jjray
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Posts posted by jjray
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I think Marque will get invited to tryout for an NBA team but end up making a comfortable living playing in Europe. Wish it were different but still a nice life.
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I think we can all agree that Grimes has not given a second thought to SLU. Based upon the recruits for 2003-2004 and Brad's statements, I think the consensus is that SLU is looking to sign a 1, 3, and 4 for the 2004-2005 class of recruits. We have our PG--Polk. We are waiting on Liddel for the 3 (I gather from comments of other posters that Tommie did not pass the ACT last time he took it ... Let's hope Terry Evans recovers his health). That leaves us with the PF slot for 2004-2005.
Based upon the size of the centers Brad has signed for next year, it seems clear his preference is to build a team that physically resembles one from the Big 10--beef up front. I am sure he would prefer a PF larger than the 6'6", 210 that Shaw is listed at (as a junior). There are fair odds that Matt grows an inch and gains 10 pounds between now and his entry into college so let's say he projects at 6'7", 220 his freshman year in college ... maybe beefing up to 6'7" 235 as an upper classman in college (still smaller than what Brad is looking for).
If the Bills took Matt Shaw, he would need a year to add beef before he could be counted on for serious minutes at PF. But remember, for the 2004-2005 season (which would be Shaw's freshman year in college), we are going to have 3 centers (Frericks 6'9", Bryce 7'1", and Ian 6'10"). We will also have a redshirt sophmore PF in 6'8" JJ (hopefully he is hitting the weights this summer). Also, at 6'10" coming from Europe, I have to believe that Ian will posses the ability to play some PF if Brad wants to go for stretches with a big lineup.
With the departure of Sloan at the end of next season, I think we have to be conscious of our athleticism and mobility up front. The UT-Martin and SMS games exposed that as a weakness. Admittedly, Izik was inactive for those games but, with the loss of Sloan, I think there is a place on the Billikens rosters for an active big man like Shaw who has hops but lacks imposing size. If we pass on Shaw, I will be disappointed if Brad recruits a big body for PF who is slow and not much of a scorer.
Here is a link to an older article that describes his game (for those who are interested):
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I for one almost always find myself posting disagreements with Too ... but have no desire for him to leave the board or feel that he is my enemy. Every plot needs an antagonist and, at least, our antagonist is witty and makes an effort to debate as opposed to pure rant.
As to the topic of this thread, the "Catholic Conference", I can agree only with the broad theoretical concept espoused by Too but find it a very impractical suggestion. If I understand Too's argument correctly, it is that by playing in a conference almost exclusively full of Catholic schools (but including Charlotte which is not Catholic nor private) and that the media may call it "the Catholic league", SLU is not being inclusive enough ... that potential students and players may find offensive or at least be turned off by it.
Rebuttal:
(a) The league will not be called the "catholic league" and it will include at least one non-Catholic member (Charlotte). Certainly Izik Ohannon knew that SLU was a Catholic institution when he ventured from Israel to join us. Why would he do that? Because he made a basketball decision--i.e., SLU was the best b-ball program for him and the rest was secondary. Why do so many young African-Americans who are not Catholic attend catholic primary and high schools and play for their teams? Because their parents have determined that it offers them the best available educational value.
(
It is in the interest of SLU to compete with like-minded institutions that are, hopefully, in some reasonable geographic proximity to St. Louis--the best rivalries shall be fostered against the Marquettes, DePaul, Xaviers of the world (we would love to add ND to that list if they were to join the league).© The vast majority of the boosters of SLU basketball are in fact "catholic". No question about it. The money people who support SLU B-Ball are going to be energized by such a league.
(d) Finally and most importantly, what is the alternative to joining such a league? It's horendous--i.e., go back to the Valley or stay with a sinking CUSA.
Bottom line: It is a fine and noble goal to mix with all different types (this is a road I have taken in my own personal life) but there just is no other real option for SLU. The B-ball program is the engine that pulls the entire athletic department along and we must play in the best conference available, regardless of religious affiliation. Honestly, if SLU got invited to play in the all-Muslim league upon the disembolment of CUSA and it was loaded with recent NCAA tourney teams, I'd be all for it.
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This is something of old news but UAB landed two big men for next year including Marques Lewis whom the Bills had interest in. UAB with size up front to go with the speed / athleticism they exhibited last year results in a squad the rest of CUSA shall have to sit up and take notice of.
ATTALLABLAZE
UAB lands 2 Big men!!!
Men's Basketball Inks Two More Recruits
Blazers receive national letters of intent from Earnest Little and Marques Lewis
May 8, 2003
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. ----- Alabama prep standout Earnest Little and junior college transfer Marques Lewis have signed national letters of intent to play basketball at UAB, head coach Mike Anderson has announced. Both players will begin attending school in the fall of 2003.
"I am very excited with this year's recruiting class," UAB head coach Mike Anderson said. "With the signing of these two athletes, we are getting two more players that fit into the things we are trying to do. We won't know how good they actually are until they get a chance to play, but both are very skilled, athletic forwards who have good size."
Little is a 6-9, 230-pound forward who played at Monroe County High School under coach Willie White. As a senior, Little averaged 15.0 points, 10.0 rebounds and four blocks per contest. Little was listed as the No. 6 player in southwest Alabama by the Mobile Press Register's "Super 16". He led his team to a class 4A runner-up finish in the region tournament and was named to the all-southwest region tournament team for his efforts. Little was also named MVP of the J.F. Shields Invitational and named to all-tournament teams at the Hub-City Classic and Clark County Invitational. Little chose UAB over Ole Miss, South Alabama and Jacksonville State, among others.
"Earnest is a young man who has his best basketball ahead of him," said Anderson. "He has good size, athletic ability, aggressiveness and his skill level will continue to get better. Most importantly, Earnest wants to be a Blazer."
Lewis, a 6-8, 250-pound forward, comes to UAB after playing the past season at Wabash Valley (Ind.) College under head coach Mark Nelson. While at Wabash, Lewis led the team with an average of 16.8 points and 7.4 rebounds per contest. He also shot 63-percent from the floor and 71-percent from the charity stripe. He earned several accolades at Wabash including being named to the GRAC (Great Rivers Athletic Conference) all-conference team and received the third-most votes when he was selected to the all-region team. Lewis played one year at SW Missouri-West Plains J.C. before going to Wabash. He is a native of Milwaukee, Wisc. where he attended Milwaukee Bradley Tech High School.
"Marques will be a great addition to our team," said Anderson. "He is a skillful player who has size, scoring ability, can block shots and is a good rebounder. He is going to help us inside the paint."
Little and Lewis join twin guards Donell and Ronell Taylor, who signed during the early signing period, as part of the 2003 recruiting class. Donell is a first-team NJCAA All-American and Panhandle Player of the Year performer last season, while Ronell finished runner-up to his brother for the Panhandle Player of the Year and earned first-team all-conference accolades.
http://www.cusa-talk.com/modules/newbb/vie...913&forum=58&10
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Good point that the best way to beat the press is to pass ... but, by the same token, a team without a superior ballhandler on the floor invites trouble over the course of a game. We'll see how it plays out. I do expect Fish to be on the floor logging big minutes and sometimes as the point; however, I would also expect Morris and Drejaj to log significant minutes and for either to act as point instead of Fish whenever they are on the floor.
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>If the rumors regarding Notre Dame lobbying for Creigton are
>true, then I suspect it is driven by competition. A couple
>of interesting facts:
>
>(1) SLU has the second largest endowment of any catholic
>university not located on a coast (after Notre Dame) and the
>third largest endowment of any catholic university anywhere
>in the US (after ND and BC).
>http://www.aas.duke.edu/development/Miscel...ts_2000-01.html
>
>(2) St. Louis has one of the largest Notre Dame almuni
>popluations in the country.
>http://alumni.nd.edu/clubs/01%20club%20analysis.doc
>
>(3) SLU is potentially Notre Dame's biggest competitor among
>catholic universities not located on a coast, and Notre Dame
>arguably competes with SLU for catholic sports fans in St.
>Louis.
I agree with David's analysis that is well supported by facts (nice to see!). Under David's analysis, ND does not want to play SLU for the same reason that MIZZOU does not--they are already viewed as at a higher level atheletically and, thus, they risk injury to that perception if they come to play the Billikens every year (twice a year in ND's case if we end up in the same conference) in a key market for their school. But I also wonder if there is not the Bennett--Soderberg curse at work here as well. Other teams know that the Bennett--Soderberg system employed by SLU can allow us to grind out wins against more talented teams in any given game. There was a buzz among the coaches at the CUSA tourney that they did not want to play SLU for that exact reason. ND, over time, may be able to pull a higher caliber of player into their b-ball program; however, Coach Soderberg is the equalizer and they know that, even with superior talent, SLU is going to garner its fair share of wins. Maybe they view it as a no-win situation and would rather trade punches with the Bluejays (who will be no walk in the park for ND on the hardwood as well) but are not located in a big ND market.
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>what makes you think that this lineup would have a problem
>with a press? fisher has been our lead guard for two years,
>izak and sloan are probably two of the better ball handling
>forwards in the conference? while i havent seen bryant much
>in the open court, i would expect he can handle the ball
>well enough. sure we dont have marque anymore, but i dont
>see any twin on the roster either. plus, if morris is what
>has been advertised, my guess is if a team wants to pressure
>us, morris will be in the game.
Every time we were pressed last year, Marque came back to get the ball from Fish (or Drejaj if Marque was out). I hardly ever saw Fish bring the ball up against pressure. He is only an average ball handler in the open court against pressure--witness the Butler game. If Morris and Drejaj are both not on the floor, then we are weak in the area of ballhanding. As to Izik and Sloan, IMHO neither handles the ball with comfort in the open court on the level of a skilled D-1 3 ... not even close. I'm not sure how you can express a strong opinion on these two as open-court ballhandlers because they NEVER do in games. Izik exhibited skill handling the ball 15' from the basket and in ... a few dribbles, no more. Maybe he shall improve in this area. However, I have seen Izik come back for the ball during the press and act as a release, not to dribble but to catch to relieve the pressure on the guards and then distribute to the open man. He does this well.
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Thanks for the info 3Star but Mick Yelovich, based on the little bits of info I pick up on him on the web (it does appear he is fine golfer ... just what we needed at PF), nothing I see makes me comfortable that we have solid depth in our recruiting options at PF. Maybe we shall not take any bigs (5 or 4) in the 04 class? Maybe it will be 1,2,3.
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>I will go with Fischer, Bryant, Izik, Sloan and Frericks.
If I were an opposing coach, I'd press this lineup all day. But you may be right that this is the way we start the year. Coach seems to give an edge to the players who know his system.
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Liddell seems to be the target at 3 for scholarship but I wonder about the other scholarship which I assume we are looking for a PF with. The only names I have heard are Grimes and Shaw (and does not sound like we have offered Shaw although he made an unofficial visit to the campus). Given our apparent lukewarm interest in Matt Shaw (I guess due to size) and Grimes apparent indifference to SLU, I really wonder who else are our targets at PF. There has to be some other player we have not heard about. Personally, I would like to see us offer Shaw. We have recruited quite a bit of size in our most recent class (6'9", 6'10", 7'1") but we need more athleticism, physical toughness. Chris Sloan is in entering his last year. Shaw brings athleticism, toughness, and a certain level of skills we could use from a 3/4. I don't want to see the Bills get caught short again on athleticism when we play the UT-Martins and UABs of the world.
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Good points 3Star ... but what if keeping the CUSA name and exit fee money means keeping some of the CUSA dogs like Houston? "No b-ball dogs" is one of the most appealing aspects of a completely new conference.
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>i will believe we will have an enthusiastic and LARGE
>student fan section consistently when i see it.
I've thought about it Roy and the point is valid: i.e., if very few students currently make it the few miles down Market Street to Savvis, what makes us think that hordes will suddenly have enough ambition to walk 3 blocks or so to the games at "on campus" venue? Who can say but I have visions of a pre-game, "on campus" pep-rally with the students marching thereafter en-masse to the Biondi Dome to play Marquette, or better yet, the hated Mizzou pussie-cats! Wait, I also see T&T in the rally crowd totally confused. Triangle is a die-hard Mizzou sympathizer but Too is totally enraptured by the SLU student mania ... his split personality is waring inside his divided brain threatening a total melt-down.
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>I doubt few would consider Butler and Indianapolis as a
>small market. That catholic requirement could be an issue
>though!
Out of curiousity, I did a quick search for facts on metro size. I found the MSA data for 1999 pretty quickly:
http://www.demographia.com/db-met99r.htm
St. Louis .... 18 (2.6 mill)
Indy ..... 29 (1.5 mill)
Omaha .... 61 (700k)
I think, to be fair, Indy is neither large nor a small market in a national sense. Metro size and geographic isolation certainly hurts Creighton though in the coming conference shakeout.
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Tag, I'm all for the new on-campus arena but I think your logic for it does not quite match up with the facts (at least in the case of SLU). By analyzing a team's history of wins home v. away, SLU has one of the best home court advantages in the country in Savvis. Despite the lack of energy for most SLU games there, the pro-style arena is a tough adjustment for a lot of opposing players who have experienced few games in such a place. Depth perception at the basket is an adjustment. What the on-campus arena brings is enthusiasm for the program and this is something that we sorely need.
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I can't think of a better senario for SLU than to land in a Great Papal conference that includes ND, Georgetown, and Marquette. To play the Golden Domers and Marquette twice in the same year not to mention the X-Men ... awesome! I feel for Creighton and Butler though if this comes to pass. These are teams with better success in the last 5 years than SLU but they shall get squeezed out ... small markets. Creighton is also farther west.
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I hope we have a "1a" choice at PW behind Grimes but ahead of Shaw given we have not offered Matt yet. I think Kalen has eyes for Big XII or Big X.
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I was wondering if anyone has additional information on SLU's interest level in Matt Shaw and vice versa. I know he visited campus but heard nothing further. Did we offer him? If we did not offer offer Shaw, then I assume we are waiting due to pursuit of another player we have rated higher at PF. Anyone know how that might be? My hope is that we are not waiting on Grimes as he has publicly displayed very little interest in SLU. In years past, we have let the Matt Shaw's of metro area slip through our fingers while we chased higher rated players. The early verbal of Polk is a departure that I hope turns into a trend. My guess is that Coach would prefer more beef at 4 than Shaw currently carries and he has eyes for others at 3 ... but he brings a ton of athleticism to the table at time when we shall need to replace Chris Sloan. Thoughts?
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The Jesuit connection is our ace-in-the-hole.
It is in the interest of SLU to compete with like-minded institutions that are, hopefully, in some reasonable geographic proximity to St. Louis--the best rivalries shall be fostered against the Marquettes, DePaul, Xaviers of the world (we would love to add ND to that list if they were to join the league).
is it imperative that we get a 6'9
in Billikens.com Main Board
Posted
Where has he been quoted in the last 6 months mentioning SLU as a possibility? Here is his list from insiders.com:
http://scout.theinsiders.com/a.z?s=75&p=8&c=1&nid=447155
No mention of SLU. Here is the list from Rivals.com:
http://rivalshoops.rivals.com/viewprospect...ey=8980&Sport=2
No mention of SLU. Here is an article dated today out of a paper in Arkansas that now says they are in the running.
"Grimes said he has narrowed his list to 15 schools, and among his favorites are Kentucky, Kansas, North Carolina, Illinois and the Razorbacks. "The school I pick doesn’t have to be contending for a national championship or something right now," Grimes said. "That won’t influence me as much as some other factors."
http://www.wholehogsports.com/story_whs.ph...aper=ADGstories
The sources state that they interviewed Kalen to come up with these lists ... so we need to be realistic, the guy ain't interested.