Sorry about the lateness of getting this out. Guests coming this evening so a frenzied day of cleaning. I’m already catching plenty of grief for taking 2+ hours out to watch the game at 4pm on ESPN. But, really, the wife should be used to it.
Georgetown has been a bit of surprise team this year. Not too much was expected from the Hoyas except middle of the pack, bubble team. Lots of youth and John Thompson III has not had his young players do too much in the past. This year, is different. Lots of early contributions and the Hoyas are in the upper quadrant of the Big East.
Tray Woodall being back has the offense looking a lot sharper. The defense still leaves a lot to be desired. Probably going to have to live with that, this late in the season.
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in the 1st game, Shaler beat Lincoln School 57-52, led by JP Holtz’s 14 pts
you tell me if you think they will be haveing bad years there has to be a gage for every thing
can you find a nr that will be grest sure but what would you like on pitt 8 players who are 5 stars and 4 who are 4 stars or 12 players who are 2 stars if you tell me 2 stars you are nuts .
They said he is “under the radar”
VERRRRY INTERESTING kid.
Is this a defensive mechanism kicking in, maybe a bit, but, with Chryst’s track record with 3’s and a few 4’s, I would definitely take that.
Remember, if he wins games, goes to a big bowl and becomes top 20 relevant, i.e. maybe a Pitt-Fla.St game, or a Pitt-Va. Tech game has a little national relevance, we will be getting the bigger star players.
I feel the best about Pitt football than I have in years. Could I (we) get burned again, sure, but I doubt it with this guy.
Also, we’re a resilient bunch, whatever happens, we’ll be here.
I have to say, I’m pretty pumped up right now.
Scout had Darrelle Revis rated as a 3-star player. He was like their 46th best corner, nationally, and was rated their 25th best player just in PA. Rivals also had him as a 3-star corner, in their mid-30’s among national corners. Oops.
Conversely, Bostick was rated relatively higher, which I’ve heard some say was the product of him having a monster year during his HS sophomore season, and neither of the sites ever downgraded him.
Dion Lewis: Scout had him as a three-star RB, ranked 70th nationally at his position. Oops.
Andrew Taglianetti in 2008 was ranked a 2-star CB Scout, who also had him ranked 114th among CB’s nationally. His only other offers were Toledo and Towson. That same class also produced Shayne Hale (Scout 5-star, ranked 3rd-best DE in the country). Again, oops and oops. Who’s been the more productive Division I football player?
I get the point…you’d always rather have a class with more talent that’s expected to do well. But these rankings fail to take into account the type of system a kid is going into, the kid’s ability and – more importantly – DESIRE to be coached up at the next level, and the abilities of the coaches to get him to that level and utilize him correctly.
Here’s one man’s evaluation (mine):
+Great size, tall (7ft ish), long arms, big hands, not a bean pole.
+Moves well, good feet, good lateral movement. Looks and moves like an athlete, not a 7 footer.
+Great hands, can catch in traffic, can grab rebounds and hold them.
+Very good court sense. He lets the game come to him, doesn’t force things, makes few (if any) mistakes. Understands where he needs to be and gets there. Very productive.
+Really, really good passer. Especially on the high post. He consistently hit the open guy.
+Free throw stroke looked really good. Good touch, good follow throw, good rotation, good balance, good results.
+Good on the pick and roll. A couple time he set a ball screen and rolled to the hoop, caught a questionable pass and scored the basket.
+Good natural rebounder. In good position, good hands and did I mention 7 feet tall?
??He seems to lack explosiveness. A good jumper, but not a natural quick leaper (ie Birch). He blocked a few shots, but he wasn’t more than a couple inches off the floor.
??Post moves. Saw a baby hook (missed), but not much else in the post. He had much smaller dudes guarding him, could/should have killed them.
??Defense, hard to tell if he can play great D. He had a couple hedges on the high ball screen that looked text book, but a couple others that were weak. My guess is that Jamie will have him playing good enough, he has the tools. But he is not the kind of shot blocker that Gilbert and Birch are. And a couple times a 6’8″ athlete blew by him like he had his feet in cement.
??Mid range jumper, looked good in warm ups, didn’t try it in the game.
??Intensity, competitiveness. He could have scored 30 if he had asserted himself. There’s a fine line between “letting the game come to you” and “coasting”. My take, he was on the right side of the line, but….
After watching him play one game, I think he’s the best prospect Pitt has had since Charles Smith. He is way ahead of Gilbert and has a lot more to his game than Birch. He is 6 inches taller than Blair.
My gut; he’s not one and done, but probably two and done. It will depend on how quickly he develops some offense or gets stronger, more explosive.
He won’t be a savior for Pitt next year, but he will absolutely contribute a lot. Certainly more than Birch did in the time he was here.
Can’t wait to see him in Greentree.
and we say the coach will coach up that 2 star or that nr and some times they do and this coach is good at it
but if we had 7 players with 5 stars and 3 players with 4 stars we would be danceing in the streets and shouting from the roof tops and you know it.
and we dont so we make the best of it and that is ok but it counts if you do so dont prentend outher wise. may be we will get there in 2 years then we can crow abought it.
There is a rule many DC area sports fans know: never count out a DeMatha team until the final whistle. Behind a lineup filled with four Stag guards, DeMatha began to force turnovers, grab scrappy offensive rebounds and — the main thing — get stops. James Robinson finished with a season-high 25 points and scored 13 of those in the fourth.
If the game plan of Robinson taking over in the paint was instituted after halftime instead of the fourth quarter, DeMatha probably leaves Bender Arena with a solid comeback victory. Robinson is one of the best distributors in the DMV, but he’s also the strongest point guard pound-for-pound. He hit nine of his ten free throws too. He’s going to be an excellent point guard at Pittsburgh, but until then, I’d make him my go to scorer.
Neither Robinson or Adams appear to be from the pampered high school merry-go-round and AAU school. Robinson is a multi-skilled guard from one of the best highschool programs and Adams is a natural athelete of immense size only surpassed by his potential.
I think they are both Jamie Dixon style players with the basketball ability at their position of any program. If given the opportunity to learn from experience getting plenty of minutes in Nov-Jan.(taking so early season losses)Pitt can, I hope, reap the benefit of this recruiting class.
There are obviously limitations to what you can interpret from the games at Greentree, but it can be a good barometer, IMO. Based on that, I would not be surprised to see Durand Johnson make some important contributions next year. He will need to learn to play D and within the confines of the offense, but from what I saw at Greentree last summer, he is athletic, can slash to the rim, and has good range on his jumper.
Looking forward to Greentree already, and hopefully a good run the rest of BE play.
Steve – the simple answer on Durand Johnson, he is a skinny, 18 year old, 6’6″ SF/wing on a team loaded with SF/wings who don’t have a redshirt available and who are physically more mature. Numbers game. FWIW – He is going to be a major contributer during his career, dude can shoot the rock.
Hail to Pitt!
Thus, if anything, Pitt letting go of Geter may have helped.
Dokish doess has have more insider info than we have but he is also a very paasionate fan … which sometimes clouds his judgements (like mots of us).
They played well in the dome. Should have beaten ‘cuse.
Kevin Jones and the big Turk will be tough matchups for us. Jones will eat up Patterson and Robinson.
Not too optimistic.
you have to have some kind of gage in every thing or perhaps ypu want some one with a high school eduction to run pitt. some times i think you just like to argue abought any thing that you can.