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What a great game-thanks Ross. Need more than a PF


bauman

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Great effort by all but this game showed that Ian is not going to be the answer. I liken him to Matt Baniak, a player with a lot of natural talent but no fire, heart or drive-see maybe his last play of the game when a rebound was knocked out of his hands, something that happened to MB hundreds of times in his 4 years As I wrote in a post about 3 weeks ago BH will also not be the answer at center so as I see it we need to recruit a talented BIG to go with the good group of Guards and SFs that BS is puting together.

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Man you drive me crazy. We just had a fantastic win on the road against a very hot team with great athletic talent and your focus is on your own little petty complaints. Ridiculous!

Watch Ian closely--he is like a little kid on a high school team who grew fast and needs to have everything else catch up. he has a nice feel for the game and he is very enthusiastic. Did you see him on the bench in the second half--he was up cheering and patting guys on the back.

Of course, he needs a lot more upper body strength. Of course, he needs more seasoning. But you have no right to say that he and Bryce, very young players are busts this early in their time with the Billikens. As you must not know, it always takes much longer to develop big men in college and most do not contribute until their 2nd or 3rd year at the earliest.

Let's be positive--The guy you said earlier in the season did not deserve to even be in the game at any time during the conference season--Varner--played a key role today with his toughness, shooting and fundamentals. You know very little about basketball but you insist on making snap judgements on our players. Give us all a break!!!

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We were really weak inside. Shooting 70% from three may never happen again for another 10 years. The Billikens were "humiliated" in the paint, especially when Ian was in the game. I would love for the Bills to have one player on their roster who plays the PF position who could throw down a dunk after an offensive rebound every once in a while.

Bauman had a valid complaint .. more rather a concern .. that may haunt us .. hmm .. against Cincinatti .. I'll go out on a limb and say we don't shoot 70% from three.

I applaud the effort, the guardplay, and the shooting of this team .. but they did have a gigantic flaw without TF in the game.

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>"Great effort by all but this game showed that Ian is not

>going to be the answer"

>

>No offense, but your coming to this conclusion 13 games into

>Ian's college career made me chuckle.

I agree with you on that...how do we know that about Ian yet???? it's only his 1st year on the team!!!!!!!!!!! he's been doing great!!! he puts forth a lot of effort, and maybe he just needs more upper body strength. The weight room can fix that!!!! I think after today's win, Brad will put Ross in more times. Great effort put out by Ross!!!

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I second that notion 3 Star.

Did Ian look slow-footed today getting up and down the court? This was my first chance to see him play .. is this how he always looks?

I know he forced shots because he got frustrated after being blocked. I'm not concerned about that. That can be a game to game issue .. he's a frosh and he'll learn to balance his confidence.

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Do you realize that our strong junior center was hurt and out! We were playing inexperienced freshmen and they had an NBA prospect senior big man who is one of the toughest low post players in the country. Of course, we were not going to control the paint! Ross did a fantastic job in the second half putting a body on Brown--a senior against a senior- and Ross is not even close to the athlete taht Brown is but he used his head. Great win. Great coaching!! Let's let our freshmen grow up!

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>"Great effort by all but this game showed that Ian is not

>going to be the answer"

>

>No offense, but your coming to this conclusion 13 games into

>Ian's college career made me chuckle.

I'm with 3Star. How the heck can you make that conclusion about a 6'11" 250 18 year old who has played what, 10 college games??? The problem is that he is too weak for the better CUSA bigs ... but we have time to remedy that in the offseason. Ian is still growing into his body.

Baniak is a bad comparison. Matt came to SLU much more physically mature that Ian--stronger, quicker, could run the floor, more range on his jumper ... but smaller. Baniak was 6'8". His freshman year while Larry was here, Baniak was great. After Larry left (for whatever reason), he regressed each year until he was a bench player.

Watch, Ian will come back bigger and stronger next year. All those jump hooks he takes in the lane with a man riding him that fall fall short this year; He'll have the strength to lean into his man and complete the play. He might just end up being a serviceable backup center but at this point we don't know.

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Now that we've all torn apart Bauman, I must say that while I disagree with his post, I can understand a little in his thinking. First of all, like everyone else said, Ian is just a freshman. I don't think the number of games he has played at the collegiate level has anything to do with with his development at this point. I think it is purely his age. Chances are Ian never had to have that much agility to compete at the earlier levels and was more than likely very successful. Now that he's playing collegiate ball he will have to adjust his game - which he can. Skip, I'm glad you mentioned Shaq. First of all though, Shaq is much faster than Ian and was when he a freshman at LSU. Also, Shaq has gotten bigger and has increased his agility even more in order to compete in other ways. Shaq's spin move under the basket is unbelievably quick for a guy his size. He's also added more to his game than monster jammimg over everybody.

Where I do understand Bauman's thought process though is in the agility of big men today. Kids are getting bigger and stronger it seems and we're seeing more 6'10" players who have incredible quickenss. Look at the NBA at look at guys like Jermaine O'Neal, Garnett, Novitzki, Kukoc, etc. These guys are perfect examples of that. On the surface you would think that in order to compete big men would have to have more quickness than yeras ago. Here's the thing though. Take a guy like Vlade Divac. Perfect example - big europeon guy who has really improved his game through the years. He will never be extremely quick, but he has learned to use his body effectively. Both Phil Jackson and Shaq have admitted on more than several occasions that Vlade plays Shaq better than everyone defensively.

Ian has time to adjust his game and hopefully our coaches will help him use his body effectively. As he gets older and wiser he'll figure out ways to be effective without being the quickest down the court, kind of like Divac and Sabonis have. If you are looking for a Jermaine O'Neal type player - you're right Ian is not the answer. But, you don't have to a guy like that to win. Guys like Ian have proven to be just as effective using their game most effectively and to their advantage. We may not have aplayer like you want down low, but then again most teams won't have a guy like IO either. So, I trust it will all blend, as we can be effective with the players we have. Let's hope the coaches get not only the team where it needs to be, but gets the individual players to their best.

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IV will never be an athletic post player; however, he will give SLU a skilled, large body in the post at 6-11, 255-270 pounds. IV has very good hands and is already a very good passer. While limited in attempts, he is 7 of 10 at the free throw line, a nice sign. He is a capable shooter out to 15 feet. In time, he will learn what low post offensive moves work best for him. Slow footed at this point in his career, sure, but at 6-11 270 pounds that should not come as a shock to anyone. I'm confident the coaching staff is glad to have IV on the team and they will finds ways to take advantage of his skills.

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If you are going to get personal in your replies (I am driving you crazy and my little petty complaints) at least have the courtesy of being correct when you make statements that appear to have a factual basis as opposed to your "don't worry, be happy" gibberish.

I do appreciate your inaccuracy, however, since it allowed me to research what in the name of @o* you could have possibly be referring to in your statement about Ross Varner. Looking back 1 year I was unable to find any post by me re RV.

Sorry if you can't stand anything other than your little dreamworld-I prefer to look at things from a realistic approach, and while I don't pretend to always be right, I'm afraid that my opinions on IV and BH( see my 1/14/04 posts) will turn out to be correct.

Lighten up or at least be accurate when attacking me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Bryant "Big Country" Reeves was able to get Oklahoma State (didn't they beat the Wake Forest team our Billikens had lost to?) to the Final Four with the help of coaching and athletic teammates, so why do we doubt that Ian Vouyoukas can contribute to Billiken success? Heck, he already contributed significantly to the Bills' win over Charlotte. It kills me that some Bills fans were so complimentary of the European players when they led the Bills to victory over Charlotte but now some Bills fans are doubting them after other Billikens picked them up in a victory over DePaul.

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I will disagree with Shaq ever having been agile ... or will ever be ... especially since the comparison was to guys like Andre Brown. If fouls were called as they should be ... Shaq and the person guarding him would foul out in the first 10 minutes of every game.

Official Billikens.com sponsor of H. Waldman

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