- Creek was definitely impressive and opportunistic. He was active with several nice rebounds and took advantage of some opportunites for some easy baskets. A much better showing than the first exhibtion game.
- Rivers really looked good. If we want to use his skills to the fullest, this team will truly need to play up-tempo. There is a lot of talk from Crean that this team will play a fast paced style of basketball, but that's often tough to dictate against good defensive teams. Anyway, I think Rivers is easily the best athlete on this team. When he gets a seam, he can be explosive to the basket. He has a little bit of that Eric Gordon type of explosiveness when he sees an opening. Of course, Gordon would explode and finish with a tomahawk, whereas Rivers seems to glide and do some double-clutch layins. Rivers continues to be the guy that I am most interested in seeing a larger sample size of playing time, but I think if he can use his 6'5" size, his strength, and his athleticism to get into the lane, good things will happen.
- Elston had a nice dunk. He grabbed a defensive board, then made a nice outlet pass to Jones, ran the floor, filled the lane, Jones hit him with a nice pass, and Elston threw down the one-handed dunk.
- Muniru definitely showed some potential. Still not sure that he will make any significant contributions this year, but if he can constantly improve, he could be a major piece to the puzzle of some very good teams in the future. It's been well documented that he is raw and he is, but I thought he looked ahead of Jobe on the offensive end. On the defensive end, he was definitely slow to react, and doesn't play as tall as he is. Even though he was credited with 3 blocks in 8 minutes, these were more an outcome of the St. Joe's player just throwing it off his arm. I'm not taking anything away from Bawa, but it wasn't as if he skied and swatted those shots out of there. On the flip side, Bawa did have a dunk in the closing minutes that was mighty impressive. He took the pass, did a dribble and drop step, and then threw it down with two hands. The crowd and the bench loved it.
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
After Further Review...
Now that I actually got to watch the game, here are some additional impressions:
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3 comments:
good stuff. will be interesting to see how dumes fits in. will bawa play over capo? how will the pritch/capo/elston rotation go. right now pritch is disappointing. will elston get a chance to start?
BTW-did everyone see David Williams is officially NOT coming to IU? that's probably a good thing. sounds like we have a good shot at 3 different guys ranked much much higher.
Coach, I appreciate the comments as always. I think Dumes will fit in nicely once he is 100% healthy. If he's hitting his 3's, he'll definitely get his share of playing time. If he was fully healthy this whole time, I would definitely see him starting in front of Creek. I think both will be inconsistent on offense and I think Dumes is clearly a better defender right now. It just depends on how strong Creek comes on and how healthy Dumes is. Ideally, they will both play well and get a majority of the minutes at shooting guard.
As for the big men, I see Pritchard and Watford starting. Pritchard gives us a true low-post guy that will post up on the block. Elston, Capo, and Watford all float out to the perimeter and play inside and out, which is fine because that can be very useful too. But I see Pritch holding down that starting spot unless his head goes really far up his ass. So, off the bench, I see Elston definitely being the first big man off the bench. Then, I would probably put Capo ahead of Bawa because I think Capo is so much farther ahead in just knowing where he needs to be and what he needs to do on both ends of the floor. I hope Bawa can get some meaningful minutes this year because that game experience really helps you improve, but he might still be too raw to make any significant contributions this year. Sky is the limit though. Also, I do expect the rotations and minutes to change quite a bit, especially in the pre-conference schedule as Crean tries to figure out the best combinations. And he'll also use the pine as a motivator if guys aren't practicing hard. A luxury we did not have a year ago.
I did see David Williams is not signing and agree that's a good thing. That was a strange commitment in the first place. IU offers to this kid that nobody has heard of and he accepts the offer on the spot. Anyway, I think we need to go after some bigger fish, so I do think it is good news.
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