Chief’s Briefs - Florida Edition

[August_West]

Humble brag. Knows that the horse radish sauce is worth having at Smith and Wollensky!

Thats a crappy Humblebrag. Smith and Wollensky is like 14th on my NYC Steakhouse list. (Ask me for my resume and pics)

 

[ColchVEGAS]

I dont like Jimmy Dykes. He was very complimentary of us last night, which is appreciated but he is a southern odiot (I dont like those people) , I would take Bill Walton every day of the week and twice on Sunday. Sorry for partying.

I do not feel strongly one way or another about Dykes in general. For whatever reason he was driving me crazy last night with shortening basketball to "ball" every time. I think there was one stretch where he was talking about Clingan choosing ball and ball not choosing him...and he just continued for minutes it seemed about ball this and ball that.

My Dykes rant is over. Back to UConn's "ball" product on the floor.

 

[uconn1999]

Thats a crappy Humblebrag. Smith and Wollensky is like 14th on my NYC Steakhouse list. (Ask me for my resume and pics)

America’s Steakhouse, with a whopping 7 locations.
The one in Dallas shuttered a number of years ago.

 

[August_West]

For whatever reason he was driving me crazy last night with shortening basketball to "ball" every time.

I forgive that, I think it is cringe, but he and others think it's hip schtick, not different than Walton haters thinking he is cringe and I think it's hip schtick. Everyone has their preferences. No problem there.

 

[Husker Husky]

I was watching on my tablet, so I didn't tab away to check the stats until after the game, but I was thinking that if the Ref's didn't send the Gators to the line possession after possession, this would have been a 40pt blowout.

 

[jibsey]

I do not feel strongly one way or another about Dykes in general. For whatever reason he was driving me crazy last night with shortening basketball to "ball" every time. I think there was one stretch where he was talking about Clingan choosing ball and ball not choosing him...and he just continued for minutes it seemed about ball this and ball that.

My Dykes rant is over. Back to UConn's "ball" product on the floor.

Dykes loves our team. AJAX his favorite, then Sanogo and Clingan of course. Crazy about Hawk and Karaban. He did everything but send a Valentine’s day card and candy last night. He already is doing the Purdue matchup with us, Dec 8th.

 

[Doctor Hoop]

When your top two guys off the bench give you a combine 75% shooting (12/16) for 27 points over 39 minutes, you know you have a lot of answers. Donovan Clingan and Joey California did that tonight.

Couple that with solid starter minutes from our Big Three (Sanogo, Hawkins & Jackson) and good defense against poor shooting and we got yet another 20 point type win against a big name school.

A weakness tonight was the realization that we sometimes lack a traditional point guard. Newton had 3 assist but 5 turnovers and nor did he give us much scoring. However, the assists by committee seem to work with Jackson (4 assists, 0 to’s ), Hawkins (3 assists) and Diarra/Joey C (4 assists combined). Compare our 16 assists and 52% shooting against FL paltry 6 assists and 30% shooting and one realizes overall we got the ball to where it needed to go. We also defended. 89% foul shooting is part of a winning formula too.

Sanogo though continue not to have the inside out passing identification that we would like him to have. As Adama had 1 assist and 3 turnovers.

Three positional strengths are clear with this team:
1) Regardless of whatever you want to call Sanogo for draft reasons, with Sanogo and Clingan, we have the top center position in the country. Tonight we had 33 points (72% FG%) , 15 rebounds and 4 blocks combined. In my World that’s huge, no matter how trendy it is to have how many guys play outside. Dominating the paint still wins games!!!

2) Hawkins, Joey C, Newton and Karaban give us either the 3 point threat or production that we have needed to keep defenses honest.

3) Andre Jackson - What do I have to do tonight for us to win? Tonight it was dominant defense FL (30% FG), good ball movement/security (4 assists, 0 turnovers) and even 2 for 5. (40%) from the 3 line. Then who tied tonight for being our top rebounder? Andre Jackson at 8 rebounds.

Going 10-0 tonight on 12/7 and having played and won our top 5 out of conference games, it is clearly time to celebrate our good fortunate as fans following such a unique and successful team. More on that later today.
Good night.

Some of your best briefs ever, Chief. Those three points are spot on. This squad has answers to almost any question.

Re: the point guard question. Small quick ball-hawking guards will cause a bit of trouble. But Jackson, quick ball movement, and well-set screens can resolve that issue.

 

[coachn]

Right now Jackson is stirring the NATY drink.
Chief look forward to reading you after every game.

 

[Chief00]

Please check out my Andre Jackson event thread. The event is next Thursday, December 15th. It should be a great opportunity to talk to Andre. He will be there for 2 hours. The long term success of the program will have a lot to do with fans supporting NIL events like this one.

 

[gtcam]

He was not being doubled on that play. It seemed to me that Fla decided to let Castleton take him Mano a Mano and shut down the 3 point shots. Joey was open, but I don't remember seeing how close his defender was. Let's hope AS works toward more of that. I'll bet that is a subject visited in every practice.

It was supposed to be a target of off season work that DH talked about after last season - didn't seem to check that box off
DH also said that AS was going to work on his handle around the basket a develop a mid range game - still waiting
He definitely worked on his 3 pt shooting and unlike others I don't mind when he steps out and throws a few up every game.
AS is a huge part of this team but just wish that he showed improvement on the two aspects of his game that DH said was going to occur.

 

[JeffConn]

If we look through the lense that Andre is our PG, there really isn't a flaw on this team. Netwon had a rough game -- I actually thought he'd step up like the Oregon game (I view the Ducks and Gators as very similar teams) but it was Joey C the one that stepped up instead (I told friends we needed 12-15 points from one of our guards not Hawk, and Joey C was the man last night). As someone pointed out in another thread, really just need Jackson to get to the rim more -- fine with the 2/5 shooting from 3, but dude needs to be able to score at the hoop to really unlock his game -- because as soon as he starts being able to do that, he'll have the easiest assists of his life to Adama/Cling. Some of his passes last night were NBA quality (not that it's anything new).

There is still a role for Newton on this team -- I think we should take the main distributor role off his plate and let him concetrate on scoring by getting to the hoop and drawing FTs, his biggest strength. If you take a look at the successful UConn teams in the past, Newton could thrive as Bazz to Andre's Kemba or Boat to Andre's Bazz or even Vital to Andre's Gilbert. He can still be a secondary distributor, but the offense needs to run through Andre (which it pretty much is).

Another thing I wanted to chat about was Karaban. Obviously tough game for him with the fouls -- and it's a real shame we don't have Samson (who was still in a boot as of the OK St game btw). Defensively, you are seeing him get exposed against physical teams. Which is normal for most freshman not named Donovan Clingan. (And also like DC he doesn't get the benefit of the doubt as a freshman and gets a lot of meh fouls called on him that in 2 years refs won't call on him. You see this in the NBA with young players and it's just part of officiating in general, baseball too with balls and strikes). Another downside is that he offers pretty limited rim protection, so when paired with Sanogo teams have pretty much a free path to the hoop (which is masked by our elite perimeter D most of the time because guys can't even get to the rim). I think the original gameplan coming into the season of Samson/Adama and Alex/Donovan would be perfect offensive and defensive compliments to each other. If Samson is healthy and able to contribute, it will make us that much more elite on D as he can rim run for Sanogo on D and still stretch the floor on O. When AK is with DC, you have a 7-2 wall if you get beat by your defender.

As wish list items, besides Andre getting to the rim and finishing more, his development of a pull-up jump shot could add another dimension to his game.

 

[jibsey]

As wish list items, besides Andre getting to the rim and finishing more, his development of a pull-up jump shot could add another dimension to his game.

Help me understand something. Andre is a guy who can jump over the backboard, dive 20 feet on the hardwood, hands so fast he could beat Wyatt Earp on the draw BUT, he can’t go up in the air with the ball and lightly flick his wrist toward the basket?

 

[bluestreak]

It was supposed to be a target of off season work that DH talked about after last season - didn't seem to check that box off
DH also said that AS was going to work on his handle around the basket a develop a mid range game - still waiting
He definitely worked on his 3 pt shooting and unlike others I don't mind when he steps out and throws a few up every game.
AS is a huge part of this team but just wish that he showed improvement on the two aspects of his game that DH said was going to occur.

Absolutely. He has to get that into his head in the heat of battle and perfect the move in order for this team to keep growing and get to the next level. Winning in upcoming tournaments.