I know Coach Muss like to play with a rotation of 7 and a half. That is what he says anyway.
But as we move ahead, I just don’t see how he plays less than 9. Of the 9 that saw significant minutes last night who is left out of the 7.5? It’s a good problem to have, obviously. I don’t see him running players in and out like Nolan or Mike…but it certainly seems to me that Muss will wind up playing all 9 of those kids quite alot. Maybe 7 more than the other 2…whomever the “other” two wind up being. But I suspect we will see 9 players consistently get double digit minutes.
I think it will the makeup of those 7.5 will change from game to game depending on matchups and who is playing the best defense against type opponents they are playing. He has a lot of choices which is great. To be in the 7.5 for the night, they will have to know and be able to execute the game plan on BOTH ends of the floor. This coach is a stickler to ever detail. Do those and playing time will come
I agree. I think 9 stand out and I’d be surprised with any of them not getting minutes. The 3 sr transfers, the 3 freshmen minus Devo, Connor, Notae and Desi. In an ordinary year Devo would get good minutes but he and Ethan could be odd men out unless we have injuries which always could happen.
It’s too bad we don’t have any returning (top) SEC players. No center, forward, or guard. Pretty much, all new; inexperienced, and never had played together before. Even UK is more “mature” than this.
True, if you are calling (top SEC) players, top 20-25 players (Joe and Jones). However, IMO, the depth of this team more than makes up for the loss. Last year we had a top 30-35 player in Whitt and a solid SEC player in Desi to go along with Joe and Jones. We had no other players that could be called a “solid” SEC player. Bailey might be considered fringe.
This season we have what I would call 9 “solid” SEC caliber players. We have 3 or 4 in the top 25-50 in the SEC ,category and another 5 or 6 in the “solid” SEC player category. In our top 9 players, we also have 3 players who are in their 2nd year of practicing together in CEM’s offensive and defensive systems. That’s Desi, Notae, and Connor.
With our top 2 stars, we went 7-11 in the SEC. IMO, we will do much better than that with this team (barring major injuries).
Don’t get me wrong, if Joe and Jones, or even just Joe had come back, we would be considerably better. But, I still believe we will be a top 5 SEC team.
I thought Devo looked solid, no turnovers, good passing, clever offense inside, and great effort. More athletic and quicker than I thought. Hope we see a lot of him this year.
It’s going to come down to playing defense in critical situations to determine which 7.5 or 9 or whatever gets solid minutes. Aside from the transfers, Desi, probably Williams and Moody we will see how the rest fill up the minutes when league play starts.
after watching ONE game, it appears Desi, Jackson and Smith are our solid top 3.
Moody had a decent game, so did Davis, although he didn’t get many minutes. Jaylin played very composed and looked like he belonged, a nice start.
KK looked great to me. Connor looked great, you all know how much I’ve looked forward to him playing for us, since he and his brothers were on the same neighborhood swim team with my sons! I’m not objective about him, so I’ll just say that I loved his debut.
Notae was up and down, but I think we all expect him to be solid. I was a little surprised how much Tate played, but he was solid. Henderson played well in mop up duty.
our team D was slack a handful of times, and a couple sloppy passes, and Muss will beat that in to the players…but man, overall, for a first game, with that many new faces, man I was very impressed. can’t wait to watch us play UTA and at Tulsa.
This looks like it may be our best team since Bobby P left.