OGT-Florida vs Loyola Maryland 11/6 Stephen C. O'Connell Center 8:00 pm

I like our squad!

 

I love our squad

 

Ask me after the Virginia game. But we are so much better than last year

 

Overall, this is a nice group of players. The thing I saw, besides a damn good Kugel, is a couple of back court players who get the Golden system and some real potential in the front court. Samuel IS the best signing this past year. THAT is a player! The others look to be tuned into what Golden wants. The two freshmen are a unique combination of height and passion mixed with more than usual freshman basketball IQ.

Our biggest question mark is the lack of stoutness in our front court besides Samuel playing against another 4. That is a win on our side. Realize we saw more size on a VERY middling mid-major team than what we had. If you don't have size, you need speed. We shall see what happens against much better teams.

Can't have a combination of meh 3-shooting and poor free throw shooting...again. That WILL be a death sentence against this team. And the "comfortable lead malaise" can't creep in this team. It isn't THAT good.

I am VERY interested in reading this book.

 

It's waaayyy too early to say that Samuel is the best signing. He's ahead of the other bigs but not radically so, and I would say that Clayton is better, and we still haven't even seen Zyon Pullin play.
Regarding the 3-point shooting, we went 6 for 16. That may not sound like a blistering hot night, but it's 37.5% and would place us as 27th-best last season, or the top 8%. Of course, it's from a ridiculously small and useless sample size, but if we are still at that percentage in another month, we're in great shape.
The 50% free-throw shooting was abysmal, no doubt, but that will get better, starting Friday.

 

IMO, Samuel playing major minutes at the 4 is WAY more important than Clayton at the 1 or 2. He just gets it and the other two freshmen are still quite green and skinny. They may blossom before the season is over but right now, a damn nice 4 is more important to the overall success than what Clayton can do that Pullin, Richard, Kugel or Aberdeen can not. Clayton's real value is going to be the one shooting FTs down the stretch at a 90+ percent clip. Otherwise, we got the 1/2 covered just fine if he falters. We can't say that about the 4 position without Samuel.

 

A young 4 or 5 not struggling in SEC play is rare indeed.