citay said:
gb1 obviously has inside information. when he says there were internal problems last year, i take him at his word. but when it comes to next year, i'm not nearly as optimistic. here's why.
--of sixteen players on our roster, ten will be freshmen or sophomores. that's a lotta youth.
--breunig is evidently athletic, but will he be the force we need inside? he played few minutes at washington. can you see joel bolomboy playing few minutes at washington? let me remind you that bolomboy scored 11 points and grabbed 16 rebounds against a very tough arizona front line in the first game of the tournament. you don't think he would have had a similar impact at washington?
--up front, where we really need help, we'll have two true freshmen, boehning and krslovic. it takes time for big men to develop. i wish we could redshirt both of them, but that's probably not possible with krslovic. boehning? please, tinks! not even qvale, the north dakota high school player of the year as a high school senior, was productive his freshman year here. if you think these two kids are going to produce immediately, you are fooling your collective selves.
--as for the upperclassmen,we'll need to see some dramatic improvement from martin and kemp. sure, that's still possible; martin has always been a work in progress and kemp now has a year under his belt. but dramatic improvement from either of these guys, albeit welcome, would be a surprise.
--oh, we had a kid named jamar. okay, he didn't have cherry's leadership qualities, but he remains one of the great players ever at montana. you don't replace a jamar easily.
--leadership? my question is still out there: if from a veteran, where was that leadership last year? leadership qualities come from within, and are immediately evident, even in freshmen. cherry was that type. gregory? i love his game, maybe he's the guy. but that remains yet another of many question marks about next year's team. i don't yet believe in answered prayers.
Gregory, Dunn, are sure fire leaders. From what I hear, Breunig will progress to be a leader similar to Ward and Selvig. Even slight improvement in the paint will be of great help from this past season. It really is hard for me to picture any circumstances, other than injury, that we are worse in the paint this coming season than last season.
We cannot replace Jamar. His versatility and overall game is what will be missed most. What needs to be done to help compensate for his loss?
(1) Post players have to rebound better. I have a feeling Breunig will be 7 plus boards per game. Kemp and Martin should average 5 plus. 3 plus rebounds per game from Weisner. Those 4 need to combine for 20 rebounds per game in any combination. I honestly feel that is realistic, and likely. With 24 plus minutes per game, I feel Kemp could easily be 7 rpg. We already know Dunn and Gregory are good for 3 plus rebounds per game each as guards.
(2) Collectively with the loss of Deshields and Jamar we need to find an additional 30 PPG in conference play. Gregory will bust his ass. Gregory is capable of no less than 17 ppg. Dunn no less than 12 ppg. Weisner 12 PPG. Breunig 13 PPG. Martin 5 PPG. Kemp 7 PPG . That alone is 66 PPG. I feel the team needs to be no less than 72 PPG, that is 5 PPG combined from the rest. Gfeller will be a good scorer. The questions is, when will he be a consistent scorer? Edmonds and Nwosu will likely play huge roles in our 1,2, 3 rotation (Edmonds 2 and 3, Nwosu 1 and 2). Bradshaw will be expected to improve. He is a gym rat so I see no reason why he cannot contribute scoring when needed. Granted, the numbers I am speculating on could vary drastically from my examples. No matter who is contributing how much scoring, I see 72 PPG as a realistic goal for the team. Defensively, I guarantee Tinkle will be upset if opponents average more than 70 PPG. I always expect GRIZ defense to give up less than 70 PPG, and likely in the 60's. I do expect the offense to struggle and be inconsistent up until conference play.
(3) Jamar was a solid defender. Defensively, Edmonds will likely be an upgrade once he gets familiar with the system. Nwosu is a wash with Deshields. Dunn is capable of being very close to a Will Cherry like defender. In my opinion our perimeter defense will be better. Just like the rebounding and post scoring, post defense can only be better with new personnel and more experience. I am not one bit worried about the GRIZ Defense.
Overall, I feel some are selling our newcomers short, especially Breunig. I also feel Andy Martin is going to be much more consistent, and be pretty damn solid in conference play. Most the basketball egrizzers can see a boat load of upside with Kemp. No doubt, the skill and potential is there. The only thing holding him back are the factors we as fans do not see behind the scenes. Whatever those factors are, if he takes his talent and coaches expectations seriously, we may see one hell of a PF/4 emerge. I really do hope he is only expected to focus on PF/4 for rest of his career. Question is, Which Chris Kemp will we get from this point forward?
GB1 summed up things well. Without trying to speculate too much and mislead people, I challenge everyone to think back to last season, if needed watch some of the games again. You can figure out where the break downs were and why certain players were slightly disciplined in not starting, having lesser role game to game, or outright inconsistent games. 1 of those players is transferring, despite loving the GRIZ, coaches, and good stats. 1 player stepped up his consistency the last 3rd of the season, and no questionable issues since. 1 player has struggled to find consistency. Only that player can determine how much impact he wants to make for the remainder of his GRIZ career?
I honestly feel the GRIZ will be a much improved conference team this season. Gregory and Breunig are the players who have to stay healthy though. I will be disappointed if the GRIZ lose more than 6 or 7 conference games this coming season. I also am thoroughly preparing myself for a roller coaster of an out of conference seasons. I don't expect any one team to run away with the conference title this season. The conference winner could have as many as 5 conference losses.
Feel free to agree or disagree. I would love to read as many breakdowns, summaries, and opinions as possible here. :thumb:
