Winners
* Chaminade: a chance in a lifetime to play three high profile Division 1 teams
* Purdue: The Return of the Landri, and Keady-tough attitude
* UCLA: Tough and grinding defense with sparks of offense. Continues to work for Ben Howland but what a disgrace to the Wooden legacy!
* Memphis: There is life after Carney and Shawne. Is there any doubt now that Darius Washington was addition by subtraction? Darius Washington got owned by Sebastian Telfair many years ago, and has yet to recover from that.
* Georgia Tech: Glimpses of the 2004 Georgia Tech team. A lot of promise, but also growing pains. The future is bright.
Losers
* Kentucky: Their talented freshmen had a few deer-in-the-headlights moments.
Neither
* Oklahoma: The former Dookie is starting his era at the University of 500-phone-calls.
Thursday, November 23, 2006
Maui: Winners and Losers
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4 comments:
Disgrace to the Wooden legacy? You have no clue what you are talking about.
I know UCLA fans don't like to hear this, but the Ben Howland style of play is a slugfest compared to Wooden's teams.
Nothing against Lorenzo Mata, infact every team would benefit if they had a player like Lorenzo on their roster, but when Matta is the #1 big man in the rotation, well, need I say more?
Obviously the current system works well for Ben Howland, and it brings in the Ws, and that maybe good enough for UCLA fans and administrators, but it's not good for the game. As one of the top 5 programs in the country UCLA deserves to be a showcase of basketball.
Ben Howland is not going to be able to recruit high-caliber recruits as long as he plays this way. He has shown that he can find diamonds in the rough (Collison, Luc Richard), which is a good thing, but it's not UCLA-level. Kevin Love was the exception, partly because Kevin Love likes to play that style. This year he could have really used Deon Thompson and Alex Stephenson, but they would rather be the 3rd and 4th big man in the rotation at North Carolina instead of starting at UCLA. Even Taylor King changed his mind and is going to tabacco road (although in this case, losing Taylor King is not a bad thing, as he is a very overrated player).
I don't have time to correct all of the inaccuracies in your posts. So, I'll just leave one comment and one objective fact. The comment - Howland has won at NAU, Pitt & UCLA with styles based on the talent he could get. The fact - UCLA averaged 83+ points per game in Maui. Not sure what you were watching. I was watching great basketball.
Well the "I don't have time to correct all the inaccuracies" is a convenient blanket statement, but it is not really saying anything I'm afraid :-)
UCLA averaged exactly 83 points in the three games in Maui, but Ben Howland has been at UCLA for more than three games. My comments are on his total body of work at UCLA, not just the three games in Maui.
The point I am making is for Ben Howland's slugfest style of play at UCLA. His ability to use different styles at NAU and Pitt is wonderful but it does not change the ugliness of his style of play at UCLA.
Brandon Jennings chosing cross-town rival USC is yet another sign of the shape of things to come for UCLA recruiting. This time he didn't lose him to Duke or Carolina or Kansas or Arizona, but USC!
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