Isaiah Washington in the Capital Classic

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DeathClutch

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He's playing in the Capital Classic All-Star game right now and just took it over for a bit. The ball is basically on a string for Isaiah and he had an incredible 3-point play where he wasn't even looking at the hoop and made the shot. Fun player to watch.
 

He will definitely get The Barn rocking! Harlem Globetrotter-esque ball control. Very entertaining! Announcers debated on whether he should be the player of the game based on the spurt DeathClutch mentioned above. He didn't win it, but they said he was without a doubt the Most Entertaining Player on the court. Nice job Isaiah.
 


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Hope this isn't literal...
 





I think he has a chance to be one of the best gophers ever... he plays with so much energy & passion, I love it!! It's probably the most excited I've been for a recruit in my lifetime; I'm younger than most of you curmudgeons.
 

GopherDude said:
I think he has a chance to be one of the best gophers ever... he plays with so much energy & passion, I love it!! It's probably the most excited I've been for a recruit in my lifetime; I'm younger than most of you curmudgeons.
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If he is one of the best ever...wow. There have been some incredible Gophers. Thompson was the #1 pick, plenty of all Americans, etc. I'll wait to get too excited because he hasn't even arrived yet. Needs to prove he can play both ends of the floor and do it at the big ten level. I'm cautiously optimistic for him
 



UpAndUnder43 said:
If he is one of the best ever...wow. There have been some incredible Gophers. Thompson was the #1 pick, plenty of all Americans, etc. I'll wait to get too excited because he hasn't even arrived yet. Needs to prove he can play both ends of the floor and do it at the big ten level. I'm cautiously optimistic for him
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Beat me to it. He does appear to have an insanely high skill set, though. I hope it translates, skill, attitude, defense, etc. He may be asked to play off the ball, which I think he could do very well.
 

Play off the ball? Only in the sense of the motion in the passing or weave of the offense. He will be the primary ball handler when he's on the floor. If you can recall (or go back and look at) high school highlights of Mason or any of our recent guards (I would suggest 20+ years) he is, by far, the best ball handler.
 

GopherDude said:
I think he has a chance to be one of the best gophers ever... he plays with so much energy & passion, I love it!! It's probably the most excited I've been for a recruit in my lifetime; I'm younger than most of you curmudgeons.
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Washington is a good recruit but your statement is insane hyberbole. Rucker Park-style street ball and entertaining ball-handling tricks are far different than excelling in a structured B1G basketball game. The length of some B1G guards will be tough for him, as he's pretty short (6'1" is a stretch) and guys in college will be able to match his quickness. His jump shot is getting better but will have to improve even more to be a good college player. We have no idea how well he plays the other half of the game (defense) but again, bigger guards will be able to shoot over him.

He has a chance to be a nice sparkplug off the bench for us next year, and then we'll see how he improves from there. Most guys ranked in the 60's (as he is) don't make it to the NBA but many turn out to be good college players, and if we can keep getting 1-2 guys in that range or higher every year (got Coffey last year, Washington this year, already have Oturu next year) we'll be consistently good.
 




I've watched a bunch of his videos. The impression I get is that he has a tremendous work ethic and drive to be the best. I believe he can overcome his physical limitations of being 6'1". Someone mentioned the B1G guards will be able to shoot over him. That may be the case, but wasn't Bobby Jackson the same height? He managed to earn B1G defensive player of the year honors .


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I love it!! He dominates out there...almost like he was playing against a bunch of high schoolers. I really like that he knows how to make a free throw.
 

It will be interesting to see if he can defend, and if he can be successful against good help defense. It's always good to have a player that can go by his man, though, and that's something we've rarely seen from the Gophers unless there is an obvious mismatch.
 

GopherDude said:
I think he has a chance to be one of the best gophers ever... he plays with so much energy & passion, I love it!! It's probably the most excited I've been for a recruit in my lifetime; I'm younger than most of you curmudgeons.
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Ok, some of you are freaked out by this statement, calling it hyperbole etc. but I don't see anything wrong with getting excited and thinking its possible a new player has a chance to be the best ever. Let get excited!!!
 

PitinoFan said:
I've watched a bunch of his videos. The impression I get is that he has a tremendous work ethic and drive to be the best. I believe he can overcome his physical limitations of being 6'1". Someone mentioned the B1G guards will be able to shoot over him. That may be the case, but wasn't Bobby Jackson the same height? He managed to earn B1G defensive player of the year honors .


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But, he was strong and could sky! Also, 21-22 when we saw him. I sure hope you're right. The fact that he's 6-1 probably a shirt that he won't be a one-and-done.

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I believe I mentioned something about him being underrated in the national rankings.. and some people kind of scoffed at it.. with his skill set he seems to be better than the 64th best player in the country iv watched some guys tape who are ranked higher than him he could easily be in the top 40..
 

gopherdiehard said:
I believe I mentioned something about him being underrated in the national rankings.. and some people kind of scoffed at it.. with his skill set he seems to be better than the 64th best player in the country iv watched some guys tape who are ranked higher than him he could easily be in the top 40..
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So you watched some YouTube mixtapes and have concluded that?
 

WanderingGopher said:
Washington is a good recruit but your statement is insane hyberbole. Rucker Park-style street ball and entertaining ball-handling tricks are far different than excelling in a structured B1G basketball game. The length of some B1G guards will be tough for him, as he's pretty short (6'1" is a stretch) and guys in college will be able to match his quickness. His jump shot is getting better but will have to improve even more to be a good college player. We have no idea how well he plays the other half of the game (defense) but again, bigger guards will be able to shoot over him.

He has a chance to be a nice sparkplug off the bench for us next year, and then we'll see how he improves from there. Most guys ranked in the 60's (as he is) don't make it to the NBA but many turn out to be good college players, and if we can keep getting 1-2 guys in that range or higher every year (got Coffey last year, Washington this year, already have Oturu next year) we'll be consistently good.
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I think he has more potential than any gopher recruit in a very long time. However, at this point he is only capable of playing StreetBall with Grayson Boucher. It's up to Pitino, et.al. to turn him into a B1G player and someone who might be able to play in the NBA--and they won't have much time to do it. My sense from watching the videos is that he's a good kid, that he's very smart, that he has already tapped into the commercial possibilities associated with high level basketball, that he won't be here more than a year and that he's not interested in academics.
 

jamiche said:
I think he has more potential than any gopher recruit in a very long time. However, at this point he is only capable of playing StreetBall with Grayson Boucher. It's up to Pitino, et.al. to turn him into a B1G player and someone who might be able to play in the NBA--and they won't have much time to do it. My sense from watching the videos is that he's a good kid, that he's very smart, that he has already tapped into the commercial possibilities associated with high level basketball, that he won't be here more than a year and that he's not interested in academics.
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Where would he possibly go if he only stays one year? The Globe Trotters?
 

jamiche said:
I think he has more potential than any gopher recruit in a very long time. However, at this point he is only capable of playing StreetBall with Grayson Boucher. It's up to Pitino, et.al. to turn him into a B1G player and someone who might be able to play in the NBA--and they won't have much time to do it. My sense from watching the videos is that he's a good kid, that he's very smart, that he has already tapped into the commercial possibilities associated with high level basketball, that he won't be here more than a year and that he's not interested in academics.
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How in the hell did you specifically come up with the last two conclusions? And yeah, where is it you think he's going after a year?
 



underground629 said:
How in the hell did you specifically come up with the last two conclusions? And yeah, where is it you think he's going after a year?
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I think he thinks he's going to the NBA. That's where Pitino and reality based coaching is critically important. In terms of academics, I watched the Jelly Fam quasi documentary videos, both of which were really good, and they show his life on the court, a little bit of home, his high school team and nothing about high school itself. He seems like a great kid and a natural leader whose sole focus is basketball.
 

jamiche said:
I think he thinks he's going to the NBA. That's where Pitino and reality based coaching is critically important. In terms of academics, I watched the Jelly Fam quasi documentary videos, both of which were really good, and they show his life on the court, a little bit of home, his high school team and nothing about high school itself. He seems like a great kid and a natural leader whose sole focus is basketball.
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You expected a high school kid that is going to play d1 basketball to make a self promoting video to include his life at school?

At first I thought you were nuts for thinking he was a 1 and done.
 


Winasota Gopher said:
You expected a high school kid that is going to play d1 basketball to make a self promoting video to include his life at school?

At first I thought you were nuts for thinking he was a 1 and done.
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No kidding, most teachers won't even let you have your phone out in class, let alone record **** on it. Sometimes a little commonsense can go along way. As awesome as that video was, doesn't do justice to Washington's overall game. While I wouldn't call him the next Hoff by any means, he certainly can ht from outside, and has nice pull up jumper too. Washington can also pick his guys pocket on defense with the best of them, and he's in the perfectr situation next year, he can 15-20 minutes a game, get adjusted to Big Ten basketball and be mentored by returning first team all conference PG
 

1 and dones usually start. Are you guys saying he is going to beat out a returning Senior All-B1G PG? You are seriously high if you do.
 

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