are my final observations on the game.

Javes is going to be a terrific player in time. Needs to work with Joe Kleine on his skills, and gain weight and strength. Courtney will have his finest season if he stays healthy. He is a great rebounder forhis size and plays hard all the time. He'll have some double digit scoring games, but should give us a solid 8-10 points a game.

WN will be a big time player in the Belt. He had 12 rebounds against Michigan State and can definitely score. He'll improve as his strength improves and he gets used to the speed of the game in D1. Marlo will give us solid minutes as a backup.

D'Andre will be an outstanding point guard. Lawton will improve dramatically in the next few games and will be a force for us.
Chucky is Chucky. Exciting. Streaky, but will settle down and be an outstanding Sun Belt guard. Fondren will get some opportunities. Tramar will give us great defensive effort, but I could see some platooning at the three if one of the freshmen shows the ability to score.

Our other freshmen, Lockhart, Dillard, and James White will continue to develop into solid SBC performers. I can't say about our walk ons.
Too early to tell. But overall, I believe this will be a solid team by the time we get into conference play. What should our expectations be?
I firmly believe we'll end up in the top four or five teams in the league prior to the tournament. And by tournament time, I believe we'll have a great shot at winning it all again. We'll see, but it should be a fun season. We have some good competition in our non conference games, and I'd love to beat Mo State just one time. They have embarrassed us in nearly every game. I don't think that will happen this season.

(11-25-2011 09:42 AM)outsideualr Wrote:  WN had 12 rebounds against Michigan State

That is what really surprised me. I have not thought about him as a rebounder particularly, especially against a physical team like MSU.

As you probably saw, he really got in there and fought hard and successfully on the boards. The announcers were really complimentary of him and said he should be a terrific player in the Sun Belt. I would say a double double against a physical team like Michigan State at this early stage of his career is just an indication that the best is yet to come for Will. I just hope he stays the next three seasons and is healthy. If that happens, it could really help our program to keep moving up to a higher level of play. Add a stronger Javes and a healthy Gus, along with James White, and we could be awesome inside.