UNI Exhibitions

[valleychamp]

Again, you looking solely at minutes played last year. These guys haven't played a ton of minutes, but they are ready to go.

Coming into last season, Marc Sonnen, Anthony James, and Jake Koch had played a combined 0 minutes. And they were (other than O'Rear) the best players we had on our bench.

[Khan4Cats]

Yeah, because UNI has never had any success with undersized post players.

Eric Coleman? 6'6"
David Gruber? 6'6"
Joe Breakenridge? 6'6"

I guess I don't have to be really worried if you don't think our posts will take care of business or not, we'll find out soon enough.

Lucas O'Rear will be Lucas O'Rear. Fouls could be an issue, might not be, depends on if he gets any senior treatment from Valley refs or not. Either way, he will draw as many fouls from getting inside the heads of opponents as he commits and we still only need him to give 20-25 high-energy minutes a night.

Jake Koch has grown and is closer to 6'10" himself this year and has gotten much stronger. He is still learning to play inside offensively but can hold his own defensively (he was second on the team in blocks last year). His offensive game may turn out to be more like former UNI player Matt Schneiderman than his brother (more of an outside threat), but he showed last year that he can make things happen and in the exhibitions has shown a burst to take balls to the rim for dunks if he gets a seem whereas his brother seemed to go for more lay ups unless he was completely clear. His upside appears higher than his brother and he is only a sophomore.

The third post will the true freshman Chip Rank. A lot of previews described him as an energy guy like O'Rear and he has shown a nose for going after the ball on the boards as well as loose balls, though not as vocal or demonstrative as Lucas. Still learning the team defensive concepts we use, but is much better offensively than O'Rear with range out to three with a soft touch and excellent free throw touch.

Our 4th post, and last year was really the 1st year we used a true 4th post regularly, Austin Pehl is a legitimate 6'10" and much more athletic than Eglseder. He runs very well (competed in the state track 400 meters and 4x400 teams in HS). There is questions as to his scoring ability, but that is not what he will be asked to do. Rebounding, playing good defense. Those will be his responsibilities and I think he will be fine.
He battled the last two years in practice with Eglseder and O'Rear and has the battle scars from it.

If we go smaller, Kerwin Dunham plays at the 4, a position he played as a freshman and sophomore but not as much last year. Tyler Lange is a 6'6" redshirt freshman who could give minutes as a 4 as well, but is more of a strong 3/practice player.

As was noted, our guard court will be fine with Sonnen and James both having earned significant minutes towards the end of the year last year. Both are capable of filling it up from outside and offer differing but tenacious styles of defense. Sonnen is bigger and stronger, capable of handling bigger guards, AJ is lightning quick and plays inside the opponents' jersey. Morrison will see limited time as the 6th guard, but reminds several long-time followers I have talked to of Darian Devries.

So, yes, depth will be there. How well we gel early may be a question, but I expect to see line change substitutions all year again in order to just wear opponents down with pressure on the defensive side of the ball. We may not light up the scoreboard by going up and down, but we will grind games out all year. May not be pretty, but has been proven to be effective.

[jayball]

Again, you looking solely at minutes played last year. These guys haven't played a ton of minutes, but they are ready to go.

While you guys do have some solid bench guys from last year coming back to join Kwadzo and Moran, you'll have to forgive most MVC fans for taking a wait and see approach. Are O'Rear, Baby Koch and Dunham ready to be full time starters? Will they be as effective in that role as the three that left? Sonnen and James got some minutes last year, but they are going to have to play a much bigger role this year. I think Sonnen will probably be pretty solid. Your post guys behind ORear and Koch are newbies. They could be great, ...who knows yet...but they will be competeing against some pretty good players at others schools with more experience. The benefit you guys probably have is your team defense. If the players still buy into that, UNI will be in most games and it will give you more time develop offensive roles for the new line ups.

We don't have a ton of experience (minutes wise) on the bench but they are all ready to go. Jake simply wouldn't be playing them if they weren't.

Who else would Jake be playing?

Most teams have new line ups or new roles to figure out. You can't just say....they are all ready to go.

No one knows who is ready for what.

[unipanther99]

While one (or maybe two) UNI posters have been defending UNI's bench productivity this upcoming season, those same posters have said they expect a top 3-4 finish for the Panthers. So I don't really know what we are arguing about here, as that's where most generally expect UNI to fall this year.

UNI has a great deal to prove this year with the loss of 3 important players, but I think it would be a mistake to summarily dismiss them.

[jayball]

99

I'm not really trying to argue or summarily dismiss UNI. I just responding to some of valleychamp's posts that seem to indidcate everyone on UNI's squad is "ready to go". Some UNI fans are realistic with the wait and see approach. Champ seems to want everyone to agree that all players on UNI's team will be great.

UNI could be great, could be good, or could struggle a bit to replace 3 great players.

[valleychamp]

Again, you looking solely at minutes played last year. These guys haven't played a ton of minutes, but they are ready to go.

While you guys do have some solid bench guys from last year coming back to join Kwadzo and Moran, you'll have to forgive most MVC fans for taking a wait and see approach. Are O'Rear, Baby Koch and Dunham ready to be full time starters? Will they be as effective in that role as the three that left? Sonnen and James got some minutes last year, but they are going to have to play a much bigger role this year. I think Sonnen will probably be pretty solid. Your post guys behind ORear and Koch are newbies. They could be great, ...who knows yet...but they will be competeing against some pretty good players at others schools with more experience. The benefit you guys probably have is your team defense. If the players still buy into that, UNI will be in most games and it will give you more time develop offensive roles for the new line ups.

We don't have a ton of experience (minutes wise) on the bench but they are all ready to go. Jake simply wouldn't be playing them if they weren't.

Who else would Jake be playing?

Most teams have new line ups or new roles to figure out. You can't just say....they are all ready to go.

No one knows who is ready for what.

You guys have to realize, we are not saying that this group is going to win 30 games again. We are just saying that they are ready to play and they are going to be solid players. If you read my other posts, I have already said I think this team may struggle early, but get better as the season progresses. It will take time for those guys to get used to their new starting roles, and for our young posts to get some game reps. But once they do, we have a chance to be pretty good.

Who else would Jake play? He doesn't have to play 10 guys. If the guys on the bench aren't ready to play, they aint gonna play. We aren't playing 10 guys just to play 10 guys. We are doing it because they are good players and they bring something positive to our team.

[valleychamp]

99

I'm not really trying to argue or summarily dismiss UNI. I just responding to some of valleychamp's posts that seem to indidcate everyone on UNI's squad is "ready to go". Some UNI fans are realistic with the wait and see approach. Champ seems to want everyone to agree that all players on UNI's team will be great.

UNI could be great, could be good, or could struggle a bit to replace 3 great players.

What? How are you getting that from what I have posted?

I have continually said that I expect this team to win around 20 games, and finish in the top 3-4. Nobody has said this is a great team.

[jayball]

I was mostly referring to the lines I quoted, but I wasn't taking previous posts into consideration or context. Maybe it just seemed like you were overhyping the new guys more than you were. We are all guilty of that a bit at the beginning of the year.

I now understand your comment about Jake playing 10 guys because he thinks they can all contribute. Reading it that way changes the tone I thought you were using.

At CU we are also hoping to get better as the year goes on with the new system and The Muchacho Grande.

I would expect UNI to be ahead of us defensively since we were absolutely awful at it last year and you were pretty good.

[Aargh]

I was surprised to see UNI credited with "very experienced" guards and backups ready to go in the front court. I did a bit of research and couldn't agree with that analysis. I thought there should be some discussion instead of just leaving what looked inaccurate to potentially mislead some Valley fans who might not have the time to do the research.

I think UNI will have a good team this year, but I think depth will be a factor that prevents UNI from having a great team. I'm thinking 4th place because CU, wth Echinique, gets my nod for 3rd, even though CU has about a total lack of depth in the front court. CU's starters up front look like one of the top 2 front courts in the Valley this year. UNI's front court starters do not.

To put even more perspective on my posts, I've got UNI beating WSU in McLeod, and I don't have WSU losing many road games, so I have a significant amout of r4espect for UNI's team this year.

[WSUbballer]

I'm kinda with Aargh and jayball on this one. From the looks of the UNI roster, there aren't many newcomers that are game-ready, simply based on the numbers. Depth seems to be a concern on paper.

However, with UNI continually moving past that, thanks to some good coaching, it's hard to slight the Panthers until they break. For two years, people have been doubting them (me included). It's really hard to knock on them until they actually do fall.