(Photos courtesy of my friend Jon Monceaux. Thanks Jon!)
I was only able to halfway pay attention to the scrimmage, as I had a two year old to wrangle at the game. But I still have a ton of notes, after my first glimpse of the team. Do keep in mind that this exhibition was used by the coaching staff as a way to get all of the freshmen loads of minutes. I'm sure we'll see a tighter rotation once live bullets start flying on Friday night against William & Mary.
Ready for another bulleted list? I sure am. I always am.
- With Sammy out, it's pretty clear what our best starting five is going to be: Jontel Evans at the point, K.T. Harrell and Mustapha Farrakhan on the wings, Mike Scott and Assane Sene in the frontcourt.
- I think James Johnson could push Sene, but he's not ready to start yet. He's impressive on the boards, but his positioning was often bad and his offense looks like a work in progress. The sky is the limit, but he looks a little bit raw at this point. (Not freshman Assane Sene raw, but maybe freshman Norman Nolan raw.)
- The main rotation will consist of the six players mentioned above, along with Joe Harris, Billy Baron, and Akil Mitchell. I'm sure Will Sherrill will weasel his way in there with his veteran presence.
- The backcourt trio of Bub, K.T., and Mu will be very, very good defensively.
- Assane Sene is MUCH improved. I was very impressed with what he did on Saturday --- he caught the ball well, played sound defense, blocked shots, and actually showed off a few nice low post moves. He played with confidence. I'm now officially excited about the big man heading into this season.
- Jontel Evans is also MUCH improved. At one point he pulled up in rhythm and drained a 15-footer. Silky smooth. That was the single most encouraging thing I saw on Saturday, because if Bub can hit that shot with regularity, defenses will be forced to play him honest.
- On the down side, Bub was sloppy with the ball at times and got a little bit wild in transition. We really need him to be consistently reliable and minimize those mistakes and limit those turnovers..... but honestly, I can live with that stuff as long as they are mistakes of aggression.
- Get ready for Mike Scott to ascend to stardom this season. He looked like the complete package to me on Saturday, including an incredibly nice mid-range jumper and a spin hook that will terrorize defenders. His problem has always been his up-and-down play. Historically, if he wasn't scoring, he wasn't able to play well in any phase of the game. Now that's he's taken on the clear leadership role on this team, I hope he's past that phase of his career. Because if we're not getting rebounds and strong defense from him, we're not going to win.
- I love Mustapha Farrakhan. He plays hard, plays good D, and contributes offensively. However, the Mu I saw on Saturday looked about the same as the Mu I saw at the end of last season. His development might have plateaued.
- Will Regan is a try-hard, blue collar guy. But his role will be minimized this season, I think. He really is like a mirror image of Will Sherrill, maybe a slightly better rebounder.
- Joe Harris is as advertised --- heady, with a shot as sweet as Yoohoo. I was really impressed with him. He's got a career 6th man role firmly in his sniper's sights.
- Billy Baron... I was not impressed with. He was nervous with the ball in his hands. Against lesser competition like Roanoke College, that does not bode well. He made a lot of mistakes in his ballhandling. I think Zeglinski's return could push Baron down the bench in a big way.
- Akil Mitchell was a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand, he didn't really show any discernible skills. He was like a positionless athlete. But on the other hand, his athleticism really is off the charts, and I can see him becoming a great lock-down defender early in his career if he focuses on that part of his game. Also, he's probably the 4th best rebounder (behind Scott, Johnson, and somewhat surprisingly, Sene) on the team, right now. I think he needs to be developed as a power forward, by the way. He's got too much "big" in his game to be playing on the wing. His jumper was a little off on Saturday, but you can tell it's something that will quickly come around.
- I was prepared to be completely awestruck by K.T. Harrell, but I wasn't. He's a good player; sound offensively, solid defensively. But he didn't really wow me at any point in the game. He's got a nice shooting stroke and fits the Bennett systems like a glove, but he didn't look like a freshman superstar to me. I've begun to temper my [admittedly unfairly high] expectations for him this season.
- With veterans (Mike Scott, Mu, Bub, Sene, Sherrill) on the floor, the pack-line looked much improved over last year's version. But when the freshmen came into the game, the holes started to appear. We need these young guys to learn the defense quickly, or it will be picked apart again this season. Harrell and Harris seemed like the most "developed" pack-line defenders of the frosh, so hopefully they'll be 100% ready to go before too long.
- The offense flows through Mike Scott, and benefits from the influx of guys who can knock down a spot-up shot from the perimeter. Farrakhan, Harrell, Harris, Baron, and Sherrill can all excel in that role, and with those numbers it will be easy to find the hot hand and ride it. Once Sammy is back, even better.
- Sometimes I'm overly obsessed with the longview. So I'm already thinking ahead to the 2011-12 season, and how our new recruits -- versatile wing Malcolm Brogdon, shooter Paul Jesperson, and athletic 4 Darion Atkins -- will fit into the team. Farrakhan and Scott are the two big losses to graduation, and I think Brogdon and Atkins are pretty direct replacements for those two. Tony Bennett is getting the program into a recruiting rhythm, and it's looking a lot like what they do at Wisconsin. Lots of shooters, bouncy bigs, and a few explosive guards to stir up the mix.
- I honestly still don't know how good we're going to be this season. Mike Scott is going to be a player. Farrakhan, Harrell, and Zeglinski will be solid parts. Sene, Evans, Johnson, and Harris are all x-factors. If three of those four play well, we could be relatively decent. But I'm prepared for another season in which no wins appear easy.
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