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BlueDevil

College Bball Thread

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I don't dispute that Oladipo improved greatly in college. Obviously, to be the number #2 pick in the draft and then become an NBA all-star given he was ranked no better than #136 coming out of high school showed enormous progress. To say Oladipo could barely dribble as a freshman in college is a ridiculous statement.

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1 hour ago, str8baller said:

I’m not going to argue semantics on the word “barely.” But for perspective, as a freshman he averaged 18min a game and was rarely, if ever, the primary ball handler when on the floor. He averaged more turnovers than assists. And that was on a bad 12 win team desperate for a lead guard.  He played a role very similar to the one he did in HS.
 

To go from that to all-pro in the NBA as a playoff team’s lead ball handler* is one helluva an improvement that rarely happens. It’s quite the transformation.  
 

*technically him and Collision split ball handling duties, but it was VO’s ball in crunch time out when they needed a score so I’m designating him as de facto lead guard. 

In fairness it’s not semantics. Vic never had any trouble dribbling, and again he averaged a double double as a guard on the strong Dematha team (and I’ve posted it here bf, a friend who scouted Vic before he picked IU gave me his opinion then that he’d be a star.

Vic was never a primary ball handler, he came in as a 2 or off ball guard, that wasn’t his role. He had high TO’s early bc of his aggressive attacking play and learning to play under control and at the speed of college ball, not bc he was somehow learning how to dribble, come on now.
His offensive game improved all around, including a monster jump in outside shooting, from the 20s to the 40s, but you could see the form in his FT’s, he had all the tools coming in, about as good a recruiting decision as I’ve ever seen

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9 hours ago, HoosierHoopster said:

he averaged a double double as a guard on the strong

Getting ten points and rebounds has nothing to do with ball handling. A weird point to hang your hat on. 

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1 hour ago, str8baller said:

Getting ten points and rebounds has nothing to do with ball handling. A weird point to hang your hat on. 

So are you really arguing Vic could barely dribble? Really? This entire discussion is weird. His “dribble” was fine man 

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On 7/30/2022 at 10:32 PM, HoosierHoopster said:

So are you really arguing Vic could barely dribble? Really? This entire discussion is weird. His “dribble” was fine man 

He was pretty bad with the ball as a frosh. If it were “fine man” he’d have handled the ball as a freshman instead of Verdell (a walking bad decision machine) and Hulls (couldn’t beat anyone off the dribble).  I forgot Jerimiah Rivers was on that team as a ball handler too until I looked it up…lol. 
 

I think the success of the later teams makes people forget how bad that team was. They were awful. I’m curious as to what you think kept him off the floor on a bad team if it weren’t for him being able to handle the ball? 

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43 minutes ago, Loaded Chicken Sandwich said:

Not that it matters really, but Jason Benetti has made the move to Fox Sports 

I think it does matter. Jason Benetti is AWESOME.

Would love for him to do big games on FOX and FS1. 

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3 hours ago, Class of '66 Old Fart said:

Rothstein - Minnesota's Isaiah Inhen will undergo knee surgery and miss the 22-23 season, per release. Brutal news. Inhen missed all of last season with an injury to the same knee.

Hate to see that happen to anyone. Memories of Maurice Creek, one of the highest scoring freshman before his first knee injury.

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1 hour ago, Loaded Chicken Sandwich said:

Hot take(maybe? I don't know)

Eastern Michigan is a dark horse to win the MAC IF, and only IF Emoni Bates can play even remotely close to his hype. 

There are guys in the MAC who don't belong in D-1. If Bates is anywhere close to his hype, EMU would probably win it easily. 

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8 hours ago, Class of '66 Old Fart said:

Rothstein - Minnesota's Isaiah Inhen will undergo knee surgery and miss the 22-23 season, per release. Brutal news. Inhen missed all of last season with an injury to the same knee.

Such a demoralizer to miss two straight seasons. Hopefully he can bounce back. 

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2 hours ago, TheWatShot said:

There are guys in the MAC who don't belong in D-1. If Bates is anywhere close to his hype, EMU would probably win it easily. 

I remember the EMU forum last year... And then remember how close that game came to Archie Era 2.0... it'll be interesting to see how he does but man... He just wasn't ready for organized basketball. 

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Trying not to be hyperbolic here, but this may be the single bone-stupidest basketball take I have ever read. Yeah, what fan of the game wants to be subjected to beautifully run 4-out motion with all sorts of cool little wrinkles?
Are you insane?!?

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21 hours ago, str8baller said:

He was pretty bad with the ball as a frosh. If it were “fine man” he’d have handled the ball as a freshman instead of Verdell (a walking bad decision machine) and Hulls (couldn’t beat anyone off the dribble).  I forgot Jerimiah Rivers was on that team as a ball handler too until I looked it up…lol. 
 

I think the success of the later teams makes people forget how bad that team was. They were awful. I’m curious as to what you think kept him off the floor on a bad team if it weren’t for him being able to handle the ball? 

No, Vic wasn’t a point, that’s the point. And he wasn’t kept off the floot?? Did you even watch those teams? I’m sorry but this is ridiculous 

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3 hours ago, Demo said:

Trying not to be hyperbolic here, but this may be the single bone-stupidest basketball take I have ever read. Yeah, what fan of the game wants to be subjected to beautifully run 4-out motion with all sorts of cool little wrinkles?
Are you insane?!?

Hmmm... Mine would be... Villanova would never have won another championship if the Big East didn't break up. And realignment has GREATLY hurt college basketball. 

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8 hours ago, HoosierHoopster said:

No, Vic wasn’t a point, that’s the point. And he wasn’t kept off the floot?? Did you even watch those teams? I’m sorry but this is ridiculous 

Yes. Every game, unfortunately.  I think you’ve lost the plot somewhere. You just admitted “Vic wasn’t a point.” (Yet, he turned into one in the pro’s…hhhmmm). Now think about it and ask yourself “why?” I think you’ll figure it out pretty quickly. 
 

Here’s a hint: it wasn’t because Verdell Jones and Austin Rivers were good point guards who took care of the ball. 

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2 hours ago, str8baller said:

 I think you’ve lost the plot somewhere.

This all began with the ridiculous statement that Victor Oladipo could barely dribble when he arrived at IU. No one disputes that he greatly improved over his three years in college--arguably as much as any IU player in memory. But the initial statement that he could barely dribble is a ridiculous point for anyone to try to defend. It would have been better to admit that it was a gross exaggeration meant to underscore the point that he improved rather than to try to defend the indefensible.

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