Carlos Morris had eight steals against Wake Forest, one shy of a Gophers signle game record held by Melvin Newborn.
The meat of the non-conference schedule is complete, which means the Gophers have six cupcake-y games between them and the start of the conference season. But even at 5-2, it’s hard to be anything more than cautiously optimistic that Minnesota is just figuring itself out early in the season. They looked downright terrible against St. John’s, snuck past Georgia in spite of themselves and were lost for half of the Wake Forest game. Yet, they’ve also shown spurts of explosiveness for extended periods of time. That’s why the non-conference season is so hard to gauge. You can’t take three quarters of the games seriously, and the ones you can are played in airport hangers and neutral courts. In past years the Gophers have upended top-ten teams in the non-conference season, only to find themselves on the bubble at year’s end or completely out of the tournament. Conversely, they’ve lost winnable games early on and have been just fine. Who’s to know?
Still, it’s hard to ignore what’s happening directly in front of you on the screen and not jump to conclusions. Unfortunately, things won’t really clear up until the B1G season begins as the Gophers haven’t done a whole lot to convince us of anything, good or bad.
GOOD – Thank the lord for defense
Perhaps the biggest frustration so far has been the unreliability of the offense. And the droughts they’ve experienced have harkened back to the Tubby years. The defense, however, has shown shades of Tubby in a different way – reliable, consistent defense.
In fact, if it wasn’t for the defense locking down opponents so far this year we might be singing a different tune in terms of optimism for the foreseeable future. The Gophers rank 29th in the nation in defense according to KenPom and, outside of Louisville, haven’t had an opponent score more than 70 points in a game. Granted, it’s early on, but so far it’s been the defense that has held down the fort, even in lieu of offensive struggles.
Even more impressive has been their domination in the steals department. Richard Pitino’s preference to play up-tempo on both sides of the ball has forced plenty of turnovers and the Gophers currently rank 4th in the nation in steals. Deandre Mathieu is as harassing as ever and, while the jury is still out in terms of Carlos Morris’ offensive acumen, he’s been a breath of fresh air on defense. In fact, he leads the team in steals, averaging 3 per game, which is good for 11th in the nation.
Defense isn’t just measured by steals, but a quick eye test on this team has shown that they’ve made opponents extremely uncomfortable with the ball, whether it’s on the run or in the half court.
BAD – The frontcourt is thinner than we thought
Even at 5-2, there’s been plenty of “bad” this year for the Gophers. Some of it seems to be growing pains to start the season, but the one constant that’s really worrisome is the lack of depth and execution in the frontcourt. The devolution of Elliott Eliason is essentially complete, to the point where he’s turned into something of a defensive specialist. And for a guy who appeared to be on the up and up at the beginning of last season, the inability to take that leap to being a complete center is frustrating.
Still, that leaves Mo Walker as the main source of production in the frontcourt. He’s shown flashes of brilliance, including great footwork and soft hands, and is third on the team in scoring. But he’s also shown an inability to really outmuscle guys on the defensive end and has been terribly sloppy with the ball in the post. Countless times he’s had the ball stripped out of his hands from behind or has been unable to corral the ball when receiving it. And don’t look now, but Walker is actually second on the team in turnovers, with three times more than Nate Mason in fewer minutes. That’s a big no-no for a center.
But the problem isn’t with Mo Walker’s production, it’s the fact that when he has to take a seat, the offense is left with no other weapons than the guards. And so far this season they’ve relied terribly heavily on jump shots. That’s all fine when things are falling like they did against Wake Forest, but when things go south like they did against St. John’s and Georgia, it can be downright ugly. Bakary Konate is nowhere near ready to contribute and Josh Martin still has plenty of growth to do. That means when Walker inevitably has to sit, Eliason and Joey King are the main options on the post. That’s turned into a scary prospect. Heck, even Morris played at the four-spot against Wake Forest.
INTERESTING – The curious case of Carlos Morris
As frustrating as he is dangerous. That’s about all we can say about Carlos Morris so far. One night he’s chucking shots like it’s his job and the next he’s nabbing eight steals in a game and scoring a season high. My patience for his chucking antics have ebbed and flowed throughout the season and pretty much bottomed out in the game against Georgia. He looked like he was in his own world on offense, taking ridiculous shots and playing rather selfishly. Even Andre Hollins was shaking his head a couple times and getting after him for his selection.
But against Wake Forest he looked like a much headier player, passing up shots he’d taken earlier in the year in lieu of going hard to the hoop or setting somebody else up. Was he learning? Was it an anomaly? Part of me wonders if someone said something to him about his chucking, or at least encouraged him to start thinking harder about the shots he’s taking, because his game definitely had a different feel to it.
I give Morris a lot of ink and expect a lot from him because he is the X-factor this year. We know what we’re getting from Hollins and Mathieu. We know what we’re getting from King and Walker. But we don’t know what we’re getting from Morris. He has the ability to turn games around on both sides of the ball and if he can find a way to harness what appears to be a pretty good offensive game and improve his shot selection, he can really make the players around him better.