I did not realize

[OttoMets]

How little scoring we return.

In putting together my season predictions, I looked at the career scoring totals for our returnees. For four or five seasons, we've had a slew of guys who just surpassed 1,000 points or who were on pace to do so in the coming season. At least three players per season have been near that milestone.

C.J. got there in New York last year; he's sitting on 1,099 right now. Next? Rakeem has 307 points. Baye's close behind with 306. Wow. For the first time in ages, it's a virtual certainty that no Syracuse player will crack 1,000.

We're going to see a lot of first-time contributors this year. I'm excited. Can't remember the last time we've returned this level of accomplishment. Maybe 2007-2008?


I also didn't realize that we're not playing a home-and-home with North Carolina (could have sworn that the early schedule release had us doing so). That makes things a little easier. Looking at our schedule, it's really not a terrible gauntlet for a young team. No ugly Saturday/Mondays, not too many traps (though that Virginia Tech trip before the Carolina game could be one to watch). Could put together a very nice record before getting into the meat of the schedule.

 

[billsin01]

How little scoring we return.

In putting together my season predictions, I looked at the career scoring totals for our returnees. For four or five seasons, we've had a slew of guys who just surpassed 1,000 points or who were on pace to do so in the coming season. At least three players per season have been near that milestone.

C.J. got there in New York last year; he's sitting on 1,099 right now. Next? Rakeem has 307 points. Baye's close behind with 306. Wow. For the first time in ages, it's a virtual certainty that no Syracuse player will crack 1,000.

We're going to see a lot of first-time contributors this year. I'm excited. Can't remember the last time we've returned this level of accomplishment. Maybe 2007-2008?


I also didn't realize that we're not playing a home-and-home with North Carolina (could have sworn that the early schedule release had us doing so). That makes things a little easier. Looking at our schedule, it's really not a terrible gauntlet for a young team. No ugly Saturday/Mondays, not too many traps (though that Virginia Tech trip before the Carolina game could be one to watch). Could put together a very nice record before getting into the meat of the schedule.

Good observations. I said somewhere, presumably in a long rambling preview-type post, that this team will be very interesting based on the simple fact that there are soooooo many question marks. We've been spoiled the past few years by really not being in the spot we're in this year where there are a lot of unknown entities.

The odd thing is that I don't really worry about scoring in a general sense. Whether Grant is able to live up to what I think he is or not, he and Fair should be tough matchups night in and night out. Ennis should get his points and Cooney should be at least a decent weapon if he can even become an adequate shooter, let alone a good one.

But I'm surprised to hear so much talk about how deep we are. Granted, I haven't seen the frosh so I could be way off the mark here, but I wouldn't be surprised at all to see a scenario when we get to ACC play where Xmas/DC/Gbinije are non-factors offensively, and the frosh outside of maybe Roberson are sitting on the bench. That would be a pretty thin group by any standard. Hopefully I"m way off.

 

[OttoinGrotto]

I remember looking at that when there was talk about CJ jumping, and remembered thinking how strange it would be Rak was our leading returning scorer.

 

[moqui]

which raises the question: Who will be the next Orangeman to top 1000 career points?

answer: the much maligned Trevor Cooney

 

[br801]

which raises the question: Who will be the next Orangeman to top 1000 career points?

answer: the much maligned Trevor Cooney

That's assuming he doesn't blow up this season and bolt for the NBA.

 

[Waltdods]

which raises the question: Who will be the next Orangeman to top 1000 career points?

answer: the much maligned Trevor Cooney

That's an interesting question. Cooney's the most likely. But Grant's got a slight lead already. If Grant comes back for a third year, he'll probably break 1000. (He'd need to average about 12 points a game over the two years.) Cooney might too that year, though I think it'd be close. So betting on Cooney is basically a bet on Grant leaving (probably not a bad bet).

Even if Grant doesn't, it's not impossible Ennis could over-take Cooney, though that would require Ennis being good enough to score a lot while also returning for at least a third season. Having both those things happen seems somewhat unlikely. Still, Cooney's only at 133 - if Ennis is scoring 12 a game and Cooney 8 or so, Ennis would be above Cooney by the end of the year. Not impossible, though probably a bad sign for the team.

 

[Sgt Cuse]

which raises the question: Who will be the next Orangeman to top 1000 career points?

answer: the much maligned Trevor Cooney

1. Ennis
2. Grant
3. Cooney
4. DC2
5. Roberson

 

[Waltdods]

But I'm surprised to hear so much talk about how deep we are. Granted, I haven't seen the frosh so I could be way off the mark here, but I wouldn't be surprised at all to see a scenario when we get to ACC play where Xmas/DC/Gbinije are non-factors offensively, and the frosh outside of maybe Roberson are sitting on the bench. That would be a pretty thin group by any standard. Hopefully I"m way off.

I mostly agree with this, but think "deep" here might have a couple different meanings. I agree that the team is not likely to be all that deep in the sense of having a lot of guys contribute once the real season starts. And I agree that there's only a handful of guys who we can be totally confident will perform. But I do think there's a different sort of depth - there are so many players that it almost seems certain that someone will surprise on the upside. Gbinije, Coleman, Christmas, Roberson, BJ, even Patterson - I think it's unlikely that any one of these guys is a huge contributor, but the chances are much greater that one or two of them become a big contributor. I see this as a team with a lot of lottery tickets. And the core is strong enough that you don't need many of the numbers to come up.

 

[Sgt Cuse]

I mostly agree with this, but think "deep" here might have a couple different meanings. I agree that the team is not likely to be all that deep in the sense of having a lot of guys contribute once the real season starts. And I agree that there's only a handful of guys who we can be totally confident will perform. But I do think there's a different sort of depth - there are so many players that it almost seems certain that someone will surprise on the upside. Gbinije, Coleman, Christmas, Roberson, BJ, even Patterson - I think it's unlikely that any one of these guys is a huge contributor, but the chances are much greater that one or two of them become a big contributor. I see this as a team with a lot of lottery tickets. And the core is strong enough that you don't need many of the numbers to come up.

I disagree with both of you. I think the team is deep and will have more contributors in the real season.

I believe this because of the unique situation in having 3 experienced centers. I believe they will all get time and in order to do that JB will probably start Rak at pf.

You have to have 3 guards. The floor for the 3rd guard in pt is pretty much what Cooney received last year. There are several candidates for the 3rd guard position and one will have to emerge. Right now it is MGs job but that is not set in stone. What is set in stone is that you have to play 3 guards.

3 center, 3 guards, +2 forwards is a solid 8 before factoring in what Roberson will do as the 3rd forward. That's a lot.

 

[orangefan13]

Our schedule is on fire.

We have 3 games before the maui.
Then we return from the Maui and we play indiana, st johns and nova during a six game stretch. Then we have one game after nova to we start acc play. we have a stretch in the ACC where we have 1 easy ACC home game in 9 games.

A stretch where we play, unc at home, @BC, Pitt at home, @ Miami, @ Wake, Duke at home, ND at home, Clemson, @ pitt.

And we start our ACC play @ vt and with UNC the first conference games can be tough, but should be alittle eaiser with our ooc schedule.

Then we end our ACC schecule @Duke @ Maryland @Virginia, GT at home, and @ FSU on senior day.

Forget all the tough road game talk, That schedule is as rough as anybody in the country's.

 

[moqui]

That's an interesting question. Cooney's the most likely. But Grant's got a slight lead already. If Grant comes back for a third year, he'll probably break 1000. (He'd need to average about 12 points a game over the two years.) Cooney might too that year, though I think it'd be close. So betting on Cooney is basically a bet on Grant leaving (probably not a bad bet).

Even if Grant doesn't, it's not impossible Ennis could over-take Cooney, though that would require Ennis being good enough to score a lot while also returning for at least a third season. Having both those things happen seems somewhat unlikely. Still, Cooney's only at 133 - if Ennis is scoring 12 a game and Cooney 8 or so, Ennis would be above Cooney by the end of the year. Not impossible, though probably a bad sign for the team.

Good points . . .I picked Grant as the team's leading scorer this year in the Iggy Awards thread, but yes, I do expect him to leave early

but I also expect Cooney to have a big year. And while I think it is possible that Ennis outscores Cooney on the year, I think the four leading scorers are going to be so bunched together that he won't make up any meaningful ground on Cooney's lead. I'm betting that Cooney ends the year with a 100 to 175 point lead over Ennis (it's 133 right now).

And, even more, if I think really far ahead, I would project Cooney to be the leading scorer on the 14-15 squad.

 

[Waltdods]

I disagree with both of you. I think the team is deep and will have more contributors in the real season.

I believe this because of the unique situation in having 3 experienced centers. I believe they will all get time and in order to do that JB will probably start Rak at pf.

You have to have 3 guards. The floor for the 3rd guard in pt is pretty much what Cooney received last year. There are several candidates for the 3rd guard position and one will have to emerge. Right now it is MGs job but that is not set in stone. What is set in stone is that you have to play 3 guards.

3 center, 3 guards, +2 forwards is a solid 8 before factoring in what Roberson will do as the 3rd forward. That's a lot.

I'm not sure we're disagreeing. I certainly think SU is going to play at least eight and probably "8.5" guys. But I don't know that playing a bunch of guys necessarily equals depth. The '05-'06 team had 9 guys getting regular minutes (and Andy Rautins in the 9.5 role). But three of them were Loiue McCroskey, Matt Gorman, and Josh Wright*. I don't think you'd call that a deep team.

As you point out, the fact that SU will play three centers complicates this a bit. But I'm not sure having 3 centers is really better than having 2 centers - this is less a sign of depth and more a sign of the inability of any of these guys to separate themselves. For that 1 or 2 games a year where there's real foul trouble (although none of these guys are Etan Thomas circa 1996), maybe it counts as depth.

What I was responding to is whether there is depth such that there's not much of a drop off when the starters come out. As you point out, it's not clear that there is much depth at the guard spot - we don't know who if anyone will be the third guard, let alone whether they'll be able to contribute in a big way. At forward, Fair and Grant are likely to eat up the lion's share of the minutes.

To try to re-state my position, I think there is a big drop-off from the Top 5 (Ennis, Cooney, Fair, Grant, BMK). So I don't see this as a particularly deep team right now. But, I think it's likely that one or two of the other guys will step up. That might not make the team "deep" - it'll still be a core of 6 or 7 - but that's more than enough to do real damage. And the sheer numbers of guys with potential the team has makes it more likely that we do see one or two guys step up, so there is a sense in which the depth is helpful.

This may be a lot of semantics.

* - Holy crap have things changed.

 

[moqui]

To try to re-state my position, I think there is a big drop-off from the Top 5 (Ennis, Cooney, Fair, Grant, BMK). .

I think that both Roc and DC2 will be bigger contributors than most are giving them credit for, and if you consider them to be players 6 and 7, then in many if not most games, the drop off will not be as significant as you believe. For both, the offense is still a work in progress and in fact may never materialize, but Roc as a defender and DC2 on the boards will be important contributors.

 

[Sgt Cuse]

I think that both Roc and DC2 will be bigger contributors than most are giving them credit for, and if you consider them to be players 6 and 7, then in many if not most games, the drop off will not be as significant as you believe. For both, the offense is still a work in progress and in fact may never materialize, but Roc as a defender and DC2 on the boards will be important contributors.

I agree. I don't think there will be much, if any, drop-off at center between BMK and Rak. And as you point out DC2 will offer a different skill set that I think JB will work hard to develop. Two McD's and a four year player may be the deepest at center we have ever been.

At forward, while Roberson may not see that much time, I believe he will be good. He may get comparable minutes to Grant's last year. But just like having Grant there is a good player there if needed.

At guard the opposite may be at play. Not really good players but someone has to play.

 

[Cusefan0307]

I could be wrong, but I think the quartet of Ennis, Cooney, Grant, and cj will be our workhorses this year. After that I see baye, dc, rak, and mike g filling out the rotation. I don't see how buss or BJ see much time. Roberson might be ready on offense, but I don't see him playing a ton unless he figures out the zone. I'm not going to be shocked when we have an 8 to 8.5 man rotation this year, because that's what happens every year. This isn't 2 years ago when we went 9.5 deep. BJ and tyler are just a tad behind where cj and James were in the 11-12 season.

 

[orangefan13]

I think Rak is going to step up and achieve...


<------------ someday. Of course that is wishfull thinking.

Dajuan and Rak have been up against smaller guys recently.

 

[IthacaMatt]

As you point out, the fact that SU will play three centers complicates this a bit. But I'm not sure having 3 centers is really better than having 2 centers - this is less a sign of depth and more a sign of the inability of any of these guys to separate themselves. For that 1 or 2 games a year where there's real foul trouble (although none of these guys are Etan Thomas circa 1996), maybe it counts as depth.

* - Holy crap have things changed.

That's 15 fouls to give against any elite low post players in college basketball, and all of these guys are pretty experienced now. Our interior defense is going to be outstanding this year. The question will be if the guards can be good enough on D, as well as the question about getting consistent outside shooting to open up the floor.

 

[IthacaMatt]

I could be wrong, but I think the quartet of Ennis, Cooney, Grant, and cj will be our workhorses this year. After that I see baye, dc, rak, and mike g filling out the rotation. I don't see how buss or BJ see much time. Roberson might be ready on offense, but I don't see him playing a ton unless he figures out the zone. I'm not going to be shocked when we have an 8 to 8.5 man rotation this year, because that's what happens every year. This isn't 2 years ago when we went 9.5 deep. BJ and tyler are just a tad behind where cj and James were in the 11-12 season.

BJ or Patterson will play if Silent G cannot hit the occasional 3. Since his handle has been a little shaky so far, that might mean that Patterson gets the nod over BJ, especially since Patterson's shot has looked improved over what he showed in Canada. Things are hopefully slowing down for him and he won't rush his shots quite so much. BJ's got a great stroke, but I don't think he could handle pressure defense helping bring the ball upcourt. Patterson has a better chance.