Our recruiting class for next season has no excellent big man. All of our future seasons will end just like tonight. 1967 and 1968 had Big E and Ken Spain. 1982-1984 had Akeem, Drexler, Mr Mean et al. No Final Fours again until Big Man talent is signed.
Gotham (transfer eligible next year) and Roberts have size. Massive big men are not absolutely required in college basketball these days. We were 1-2 foul calls away from winning that game.
I would be more concerned about replacing Corey’s production next year.
The Coogs desperately need more offensive consistency from the bigs. Brady just never seemed to be able to put it together on both ends. The rest of our bigs are decent at defense but have no offense. UH needs a decent big on both sides of the floor. He doesn’t have to be a giant either just good size and dependable.
Gorham is more of a 4. The coaches seem to love him. Alley needs to take the next step at the 4 as well.
Gresham and Harris are the only pure 5s next year. But if Gorham can rebound and D, I bet he and Fabian play the 4 and 5.
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Who knows what we will look like next season? Who knows who will be coaching? The past two (2) years were great! Go Coogs !!!
Jeremy Branham tweeted that Jaedon Ledee entered his name in the transfer portal today. 6’9 230 freshman from Kinkaid, is transferring from Ohio State. He knows Cedrick Alley and another UH player. I hope he strongly considers coming home.
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talked about him in the transfer thread…we’ll be the favorite for him…but note ledee isnt a true big
He didn’t RS a year did he.
This is a normal Cal team his teams are normally ultra talented ultra long and have size at every position. They are one of the hardest match ups for anyone not just us.
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Really? Cmon now. You can argue that you’d want to see an a Armoni shot at the end but I really don’t see all of the complaining about Davis’ play at the end of the game.
Davis got past his defender and had an open lane to the basket. There was zero help defense. We just didn’t get the finish. That happens. That was the play Sampson absolutely drew up.
No part of this loss was due to Davis trying to do too much. We lost for two very simple reasons. We couldn’t limit our fouls in key situations and we allowed too many offensive rebounds. That’s where the difference was.
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Flipping between games last night… there was a definite difference in the way the two games were officiated. But I don’t blame the refs for our loss despite being concerned about them throughout the season. KY shut us down and we ran out of time. We lost a close one to a good team WITH their best player on the court while he carried his limpy-limp drama purse along. Sure would’ve liked to have seen us go up against Auburn with only 2 days of preparation.
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I don’t think he was ever hurt. There was no evidence of it at all. No discomfort shown, no winching in pain, no labored effort running, no change to his game whatsoever. Smoke screen.
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Hey guys, UK fan here. Not here to troll. Just here to say mad respect and great game last night. Davis had a bit of an off night, but the other kid killed us from deep. You guys hold your head up high, and sorry if any UK trolls tried to unhinge your site. It’s what some of those mouth breathers love to do. Believe it or not, they do it to UK sites too.
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Thanks Jordan. Hell of a game last night. Good luck the rest of the way. Maybe we’ll see ya’ll again next year. Peace. Go Coogs.
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Jerrycoog I agree with this. Cal’s teams are known for length, and the length has its biggest effect on defense because teams just haven’t seen anything like it all year. You can talk about it, but until you experience it, it’s a different story.
Meanwhile, UK’s Achilles heel year in year out are savvy experienced veteran guards who aren’t rattled by big opponents. There’s a list the size of Texas of guys like Armoni (excuse my not knowing his last name, my apologies) who just torch us on a big stage. It happens every freaking season. And the common denominator is that they’re usually a junior or senior. They’ve been around the block.
I’ll be honest, I was worried about this game more than I would have been a UNC match up after a win. True story. You guys had a really good team.
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Having slept I feel like commenting on how are season ended.
In basketball, the great unknown is officiating. Refs are going to miss calls and make calls that aren’t there. I think a basketball ref has the hardest job in sports, maybe a close second to hitting a curve ball. The refs last night missed calls and made bad calls on both ends. Was it more in UK’s favor? Idk. Maybe but it wasn’t intentional as some here like to imply or just flat out declare. Case in point is the traveling called on I think Travis late in the game. It was definitely a travel but he barely moved his feet. If the refs had an agenda, i.e., screw UH, that would not have been called. So get over the officiating, because that’s the way basketball is.
We had a fabulous season. I have no complaints. Here’s to an even better year next season! Go Coogs!
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The problem with our second to last possession is simple to me…but I’m not a basketball coach.
We’re down by two with around 25 seconds left and two of our bigs (Gresham and White) have fouled out. Even if Davis makes the two it’s only tied, and Kentucky has the ball with plenty of time to win in regulation. If we go to OT, we’d have little shot without enough front court help for five minutes.
I thought that we should have run a play to get Davis or Brooks a quality three at the end. If it goes in, we win. If not, you tried with your best percentage play to get the W.
Sampson has forgotten more about basketball than I’ll ever know, but don’t understand what happened there.
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As he sat at his locker for the final time, Davis said he would probably would wear his jersey home.
“They are going to have to fight me for it at this point,” he said. “I don’t think I want to give it up.”
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Agree
Ok not a drill not lying I’m flying back to DFW (connecting) and I’m sitting next to Corey’s mom!!! I’m like you’re a big celebrity with the fan base.
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