Stephen Oh - AccuScore Analyst

The NCAA Season starts with a mega-clash of Tennessee vs. Memphis, with a duel of potential All-Americans, Chris Lofton, Chris Douglas-Roberts, and Joey Dorsey.  What’s that?  It’s Tennessee-Martin, not Tennessee?

Whoops.  Honest mistake.

So the College Basketball Season will technically start on November 5th, but the really meaningful action won’t begin until December.  Even when great teams match-up early it often doesn’t have any impact long-term.  Remember when Kansas beat Florida in November of last year?  How did their seasons end?

Here’s what I’m looking forward to in the 2007-2008 College Basketball Season.

WHO WILL BE IN THE FINAL FOUR?
After a confusing, upset-laden 2005-2006 season where George Mason made the Final Four and the best players in the country were, gulp, Adam Morrison and JJ Redick, things got back to normal in 2006-2007.  We had the most talented teams making it into Regional Finals and the most talented team, Florida, repeating.  We have truly great players making All-American Teams and winning post-season Awards.

I think the 2006-2007 trend will continue with the best teams rising to the top. 

NORTH CAROLINA
Brandon Wright was a great player in his one year, but I think UNC will be better off with having Tyler Hansbrough be THE MAN in the middle for the team.  In modern day college basketball you don’t need All-Americans at every position.  This team would get caught up in making sure every player was happy with the number of touches they got last year.  This year they have the floor leader in Ty Lawson, a potential 18 ppg perimeter scorer in Wayne Ellington and the guy you pass to first in the half-court sets, Tyler Hansbrough.  Nice and simple.  Stars are happy, role players know their role.

KANSAS
Julian Wright was their best player last year, but like UNC, I think Kansas will be better off with fewer options on offense, plus Sophomore Darrell Arthur should be a beast this year.  If you saw the Florida-Kansas game last year, you would definitely have thought Arthur was as good or better than any of the Big Men playing in that game.  Brandon Rush has a lot more talent (offensively and defensively) than his older brothers (JaRon Rush from UCLA, Kareem Rush), but he doesn’t seem to have their confidence.  If Rush plays with a little more attitude and confidence the Jayhawks will be better off than him playing so much “team basketball”.

UCLA
That’s right, three straight years to the Final Four.  They lost Arron Afflalo who was good enough to get UCLA into the Final 4, but never good enough to handle the defense of Corey Brewer.  Every great team from last season lost talent so UCLA is not any worse off than anyone else in this area.  They are still loaded with Darren Collison, Josh Shipp, Luc Richart Mbah a Moute (who doesn’t look like he’ll develop into a star, just a solid 9 pt, 9 reb guy), and of course freshman Kevin Love.  When I first heard descriptions about Love, I was worried that he would be the next Raef LaFrentz, who, when healthy, was a solid rebounding, shot blocking PF/C who could hit from the perimeter, but obviously UCLA fans expect Love to be more than LaFrentz.  I’m not sure if UCLA fans want Love to be great enough to go to the NBA next year, or be just good enough to contribute this year, but clearly need at least 2 seasons in college.

TENNESSEE
The team struggled when Chris Lofton hurt his ankle.  When he’s healthy he is the best shooter in the country and he can nail shots when it counts most.  The first time I really paid attention to him was that great game against Texas where he his a couple huge three’s over the outstretched arms of Kevin Durant.  He couldn’t even see the basket, but he still nailed the shot from 25 feet.  The team has some injuries and suspensions on the frontline so I don’t expect them to be playing their best ball until the 2nd half of the season, when it counts most.

Some notable teams ranked higher than Tennessee that I don’t have making the Final Four include:

GEORGETOWN – While every great team lost players, I think Jeff Greene’s departure will be especially painful because of his value in every area of the game.  Roy Hibbert will be an All-American, but the guards turn the ball over too much.

MEMPHIS – I don’t like the lack of competition in Conference USA.  They do have some good competition on the schedule (Georgetown, USC, Arizona, and Tennessee), but with the exception of Tennessee all these tough games are at the start of the season.  The season may only be 4 months long, but there is a world of difference between starting fast and ending fast.  Memphis needs to play tougher competition heading into the tournament for them to be properly battle tested.

LOUISVILLE – They have a deep team that plays that Pitino defense.  This is more a personal bias.  I watched Louisville 8 times last year and it seems like they would radically alternate between looking great and looking bad.  I must have gone 0-8 on Louisville point spreads because just when I thought they sucked, they’d win. When I thought they’d be good, the sucked.  If they play up to their potential, are consistent and hit three pointers (so vital to Pitino’s offense) then they are a Final Four team, but after getting burned so much last year I can’t put them in my Final Four.

WHICH PLAYERS WILL MAKE AN IMPACT NEXT YEAR IN THE NBA?
Every year I like to imagine what top College Players will ultimately be like in the NBA. What is there upside and downside?  Who will they resemble at the next level?

For example, I’m interested to see if Kevin Durant will be a combo of Tracy McGrady (without the ball-handling) and Kevin Garnett (without the interior toughness) or will he be the next Glenn Robinson.  Remember, the Big Dog was the clear #1 pick over Jason Kidd and Grant Hill and was the best college basketball scorer I saw in the 15 years prior to Durant.  I’m definitely leaning towards the Durant is a superstar and not another big Dog.

I speculated that maybe Joakhim Noah could be like Andrei Kirilenko (without the crying).  Like Kirilenko, the perimeter shot is not going to be reliable, but he could end up consistently grabbing 8-10 rebounds, blocking 2 shots, getting 2 steals, and scoring 10-14 pts.

I’m taking a look at this year’s top players and am disappointed with what I see.  I’m looking forward to one or more of these guys proving me wrong, and not only dominating college basketball, but also making a meaningful impact in the NBA someday.

TYLER HANSBROUGH
Strong, relentless player.  A little undersized.  Clear All-American capable of averaging 20 and 10 at North Carolina.  I love his work ethic and his game at this level, but I can’t help but be reminded of another UNC Power Forward who played a similar style and got similar accolades at this level --- J.R. Reid.  Reid played a lot of years in the NBA, but somehow went from being a 6-10 monster in college to a 6-8 tweener in the NBA.  You gotta love when the college media guides add 2 inches and 20 lbs to your big men.

CHRIS LOFTON
Kind of reminds of Michigan State’s Shawn Respert and NC State’s Rodney Monroe - two undersized shooting guards that put up huge numbers in college, that I really liked in college, but couldn’t come close to panning out in the NBA.  Ultimately, lack of size will keep Lofton from making an impact in the NBA.

DARREN COLLISON
I love his speed and his ability to hit from the perimeter.  I think this guy will actually pan out big time in the NBA.  There aren’t any PGs that he immediately reminds me of and maybe that’s why I think he’ll pan out.  Most speedsters can’t shoot or are too wild.  Let me think on this one for a while…

JOEY DORSEY
The comparisons to Ben Wallace are obvious.  After the way he talked tough about Greg Oden, and then did nothing against Ohio State, he may not have the humility to work on his game and make a huge NBA impact.  I usually love great rebounders like Paul Millsap for the Jazz, but I don’t like them when they think they’re the man before proving it.

ROY HIBBERT
I think he’s better than Eric Montross, but he does remind me of the former #1 High School Player in the country.  Montross had decent touch in the post, just like Hibbert has developed.  Hibbert is bigger and is a better defender than Montross was.  If he continues to work on his stamina and strength then he could average 10 pts, 10 rebounds, 2 blocks for 10 years in the NBA.

OJ MAYO
I only saw him play 3 high school All-American games.  I don’t think I saw him make a single jumper.  While people bring up LeBron comparisons, he reminds me of another Cleveland Cavalier – Larry Hughes.  We’re talking a guy who might score 18 pts if you give him 20 shots.  He can’t hit an open jumper consistently.  He could get steals, but that is not the same thing as being a great defender.  He’s fairly athletic, but nothing that will make your jaw drop.

CHASE BUDINGER
I was actually impressed when I saw him play on an incredibly disappointing Arizona team last year.  I usually do a good job of avoiding white-to-white comparisons (you know how white players are usually compared to other white players no matter how different their games might be) or black-to-black.  You’ll see that I compared Hansbrough to J.R. Reid and Roy Hibbert to Eric Montross, but I’m going to do the white-to-white comparison with Budinger.  I think he’s a better shooting Mike Dunleavy.  Dunleavy was supposed to be a great shooter, but he’s only a good shooter.  Budinger is also more athletic, but not as tall.  Maybe, I should compare him to Rex Chapman?

FINAL THOUGHTS UNTIL THE REAL SEASON BEGINS
Early season tournaments can be exciting to watch, but ultimately they rarely have any long-term impact.  Great teams will lose early, bad teams will win early.  So until the real action starts in January, I’ll sign off.  That is, unless my Maryland Terps actually look good on any level.

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Stephen Oh's Momma said:

Steve, Get back in this house before I switch you. You know you cannot be writing nonsense like that until you can use logic and common sense. Tennesse is a pretender not a contender.

November 06, 2007

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