Gophers men's hoops 11th in Big Ten unofficial media preseason poll

[BleedGopher]

per Marcus:

Coming off the program’s first NCAA tournament win in six years, the Gophers men’s basketball team was picked to finish 11th in the 2019-20 Big Ten unofficial media preseason poll released Monday.

Michigan State was one vote away from the unanimous pick as preseason favorites to win the league title, followed by the only other team with a first-place vote in Maryland. Ohio State, Purdue and Michigan rounded out the top five. Minnesota’s border rival Wisconsin was sixth.

Big Ten unofficial poll (first-place votes)

Michigan State 391 (27)
Maryland 349 (1)
Ohio State 336
Purdue 311
Michigan 255
Wisconsin 241
Illinois 239
Iowa 174
Penn state 164
Indiana 155
Minnesota 127
Rutgers 95
Nebraska 69
Northwestern 34
Unofficial preseason All-Big Ten team

G - Cassius Winston, Michigan State

G – Anthony Cowan, Maryland

G – Ayo Dosunmu, Illinois

F – Lamar Stevens, Penn State

C – Kaleb Wesson, Ohio State

My Big Ten predicted finish

Michigan State
Ohio State
Maryland
Michigan
Purdue
Illinois
Wisconsin
Minnesota
Penn State
Iowa
Indiana
Rutgers
Northwestern
Nebraska
My Big Ten preseason player of the Year

Cassius Winston, Michigan State

My freshman of the year

Trayce Jackson-Davis, Indiana

My five-member all-conference team

G- Cassius Winston, Michigan St

G- Anthony Cowan, Maryland

G-Ayo Dosunmu, Illinois

F-Lamar Stevens, Penn State

C-Kaleb Wesson, Ohio State

http://www.startribune.com/gophers-...en-unofficial-media-preseason-poll/561778742/

Go Gophers!!

 

[Gopherfan84]

Gross. besides Michigan State being first, I don't really agree with much of any of this.

 

[Go Gophs]

Hard to really expect them to finish anywhere towards the top though. When you lose your 2 best players, 2 top scorers and 50% of your rebounding, it is going to be tough to start out anyway.
My hope for this season would be to at least be in bubble territory at the end of the season. Maybe they will be better than that, but I just don't see it, yet anyway. Hopefully they surprise.

 

[bga1]

Hard to really expect them to finish anywhere towards the top though. When you lose your 2 best players, 2 top scorers and 50% of your rebounding, it is going to be tough to start out anyway.
My hope for this season would be to at least be in bubble territory at the end of the season. Maybe they will be better than that, but I just don't see it, yet anyway. Hopefully they surprise.

Since the Vince Grier year, I never rule a team out. Having lost an All Big Ten player off of a horrid team one would have thought that team would be far and away a last place team. Instead an improbable squad of Grier, Coleman, Lawson, Arob and Hagan and a few nice depth player made it a really fun and competitive year. It's how a blend of players an talents come together. I am hopeful of something better than last year, which would be a big and pleasant surprise. Oturu, Gabe and Carr are a really nice nucleus.

 

[gopherguy15]

I said this in the spring, and I'll say it again. This is the year to judge Gard's coaching ability. I'm not sold on Wisconsin. I would take Oturu, Gabe, and Carr any day over Reuvers, Davison, and Trice. We'll see just how well he can coach.

 

[Duker]

Since the Vince Grier year, I never rule a team out. Having lost an All Big Ten player off of a horrid team one would have thought that team would be far and away a last place team. Instead an improbable squad of Grier, Coleman, Lawson, Arob and Hagan and a few nice depth player made it a really fun and competitive year. It's how a blend of players an talents come together. I am hopeful of something better than last year, which would be a big and pleasant surprise. Oturu, Gabe and Carr are a really nice nucleus.

Couldn’t agree more, probably the most enjoyable season to watch the Gophers
since 1997-1998. Other than Grier, not overly talented, but they played
together so well, especially help defense.

 

[Bigeddysprings]

I said this in the spring, and I'll say it again. This is the year to judge Gard's coaching ability. I'm not sold on Wisconsin. I would take Oturu, Gabe, and Carr any day over Reuvers, Davison, and Trice. We'll see just how well he can coach.

He has finished 3rd, 2nd,9th and 4th. in the B1G. His overall record is 80-47 and 45-29 in the B1G. If I were you I would stop worrying about Greg Gard and start worrying about Coach Pitino Who's finishes include, 7th, 10th, 13th, 4th,11th and 7th His overall record is 130-92. In the B1G he is 40-70.

 

[howeda7]

He has finished 3rd, 2nd,9th and 4th. in the B1G. His overall record is 80-47 and 45-29 in the B1G. If I were you I would stop worrying about Greg Gard and start worrying about Coach Pitino Who's finishes include, 7th, 19th, 13th, 4th,11th and 7th His overall record is 130-92. In the B1G he is 40-70.

Wow. That is bad.

 

[Bigeddysprings]

Oops my bad fixed it to 10th .

 

[jovs]

He has finished 3rd, 2nd,9th and 4th. in the B1G. His overall record is 80-47 and 45-29 in the B1G. If I were you I would stop worrying about Greg Gard and start worrying about Coach Pitino Who's finishes include, 7th, 10th, 13th, 4th,11th and 7th His overall record is 130-92. In the B1G he is 40-70.

The first two years he had Hayes, Koenig, and Happ, it would be tough to lose with that nucleas, you could take joe blow of the street and be successful, last year they overachieved I will grant you that, it will be interesting to see how he does the next couple of years.

 

[bemidjigopher]

He has finished 3rd, 2nd,9th and 4th. in the B1G. His overall record is 80-47 and 45-29 in the B1G. If I were you I would stop worrying about Greg Gard and start worrying about Coach Pitino Who's finishes include, 7th, 10th, 13th, 4th,11th and 7th His overall record is 130-92. In the B1G he is 40-70.

Big***gy triggered!

Sent from my XT1650 using Tapatalk

 

[Gopherfan84]

Hard to really expect them to finish anywhere towards the top though. When you lose your 2 best players, 2 top scorers and 50% of your rebounding, it is going to be tough to start out anyway.
My hope for this season would be to at least be in bubble territory at the end of the season. Maybe they will be better than that, but I just don't see it, yet anyway. Hopefully they surprise.

Totally get what we lost, but so did a bunch of other schools. Richard hasn't earned the benefit of the doubt yet (probably shouldn't have either I guess), but we were picked to finish low last year and achieved above it. I don't see us being a top 4 team, but I do see us being a 5-8 team. I don't think Iowa is great, I think Penn State is a one man band, Michigan will have a new system and learning curve plus lost a bunch too, Wisconsin lost Happ, Purdue lost a ton of scoring and I struggle to think they'll score consistently, Illinois is still young as is Indiana.

Rebounding can be a misleading stat. Murph was phenomenal on the boards, but our offense will be different with him and guys like Oturo and Thomas will be able to pick up more responsibility. Also will have to be better on the perimeter. I also think we will have a better flowing offense this year with guys with more diverse skill sets. I think we were easy to guard if you had the right pieces as we were pretty limited due to our lack of outside shooting to create spacing. I don't foresee that as an issue this year.

The thing I do find the most humorous is that somebody didn't put Michigan State as a number one... I'd go tiers for preseason ranking of the Big 10 this year.

Tier 1: Michigan State

Tier 2: Maryland and Ohio State

Tier 3: Purdue, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois, PSU, Indiana

Tier 4: Iowa and Rutgers and Nebraska

Tier 17: Northwestern

 

[gopherguy15]

The first two years he had Hayes, Koenig, and Happ, it would be tough to lose with that nucleas, you could take joe blow of the street and be successful, last year they overachieved I will grant you that, it will be interesting to see how he does the next couple of years.

Yep, I stand by what I said. He had some fantastic left-overs from the Bo Ryan era. In fact, Happ was a Bo Ryan recruit as well. We'll see what Gard can do with strictly his own players. Bigeddysprings thinks I'm bashing Gard, but saying that I'm not giving him the benefit of the doubt (like everyone gave Bo Ryan because he got it done every year) with what I consider to be an average lineup is not bashing. It's a valid argument until we see what happens this season.

 

[MinnGopher]

He has finished 3rd, 2nd,9th and 4th. in the B1G. His overall record is 80-47 and 45-29 in the B1G. If I were you I would stop worrying about Greg Gard and start worrying about Coach Pitino Who's finishes include, 7th, 10th, 13th, 4th,11th and 7th His overall record is 130-92. In the B1G he is 40-70.

Do you not like context or were you unaware that UW basketball has been very successful over the past 10-15 years and have credibility. We haven't since we were sanctioned. Not a great comparison but yeah Gard has been successful.

 

[RickDornsby]

There actually are probably a lot of coaches that would’ve failed with Koenig/Happ/Hayes and especially “just Happ” last year even when they were healthy.

There are lots of teams that have 2-4 G-League players and can’t make the tournament. Richard did fine with Coffey/Mason/Murph and I guess Lynch but I’d say those WI teams were a shade better even with their flipped tournament seed 4 years ago.