Buggs and Ellenson enrolled for summer session and will be on campus in June

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I was able to spend a little bit of time with Charles and his summer teammates Nick Victor (Winchendon to Yale) and Barrington Stevens (St. Thomas More to S. Alabama) while they were back in Texas for spring break. We got together to watch some NCAA games. (BTW, those are 2 very underrated kids to keep an eye on. Yale got an absolute steal in Victor and Stevens shot over 50% from 3 in the summer and again during his prep year at STM).

We watched Wisky, Mich St, and Ohio St that night, so it was nice to see future competition and scout them some. Charles looks to be in great shape and seems to have a great attitude as he looks to move to college. We discussed several topics, and he noted that shots were impossible to come by on that team, and that in the UNC-JV game that someone posted a box score of that he played early minutes then his coach took him out because he was sick.

We also discussed his recruitment, and Marquette, Clemson, Arkansas, Miam-FL, Seton Hall, and numerous other schools were all over him once he was "discovered", but Tubby had gotten in early and made a strong impression.

It seems that overall the prep year was a very beneficial year for his development. He has made great progress, and his teammates both mentioned that they think he has just started to scratch the surface of his potential.

I also watched the NIT games, and it was exciting to watch the gophers play so well late in the season. they have to clean up the turnovers, but I love the way Tubby's teams defend.

I know the team is loaded, but hope Charles can play a role next season.

the best comparison I can make in CBB right now might be Quincy Miller at Baylor. Both are lanky, long, and extremely athletic. Both can really shoot it. Both need to refine their all around game and become more consistent. Miller is a possible 1st round pick next year if he returns to Baylor, so I know that is high praise. But that is the type of game Buggs has in terms of style and strengths of his game, as well as areas for improvement.

One thing I had forgotten and asked him about was his shoe size. He wears a size 18 at 6'8, so that gives you and idea of the type of frame he has.

I hope the transition goes well for the 2 newcomers, and I am excited to follow the gophers next season. I hope to make a trip to Minneapolis to watch a game.
 

I think getting kids on campus & working out in the summer, as well as getting acclimated to college life for some, is very beneficial. Good to hear both of these kids are planning to get things started soon.
 

Thanks for the insight, Jimmy! It's really nice to get a feel for the kid when he has been such an enigma since we signed him. I know a lot of people around here are thinking we'd probably redshirt either Buggs or Ellenson (and perhaps both) since we have a fairly experienced core coming back (especially if Trevor returns). What do you think about using a redshirt on Buggs?

Jmmy Chitwood said:
One thing I had forgotten and asked him about was his shoe size. He wears a size 18 at 6'8, so that gives you and idea of the type of frame he has.
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My god, I thought I had big feet with size 15 at 6'6".
 

MinneStoa said:
Thanks for the insight, Jimmy! It's really nice to get a feel for the kid when he has been such an enigma since we signed him. I know a lot of people around here are thinking we'd probably redshirt either Buggs or Ellenson (and perhaps both) since we have a fairly experienced core coming back (especially if Trevor returns).
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+1
 


Gopher Warrior said:
I think getting kids on campus & working out in the summer, as well as getting acclimated to college life for some, is very beneficial. Good to hear both of these kids are planning to get things started soon.
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GW- Buggs is an obvious redshirt candidate. Personally, I think Ellenson is also an excellent redshirt candidate. I'm hoping Tubby redshirts at least one. What do you think?
 

Great post Jimmy-- thanks for the info. Looking forward to Howard Pulley League already to see them play.
 

RoyalGopher said:
GW- Buggs is an obvious redshirt candidate. Personally, I think Ellenson is also an excellent redshirt candidate. I'm hoping Tubby redshirts at least one. What do you think?
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Buggs has just spent a year in prep school. If he redshirts it means he will wait 2 years after graduating from HS before he makes his college debut. I am not sure he would agree to that.
 

RoyalGopher said:
GW- Buggs is an obvious redshirt candidate. Personally, I think Ellenson is also an excellent redshirt candidate. I'm hoping Tubby redshirts at least one. What do you think?
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I can see where you are coming from and it might make sense for these two based on the projected make up of the 2012-13 team. However, there are a lot of things to consider. Generally, my first question is whether the kids can contribute to the team. If they can, play them, if not, don't play them. That said, if you're not playing a kid in his first year, that might indicate that you haven't brought in a very impressive recruit.

Specific to these two, Ellenson has game and may be able to help this winter. Could turn out to be pretty good. Buggs I just don't know enough about. I'm not sure how much he can help inside vs. being more of a face up guy, but one thing that may dictate how much he plays is the return and health of certain guys that we have questions about: Mbakwe, Walker and Ingram have each had recent medical issues and if they are all back, will they be healthy? Oto Osenieks was forced to play inside although he's probably better served as a perimeter player on offense and that may be a reason to get Buggs going early as well..

Mixed feelings, I guess. I just don't like the idea of redshirting kids in basketball generally, but I'd agree with you that these two may be candidates.

Other random considerations on redshirts in general:

Health/physical - Has the student-athlete had a recent injury?... physically are they frail, but have the frame and ability to get a lot stronger (especially for big men who will be going up against much stronger guys)?

What does the kid want? Are the coach and kid (and parents) on the same page? With Eliason, he had been talking about redshirting long before ever reaching campus.. it had been addressed up front.

Class balancing - let's assume Mbakwe is back and Armelin is out. That would mean the Gophers have 4 openings in the 2013 class and just 2 in the 2016 class. If you redshirt either Buggs or Ellenson, now you've got 5 and 1.
 



After watching Matt Thomas today go all out for him Tubbs!
 


Wally, as athletic as he is, is a definitely a redshirt type player. He needs to not only work on his shot (streaky is the best description) but defensively he could be a liability. His lateral food speed needs work for sure.
 

Gopher Warrior said:
I can see where you are coming from and it might make sense for these two based on the projected make up of the 2012-13 team. However, there are a lot of things to consider. Generally, my first question is whether the kids can contribute to the team. If they can, play them, if not, don't play them. That said, if you're not playing a kid in his first year, that might indicate that you haven't brought in a very impressive recruit.

Specific to these two, Ellenson has game and may be able to help this winter. Could turn out to be pretty good. Buggs I just don't know enough about. I'm not sure how much he can help inside vs. being more of a face up guy, but one thing that may dictate how much he plays is the return and health of certain guys that we have questions about: Mbakwe, Walker and Ingram have each had recent medical issues and if they are all back, will they be healthy? Oto Osenieks was forced to play inside although he's probably better served as a perimeter player on offense and that may be a reason to get Buggs going early as well..

Mixed feelings, I guess. I just don't like the idea of redshirting kids in basketball generally, but I'd agree with you that these two may be candidates.

Other random considerations on redshirts in general:

Health/physical - Has the student-athlete had a recent injury?... physically are they frail, but have the frame and ability to get a lot stronger (especially for big men who will be going up against much stronger guys)?

What does the kid want? Are the coach and kid (and parents) on the same page? With Eliason, he had been talking about redshirting long before ever reaching campus.. it had been addressed up front.

Class balancing - let's assume Mbakwe is back and Armelin is out. That would mean the Gophers have 4 openings in the 2013 class and just 2 in the 2016 class. If you redshirt either Buggs or Ellenson, now you've got 5 and 1.
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Thanks, GW.

StCroix said:
Wally, as athletic as he is, is a definitely a redshirt type player. He needs to not only work on his shot (streaky is the best description) but defensively he could be a liability. His lateral food speed needs work for sure.
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Agreed. I think Wally is a huge redshirt candidate if we somehow end up getting Lockett, because I can't imagine that Ellenson would end up getting very many minutes. I think the biggest roadblock to redshirting from this class is how uneven the classes would become.
 



Thanks for the update on Buggs Jimmy. I think it is way too early to determine if Buggs or Wally will redshirt. We don't even know the complete roster for this fall. Will the roster include Trevor, Rodney, Trent and/or Chip or none of them? I think we should give Wally and Charles a chance to compete on the floor before we state they aren't ready to play next season.
 

I don't think Charles will redshirt at this point.

I am not sure how much he will play, and as some mentioned the roster will need to shake out to determine that.

I do think he can contribute as a freshman and think easing him into non conference games could enable him to be a bench contributor in conference play.

I have no clue on the other recruit bc I have never seen him play.
 

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