Gophers land George Washington transfer Jamison Battle

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PeterMac05 said:
Gophers land first recruit of the year and the Ben Johnson era has officially begun! Battle averaged 17 last year at George Washington as a sophomore. Battle, a former Delasalle Crusader comes home, and should create an immediate impact as a sophomore next year.
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o7 Coach Johnson
 


Ozzy&Ray said:
Based on what? Having seen him actually play, he’s not polished, he’s athletic playing against poor competition. He doesn’t have a solid jump shot that translates to this level where it will be contested consistently. Would I like him on the roster? Yes. He’s a role player though.
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They're all role players. That's why they're all interchangeable.

Could Brandon Johnson go to Northern and average 21 ppg? Probably. Could Ihnen? I doubt it.
 

atsgopher said:
De La Salle Islanders... I think the De La Salle Crusaders are in Oakland.
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They're actually right next to me out here in the East Bay of the Bay Area; Concord Ca.

I had to look though before sending this and I actually found a High School called this in Oakland:

CRISTO REY DE LA SALLE​

cristoreydelasalle.org

Home - Cristo Rey De La Salle

Cristo Rey De La Salle East Bay High School St. Elizabeth Campus, is a diverse, Lasallian Catholic learning community that educates young people to become men and women of faith, purpose, and service.
cristoreydelasalle.org cristoreydelasalle.org

They don't have sports though - further inspection, they do have sports (but are the Mustangs). The school you were probably thinking of is this one (as they are a nationally known power in Football), which is in Concord Ca., and they are the Spartans, not the Crusaders:

DE LA SALLE HIGH SCHOOL (Spartans)
www.dlshs.org

Premier All Boys Private High School in East Bay, CA | De La Salle

De La Salle is a premier all-boys private high school in Concord, CA, where students are uniquely empowered with the academic, spiritual, physical, and social skills needed to thrive in college and beyond. Learn more!
www.dlshs.org www.dlshs.org

The De La Salle Football team owns the longest winning streak of 151 games in the US. They lost their first game of the 2004 season to break the streak.

I know; wrong sport...
 
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DeathClutch said:
The A-10 is farrrrrrr from a weak conference. You have no clue what you are talking about.
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It's not a weak conference but the bottom of it was pretty bad this year. There were a lot of team fattening their win totals on the likes of Fordham, St. Joes, LaSalle, and GW. Those teams (other than Fordham) are good some years but not this year.
 

Ozzy&Ray said:
How in the world would you know Fox is better than Ihnen? This infatuation with new is hilarious. It’s just new, not always better. Ihnen has a ton of potential, and with a coaching staff that may have a clue how to use him he could have a significant impact.
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I like Ihnen as an offensive rebounder and think he is an ok Big Ten bench player but besides that, he doesn’t do much.

If Ihnen entered to portal, he absolutely would not be hearing from the list of schools Fox has heard from and wouldn’t be getting calls from over 100 programs.

 





GophersInIowa said:
Hopefully he develops but he isn’t close to being a contributor on a top 5 in the big ten type team right now
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In what world are we a top 5 team any time soon? If Ben thinks he is the kind of player that works in heretofore unknown system and can be important in implementing culture he is worth the risk. If we’re turning down guys who have no place on a top 5 team we might be waiting three years to fill out a roster.
 



die hard gopher said:
I like Ihnen as an offensive rebounder and think he is an ok Big Ten bench player but besides that, he doesn’t do much.

If Ihnen entered to portal, he absolutely would not be hearing from the list of schools Fox has heard from and wouldn’t be getting calls from over 100 programs.

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Lol. Yeah, they are all interested.
 




Ozzy&Ray said:
How in the world would you know Fox is better than Ihnen? This infatuation with new is hilarious. It’s just new, not always better. Ihnen has a ton of potential, and with a coaching staff that may have a clue how to use him he could have a significant impact.
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Agreed. I still like Ihnen's potential.
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
They're all role players. That's why they're all interchangeable.

Could Brandon Johnson go to Northern and average 21 ppg? Probably. Could Ihnen? I doubt it.
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I don't see a scenario where Johnson or ihnen aren't studs playing D2...big ten basketball and intercollegiate sun or whatever it's called are worlds apart. Ihnen was par at best last year but that drop off is like D2 athletes playing me after sucking at the D2 level.

With that said can fox contribute here? Maybe...
 

Ozzy&Ray said:
This infatuation with new is hilarious. It’s just new, not always better. Ihnen has a ton of potential
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This infatuation with potential is hilarious. I bet you were a big Charles Buggs fan too. Ihnen has a lot of athletic ability, but it has only ever been potential on the offensive side. He never really flashed what he could be on the offensive end, so I think it is unlikely a new coach suddenly unlocks his abilities.
 

Holy Man said:
In what world are we a top 5 team any time soon? If Ben thinks he is the kind of player that works in heretofore unknown system and can be important in implementing culture he is worth the risk. If we’re turning down guys who have no place on a top 5 team we might be waiting three years to fill out a roster.
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What does that have to do with what I said. Someone said ihnen has a ton of upside. I guess you and I disagree with what a ton of upside means
 

GopherWeatherGuy said:
Why do we automatically lose Ihnen? Are we not going to have a bench next season? We don't have very many players on the roster right now.

And even if we did lose Ihnen, 2.8 PPG is not exactly daunting to replace.
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Hopefully Ben is not going to continue Pitino's play 6 trust 4 system.
 

Ozzy&Ray said:
Lol. Yeah, they are all interested.
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They may not all offer or have a ton of legitimate interest but again, if Ihnen entered the portal, I highly doubt he would be hearing from all those schools, even if we are just talking preliminary inquiries.
 

tmvander said:
I don't see a scenario where Johnson or ihnen aren't studs playing D2...big ten basketball and intercollegiate sun or whatever it's called are worlds apart. Ihnen was par at best last year but that drop off is like D2 athletes playing me after sucking at the D2 level.

With that said can fox contribute here? Maybe...
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They'd be pretty good but I can't see Ihnen quite putting up 22, 9.6 and 3.2 blocks a game shooting 62% from the field at the DII level. Johnson maybe could.

Look at what he put up in Germany as a senior, he averaged 13 points, 8 boards and 1 block a game and in the U20 Euro IBF games for Germany, I think he put up about 5-7 points a game, 4-5 rebounds. Omersa put up 18, 11 and 1.9 blocks per game in class 3A as a senior in HS and averaged about 7 and 5 in the EYBL. Neither have ever dominated the game at any level the way Fox did the NCAA DII level.

I think we can all agree that the NCAA DII level is quite a bit higher level than Minnesota 3A HS basketball or the league Ihnen played in Germany and maybe somewhat comparable to the EYBL and Euro U20 games. So if a HS senior signee put up the numbers Fox put up in one of the top HS leagues in the country, I think we'd all be pretty pumped and talk about how he is going to be an immediate contributor.

Like I said before, Fox has the size and athleticism that translates to the Big Ten level and even at this level, he is still going to be the best athlete on the floor every night. He may be the best dunker in college basketball next year. I don't know if he is a starter or not but I do think he'd be a high level bench player at this level.
 


bga1 said:
Maybe Johnson thinks he can use him differently? I do think Johnson was lost in the Pitino offense. He was out there standing on the wing. I would have much preferred him catching it in the high post and working hi-lo with Robbins. He just needs to be used right and gain some confidence.
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Exactly! We don't know his offensive potential because we had him standing on the perimeter!
 

TruthSeeker said:
No defense. Decent offense.

Good bench player on a good team. Ok starter on a bad team.

He's worth it under the circumstances.
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TruthSeeker said:
Not really.
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It's all in what you are truly expecting. Should we expect Battle to come in and average 17 ppg? No, but can we expect him to come in and play hard and help build a strong culture? Yes.
 

manderson1984 said:
It's all in what you are truly expecting. Should we expect Battle to come in and average 17 ppg? No, but can we expect him to come in and play hard and help build a strong culture? Yes.
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Based on what I have read, it appears defense is the weakness. I thought defense was a staple.
 

BarnBurner said:
Based on what I have read, it appears defense is the weakness. I thought defense was a staple.
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I've always found that getting a player to be be good defensively can be easier than getting them to be good offensively. It requires less skill than shooting/ passing/ dribbling. It does, however, require a lot of effort and desire to consistently be in the right place at the right time. It really is more of a mindset than anything else, as a lot of people have said before. Athleticism helps :)

As a coach, I'd rather have a good offensive player and be tasked to teach them how to play good defense than the other way around.
 

BarnBurner said:
Based on what I have read, it appears defense is the weakness. I thought defense was a staple.
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I certainly hope good defense is the staple. Good team defense doesn't require all 5 guys to be elite defenders one on one, but it does require 5 working together and being in the correct spot positionally.

Battle is limited physically which is why he never got an offer out of HS. He has been taught to defend and will be in the right spots positionally, just will never be an all B1G defender. He will at least work on that end.
 

bfriedrichs10 said:
I've always found that getting a player to be be good defensively can be easier than getting them to be good offensively. It requires less skill than shooting/ passing/ dribbling. It does, however, require a lot of effort and desire to consistently be in the right place at the right time. It really is more of a mindset than anything else, as a lot of people have said before. Athleticism helps :)

As a coach, I'd rather have a good offensive player and be tasked to teach them how to play good defense than the other way around.
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Players play, but good coaches teach players to defend at a high level. I've seen some offenses where coaches literally don't coach it and just get out of the way. You won't ever see that defensively.
 


manderson1984 said:
Players play, but good coaches teach players to defend at a high level. I've seen some offenses where coaches literally don't coach it and just get out of the way. You won't ever see that defensively.
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Baylor last night for example......They have 3 or 4 Marcus Carr level play makers and they believe in each other and make plays. On defense they defend together.
 

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