STrib: Carlos Morris has big shoes to fill in potentially replacing Austin Hollins

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BleedGopher

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per the STrib:

While junior college transfer Carlos Morris may physically replace graduated senior Austin Hollins in the University of Minnesota's starting lineup, the role goes far beyond the title.

At Pitino's press conference marking the official start of fall practices for Minnesota (the Gophers play their first game six weeks from Friday), the coach indicated that while Morris has proven very capable in summer workouts and practices, there is still plenty for the newbie to learn.

"Austin was a great calming presence on the court," Pitino said. "You knew he was going to make the right rotation defensively, he was going to do the right thing, he was going to execute the right way. Carlos Morris doesn't quite understand that just yet, so he's got to figure that out. But we've had four or five practices so we expect him to be there eventually."

http://www.startribune.com/sports/blogs/278052911.html

Go Gophers!!
 


I liked Austin and will miss him but keep in mind he went mia on offense for the bulk of conference play. Squirrel just needs to be the fourth option on the floor play good defense and not turn the ball over.the all dre back court will determine how far we can go
 

bemidjigopher said:
I liked Austin and will miss him but keep in mind he went mia on offense for the bulk of conference play. Squirrel just needs to be the fourth option on the floor play good defense and not turn the ball over.the all dre back court will determine how far we can go
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I think you may have just coined a new phrase.

Our "All Dre" backcourt. "All Dre Long"?
 

Loved Austin defense all season long but no offense for the whole big ten season and lots of turnovers could not dribble whats so ever. This is what we will love about morris game great ball handler and great passer with some offensive game. I think the defense will be a wash.
 


gopherhoopsguy said:
I think the defense will be a wash.
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Not likely. Austin was a hulleva defender, got loose balls, rebounds and did a nice job on PGs from time to time and whomever else we needed him to match up with.
 

HOOP DREAMS said:
Not likely. Austin was a hulleva defender, got loose balls, rebounds and did a nice job on PGs from time to time and whomever else we needed him to match up with.
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Agree. You can't project Austin's offensive struggles on to his defense. One thing you can say about Austin is that he never hung his head and he brought it every night on the defensive end.
 

I'm not going to lie. I absolutely LOVE Phineas and Ferb.
 




One thing Pitino may be able to do with Morris that he couldn't with Austin, is run some offense with Morris playing the point. It looks like he has good enough handles to be a secondary ball-handler. I think he could have some success running the PNR. It would give opposing defenses a different look at times.
 

Let's undermine the achievements of one of the best representatives we've had for the program in recent years (on and off the court) and then pretend we're able to project the play of a player who we've never seen play D1 basketball.
 

gopherhoopsguy said:
Loved Austin defense all season long but no offense for the whole big ten season and lots of turnovers could not dribble whats so ever. This is what we will love about morris game great ball handler and great passer with some offensive game. I think the defense will be a wash.
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I hope you payed close attention in your English class today.
 

underground629 said:
Let's undermine the achievements of one of the best representatives we've had for the program in recent years (on and off the court) and then pretend we're able to project the play of a player who we've never seen play D1 basketball.
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Touche. Austin routinely covered the opponents best player for most of his four years with great success. It's also pretty rare for an incoming player to be a "stopper" on defense. We're bordering on delusional if we think Austin's defense will be replaced by a newcomer. Maybe by someone else (McNeil?) but not one of the new guys.

In the world of freshman phenoms and the stars coming in who have never played, I'm sticking with the seniors and others who have proven themselves until proven otherwise.

That having been said, I look forward to Carlos proving himself on both ends of the floor. He will likely get plenty of opportunity to that.
 



I think the overall growth of the defensive system will hopefully make up for the absence of our best defender. With improved athleticism at the 4, whether from a new comer or from the improvement of Joey's skills, along with the added health of Dre we should see some improvement to balance the likely incremental decline we experience at the 3. Add in that our backup guards will definitely be better defenders than Mav and or Malik and I'm optimistic we come out ahead. Also throw in the fact that we are 3 deep at the 5 this year thus making situations where 2 undersized 4's have to play the post positions a non factor. In those situations we might have had the worst defensive lineup on paper in the Big 10!
 

I agree with Winasota. There is no individual on the roster that will be able to do what Austin did on the defensive end, but I expect the team to progress as a whole (being greater than the sum of their parts).
 


underground629 said:
Let's undermine the achievements of one of the best representatives we've had for the program in recent years (on and off the court) and then pretend we're able to project the play of a player who we've never seen play D1 basketball.
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Are you new here? By those standards this board would be a ghost town.
 




Exactly. Austin certainly had some frustrating games offensively--as basically every player does--but it's probably pretty difficult to be a big factor on offense when you're always guarding the other team's best perimeter player. Even so, he managed to score in double digits for basically 3 years... all while being an exemplary player on and off the court. Even though he was quiet, from everything we've heard about him, his leadership and contagious work ethic will be missed.

Holy Man said:
Touche. Austin routinely covered the opponents best player for most of his four years with great success. It's also pretty rare for an incoming player to be a "stopper" on defense. We're bordering on delusional if we think Austin's defense will be replaced by a newcomer. Maybe by someone else (McNeil?) but not one of the new guys.

In the world of freshman phenoms and the stars coming in who have never played, I'm sticking with the seniors and others who have proven themselves until proven otherwise.

That having been said, I look forward to Carlos proving himself on both ends of the floor. He will likely get plenty of opportunity to that.
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I can't tell if you're taking a shot at the board in general or implying that what I said was unreasonable. I'm going to assume the former.

howeda7 said:
Are you new here? By those standards this board would be a ghost town.
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