Reusse column: Mathieu joining list of elite Gophers' JUCOs

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BleedGopher

BleedGopher

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per Reusse:

So far, he’s been the catalyst in giving Rich Pitino a competitive start to his Minnesota tenure. When have the Gophers had a flat-out faster guy on the court than Mathieu? I’m not sure.

To me, with junior Andre Hollins and senior Austin Hollins being more erratic in game-to-game performances than anticipated, Mathieu has been the Gophers’ most valuable player.

Yes, Mathieu’s going to throw it away on occasion, but when he’s the one being asked to push the Gophers to the fast pace his coach wants to play, turnovers are going to happen.

Mathieu is shooting 49 percent and averaging 11.4 points, with 38 turnovers, 74 assists and a team-leading 32 steals. On Saturday, Mathieu got to the basket for a game-tying layup in the final second, and if it had been in Minneapolis and not East Lansing, he might have been shooting a free throw to win the game.

http://www.startribune.com/sports/blogs/239919901.html

Go Gophers!!
 

You can have as many turnovers as you want when you have almost a 2:1 A:TO ratio.
 


dpodoll68 said:
You can have as many turnovers as you want when you have almost a 2:1 A:TO ratio.
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Maybe if you're talking about the team A:TO ratio. If Mathieu was the only guy dishing out the assists and everyone else's turnovers remained the same, you'd have problems. It's also pretty useless as a stat if you can't distinguish between good defensive plays that forced a turnover that would have otherwise resulted in a basket, and unforced turnovers that weren't going to put the ball in a good scoring position in any case.
 

AO54 said:
Maybe if you're talking about the team A:TO ratio. If Mathieu was the only guy dishing out the assists and everyone else's turnovers remained the same, you'd have problems. It's also pretty useless as a stat if you can't distinguish between good defensive plays that forced a turnover that would have otherwise resulted in a basket, and unforced turnovers that weren't going to put the ball in a good scoring position in any case.
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I find it useful. I don't agree with your final point because I think these situations even out over the course of an entire season. Thankfully Mathieu isn't the only one dishing out assists and I agree with Reusse that his TO's are fairly low considering the pace Pitino wants him to push it at.
 


I like how fearless he is, but there are a few times when he goes up among those trees where he would have been better served dumping it off or keeping his dribble. Although not technically a TO, he does seem to have at least 2 shots blocked a game. Other than that, he has been a fantastic addition and his decision making will only get better as he adjusts to the competition.
 

Gold Vision said:
I like how fearless he is, but there are a few times when he goes up among those trees where he would have been better served dumping it off or keeping his dribble. Although not technically a TO, he does seem to have at least 2 shots blocked a game. Other than that, he has been a fantastic addition and his decision making will only get better as he adjusts to the competition.
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+1 He needs to get once thru the B1G. He'll be alot better as a senior.
 

Mathieu has been a huge, huge pick-up for the Gophers. Don't know where they'd be without him. With experience he should be able to limit the "chicken with his head cut off, caught in no-man's land" turnovers that can be killers at the end of a tight game.

I'd really like to see Craft guard him on Thursday. Would be real curious to see if Mathieu can do some damage against Craft. If there's a defender that'll tell you where you stand as a PG in terms of handling pressure, Craft is the guy.
 

Many or most juco's take about a half year to adjust to the step up. Bobby Jackson #1 example and he really stepped up in year two. How high is the ceiling for Mathieu?... it will be fun to watch.

Patrick's 'first year' was also mine to follow and attend Gopher Hoops at The Barn. I remember hearing that the previous year, when Hudson, Clark and Yates were on the Freshman team, they scrimmaged the varsity and easily handled them.
 



station19 said:
Many or most juco's take about a half year to adjust to the step up. Bobby Jackson #1 example and he really stepped up in year two. How high is the ceiling for Mathieu?... it will be fun to watch.

Patrick's 'first year' was also mine to follow and attend Gopher Hoops at The Barn. I remember hearing that the previous year, when Hudson, Clark and Yates were on the Freshman team, they scrimmaged the varsity and easily handled them.
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I also remember when Reusse wrote interesting articles about Town Team Baseball in Fulda, many many many years ago.
 

SelectionSunday said:
Mathieu has been a huge, huge pick-up for the Gophers. Don't know where they'd be without him. With experience he should be able to limit the "chicken with his head cut off, caught in no-man's land" turnovers that can be killers at the end of a tight game.

I'd really like to see Craft guard him on Thursday. Would be real curious to see if Mathieu can do some damage against Craft. If there's a defender that'll tell you where you stand as a PG in terms of handling pressure, Craft is the guy.
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You probably caught more of the Ohio State-Iowa game than I did, but Craft, at least while I viewed the game, wasn't matched up on Gesell defensively. Sure Matta had his reasons. I'm anxious to see Andre against Craft also.
 

I agree with Reusse. Mathieu is our best player. I think he could legitimately be first-team Big Ten next season.

To do that he'll need to improve his decision-making when he goes to the hole, and he'll need to become more of a scoring force. He should be able to do both.
 

Gopherguy0723 said:
I agree with Reusse. Mathieu is our best player. I think he could legitimately be first-team Big Ten next season.

To do that he'll need to improve his decision-making when he goes to the hole, and he'll need to become more of a scoring force. He should be able to do both.
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He's been a very pleasant surprise, but he's not a first-team Big Ten player. He was outclassed by Appling in the last game (granted he is a senior). Mathieu is fearless, no doubt, but he is still 5'9" and will be next year too.
 



golfing18now said:
He's been a very pleasant surprise, but he's not a first-team Big Ten player. He was outclassed by Appling in the last game (granted he is a senior). Mathieu is fearless, no doubt, but he is still 5'9" and will be next year too.
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He's gonna show you up when he hits a growth spurt this summer and comes back to school at 6'9".
 

mplarson7 said:
He's gonna show you up when he hits a growth spurt this summer and comes back to school at 6'9".
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Lol. A 6'9 player with Mathieu's skill set and athleticism would be a top 3 pick. Can you imagine having a player that tall and that quick at the 1?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

Who will be the top returning PGs in the conference?

Appling - Graduates
Craft - Graduates
Yogi Ferrell - Junior (17.2pts 4.2asts 3.2 steals 2.9tos)
Matheiu - Senior (11.4pts 4.4asts 1.9 steals 2.2 tos)
Gessell - Junior (6.8pts 3.7asts 1.3 steals 1.2 tos)
Abrams - Senior (12.6pts 3.3asts 1.2 steals 1.7 tos)
R. Johnson - Junior (11.4pts 3.6asts 0.6 steals 1.7 tos)
And I'm not sure who will start at PG for Wisconsin, Gasser, Koenig, or Jackson.
I also have no idea if there are any elite PGs coming in to the conference for the 2014 class.

I'd say Mathieu has at least a puncher's chance at 1st team though. He'd have to improve his scoring to beat out favorite Yogi Ferrell.
 

MadtownGopher said:
Who will be the top returning PGs in the conference?

Appling - Graduates
Craft - Graduates
Yogi Ferrell - Junior (17.2pts 4.2asts 3.2 steals 2.9tos)
Matheiu - Senior (11.4pts 4.4asts 1.9 steals 2.2 tos)
Gessell - Junior (6.8pts 3.7asts 1.3 steals 1.2 tos)
Abrams - Senior (12.6pts 3.3asts 1.2 steals 1.7 tos)
R. Johnson - Junior (11.4pts 3.6asts 0.6 steals 1.7 tos)
And I'm not sure who will start at PG for Wisconsin, Gasser, Koenig, or Jackson.
I also have no idea if there are any elite PGs coming in to the conference for the 2014 class.

I'd say Mathieu has at least a puncher's chance at 1st team though. He'd have to improve his scoring to beat out favorite Yogi Ferrell.
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Yep. I expect he'll pick up more of the load with another year of maturity and Austin Hollins graduating. He could easily double his three-point attempts. If he hits those at a good rate, finishes better/makes better decisions at the rim, and asserts himself more, then he could definitely increase his points by 20-40% and increase his assists by close to the same. If he averages 16 points and 6 assists a game with 2 steals and maintaining or improving his turnover ratios, then he would be in the discussion, maybe even the frontrunner.
 

Jeshurun said:
Lol. A 6'9 player with Mathieu's skill set and athleticism would be a top 3 pick. Can you imagine having a player that tall and that quick at the 1?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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I was thinking the same thing and wishing he had worked on his height a bit more during the off-season.
 

I was operating under the assumption that the First Team All Big Ten wasn't necessarily position dependent. In other words, you wouldn't be competing against just point guards, but you would need to be one of the top five players in the conference overall. I might be wrong on that. It's not absurd to think he would be in the running for the top point guard, but he won't be one of the top five players next year overall.

Madtown -- don't forget about Tum Tum.
 

BleedGopher said:
per Reusse:

So far, he’s been the catalyst in giving Rich Pitino a competitive start to his Minnesota tenure. When have the Gophers had a flat-out faster guy on the court than Mathieu? I’m not sure.

To me, with junior Andre Hollins and senior Austin Hollins being more erratic in game-to-game performances than anticipated, Mathieu has been the Gophers’ most valuable player.

Yes, Mathieu’s going to throw it away on occasion, but when he’s the one being asked to push the Gophers to the fast pace his coach wants to play, turnovers are going to happen.

Mathieu is shooting 49 percent and averaging 11.4 points, with 38 turnovers, 74 assists and a team-leading 32 steals. On Saturday, Mathieu got to the basket for a game-tying layup in the final second, and if it had been in Minneapolis and not East Lansing, he might have been shooting a free throw to win the game.

http://www.startribune.com/sports/blogs/239919901.html

Go Gophers!!
Click to expand...

That last statement I remember yelling and one, but quickly realized their was no way in hell we would get that call in East Lansing
 





bemidjigopher said:
That last statement I remember yelling and one, but quickly realized their was no way in hell we would get that call in East Lansing
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After the bad OT, I completely forgot about that. It was a foul and probably is called 75% of the time, but Izzo would have had a heart attack if that was called.
 


Gopher Warrior said:
Good grief. I've seen silly comments before, but...
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What's wrong with that? Assists are a guarantee of at least two points. Turnovers aren't a guarantee of anything. If a player is directly responsible for at least four points for every chance that they give the opponent, I'd take that day in and day out.
 

JUCO Greats... The one that got away...

Mark Jones 95-96
If we could have kept him in school, he would have made the list. Great basketball player after leaving U and going to UCF - still has records there for pts & rebounds. Got a cup of coffee in NBA with Orlando.
 



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