50YRsofCuse
Syracuse Fan in Florida and in SC
- Joined
- Oct 26, 2016
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I like the optimism, but I think we are going to have trouble scoring. There is some young, green talent on this team, but we don't run a very sophisticated offense. We rely on guards who can beat their man off the dribble, and 3 point shooters to create space for driving lanes for the guards. Do we have those guys on this squad?
If you look at the backcourt, you've got Frank and Washington at the PG, and Geno Thorpe as a combo and Tyus Battle, who is going to be our go-to guy. Can Thorpe play the point well enough to unseat Frank and Washington, so that we have our two best scoring guards on the floor?
I think JB will try to play Frank and Washington at PG early in the season, and rotate Thorpe in and out. I don't trust Frank to be much more than a backup PG, but I think he's going to get first shot at winning the job. Washington sounds like a poor man's Tyler Ennis (i.e., a true PG). If Frank loses his starting spot, will he also lose his Shznit?
Turning to the front court, we have 2 unproven guys at Center - Chukwu and Sidibe. Chukwu, to me, looked so clumsy out there in the zone before he hurt his eye. I was very disappointed in his footwork and his movement. I was expecting a much more natural player. He seemed very mechanical. Unless he did a lot of drills to improve his footwork and slides in the middle of the zone, I don't think he's going to be a starting caliber player.
Sidibe, to me, has a lot of promise. He wasn't ranked as high as some big men in this class, but he played against several of them last year, both in the summer on the AAU circuit, and then in New Jersey, playing for a high level HS program at St. Benedicts. Whenever he played the highly rated kids, he really competed, and he got the best of several of them. He showed a good motor, and good skills scoring inside. To me, he looked like a poor man's Anthony Davis (the guy who used to play for the Pacers back in the 90s). I could definitely see him winning the starting job, although he is still awfully thin.
Turning to the forwards, again there is a lot of promise but so little experience. Starting with O'Shea Brissett, he looks like a prototype SU forward, in the C.J. Fair / Kris Joseph mold. Any kid who is named the best player in Canada has to be pretty good. I see him as our starting SF. But I wonder if he can hit the three against ACC defenders.
We really need him to, because if we don't have a forward who is a threat from outside, historically our offense turns to crap. Teams bunker in against us to cut off all our driving lanes, and challenge us to hit 3's. That's what I kind of see with this team. I don't think we have nearly enough outside shooting to keep teams honest and open up the floor for our athletes.
Next up is Matt Moyer, who is probably the nicest kid and the best representative of the program that you could ever hope for. When I looked at his film from prep school, he played in that good New England prep league for South Kent, I think it was. Previously, he had been player of the year in Ohio. He showed a really good motor around the rim, was a hard worker inside, and had a bit of a nasty streak (which seems out of place for what a nice kid he is). I don't recall him showing any real outside game, though. He reminded me a young Terrence Roberts. I think he will start at the four, and play in the high post on offense, with Sidibe in the low post.
I think those 2 guys might play well together, and could be our best inside "tandem". The only problem is that they both weigh only about 215, and are going to get pushed around on the defensive boards. We are going to have an awful time on the defensive boards this year. That means that we are not really going to have a fast break offense (again).
And then the wildcard is Marek Dolezaj. Despite all this one-and-done talk, I just don't see him starting. According to the official roster, he weighs about 30 pounds less than any of our already-too-skinny frontcourt players. He doesn't really have a 3 point shot at this level. His release point is too low, and he shoots it too flat. But, boy!, can he blow by people on the drive. But we lack the 3 point shooters for him to have the space to spread out a man-to-man defense, and then let him blow past his defender. His lack of weight contributes to his relative quickness for such a big guy, but if the other guys are going to struggle on the boards, Dolezaj is going to get killed. I just can't see him playing defense at this level.
So that's my pre-season synopsis on what I see. I think there are some interesting pieces here, but we need the following recruiting class to really turn this roster into something. Hopefully the only guy we lose is Battle, and really, I wouldn't mind if we wind up crappy and miss the NCAA tournament this year, if it meant that he came back to have a good run.
If we somehow kept Battle (yeah, I know, but guys from crappy teams seldom get drafted in the top half of the 1st round, and Battle does have that potential), then the 2018-19 team could be special. If Battle leaves, we will definitely need a high scoring 2G who is a dead eye from three.
We could have:
PG: Jalen Carey, Howard Washington
SG: Tyus Battle, Buddy Boeheim
SF: O'Shea Brissett, Marek Dolezaj
PF: Darius Bazley, Matt Moyer
C: Bourama Sidibe, Nate Roberts, Pascal Chukwu
Did you leave Elijah Hughes out for any reason or just as an oversight?