come from?
The top 4 scorers are all gone whether it was NBA (Kabongo), Europe (Papapetrou) or transfer (Lewis, McClellan) and the leading returning scorer is Javan Felix at 6.8 points a game. There's no go-to scorer on the team at this point like there usually is. For a coach like Barnes who's teams generally struggle on offense when they have top shelf talent this is a major question.
Who's going to show the most improvement?
6-10 Center Cameron Ridley was a huge recruiting win a couple of years ago. He didn't play like a 5 star last year. Is he going to turn into the low post monster you expect him to be? Is there going to be a guard who's able to get him the ball in scoring position? A constant problem with Barnes coached teams seems to be the inability for guards to get the ball into the post effectively. Connor Lammert showed some flashes last year and has good size and ability and could give the Horns a big body with some outside game to compliment Ridley.
Which freshman is going to make the biggest impact?
Kendal Yancy? Isaiah Taylor? Demarcus Croaker? Martez Walker? Your guess is as good as mine. Been a while since we've brought in a class like this. There's talent there, but none of them just blow you away. Need at least 2 of them to become major players this year if not more.
Is this going to be a farewell to Barnes?
Does he even have a chance to stay another year? What does he have to do in order to keep his job? Make the tournament or more? There sure seems like a lot smoke that he's out after this year almost no matter what he does and with the issues around the program it's going to be tough for him to do a lot of winning.
Where is the offense going to come from?
The top 4 scorers are all gone whether it was NBA (Kabongo), Europe (Papapetrou) or transfer (Lewis, McClellan) and the leading returning scorer is Javan Felix at 6.8 points a game. There's no go-to scorer on the team at this point like there usually is. For a coach like Barnes who's teams generally struggle on offense when they have top shelf talent this is a major question.
Who's going to show the most improvement?
6-10 Center Cameron Ridley was a huge recruiting win a couple of years ago. He didn't play like a 5 star last year. Is he going to turn into the low post monster you expect him to be? Is there going to be a guard who's able to get him the ball in scoring position? A constant problem with Barnes coached teams seems to be the inability for guards to get the ball into the post effectively. Connor Lammert showed some flashes last year and has good size and ability and could give the Horns a big body with some outside game to compliment Ridley.
Which freshman is going to make the biggest impact?
Kendal Yancy? Isaiah Taylor? Demarcus Croaker? Martez Walker? Your guess is as good as mine. Been a while since we've brought in a class like this. There's talent there, but none of them just blow you away. Need at least 2 of them to become major players this year if not more.
Is this going to be a farewell to Barnes?
Does he even have a chance to stay another year? What does he have to do in order to keep his job? Make the tournament or more? There sure seems like a lot smoke that he's out after this year almost no matter what he does and with the issues around the program it's going to be tough for him to do a lot of winning.
