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Message: [QUOTE="Orangezoo, post: 228375, member: 237"] First of all as it has been said we have had a great year on the court. I could not be prouder of the student athletes as an alum for dealing through all the off court sideshows that could have drowned this season. This team has been one of the best defensive teams we have ever had and one of the deepest ever. Losing Fab makes us a smaller team right out of the gate that will rely on Offense more than ever. This team has plenty of talent to go along with experience and athleticism. All of that has ultimately been put to the side this year by an unselfish team that put defense first and put their trust in a large Brazilian man to put a lid on the rim and make life miserable for opposing teams. Losing Fab will let us see what some of the highly touted youngsters are made of. We will get to see what Rak is made of, what Dion is made of and how consistant he can be. We will get to see how this team does when offense becomes the word of the day and defense becomes hustle and play hard enough to win. It should be a trying week/end and hopefully a dramatic couple of weekends considering that would mean we made it past Kst/USM. All the off-court distractions are difficult to handle and they all came in a news media atomic bomb. This exacerbated the problem and took a situation that maybe was manageable into a circus. It drew out opinions that were rash and just as impulsive as the content of the stories that came out of various media sources. With all that said we won 31 games. We saw two seniors come up big all year making big shots and big plays. We saw the future begin to blossom with shades of Rak, MCW, the improvement of Fair/Southerland. We also were witness to the birth of a star in Dion who will hopefully shine for us in the tourney but we all know he will likely shine brighter in the NBA. This years tourney becomes a matter of effort on defense and how well our key cogs/seniors can take us. If we get crisp ball movement and make shots.. anything can happen. We have 6 guys who can take the ball to the rim. We have some decent shooters and good defenders. We have athleticism and we have a Hall of Fame coach. What we dont have (unless Dion proves otherwise) is a guy who can really make the team as a whole so much better that the game becomes easy. In 03 we had Melo/Billy /Gerry who brought angles to the game that made us a dynamo. This year we have a lot of great parts.. a great team capable of anything. Melo's loss means we now lean on one of these guys to turn into the game changer we need to make a true run to New Orleans. Will it happen? I don't know but it should be fun to watch. If it does we will all be hopping off our couches like we did in 2003.. if it doesn't well then the reality of Fab being the only guy who is a true game changer sets in and we take what we can get and Thank Scoop/Kris for a wonderful season that won't be soon forgotten. If anything it becomes the Orange Revenge Tour of 11-12 with wins over Uconn/Louisville/Pitt. With all thats said.. I hope next weekend were not saying wait till next year. But if we are.. I think the future is extremely bright. If we can land Noel(all off court issues aside) and he is eligible, We have - James/Brandon as seniors who will play important roles. DC2 who gives us a low post scoring threat and rebounding presence. Rakeem/Baye to add front court depth and give us the length we need in the back line, and then the most impactful freshman in the country potentially in Noel. Add to that a dynamine PG in MCW, a marksman in Trevor , a glue guy in CJ who will be even further improved and finally and young prospect wing player in Jerami Grant. With all the greatness of this year.. next year we add elements we had this year plus two things we do not in a true pure shooter at G and an offensive post presence. You are talking about another extremely deep team that actually is more talented than this year's team. And you say JB is going somewhere? I don't think so. If we can squeeze out 3 or 4 wins in this years tourney.. next years team should have even more to offer. Again lets raise our glasses to this years team and hoping we dont care about next year until April, but if we must lets be real about just how good we could be once again.. possibly even better. LGO Cuse! [/QUOTE]

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