A couple of early season predictions for SU hoops this year

[billsin01]

Defensive rebounding has been a definite shortcoming the last few years, while offensive rebounding has generally been a strength. A healthy Coleman would no doubt help on the defensive boards. Here's hoping.

I would say this is the rule rather than the exception in the zone and within JB's system.

 

[billsin01]

LOTS of uncertainties heading into this season! But here are a couple of early predictions I'm comfortable making, on the cusp of preseason practice getting started:

• Tyler Roberson is going to show the sophomore leap, and have a good year
• He'll be our best rebounder
• Chris McCullough is going to shoot the ball better than people expect
• Rak is going to approach averaging 8 and 8, showing more consistency and benefitting from being "the guy" inside
• ...which is important, because Chinoso Obokoh is going to be quite foul prone
• Obokoh--despite being slightly undersized--will surprise people with how he competes inside, and how good of a rebounder / shotblocker he is
• Dejuan will end up redshirting
• BJ will be the latest "super scoring sub," and will average between 7-10ppg, giving JB the luxury of having a sixth man who plays starters minutes
• Cooney will take the next step from the standpoint of consistency. His ppg average might remain approximately the same, though, but he'll do it more efficiently
• Buss will play his way into the regular rotation and contribute as a three point complimentary threat, but find minutes inconsistently allocated in some games
• Overall, the team offense will be improved over last year's anemic performance, despite having so many question marks entering the season

I'm a lot less certain about what Joseph is going to do as a starter, whether Gbinije is going to show more consistent offese, or whether that last game was just a flash in the pan, and how we'll shoot the ball collectively as a team [I think a lot better than last year, but there's no way to know until they lace 'em up].


Edit: this was copied from a post I made in response to a therad DocSU posted. Curious to see if it generates any discussion.

Nice post. A comment and a couple predictions of my own:

The comment: Cooney is completely confounding player who is hard to predict b/c we really don't have any even rough comps to him. For one, he's a redshirt player and he's here for a fourth season -- both rarities at SU. Secondly, he came in with a rep as a shooter but in his first taste of playing time had trouble hitting the rim, let alone making a shot. Then he put together one of the most confounding seasons I can remember last year. Hit 51% of his threes in the first 13 games. That number for that many games would be impressive regardless but he did it against some decent competition and in some games that could have gone either way. He then settled down and had a decent if not terribly impressive stretch during the first half of ACC play -- some pretty good games, some quiet games and the BC game when he went off. Then he finished with an absolutely atrocious 8 or 9 game stretch.

So how do you predict cooney this season? I have no idea, but I'd suggest two things are likely.

1) He shows a bit more consistency. I'm fine with 40% for the first 13 as long as he's in the 35-40% range in the last 9. Will he be that consistent? Probably not, but hopefully he's made some improvement there. If he has, he's a key player b/c he's proven he's an adequate defender and not terrible ball-handler. Would it be great if he added a bit to his game inside the 3-point line? Yes, but I would argue that's not as important as consistency.

2) He would benefit from a more rest. I doubt it will happen b/c we know JB loves the guys he trusts. But Cooney has a ton of legs in his shot and the idea that he's going to start playing 37-40 mpg once Jan. rolls around has to make everyone nervous in March. Regardless, an improved Gbinije and maybe some contributions from BJ or Patterson at the 2, would go a long way toward making Cooney more valuable to this team.

As for other predictions:

-- Roberson leads this team in scoring. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing depends on how he plays, but that's my guess. Roberson followed by Cooney and then maybe Joseph?

-- This team plays at a faster tempo than we've seen the past couple years. The coaches have talked about this but we've gotten next to no transition buckets for two years and I"m not sure why. I love not turning the ball over but I really think the ability to make teams pay with fast breaks and secondary breaks after bad shots and turnovers is an important part of basketball in general, but particularly for SU which is not going to spend an entire game running precise half-court sets.

-- Johnson struggles to find minutes and we start hearing transfer rumors. I'm obviously not hoping this happens but I think minutes *could* be hard to come by. Gbinije/Roberson/McCullough are ahead of him at , Cooney/Gbinije/Roberson (potentially) are ahead at the 2. The kid seems like he has great potential and maybe he starts making some of those jumpers he loves to hoist this season, but if not, it could mean a lot of pine time and given the fact that I don't get the sense that his family has any shortage of confidence in him, it could make for an ugly situation.

That's all I've got.

 

[RF2044]

Nice post. A comment and a couple predictions of my own:

The comment: Cooney is completely confounding player who is hard to predict b/c we really don't have any even rough comps to him. For one, he's a redshirt player and he's here for a fourth season -- both rarities at SU. Secondly, he came in with a rep as a shooter but in his first taste of playing time had trouble hitting the rim, let alone making a shot. Then he put together one of the most confounding seasons I can remember last year. Hit 51% of his threes in the first 13 games. That number for that many games would be impressive regardless but he did it against some decent competition and in some games that could have gone either way. He then settled down and had a decent if not terribly impressive stretch during the first half of ACC play -- some pretty good games, some quiet games and the BC game when he went off. Then he finished with an absolutely atrocious 8 or 9 game stretch.

So how do you predict cooney this season? I have no idea, but I'd suggest two things are likely.

1) He shows a bit more consistency. I'm fine with 40% for the first 13 as long as he's in the 35-40% range in the last 9. Will he be that consistent? Probably not, but hopefully he's made some improvement there. If he has, he's a key player b/c he's proven he's an adequate defender and not terrible ball-handler. Would it be great if he added a bit to his game inside the 3-point line? Yes, but I would argue that's not as important as consistency.

2) He would benefit from a more rest. I doubt it will happen b/c we know JB loves the guys he trusts. But Cooney has a ton of legs in his shot and the idea that he's going to start playing 37-40 mpg once Jan. rolls around has to make everyone nervous in March. Regardless, an improved Gbinije and maybe some contributions from BJ or Patterson at the 2, would go a long way toward making Cooney more valuable to this team.

As for other predictions:

-- Roberson leads this team in scoring. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing depends on how he plays, but that's my guess. Roberson followed by Cooney and then maybe Joseph?

-- This team plays at a faster tempo than we've seen the past couple years. The coaches have talked about this but we've gotten next to no transition buckets for two years and I"m not sure why. I love not turning the ball over but I really think the ability to make teams pay with fast breaks and secondary breaks after bad shots and turnovers is an important part of basketball in general, but particularly for SU which is not going to spend an entire game running precise half-court sets.

-- Johnson struggles to find minutes and we start hearing transfer rumors. I'm obviously not hoping this happens but I think minutes *could* be hard to come by. Gbinije/Roberson/McCullough are ahead of him at , Cooney/Gbinije/Roberson (potentially) are ahead at the 2. The kid seems like he has great potential and maybe he starts making some of those jumpers he loves to hoist this season, but if not, it could mean a lot of pine time and given the fact that I don't get the sense that his family has any shortage of confidence in him, it could make for an ugly situation.

That's all I've got.

Cool post! I agree with most of your assessement, except for the part about BJ--who I think breaks out this year.

 

[edowd26]

Do igor posts count in the 7? For the record, I don't think they should. On that note, I also predict that by December 15 he is calling Kaleb Joseph "the best PG in the history of Fox Sports 1" and blaming any freshman mistakes on JB's mishandling of him.

Negative I don't even thinks he counts in the census

 

[mark79]

I predict those that play great defense get a lot of time and those that don't ride the pine .
IF we can get our defense going like we did with MCW a couple of years ago and IF as others pointed out Rak and Joesph can stay out of foul trouble, with our rebounding and steals and folks on the floor like McCullough, Roberson, BJ and Joseph that can run and convert we could all be pleasantly surprised.

If our bigs and /or point guard have foul trouble or if our defense is substandard for whatever reason we will have up and down games.

I know my post is not rocket science and it's common sense to all of us who follow syracuse basketball closely. As long as JB is here, many of the same principles lead to success or lack thereof every year.

Thanks to all who posted and for RF who started getting us excited again!

 

[realorange]

In the few games when Robertson played, he tried for a lot of rebounds, and generally lost out to bigger, stronger opponents. Maybe he has improved? Or just take a wait and see attitude toward what Robertson & McCullough can actually do in inside play until October rolls around?

If you look at the stats for rebounding in Roberson and BJ trip overseas you'll see that Tyler pulled down a man's share.

 

[SU_Fan_in_VA]

I would LOVE to see that.

As much as I am looking forward to seeing what the young talented players on this year's team will bring, I believe this team will go as far as the upperclassmen (Christmas, Cooney, Gbinije, and Coleman, if healthy) can take it.

Many will be pleasantly surprised to see how good Gbinije really is. He is the kind of player who is at his best when he team is counting on him and things are setup for him to produce this year. Cooney will be in a similar position and will carry his share of the load and so will Christmas.

 

[HarrisonJBounel]

I predict we will be better than everyone in the media expects.

Boeheim is a great coach with good players, but only a good coach with great players.

 

[br801]

I predict we will be better than everyone in the media expects.

Boeheim is a great coach with good players, but only a good coach with great players.

I think you mean some of JB's best teams have emerged when expectations among the media and fan base were relatively low going in.

 

[HarrisonJBounel]

I think you mean some of JB's best teams have emerged when expectations among the media and fan base were relatively low going in.

Yes, we are saying the same thing.

IMHO, and I know I am speaking in empirically unprovable subjective generalities (AKA "crap out my ass"), he has very good results with hard-working overachievers, like himself as a player, who are more four-year player types, who learn the subtleties and nuances of his system.

 

[orangefan13]

If you come out multidimentional you can beat anyone. And JB's teams tend to have lots of multidimentionality. Thats the kind of players he wants.

 

[We Are Syracuse]

Interesting a lot of people here think BJ will play over buss. Personally, I think Buss will provide the scoring punch. Back line will use Gbinije, McCullough, and Roberson at the 3 and 4. Need help with ball handling and at the guard spot. Joseph will have his fair share of rough games. Syracuse NEEDS to develope another guard and that's why I am hoping buss gets time.

 

[reedny]

Interesting thread, Ry. Good to get a MBB discussion started after the foot-shooting exercise we conducted last weekend on the gridiron. You did a nice job pulling predictions out of one of the most unpredictable years I can remember. We often loose good players, sometimes several. But the point guard (NBA), the starting PF (NBA) and a reliable backup center with magic feet -- big voids to fill on both ends. I do think this year's team is unusually versatile -- with 4 or 5 guys can play at least 2 positions: Gbinje (point, SG or SF), BJ (SF or SG), Roberson (SF/PF), Rak (Center/PF) and McCullough (SF/PF). We also have a brand new PG, a freshman PF, a RF backup center and a sophomore SF whose outside shot is a dice-roll. So rotations may change game by game. Add to that DC2's injury ... and you'd have to have a crystal ball and some beads to figure this thing out.

Here's what's left:

-I agree that rebounding will be good, maybe better than last year. Even with Coleman out, Rak, McCullough and Roberson will be mobile, athletic and hard to keep off the glass on both ends of the floor;

- Overall defense is hard to predict. Our zone will be tall up front and hard to run against. Inside, I think we'll be difficult to score on because of our size and shot blocking ability. My worry is ... what happens with DC out. In that case, foul trouble for Rak will require switching from beer to hard liquor. There's so much inexperience left on the front line (1 frosh, 1 soph and 1 RSF). I don't see McCullough and Roberson lighting up the scoreboard, and the center spot will be a big challenge for a RSF. With DC back, we have the depth (and beef) we'll need.

- Offensively, I'm not as optimistic as you are. Outside, even if TC takes a step up, I'm not sure that we'll have other productive shooters, or inside scoring, to take the pressure off him. I think his season will depend on how good his surrounding cast is. If MG and BJ can come in and score, TC could be a killer. If he's the only outside threat ... he'll draw tight defense and will struggle to score off the bounce. Inside, Rak might be better but he is not a scoring machine (I think 8/8 is reasonable). If DC plays, that won't be as much of a concern. But without him, I think McCullough/Roberson could struggle to score until well into the season. This could hurt our balance and turn us into a jump-shooting team. Joseph is an unknown, and Roberson has not demonstrated enough outside prowess to pull defenders out (they'll play him loose to drive).

Just some thoughts.

 

[jimsonjunction]

I'm not sure if this counts as a prediction, but I think Obokoh steps up and handles backup center duties.

If Rak were to get in foul trouble (which he will at some point), I'm confident that Obokoh can step in and defend the paint. I wouldn't expect anything offensively, but logic tells me that an SU recruit with a year in the system can hold down the paint for 15-20 minutes a game. From what I've heard through interviews and posts on this board, he's a smart, active player. I'm excited to see what he brings.

 

[MSOrange]

I'm not sure if this counts as a prediction, but I think Obokoh steps up and handles backup center duties.

If Rak were to get in foul trouble (which he will at some point), I'm confident that Obokoh can step in and defend the paint. I wouldn't expect anything offensively, but logic tells me that an SU recruit with a year in the system can hold down the paint for 15-20 minutes a game. From what I've heard through interviews and posts on this board, he's a smart, active player. I'm excited to see what he brings.

I hope you're right because that would be huge. I'd settle for 10 minutes a game most games unless Rak gets himself in foul trouble. I just hope he will be better prepared to compete at this level than Dashonte Riley was when we needed him. And I don't mean that to be a total slam on Dashonte. Not every kid can compete at the Syracuse level. But he ended up having a good career at Eastern Michigan. Being able to play at any school at the Division 1 level is a great accomplishment

 

[cuseguy]

We struggle to score in a big way.

Just what I'm hearing.

 

[OttoMets]

We struggle to score in a big way.

Just what I'm hearing.

I've seen that show before.

I think it was called "2012-2014."