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OT: Bryce Hopkins big man on Providence campus: leads in mins, shots taken and made, points and rebounds.

Hopkins is the guy who should be our starting 4 this season.

Cal really mishandled him last year. First, by stubbornly playing him at the wrong position. And then by seeming to completely forget about him after he started really showing promise. Hopkins completely saved our asses in that LSU game … and his reward for it was for Cal to never play him again. Made no sense at all.
 
Hopkins is the guy who should be our starting 4 this season.

Cal really mishandled him last year. First, by stubbornly playing him at the wrong position. And then by seeming to completely forget about him after he started really showing promise. Hopkins completely saved our asses in that LSU game … and his reward for it was for Cal to never play him again. Made no sense at all.
he was lazy
 
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They played #24 TCU. Pretty good team, AND Miami, whom is 9-1. Did you even look at the schedule??
Rider, Northeastern, Stonehill, Saint Louis, Merrimack, Columbia, Rhode Island, and Manhattan are the others. So yes they have had an easy schedule. Miami isn’t good.
 
Exactly.

That’s what baffles me. Is he played that way at Memphis and Umass. The “dribble drive motion offense” actually kinda works when you have that athletic, skilled guard/SG/SF oriented basketball with no true big man unless they are a specialist and only gets garbage points…not tuning the O through them.

Then suddenly he went away from how he use to do things and it can strictly about size and PF/C Heavy lineups and playing through them
Ironically he usually had 2-3 wings built like tanks...like Thiero.
 
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The impression you’re under appears to be a mistaken one regarding when Wiltjer played CBB. He was still playing for Gonzaga in 2016 and doing extremely well there:

Oh, apologizes for failing to mention that where i was mentioned was when he transfered to Zaga...
Witjer was 6 years ago.
Sacha Jones, Jemarl Baker, Devin Askew, Camron Fletcher, Quade Green, Dontaie Allen, Johnny Juzang are all more recent examples and ones I defer too to gauge how much I want to whine about them being disserviced here.
 
Could I get a gibberish to English translation of this sentence?

I’ve no clue what you’re trying to say here. A poster said he had an AA season. You responded by saying that was 2014. You were wrong. It’s that simple.
And I responded to you saying that I failed to mention that I meant 2014 as when he transferred there? This is really fun and beneficial for everyone involved, shall we keep going?
 
Crazy thing is “positionless” could actually work if it was small ball centric…. The GSW are essentially a “positionless” basketball team w small ball Draymond that’s capable of handling the ball to drive and can knock down wide open shots respectably enough.

You just can’t play “positionless” with a roster of 4s and 5s that lack ‘all around fundamental game’ plus 1 complete guard and 1 “go stand in the corner” shooter

If you want to be positionless it has to be a roster full of SKILLED 6’3- 6’8 PG-PFs at the 1-4 at minimum and then you can have a max of 1 true big man as a shot blocker or rebound machine

Yup. And we could play that lineup a couple different ways.

And Cal never does it. Because 1995 New York Knicks.

Oscar
Toppin or Livingston
Reeves or Theiro
CJ, Reeves or Wallace
Wallace
 
I will also sadly point out 2015 where Cal insisted on playing bigs at the 3 instead of playing much with 3 guards...Duke midseason moved Winslow from the 3 to the 4 and they took off. He was the same size if not a little smaller.
because Duke had a real "coach" that knew how to make adjustments instead of only 1 way
 
Most of you guys never cease to amaze me. Hopkins played one good game last year. Calipari gave him plenty of chances to play. When he played, he would usually fumble the ball away, make some other mistake or take bad shots.
Cal kept him on the bench because that's where he belonged. You're mad at Cal because Hopkins is playing decently for a small-time school like Providence. The competition he is facing now is nowhere near as tough as he would face for the most part if he had stayed at Kentucky.

It's not Cal's fault if the kid realized he needed to play in a weaker conference. I'm glad he is playing better. The team has not been negatively affected by his loss.

You try to blame Cal for everything. Most of us are very critical of Collins. If he transfers next year and plays a little better, a lot of you will use that as an excuse to bash Cal.
 
It is interesting how the stats for Hopkins are looked at with little regard--"Because he hasn't played against good competition" this season.

yet--the UK 82ppg scoring is viewed as wonderful and terrific and a sign of a UK team ready to score over 80ppg for the season---yet 3 cup cake games averaged 99ppg--while 5 reasonable teams the scoring is 72ppg---mediocre at best.

Just an interesting observation how some are inclined to degrade one, while pretending the other is so good.

rr
 
Honestly, I think Cal should have been trying to get him back. He would do very well as the 4 instead of Toppin here. Just my opinion.
 
Hopkins is the guy who should be our starting 4 this season.

Cal really mishandled him last year. First, by stubbornly playing him at the wrong position. And then by seeming to completely forget about him after he started really showing promise. Hopkins completely saved our asses in that LSU game … and his reward for it was for Cal to never play him again. Made no sense at all.
And he did that ("save our asses" in the LSU game) at the 3 with Toppin at the 4 (LOL)
 
Replace Hopkins with Thiero and you have a 2023-24 headline.
You could be right, I hope not. I think Cal is hedging his bet here that between his relationship with Theiro's dad AND that he came in as a 3* not expecting to play much, that it buys him at least a year. But if he can play (good) then play him, or at least give him a chance. It's not like Fredrick is doing anything.
 
Cal would be playing him at the 3 here again so not a big loss.

Cal’s team building is so lopsided. He’s always 2-3 guards short and 2-3 bigs heavy, which kills our rotation, offense and defense. Next year we could possibly have 5 centers on roster. It’s absurd.

Hopkins and Livingston are modern 4s. Playing them as 3s neuters them. Same thing he did to Lyles.
Somehow he’s a master of getting five star big men that look like they have never played basketball or ones like Collins who break at the first sign of a mild wind.
 
Cal doesn't build rosters. We used to say he just took the best recruits available, and that he was just going to out-talent everyone. Then he started with his positionless basketball garbage, and he hasn't looked back sense. He will literally put a big anywhere on the court.
I wish he would go back to building a roster like he did in 1996 then. If he wants to play rock fights at least have a team where everyone can actually play the position you need them too. I’m sick of seeing Collins or Ware in for 15 minutes a game floating around and maybe grabbing a rebound or two and being no other factor in the game.
 
Rider, Northeastern, Stonehill, Saint Louis, Merrimack, Columbia, Rhode Island, and Manhattan are the others. So yes they have had an easy schedule. Miami isn’t good.
Miami is a NET & Kenpom top 50 team, actually watch some games.
 
Most of you guys never cease to amaze me. Hopkins played one good game last year. Calipari gave him plenty of chances to play. When he played, he would usually fumble the ball away, make some other mistake or take bad shots.
Cal kept him on the bench because that's where he belonged. You're mad at Cal because Hopkins is playing decently for a small-time school like Providence. The competition he is facing now is nowhere near as tough as he would face for the most part if he had stayed at Kentucky.

It's not Cal's fault if the kid realized he needed to play in a weaker conference. I'm glad he is playing better. The team has not been negatively affected by his loss.

You try to blame Cal for everything. Most of us are very critical of Collins. If he transfers next year and plays a little better, a lot of you will use that as an excuse to bash Cal.
Check out this drivel. Good Lord. Same BS, over and over.
 
I wish he would go back to building a roster like he did in 1996 then. If he wants to play rock fights at least have a team where everyone can actually play the position you need them too. I’m sick of seeing Collins or Ware in for 15 minutes a game floating around and maybe grabbing a rebound or two and being no other factor in the game.

Yup. That's why these guys leave and find more success. Bryce Hopkins was never going to be a 3. Collins will never be a 4.
 
No they aren't. Having strength to move people off the block is just as valuable as length. Notice how Collins gets bullied? His blocks come from weak side. Both Hopkins and Livingston would thrive as face up fours where their first steps are valuable, not asking them to drive from the 3pt line. By playing them as their natural position you use their assets, by playing them on the perimeter you negate them, it is that simple. And the shooting % comment is nonsensical, he is getting more open shots because the spacing is better.
Great post you clearly get the game, some just play it on a video game, there in lies the constant Cal slurpers. ANYONE that knows squat about the game knows Hopkins passed the eye test bigtime and probably played against a guy like that. Dudes like that are awfully tough to guard and sure he needed to drop a few pounds but bluntly his body type is a real asset to him overall, Cal just refused to allow him to play to his strengths.
 
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