Just a simple thing as not playing a guy can make a world of difference. I saw a Dustin Thomas tonight with a sense of urgency, and not trying to be laid back and cool all the time. He took his open shots, took advantage of mismatches, ran the floor well, and played solid defense. That’s all we need him to do. Only criticism is those illegal screens, he’s gotta work on holding it a little longer, but other than that, this looks like the Dustin Thomas I was excited about when I heard he first was transferring here. If we can get this outta him every night the rest of the way I still like our chances to make some noise in March.
I think those screen calls were more of a ref quota deal.
He has those runs where he plays D, rebounds, runs the floor and scores 6 points in 4 minutes.
If you didn’t know anything about our team and watched his spurts, you’d think he was a 20 point 10 rebound guy.
Then he disappears.
But somewhere in that guy is a good college 4, who could consistently be 10 point, 7 rebound guy. Man, if he could do that to end the season, it would really help
GHG
Agreed. Have you ever seen him shooting in warm-ups? Dude can stroke it as well. That’s why I’m shocked he’s only taken 1 three this year. He can legit cause match-up problems with his ability to stretch the floor and handle the ball, but for some reason he turns down open shots and decides to play passive most of the time. Nolan Richardson talks about Thomas every time they ask him about the team, he’s like his favorite player. But, for some reason Thomas only plays in spurts. He’ll show a flashes then completely disappear. I hope that DNP, was a wake-up call and he plays with this urgency the rest of the season.
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen one player get 3 in one game. Pretty impressive.
It seems like illegal screens are a lot like holding in football. You could almost call one on practically every halfcourt set. It’s rare three are called in a game much less one player getting the hat trick.
I like Dustin and pray that he can consistently play to his potential because he is actually pretty good at times. He could be a difference in the rest of our season if he could compliment Gafford better by rebounding, hitting the 15 footer shots that pull a big out on him, and his hustle is quite good.