Pac-10 Basketball Early September Season Preview
Since fall is upon us and soon school will be starting, I would today like to start looking up and down the Pac-10 in Men’s Basketball again and give my version of what ESPN just did with their “Summer ShootAround” series. First of all I’ll give my assessment of the league and where I feel the teams will finish, based on what we know at this premature moment in time.
My Pac-10 Predictions as of September 6th 2009:
Cal
Washington
Oregon State
UCLA
Oregon
Arizona
WSU
ASU
USC
Stanford
Here are my thoughts as to why I made these selections:
Cal is my favorite to win the league this year, but it will be a close struggle between the Bears and the Huskies. Jerome Randle is a senior PG with all of the skills necessary to bring home a league championship. He greatly benefited from his coaching under first year coach Mike Montgomery, himself a savvy veteran of this level of basketball and will not stop improving this coming year. I expect this to be his and Cal’s year in the Pac-10.
Patrick Christopher and Theo Robertson is a perfect pair of bookend wing/guards to surround Randle and they will have a special season as a group. The depth behind them is also very good and should be even more remarkable after they leave. Jorge Gutierrez and D.J. Seeley are certainly the future and their present next season will make Cal’s guard group on par with the nation’s best. There is more depth as well coming up behind them in third year PG Nikola Knezevic (veteran back-ups at PG in the Pac-10 are always a plus) and Bay Area frosh Brandon Smith, who we hear is more likely to take those back-up minutes based on his ball control ability and overall game.
On points I would say that this group of guards, as well as Washington’s will be among the top-5 in the nation, despite what the national media will promote. They will not have as many high NBA picks between them, though Washington’s Abdul Gaddy has top-10 pick written all over him, but based on criterion like overall talent, experience, chemistry and depth both of these groups have few if any peers across the country. Guard play wins in the NCAA tournament, at least on the first weekend, so those that feel that the Pac-10 will not fare well in March I believe will be proven wrong.
The main reason I’m picking Cal to win the league is more to do with experience than raw power. Yes, UW has senior Quincy Pondexter, but I believe that Pondexter will play more of a role as a front court threat. Quincy’s perimeter game will improve measurably and I think that’s why UW will do well enough this year to be in the Pac-10 race up until the last weekend. I think that one intangible which is the head to head match-up between these two clubs holds the key.
Last year the Bears swept UW and I feel that while against some other clubs UW this year will be a tougher match-up than they were, it will take quite an effort to pull ahead of Cal. That’s not to say that UW cannot do this and win the league for the 2nd straight year, I just have to go with my gut and make a choice, which could and probably will easily change once we get a chance to see these teams in November and December.
In the front court Cal has a clear wildcard to play and that one comes from a place known for mystery and intrigue, that being the Far East. Max Zhang played on the 23rd best team out of 24 in the World University games in Serbia this summer, but came out of that event with statistics that would best be described as mind altering. He averaged nearly 20 points and 20 rebounds per game over about a dozen outings and against players that would range in abilities from low end mid-major level college players to entry level pros.
Max is seven-foot-three and Montgomery is known for getting a huge amount of quality production from big men that others thought were projects at best. Many in the Pac-10 may be able to find a way to exploit holes in Zhang’s game, but Monty may also be able to use him in key situations to great advantage. For this task I like Mike’s chances to get something out of the big kid from Yantai, China.
Another new face for Cal who will play a vital role in league play will be Markhuri Sanders-Frison. This former Portland, OR product worked his way through the JC jungle to get to Cal and is a rare JC player for Mike, who obviously feels that this guy can help right away and is the exception to what for him is clearly a rule. I believe that Markhuri will start at one post and use his big athletic frame to eat up space, much as Zhang could use his height to accomplish similar goals.
Jordan Wilkes retired from hoops a year early as his brother Omar did as well, while promising Harper Kamp had off-season knee surgery which will (I’m about 90% sure) lead him to red-shirt this season and come back a junior in 2010-2011. Those two losses hurt Cal’s chances, but that odd looking three man core of 5th year senior Jamal Boykin, Sanders-Frison and Zhang, combined with the added athleticism and energy of the emerging sophomore Omondi Amoke will fill out the front court in my opinion. I think with what he has to work with here on 09-06-09, Coach Monty will be able to carve out a pretty darn good 8-9 man rotation.
So will Coach Lorenzo Romar and the Huskies, who come into the year as defending champs. I am about 49% certain at this point that UW will win their 2nd straight league title. I’m afraid that every bit of that other 51% goes to Cal, because I do not believe that anyone else in the league is going to have a reasonable chance. Where Cal brings a cohesive unit of seniors in Randle, Robertson and Christopher, with good depth behind them in support, Washington brings in the best freshman in the league in Gaddy, who is also the best PG as well in everything that counts except experience.
His mental approach to the game is very strong, so that experience deficit may become less and less as the year rolls by. Another guy with a huge upside this year is Isaiah Thomas. Pac-10 fans saw what I believe was a weak year from Isaiah last season. He has always been a much better shooter than that, both from behind the arc and from the line. I believe that he will put in a much more productive season this year as a shooter and at least as good of one as a scorer. He was able to run the team from the PG spot and improved his ability to find the open man, as he sliced and diced his way through the heart of defenses up and down the coast.
Those skills will continue to improve over the course of his UW career (along with his defense which was surprisingly solid), but with Gaddy initiating the offense, those skills he did learn will allow UW to have almost an unfair advantage over teams trying to figure out how to contain these two. Stopping Isaiah and Gaddy, who can also shoot, penetrate and finish will be a challenge that few in the Pac-10 will accomplish over the course of the new season, Cal having the greatest chance with their experience and depth.
Some teams will attempt to wear the two of them out on the defensive end, as Isaiah is short and Abdul is young and they may feel that this is their best chance to beat UW. That’s when you start talking about the next two guards in Venoy Overton and Elston Turner. It will take a lot of effort to get past Gaddy and IT and once teams do, these other two will likely see minutes against a lot of back-ups and make hay while the sun shines.
Venoy is now a veteran player that can be counted on to disrupt other teams top guards, especially those that are the key to their offense (PG’s). Bringing Overton in for Gaddy or Isaiah will accomplish a great deal in keeping up and likely increasing the pressure on both ends. Venoy is the most fearsome guard at Washington since Nate Robinson on the defensive end and he has a chance to leave his own unique mark. He must improve his offense, but I believe that he will in his 3rd year to make this four-man rotation better than last years champs which included a four year starter in All Pac-10 guard Justin Dentmon.
One guy that is not going to have people talking about his poor shooting, or say very little else bad about his game is Elston Turner. Many talked about Washington’s smallish guards being a mismatch against certain teams. The six-foot-four plus Gaddy and Turner have the look of one of those near pro back courts that you would expect to see at UConn, Kansas or Louisville. Washington could go with a line-up that has size, length, quickness and athleticism in Abdul, Elston, junior Justin Holiday, Quincy and Darnell Gant at the 5 spot where all 5 guys can guard all five positions and are not without rebounders, defenders, playmakers, shooters and slashers.
It’s this type of line-up that makes UW a clear favorite, at least at this juncture in the 2010-2011, after Cal loses most of their experience. True, UCLA will be very deep with high end talent, but their guard play is something that I have to see before I believe that it will be able to handle this UW crew. Oregon State and Oregon will also be decent and Arizona is going to continue to bring in those blue chippers by the carload, but my money (or at least my confidence) is on the guys in purple, at least in the back court for the next two years overall.
The Pac-10 will be down in the front court, but playing a line-up that small and quick is not going to be possible, other than in segments. Matthew Bryan-Amaning and Tyreese Breshers production will be the biggest factor in Washington’s season and will foretell the team’s future, as to whether they will be Pac-10 good in 2010-2011 or Final-Four good. The league lost its best post players and the guy that led that list was Jon Brockman, despite ASU’s Jeff Pendergraph being chosen higher in the NBA draft.
Just how well MBA, Breshers and Gant, with possible help from freshman Clarence Trent (in a similar way to what Cal could get from Amoke) will rebound, defend and score on the low block could tell the story of UW’s season. Will they be good enough to navigate the Pac-10 to challenge for a title this year with the loss of big men up and down the coast? I believe they will. Will they be able to improve on their 2nd round showing in the NCAA tournament? I believe that they can, but whether they will or not depends in huge ways on those three players.
The senior Pondexter will make those guys look better as a unit, while he bounces between the 3-4 forward spots, but ultimately those guys are going to have to be pretty good to accomplish a similar result to last year or surpass it. In fairness, a team that is as good as last year’s team could actually win more games in this coming year’s Pac-10, so I’m not just talking about conference wins. I’m talking about whether they will be as good of a team and I have my doubts, though I am also optimistic that the pieces are there to make it so.
One reason is that UW has it’s own mystery man and he comes from the not so far east out there near the Great Salt Lake (it’s not close either, if you’ve ever tried to make the drive). C.J. Wilcox is an outstanding prospect. He and Scott Suggs, both of whom are thin, but athletic could weigh in heavy to this UW season. If one or both of these guys can bring offensive spurts off the bench with their shooting and scoring and play in concert defensively with what should be a very tough defensive package, that factor could add a handful of notches on UW’s belt of Pac-10 conquests.
It is going to be very tough to keep Isaiah, Gaddy and Venoy on the bench, so most of those minutes will come from the third guard spot. Turner should have the maturity to find some minutes as the 4th wheel in the 1-2 spots in the rotation and as a zone buster, but I’m just not sure how many minutes will be there for either C.J. or Suggs. Holiday will certainly play most of his minutes at the 3 spot, with the chance that we see more of a very quick line-up with him at the 4 a little more this year.
Pondexter will see a lot of minutes at the 3 and the 4, but he can’t be two places at once, so I believe that Pac-10 fans see a little bit of Scott and Wilcox at the three. I am of the opinion that red-shirting either one would be a mistake as both possess NBA height and skill set potentially and could go early, but if one were to get hurt, I’d say pull the trigger on the red-shirt. After Quincy moves on, there will be a lot of minutes available for them more than likely, unless Justin Holiday really takes off as an offensive player.
That would be the only way I’d red-shirt one of them and that would be whomever was least ready, not necessarily Wilcox, just because he is the freshman. The difference here between UCLA’s Mike Moser and Tyler Honeycutt and these two is that the purple and gold guys will not be needed to contribute badly and can develop and get their bearings at their own pace. Moser and Honeycutt may be higher rated prospects and potentially much better (especially Moser who has great post scoring skills), but are they really that much better than these two right now?
Oregon State is going to make believers out of a number of college basketball experts around the country who are likely to give the 3rd or 4th spot to either UCLA or Arizona based on perceived mojo, grandeur or political connects (whichever floats your boat). The Beavs lose PG Ricky Claitt, who was a key factor for them down the stretch as they won the CBI tournament and went from winless in the league to 18-18 in one year. They gain a great one in Roberto Nelson who should help them as a freshman in the league.
Nelson is a scorer and a shooter who will not have an effect as great as a first year player as James Harden or O.J. Mayo did, but he will give the Beavs something of substance in that same type of “go-to-guy” role. Big versatile guards, senior Josh Tarver and junior Calvin Haynes will absorb Claitt’s minutes, but don’t rule out the potential contributions of freshman Jared Cunningham in that important back-up PG role.
Many rated Jared as the #2 or 3 frosh PG coming into the league on 2009 after Gaddy and perhaps Lamont “Momo” Jones at Arizona. OSU also returns streaky shooting guard Lathen Wallace, who could find himself much more consistent as a junior this year and big senior wing guard Seth Tarver, who also may realize what many saw as great potential when he and his brother Josh won a state title for Jesuit in Portland, OR on a miraculous comeback over Kevin Love and Lake Oswego.
Speaking of big guys who can pass the rock, Joe Burton is another frosh who could help, as he is big and strong and like Nelson is just good overall. Joe won’t have all that much pressure on him though with big, tall seniors on the roster in Calvin Hampton and Roeland Schaftenaar, who like Haynes, was an All Pac-10 Honorable Mention selection last season. Those two along with versatile junior forwards Omari Johnson and Daniel Deane will continue to refine the system that Coach Craig Robinson was able to use to right the Beavers ship in just his first season as head man.
Burton will find minutes I believe though. Big six-foot-ten post Angus Brandt and six-foot-seven combo forward Rhys Murphy are two Australian frosh that will add some international flavor to the Beavers, but I would also have to believe that they will have their contributions limited to the deep bench at best this season. That is a very strong group that Robinson has to work with and I believe that he will continue to bring in great talent on the recruiting trail in 2010 and 2011 as well.
The Beavers have turned it around in a hurry and will remind Pac-10 fans of the great teams and good times of the Ralph Miller era while forgetting the foibles of Jay John (who is actually doing a great job as an assistant for Montgomery at Cal). This team has great shooting and scoring to work with on the perimeter potentially from Haynes, Nelson and Wallace, while the heady play of the Tarver brothers could be the glue that holds it all together.
They are deep and effective in the front court and what’s more still hungry. I see the heart and soul of this team unsatisfied with their mezzo mezzo success of last season. Most of the older kids endured one of, it not the most humbling experiences in Pac-10 history, in the seasons before Robinson and I believe that they still have a lot to play for this year, as much as anyone in fact. I believe that Robinson is a coach and a leader that can motivate and I do not think that he has peaked in that endeavor.
With the Pac-10 having lost Brockman, Taj Gibson, Pendergraph, Aron Baynes, Jordan Hill and other notable big men, the Beavers full group of four veterans and one mature looking freshman is going to be effective. I still feel that Cal and Washington have superior talent in the back court and on the wing that is going to minimize the Beavers effectiveness, but few Pac-10 teams are going to have an easy time of it at Corvallis this season more than likely, even the mighty Bruins.
If you were to listen to the posters at Bruin Report Online, you would think that the Pac-10 should just crown UCLA the champion, assign the top recruits to Westwood and send them to the NCAA tournament as an automatic bid, while allowing the rest of the Pac-10 to play a season of basketball to decide the secondary laurels. This year is going to be a good one for the more dogmatic of those who root for the powder blue and gold to take a long cruise away from the radio signals of the game broadcasts, cable television or the internet, other than a special web site with no access from the rest of the net where they can discuss their superiority until the great Howland recruits his way back into being balanced enough to play to the standards that they expect him to every year.
Three straight Final-Four appearances by UCLA has given many of them the feeling that the days of John Wooden are back and the mighty Bruins are once again the invincible force that won the Pac-8 and the NCAA tournament every year as if they were an off-season exhibition tour through Canada. Though I have said much on this site to infer that there could be problems with Ben Howland’s program in the area of recruiting and team chemistry, I will not touch on that in this preview, other than to say that this season there could be unprecedented pressure from the Bruin faithful and concern over possible developments on and off the court in my opinion.
All that said UCLA is as usual loaded with talent. The problem is that this talent is not so much in the back court where games are very often won and lost in Pac-10 play. At point guard Ben will likely go with sophomore Jerime Anderson, who frankly looked very lost last season in a limited back-up capacity to outstanding senior Darren Collison. If Anderson cannot be that floor leader on both ends that have made the Bruins so successful over the past 4 seasons, who will take that spot? Will it be Malcolm Lee, who is thought to be a combo guard, backed up “One and done” Jrue Holiday at the off guard and logged no minutes at PG last season?
Will Lee and Anderson be able to do it by committee, while Lee also plays the off-guard by committee with senior shooting specialist Mike Roll who is really closer to a SF than a SG? Are there other guards currently are on the UCLA roster that can fill some of those holes and raise their guard play to the anywhere near the level it has been? Will talented six-foot-eight 180 lb. SF’s Tyler Honeycutt (who had surgery and may be hampered or out all together) and Mike Moser, both of whom are potentially great wings or possibly combo forwards, come in and provide needed support at guard?
In my opinion the answer to all four questions is no. The Bruins (like USC, but no where near as badly) will struggle with depth, experience and overall play at guard. They will play a power game that will be very effective, with the senior Nikola Dragovic lighting it up from outside at times. Sophomore Drew Gordon leads a front court that will be top shelf by next year’s depleted Pac-10 standards, with senior James Keefe and fellow soph J’mison Morgan. The freshmen posts (Brendan Lane, Reeves Nelson and Anthony Stover) could possibly see some minutes, but that will not be good news for Howland, as that will likely mean that the veterans were not able to step up their games this year to meet this huge challenge ahead of them, should they want to stay the elite program that they feel they are without peer in the Pac-10.
Can Ben find a guard somewhere in this huge world, especially with the help of a huge recruiting machine behind him? That could be. Can these Bruins really play well, stay healthy and have excellent chemistry? Howland has done it before in circumstances and I would say that it is possible that he could do it again. I believe that something in the middle will happen and that UCLA will once again be good enough to go to the NCAA tournament. Rather than taking the Pac-10 title out right, tying for it or coming in a close second, as they have done for the last four years, I believe they will not be so close this time and rather fight it out with Oregon (who won two Pac-10 games last year) for the 4th and 5th spots in the league.
The Ducks will have a unique coaching situation brewing, as the season rolls through. It will be interesting to see how Ernie Kent can take a team that has literally everyone back, but was the worst in the Pac-10 last year and turn them around, with the help of highly thought of now head assistant Mike Dunlap, who moved over to Eugene from Tucson, AZ. ‘Zona scratched and clawed itself to two more NCAA tournaments this past two years, both times when many, including myself felt that they didn’t deserve to be there.
Last year, Dunlap was a lot of the reason why. He is an intense competitor and a smart basketball guy and at an institution like Oregon where recruiting is as easy as landing on a bed of feathers, he could be just what Kent, or anyone that the Ducks (hic#*Nike%$up) put in that chair. There has long been talk and the possibility still exists that Mark Few could take that seat, should Kent not meet expectations, but now the speculation is that Dunlap could be getting groomed for it or (at least auditioned) as we speak.
If the Ducks do well does that mean that Kent keeps the job or does it mean that Dunlap gets the job and Kent gets another job? Is Kent already out and just auditioning himself for another Nike job or is that Dunlap’s role more than likely? So much to think about, but the good news is that the team has a lot of talent. This talent has been assembled well and the new guys coming in this season are some of the best talent wise to enter the Pac-10 this year.
Malcolm Armstead is a highly thought of JC point guard, probably the best in the nation this year from the JC ranks. Kam Brown turned out to be a bad move for Oregon, as was his childhood buddy Drew Viney, both from the same part of SoCal and childhood team mates for years. They are both gone, but not only has Brown been replaced by the much superior Armstead, but Viney has been replaced by Jamil Wilson, another big time, NBA looking player from the Midwest.
It’s nice when you always seem to get a soft landing when things don’t work out. Thank Uncle Phil for this one too kiddies. The Ducks have all of the pieces, they have one of the best ball control PG’s in the Pac-10 this year and the guy who should compete with USC’s Alex Stepheson for the newcomer of the year, if there were an award like that anymore. They also have a very solid young sophomore PG that played a lot of minutes last year in Garrett Sim, to go with a guy who has played PG rather poorly, but is much more suited to SG (despite his frame) in Tajuan Porter.
Porter is a terrific shooter and a tough competitor. With a decent point guy running the offense, he can be devastating on the offensive end as we saw when he was only a freshman alongside Aaron Brooks. On the wing Matthew Humphrey and LeKendric Longmire are both high level talents. Humphrey struggled quite a bit as a frosh, but has a scorer’s mentality and should be more effective this season. Longmire was basically an effective, dynamic player on a bad team last year, but with the new comers and the emergence of some of the young Ducks, he could become a very serious threat in the Pac-10.
Between Wilson, Longmire, Humphrey and Porter, I think that the 2-3 spots should be in very good shape for any coach that comes along. The “4 spot” is also in good hands with senior post Joevan Catron and big imposing sophomore Josh Crittle, who is both a guy that you want with you in a dark alley and a very promising basketball player. He was very young last year, along with most of this Duck team and I would think that he will be improved enough to help aid the cause in the middle.
Crittle’ll be second fiddle though to the really big guy from Chicago. If you think you’re having fun again, well you haven’t met Mr. Dunigan. Michael Dunigan is an NBA prospect. He will start getting the push from agents to “Test the process” after this year in my opinion at six-foot-ten and about 260+ lbs. In this year’s Pac-10 he will excel and stand out like Rodney Stuckey did in the Big Sky (well not that much). He’s not that good and the argument could be made that if Dunigan is going to do so well, then why isn’t UCLA’s “Bobo” Morgan?
UCLA is going to do well, about 4th place and so is Oregon, right there next to them at 5th. I just like Dunigan better and Oregon’s over all talent better, but I do feel that the circus that is this Duck program is going to be a distraction. Last year this team was talented, albeit young and the problem was chemistry. The talent wasn’t there for a common purpose. If Kent and/or Dunlap can get these guys to play as a team, I could see them as high as 3rd in the Pac-10. If he can’t get a high enough finish for an NCAA bid he probably deserves to lose his job, but he might just keep it, if he at least makes the top-5 in the league.
Many folks feel that Arizona is going to compete for the conference title with their great class of 2009 freshmen and Nic Wise returning. Many feel that Fogg and Horne are going to emerge as money men to help replace the production of Chase Budinger and Jordan Hill. I don’t feel that way. I feel that both of those guys and Wise to an extent were dependent players that fed off the opportunities left by the huge focus that teams had to devote to Hill and Bud.
I feel that Wise will step up his game and win a lot of games for them when he is hot, especially at home where it is very hard for anyone to get a win, but that this year will be a transition year for ‘Zona and that they will sit at the top of the bottom half of the Pac-10 at #6. That is not to say that they won’t be good, they won’t have some shining moments of hope for the future or that Sean Miller is not going to recruit the heck out that very attractive basketball destination for high level kids.
I think we’ll see a couple of years of Arizona around the middle of the pack and then the ‘Cats will be back and very much in the hunt for the Pac-10 title. I doubt that they will get back to the NCAA Tournament this year, but I’ve certainly been wrong before about that. Almost everyone thinks that the Pac-10 is down and that the league will only get 4 bids, 5 at the most. I disagree and believe that as the season wears on that the Pac-10 will get its usual 5, but if Arizona is the 6th team and wins one game in the Pac-10 tourney that they may just squeak in for the third straight year.
What I said about UCLA fans feeling entitled goes for the ‘Cats, but in a different way. They feel that they should be in the NCAA tournament because of their great tradition and often use strength of OOC schedule as a big part of their logic and it seems to work for them with the NCAA. Other Pac-10 teams win more games, more conference games, play tougher non-conference schedules, but that doesn’t seem to matter to them. They are Arizona and there is just something better about them.
This year they will not be better than last year, in fact they were probably not better than the team which featured Jerryd Bayless the year before, but the hype and hysteria will continue. Face it, they have to continue selling all of those ‘Zona hats and jerseys and premium seating for all of the blue hairs down in the desert living on their golf courses. It may be harder to get them juiced up about someone other than the silver fox, old sneaky Lute Olson, but Sean Miller is a nice young man.
He’s the kind of guy that could do a song and dance routine on Lawrence Welk in some kind of jumpsuit with matching pumps, but I digress.
The ‘Cats will likely feature a very good post prospect in Russian import Kyryl Natyazhko as the starter in the middle as a true freshman, with junior Alex Jacobsen maybe logging a few minutes of back-up and rather poorly I might add. Kyryl is a great looking player, with a bright future in the game. In a year when post play is going to not be at the level that it was in the last few years in the league, he could be very productive. Will he out fox some of the more developed D1 guys out there up and down the coast?
My gut says not often, but he has a lot of time to get his act together. To me he will be the Dunigan of next year, plus some. I think that he will do better this year than Michael did this past year and in 2010-2011 put himself clearly in position for a jump to the NBA, should he want to make it. The other starting spot should be filled by either one of three true frosh forwards. Kevin Parrom, Solomon Hill and Derrick Williams are all great prospects that originally committed elsewhere, but that Miller (with just a little help from his wonderful friends at Nike and perhaps a few of those blue hairs in my opinion) was able to work free in the spring.
I’m sure that all three will get quite a bit of burn, as will frosh PG “Momo” Jones, who looks to be the back-up for Wise this season and who could also be productive alongside Nic. Again, I like Arizona to have a decent team that will hang in with the Pac-10 field this year, but in the end I’m going with my gut in that they will be way out on the bubble at best. Could the NCAA get them in again regardless, even in what is perceived as a down year for the league? I’d give them a slim chance this year, as there are teams below them that could actually finish higher.
The team I’m thinking has the best chance to work its way into the 6th spot ahead of the ‘Cats is WSU. The Cougs are going to feature two solid returnees in Klay Thompson, who is an NBA level shooting guard prospect and a wicked weapon on a Pac-10 level and Deangelo Casto who can scrap and bang with the best and was a huge pick-up for the Crimson and Gray. Both guys are second year guys that were surrounded by veterans last year and playing for a 1st year coach, but both have the intangibles that a guy as well prepared as Ken Bone can build a winner around.
Another vet that will likely compete for a starting spot is Marcus Capers, who was a starter much of last year and is a good solid defender and glue guy. If Capers improves his offensive game and Klay and Casto make impressive strides, that trio could be the solid core that could make Bone’s job fairly easy, at least if your best case scenario is a lesser post season bid. An NCAA tournament bid is going to be a lot more difficult.
The Cougars are going to be very thin in the post, but once again the league is down and wide open for new faces to establish themselves in the paint. One guy who could make a big splash is Australian Brock Motum, who left a strong impression at the World University Games this summer. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him start alongside Casto in the middle, with Klay on the wing and two of Capers, former Rainier Beach and O’Dea great PG Reggie Moore or super frosh combo guard Xavier Thames at the guards. You probably give the edge to the guy with experience here, but Thames is very good and could win a starting spot at the two or possibly the one over Moore.
I feel pretty good about Reggie’s chances though and though the kid is young, he has the kind of make-up that fits Bone’s style to a tee. There are quite a few more good young talents to talk about here as well that could work its way into the starting circle. Sophomore Michael Harthun is a great shooter that could take a lot of pressure off Klay. Nikola Koprivica is a senior who could find himself at the starting wing spot, moving Klay to the SG position where he could be a big mismatch for some of the shorter SG’s in the league.
Abe Lodwick is a 3rd year sophomore that started to get untracked towards the end of last season and could also do what Nikola could do by moving Klay to the two. Another freshman, Anthony Brown from T-Town (Tacoma) is a player that Husky Digest sources feel is a sleeper who could excel in the Pac-10. Anthony could come in and earn minutes at the 2 or the 3. Finally there are two posts that are likely to fill the back-up positions for Casto and Motum and those are former Nevada signee Steven Bjornstad and 3rd year sophomore Charlie Enquist from Edmonds WA.
Enquist played precious few meaningful minutes last year in Pac-10 play and Bjornstad is thought to be a guy that could use a red-shirt year to get bigger. If Steven continues to grow bigger and taller as he’s been reported to be doing, he could become quite a center with his sound offensive game. One and probably both of these guys has to be ready to play this year, as they are really all WSU has at the post positions, or else Bone may be tempted to run a lot of Koprivica or Lodwick at the 4 spot in a quicker line-up that will make people forget the grind it out lunch bucket style of (Tony and Dick) Bennett ball.
Overall the Cougs are very young and very thin at the post positions. I feel that Thompson, Motum, Casto, Thames and Moore are their five best players, but that experience will be crucial in winning games and that some of those young guys may have to work their way into the mix more slowly than others. Bone is a great coach and is certainly going to bring a style and quality to the program that will succeed in both drawing fans and regional recruits away from Gonzaga and keeping alive the momentum that was injected into the program by Dick and Tony.
Below WSU in my opinion are three teams facing huge hurdles this season and the one that I feel will take the 8th spot is ASU. The next best is likely USC, which we are hearing is having a hard time stopping the bleeding as we speak with the talk of Leonard Washington’s eligibility issues starting to come out. ASU has no scandal on their doorstep, at least at the moment (but we would not be surprised to see one in the future for Herbie Sendek), but the Sun Devils have lost the heart and soul of their team in Harden and Pendergraph.
The guys left over are mostly known for getting the ball to those two or playing selected supportive roles. Someone has to be the go to guy in any system, no matter how specialized, but if you have enough guys that can fill roles and just a little go-to-guy or two, then maybe you can put a winner out there. That is Herb’s brightest hope.
He has a veteran senior PG in Derek Glasser, who can hit shots now and again, but Glasser is not going to be the next big game James. They have a capable back-up in former Seattle, O’Dea star Jamelle McMillan, who just may be a better choice than the senior Glasser this year, but is not going to step in and do anything but give better support to whoever is actually going take the majority of the big shots. They have a junior SG in Ty Abbott, who can hit threes on occasion, but he is going to need a playmaker to open things up for him.
They have a senior SG in Jerren Shipp, but his contributions thus far have been spotty and anemic, compared to what would be needed to replace Harden. The guy with the brightest look about him is last year’s starting PF Rihards Kuksiks, who can hit open looks when they are there and was able to open things up for Pendergraph offensively while playing decently on defense. Kuksiks will have to be very productive, much in the same way that Dragovic is probably the biggest hope for UCLA of their returning seniors to emerge as a new found go-to-guy on a team that will sorely need one.
In my opinion neither is going make anyone forget Jeff, James, Love or Arron Afflalo. ASU has a senior center in big British Duke transfer Eric Boateng, but he was more often than not a liability and not a good back-up for “Pendo” the last two years. Boateng could pick it up and probably has to for ASU to have any kind of season, but very few folks that I know are too jazzed that he will to any great degree. Sendek may find himself better served to utilize little used soph Taylor Rohde or ASU’s answer to Kyryl Natyazhko (who he lost in a recruiting battle with Miller and is also from Russia), Ruslan Pateev, in the post than Boateng.
Is Pateev any good? I feel that he is, but not as good as Natyazhko. Ruslan may turn out to be a great player in the Pac-10 though, but he is not the real story from ASU’s 2009 class, which is underrated I feel. All three of SG’s Trent Lockett and Demetrius Walker and SF Victor Rudd have a chance to wrestle minutes away from the veterans. I really like all three of these freshmen and really they are closer to the same level of quality of prospects as the three much higher touted Arizona guys in Hill, Parrom and Williams.
The difference between the two situations is that ‘Zona has a decent go to guy in Wise, supportive players that I have more confidence in with Fogg and Horne and a freshman post that I like much better in Natyazhko. If Herbie can get guys to perform as upperclassmen much better than they did the previous two years that gap between the #6 and #8 spots may end up to be a very thin margin.
The #9 spot goes to USC, a team that had it not had that little $1,000 cash envelope problem would have easily been a favorite to win the league this year, even with the attrition to the NBA of Demar Derozan and Daniel Hackett’s trip back home to Bella Roma. We are very convinced that Taj Gibson would have stayed, had it not been for the scandal, Floyd probably would have rolled the dice on Renardo Sidney, Williams, Jones and Hill would not be at Arizona and Noel Johnson wouldn’t have gone to Clemson.
As it is, the Trojans will face the possibility of NCAA sanctions which if they are going to happen are likely to fall on the hoops team, as the football team and all the potential lost revenue involved there will not likely be squandered in my opinion. The way the NCAA handled the Memphis and Calipari situations makes me wonder if anything will happen to USC, but I imagine with all of the publicity that something has to happen. Southern Cal AD Mike Garrett did the safe thing to hire Kevin O’Neill, who is a veteran and a disciplinarian, albeit one that very few seem to have much good to say about.
I think that at Arizona he really played himself out to be a guy that few players would like to play for, but then again Ben Howland, despite the army of PR people working to shine up his image, is also Mr. Not-So-Nice, in my opinion. “Two Huge @#$H&^!%S in Tinsel Town” should be the preview of the LA Times Pac-10 Basketball Preview, but I guess we won’t be so lucky, at least in the near future. Another factor for USC will be the fact that the NCAA may not do anything for a while, as they have already been about three years since the Reggie Bush stort surfaced and nothing has happened.
In the mean time what you have left at SC is a team that is paper thin, but has some talent. Last years little used back-up PG Donte Smith did an about face after announcing that he was transferring out. I guess he realized that he could be the starter in the Pac-10 or sit out a year and compete in the Big West as a Cal-Irvine Anteater. He chose to turn around and stick with USC, but could have some competition from former Pepperdine Wave Mike Gerrity, who regains eligibility for winter quarter and Pac-10 play.
I like Gerrity and feel that he will play more than Donte in 2010. He can score and is likely better initiating the offense than Smith. The strength of USC is senior Dwight Lewis, who thought better of declaring for the draft. He is a proven weapon and a veteran of Pac-10 battles that should help USC win some games unless more guys leave. Smith, Gerrity and Lewis will have little depth, unless you think that Percy “L’il Romeo” Miller is going to be a player.
I do not and feel that USC is so thin that before Gerrity, wings Marcus Simmons and Marcus Johnson will have to play back-up SG and that Lewis will have to back-up at PG. USC is going to get eaten alive by anyone with even good guards in the OOC, but in conference play they may be able to stack up a few wins here and there and both of those wings, along with maybe straggler 2009 lone signee Evan Smith, should be enough to at least stock that position, barring injury or foul trouble.
Johnson is a high flyer and a solid offensive threat, but not an outstanding outside shooter or he would have made the NBA draft, which thus allowed him to return to school. Simmons is an outstanding defender, who will be counted on to slow down the other team’s top dogs, and is a good glue guy. Evan is probably not enough good yet for prime time, but you have to admire his loyalty which is actually an underrated trait in college basketball. Getting players to not just commit to a scholarship spot, but commit to a program and stay for four years playing with your heart in it is a major asset to any program. There is still not great depth on the wing, but not emergent weakness like at guard.
In the frontcourt, Washington (should he stay eligible), Nikola Vucevic and UNC transfer Alex Stepheson will make up (surprisingly) one of the best front courts in the league. Again there is lack of depth, but if oft injured Kasey Cunningham can provide a 4th wheel USC should be able to operate inside this year. This team is living on the edge depth wise though and any injury could put SC into the kind of tailspin that usually ends up being pretty ugly.
Last place is not out of the question by any means. Nor is better than 9th if everything goes right, but that’s a lot to expect from kids that came here thinking Pac-10 titles and great access to agents, NBA scouts and lucrative shoe deals (at least the post NBA contract kind). Keeping these guys upbeat is going to be the challenge for O’Neill and I don’t think he is really the best guy for the job.
That brings us right to the bottom spot in the conference this year and that has to be the Stanford Cardinal. Johnny Dawkins has a big job on his plate to keep these guys competitive, even with so many teams with rebuild jobs on theirs. Losing the Lopez Twins devastated a team that was arguably the best in the league two years ago where certainly they were so at times. The remaining pieces, mainly a group of seniors, remained last year on a team that (at best) stood in the middle ground of the Pac-10.
Those are history now and the younger players that remain are a thin group, supported by an even thinner one of newbies. Recruiting has not been something that Dawkins has really stepped into as well as many thought he could at the most prestigious academic name of all the big universities out west. Whether his 2010 group that includes Vashon Island, WA’s John Gage and Bellevue’s Aaron Bright will start the ball rolling again for the Cardinal is anyone’s guess, but in the mean time the 2009 class is not likely to be one similar to the types of recruiting classes that Dawkins was used to at Duke.
Injured Andy Brown and PG Gabriel Harris are the two freshmen on a team that lost 4/5 of its starting line-up to graduation and are not going to step in and make a huge difference. Harris may provide sorely needed back-up minutes for last years back-up senior Drew Schiller, who I am not really sure belongs in the Pac-10 as a starting PG. The only other potential back-up at point with any experience is Emmanuel Igbinosa who played only 4 games last year because of injury.
Jeremy Green showed a nice long range stroke as a freshman off the bench and he will have to produce big numbers this year, as he has very little proven depth or even highly thought of newcomers behind him in what should be his first year as starter. Landry Fields and Josh Owens are returning starters that should be the heart and soul of this team, but neither even close to the kind of player that is going to be able to regularly take a team on his back in the Pac-10 and will them to a win.
There is also little depth in house to back them up. The only other guy that even resembles a combo forward on the roster is little used Jack Trotter, basically a garbage time and deep bench guy. Elliott Bullock was a little used reserve that could play in the post at six-foot-ten and 220 lbs., while another returnee Romanian Matei Daian is the same size but played even less. This is the weakest Stanford team in many, many years and if Dawkins can’t get this guys looking good somehow over the next two seasons, he is going to have to start looking over his shoulder, despite the fact that the lack of foresight by the Athletic Department allowed Trent Johnson to leave which devastated the program and left a huge mess for him to clean up.
That says it on my thoughts on this year’s upcoming basketball season, just as football is now underway. There will be a lot of emerging stars and surprises this year, probably more than in a long while. There will definitely be many between now and when the teams actually start to take the court in early November and quite a few again between then and the beginning of the Pac-10 season two months later, but as of right now this is my best guess as to the way things are going.
Here are the players that I would expect at this point to be the most productive and the biggest surprises:
All Pac-10 (including honorable mention):
Nic Wise (‘Zona), Rihard Kuksiks (ASU), Nikola Dragovic (UCLA), Malcolm Lee (UCLA), Dwight Lewis (USC), Landry Fields (‘Furd), Jerome Randle (Cal), Patrick Christopher (Cal), Theo Robertson (Cal), Calvin Haynes (OSU), Roeland Schaftenaar (OSU), Michael Dunigan (UO), Tajuan Porter (UO), Klay Thompson (WSU), Deangelo Casto (WSU), Quincy Pondexter (UW), Isaiah Thomas (UW) and Abdul Gaddy (UW).
The Freshman of the Year will be: Abdul Gaddy
The Coach of the Year will be: Mike Montgomery
The Surprises of the year for each team will be:
Arizona: Kyryl Natyazhko
ASU: Trent Lockett
UCLA: Nikola Dragovic
USC: Mike Gerrity
Cal: Max Zhang
Stanford: Jeremy Green
Oregon: Malcolm Armstead
OSU: Roberto Nelson
WSU: Reggie Moore
UW: Matthew Bryan-Amaning