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The Good, The Bad and The Interesting: The Season of Hope is Here Edition
By ZipsOfAkron
http://www.gopherhole.com/news_article/show/571425?referrer_id=
Hey, we’re back! After another can’t-make-it-up offseason (as if there’s there any other with the program), we head into the 2015-16 season with muted expectations but tons of hope. Actually, that’s not a bad tagline for this program. It’s a real safe, Scandinavian place to live.
Of course, that’s a slight variation from last year at this time, where we had tons of expectations and lots of hope. But that ended in a train wreck, which we probably should have seen coming. This year, our expectations now morphed into that comfortable, front-porch-on-a-warm-summer-day mentality where we’re just going to take what life gives us. Lots of losses? Sure. But man, that hope thing is still there and it feels real nice.
Now, I’m never not excited for an upcoming Gophers basketball season, and even with the overarching prediction that the Gophers will struggle to stay out of the conference basement, I’m much more excited for a season where everything will be gravy. From a story line perspective, we’ll have all season to watch the exciting crop of the future develop and gel, with an eye towards 2016. To be honest, last year was just boring. I mean, when the season is basically over by January 20 and we’re just waiting for half of the team to leave via graduation, there isn’t a whole lot of intrigue left. Carlos Morris shot attempts can only hold my attention for so long.
Not this year though. Let’s take a look at what happened this offseason:
GOOD: Pitino is really hitting his stride with recruiting
It was a busy, exciting offseason for Gopher recruiting, with two big-time prospects agreeing to don the maroon and gold and complete what turned out to be a nationally-rated recruiting class according to reputable services. What started with a Kevin Dorsey commitment way back in summer of 2014 culminated in the biggest hometown commitment in recent years in Amir Coffey.
It’s not every day a four-star, nationally-rated recruit chooses the Gophers. It’s even rarer when they’re a local product. Coffey, one of the biggest recruits to come through in recent memory, was a nice consolation after losing Jarvis Johnson. Coffey chose Minnesota over Arizona, Baylor, Texas, Wisconsin, Sparty and Indiana. That’s a huge coup.
The awesome news kept on coming. Right after Coffey committed, four-star PF recruit Eric Curry out of Arkansas favorited the Gophers and verbally gave the thumbs up. Even with the awful Johnson news, the Gophers still maintain a top-20 2016 recruiting class. Add that to a couple of high-potential transfers in Davonte Fitzgerald and Reggie Lynch and suddenly we’re cooking with gas.
Say what you will about the actual talent on the Gophers roster this year, but even with a huge amount of attrition from last season’s team, Richard Pitino is delivering when it comes to recruiting. Now, bringing in highly rated recruits and actually developing them are two different things, but at least on paper, Pitino is doing what he can to set the program up for success and make his mark.
BAD: Attrition, injuries and injustice
Graduation is a necessity of college basketball, but couple that with injuries, arrests, department store thefts and, now, devastating medical issues and you have the recipe for a normal Gophers offseason.
As if losing four seniors and two of their best players wasn’t enough, the Gophers had the rug pulled out from under them when it was announced that Jarvis Johnson was not medically cleared to play on the team. Not only was a promising young career stopped dead in its tracks, the Gophers were all of sudden without one of their most important recruits of the past decade. It was enough to make you want to puke.
But it didn’t stop there. Already thin down low (paging Josh Martin), it was announced that Bakary Konate, essentially the team’s only center, would miss up to a month of action with a stress fracture in his foot. For a 7-foot monster, a stress foot issue is probably the last thing you want, though the team is “hopeful” that he’ll be ready for the season opener against UMKC. Color me skeptical. Instead, the Gophers will turn to some combination of Gaston Diedhiou and Jordan Murphy, two guys with 68 combined NCAA minutes. Oy.
And then there’s Nate Mason, who narrowly avoided what the team thought might be a torn ACL, which ended up being merely a bone bruise. Still, can we cool it on the preseason injuries? Package these guys in bubble wrap.
INTERESTING: New rule changes coming to a court near you
Rule changes happen every year, but this year’s changes may be especially impactful. Most importantly, the game decided to move to a 30-second shot clock, which marks the first time the clock has changed since they moved from 45 seconds to 35 in 1993. I’m honestly not old enough to remember the 45-second clock, but that sounds painful in itself. Still, the 30-second clock promises to push the tempo and give defenses a little more opportunity to create chaos. Something the Gophers could certainly take advantage of.
My favorite rule change? Players faking fouls are liable for punishment if the refs determine they flopped. Officials can review the integrity of a call during flagrant foul video reviews. Duke and Wisconsin can’t be happy about this, what with flopping such a key part of their approach.
Also, refs can now use the monitor to review potential shot clock violations on made field goals throughout the entire game. Yay logic!
Oh, and in lower-tier postseason tournaments, we’ll see some experiments with allowing six fouls per player instead of five. Get ready.
By ZipsOfAkron
http://www.gopherhole.com/news_article/show/571425?referrer_id=
Hey, we’re back! After another can’t-make-it-up offseason (as if there’s there any other with the program), we head into the 2015-16 season with muted expectations but tons of hope. Actually, that’s not a bad tagline for this program. It’s a real safe, Scandinavian place to live.
Of course, that’s a slight variation from last year at this time, where we had tons of expectations and lots of hope. But that ended in a train wreck, which we probably should have seen coming. This year, our expectations now morphed into that comfortable, front-porch-on-a-warm-summer-day mentality where we’re just going to take what life gives us. Lots of losses? Sure. But man, that hope thing is still there and it feels real nice.
Now, I’m never not excited for an upcoming Gophers basketball season, and even with the overarching prediction that the Gophers will struggle to stay out of the conference basement, I’m much more excited for a season where everything will be gravy. From a story line perspective, we’ll have all season to watch the exciting crop of the future develop and gel, with an eye towards 2016. To be honest, last year was just boring. I mean, when the season is basically over by January 20 and we’re just waiting for half of the team to leave via graduation, there isn’t a whole lot of intrigue left. Carlos Morris shot attempts can only hold my attention for so long.
Not this year though. Let’s take a look at what happened this offseason:
GOOD: Pitino is really hitting his stride with recruiting
It was a busy, exciting offseason for Gopher recruiting, with two big-time prospects agreeing to don the maroon and gold and complete what turned out to be a nationally-rated recruiting class according to reputable services. What started with a Kevin Dorsey commitment way back in summer of 2014 culminated in the biggest hometown commitment in recent years in Amir Coffey.
It’s not every day a four-star, nationally-rated recruit chooses the Gophers. It’s even rarer when they’re a local product. Coffey, one of the biggest recruits to come through in recent memory, was a nice consolation after losing Jarvis Johnson. Coffey chose Minnesota over Arizona, Baylor, Texas, Wisconsin, Sparty and Indiana. That’s a huge coup.
The awesome news kept on coming. Right after Coffey committed, four-star PF recruit Eric Curry out of Arkansas favorited the Gophers and verbally gave the thumbs up. Even with the awful Johnson news, the Gophers still maintain a top-20 2016 recruiting class. Add that to a couple of high-potential transfers in Davonte Fitzgerald and Reggie Lynch and suddenly we’re cooking with gas.
Say what you will about the actual talent on the Gophers roster this year, but even with a huge amount of attrition from last season’s team, Richard Pitino is delivering when it comes to recruiting. Now, bringing in highly rated recruits and actually developing them are two different things, but at least on paper, Pitino is doing what he can to set the program up for success and make his mark.
BAD: Attrition, injuries and injustice
Graduation is a necessity of college basketball, but couple that with injuries, arrests, department store thefts and, now, devastating medical issues and you have the recipe for a normal Gophers offseason.
As if losing four seniors and two of their best players wasn’t enough, the Gophers had the rug pulled out from under them when it was announced that Jarvis Johnson was not medically cleared to play on the team. Not only was a promising young career stopped dead in its tracks, the Gophers were all of sudden without one of their most important recruits of the past decade. It was enough to make you want to puke.
But it didn’t stop there. Already thin down low (paging Josh Martin), it was announced that Bakary Konate, essentially the team’s only center, would miss up to a month of action with a stress fracture in his foot. For a 7-foot monster, a stress foot issue is probably the last thing you want, though the team is “hopeful” that he’ll be ready for the season opener against UMKC. Color me skeptical. Instead, the Gophers will turn to some combination of Gaston Diedhiou and Jordan Murphy, two guys with 68 combined NCAA minutes. Oy.
And then there’s Nate Mason, who narrowly avoided what the team thought might be a torn ACL, which ended up being merely a bone bruise. Still, can we cool it on the preseason injuries? Package these guys in bubble wrap.
INTERESTING: New rule changes coming to a court near you
Rule changes happen every year, but this year’s changes may be especially impactful. Most importantly, the game decided to move to a 30-second shot clock, which marks the first time the clock has changed since they moved from 45 seconds to 35 in 1993. I’m honestly not old enough to remember the 45-second clock, but that sounds painful in itself. Still, the 30-second clock promises to push the tempo and give defenses a little more opportunity to create chaos. Something the Gophers could certainly take advantage of.
My favorite rule change? Players faking fouls are liable for punishment if the refs determine they flopped. Officials can review the integrity of a call during flagrant foul video reviews. Duke and Wisconsin can’t be happy about this, what with flopping such a key part of their approach.
Also, refs can now use the monitor to review potential shot clock violations on made field goals throughout the entire game. Yay logic!
Oh, and in lower-tier postseason tournaments, we’ll see some experiments with allowing six fouls per player instead of five. Get ready.
