New Richard Pitino Blog: Early Summer Impressions

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BleedGopher

BleedGopher

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per Pitino:

Kevin Dorsey - DeAndre Mathieu speed. Can go by anyone. Tough, physical defender. Needs to work on defending without fouling. Has shown me in a few workouts he's a better shooter than I anticipated. He should make an immediate impact.

Jordan Murphy - Powerful, explosive athlete. At times has some Rodney Williams in him when he dunks the ball. Should be an elite defender and rebounder. Has long arms and can be a matchup problem on both ends. He's 228 this morning and moves great.

Lots more here:

http://www.gophersports.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/062915aaa.html

Go Gophers!!
 

Interesting that he seems to attribute last year's disappointment at least in part to not being able to block out the "noise." That's a broad and evocative term. We can guess what that all means, but I'd still like to pick Pitino's brain about what all he thought went wrong.
 

Bad Gopher said:
Interesting that he seems to attribute last year's disappointment at least in part to not being able to block out the "noise." That's a broad and evocative term. We can guess what that all means, but I'd still like to pick Pitino's brain about what all he thought went wrong.
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I think if you could hit him with truth serum he's say it was a talent issue. I love these blog reports and can't wait to see the foundation of what Pitino plans to build in action on the court. The report on Murphy was the most interesting to hear.
 

Another good blog post. Is Louisville the expected home-and-home?
 

Can't wait to see this team on the court. Really can't wait until Lynch and Fitzgerald join the squad the following year.
 


What Went Wrong...

Bad Gopher said:
Interesting that he seems to attribute last year's disappointment at least in part to not being able to block out the "noise." That's a broad and evocative term. We can guess what that all means, but I'd still like to pick Pitino's brain about what all he thought went wrong.
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Lil Dre and EE were brutal all year. Ricky didn't see that coming. Those guys have good years and we make the Dance with a .500 or better B10 record.
 

Nice to see Murphy at about 230 and being able to move well. Feel like he will add some of that toughness our team needs. Kid will get a lot of playing time this year I'm guessing.
 





LesBolstad said:
What part is false? In your opinion, what were the biggest drivers to the poor season?
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Mathieu and EE being brutal all year is false. EE didn't get time in Big Ten games, but when he did he was just fine (better than others). Mathieu's overall season was fine, but he did struggle offensively in Big Ten games.. but so did Morris, Mason, Konate, Diedhiou, etc.

Mason had a solid freshman year, but he also shot 42.3% eFG% in conference -- worst of all Gophers.

The biggest issue was defense. Two things there in particular: (1) they let the other team shoot the ball extremely well and (2) they let the other team get second chances via offensive rebounds. These two things wiped out the good coming from the elite level of steals and turnover creation.

Truth be told, more minutes for EE would have helped with both (1) and (2) above. Miscalculation by the staff.
 

My happiest parts? Lynch catches everything, how long since we had a big that caught anything?

Jordan Murphy can dunk like Rodney??? When's the last time we had that? Rodney obviously, but since then??? We have got to lead the league in missed layups/dunks.
 


Winasota Gopher said:
My happiest parts? Lynch catches everything, how long since we had a big that caught anything?

Jordan Murphy can dunk like Rodney??? When's the last time we had that? Rodney obviously, but since then??? We have got to lead the league in missed layups/dunks.
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I can't believe that's true. Andre Ingram graduated in 2013.

Disclaimer: I really liked Ingram.
 



Is Jarvis for sure never going to play for the gophers? Our is it something that can be reevaluated later on this year or next year? Sorry if I missed this being posted elsewhere
 

I don't always agree with you

LesBolstad said:
Lil Dre and EE were brutal all year. Ricky didn't see that coming. Those guys have good years and we make the Dance with a .500 or better B10 record.
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but I definitely do agree with your analysis on this point.
 

The surprising thing to me in Richard's post is his bullish nature on our Big Ten record this coming year. Last year all the way along
reading between the lines it seemed to me like he was never sure how well we might do...kinda walking on egg shells. One week of summer workouts and he's predicting success this season. Didn't expect those words from him. That's exciting.
Maybe he's excited Bo is leaving...
 

tonestang said:
Is Jarvis for sure never going to play for the gophers? Our is it something that can be reevaluated later on this year or next year? Sorry if I missed this being posted elsewhere
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It sounds like in the St Paul article that he won't play for the Gophers. If he wants to pursue playing basketball he can look elsewhere.
 

2014-2015

Gopher Warrior said:
Mathieu and EE being brutal all year is false. EE didn't get time in Big Ten games, but when he did he was just fine (better than others). Mathieu's overall season was fine, but he did struggle offensively in Big Ten games.. but so did Morris, Mason, Konate, Diedhiou, etc.

Mason had a solid freshman year, but he also shot 42.3% eFG% in conference -- worst of all Gophers.

The biggest issue was defense. Two things there in particular: (1) they let the other team shoot the ball extremely well and (2) they let the other team get second chances via offensive rebounds. These two things wiped out the good coming from the elite level of steals and turnover creation.

Truth be told, more minutes for EE would have helped with both (1) and (2) above. Miscalculation by the staff.
Click to expand...

Biggest disappointment was Lil Dre's big dropoff from 2013-2014. FG% 51 down to 44; 3PT% 49 to 32 and PPG 12 to 8.5. He just never got going for whatever reason.
 


Not that rehashing matters much, but second chance points did kill the 2014-15 Gophers as did inconsistent PG play. Also, from Andre Hollins' recent interviews it does appear his ankle (and hip) never recovered sufficiently to restore the explosiveness necessary to get him to the line 5-10 charity shots a game. EE gave his all and by all accounts is a credit to the program, but his senior season was a huge disappointment. Mo deserved his 25 mpg; had EE embraced his role as effective rebounder/defensive stopper and stayed on the floor without picking up peevish fouls, he would have played and contributed more.

Bring on the futuro!
 

Can we please keep the thread on this year and not rehash last year.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

Any chance Murphy starts at the 4 with King at the 3 or on the bench? I feel like Joey will start somehow because he's the closest thing we have to a veteran.
 

I enjoyed the blog and I thought Pitino did a nice job of focusing on the strengths of the incoming players without making them out to be All-Conference candidates. That said, I am little concerned by the final paragraph and "never letting" 6-12 happen again. I think that gets hopes up for this season that may not be realistic. Last year Pitino made some similar positive comments about not just making the NCAA tournament, but making some noise there and then at some points blamed "wacky" expectations for the teams disappointing season.

One thing to watch for this year is how successful the training staff is with putting weight on guys. We have some thin guys on this team and are also recruiting some guys who will need to gain weight as well. Not everyone is capable of putting on good weight, so it will be interesting to see if the success/failure with Morris/Gilbert/McBrayer impacts recruiting in both the short and long term.
 

When you strive for greatness you make some goals. You may not make them, but without goals you will not be great.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

howeda7 said:
Any chance Murphy starts at the 4 with King at the 3 or on the bench? I feel like Joey will start somehow because he's the closest thing we have to a veteran.
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I'd say it's more likely that Murphy starts at the 3 with King at the 4. Even if he doesn't start this year I'm sure he'll be getting a lot of play time.
 

I think Murphy starts regardless. Pitino seems to be really high on him.
 



We are only Four months away but

MadtownGopher said:
I think Murphy starts regardless. Pitino seems to be really high on him.
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I'd say King starts regardless and agree about Pitino being high on Murphy . Murphy appeared to be our best recruit or the guy with the highest ceiling to me and evidently he looks good the first week. However, Josh Martin got a lot of hype last summer and looked totally frightened come November. Time will tell...
 

Jeez. Was the Martin episode just last summer? Maybe I tried to block it out, because it seems like the distant past.
 

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