Longhorn Basketball Recruit Kevin Thomas Fails to Qualify

With McClellan and Lewis. I’m going to cut somebody if we start getting Gibbs, Brown, Kabongo lineups night in and night out.

Zone defense with small teams is a total disaster. If you don’t block shots, and don’t have super athletic rebounders (who can get defensive rebounds with inconsistent box outs), zone defense just gets destroyed.

I’m not missing a single minute, too.

either Chapman or Wangmene inside

I have a friend and former colleague who coaches youth basketball. He was running a tournament for 10 year old girls a couple of springs ago. The local high school had lined up a few students to ref the games, but he hadn’t met them yet. He was worried that the parents at the game would give the refs a hard time (parents at kid’s sports can be real jackasses). So he made this speech about how he wouldn’t tolerate anyone giving crap to the refs.

Anyway, as he was making this speech, in walked the first referee — Jordan Hicks. At that point, my friend was in the middle of saying something like, “if I hear a lot of crap directed at the refs, I will…” When he saw Hicks, he stopped his speech. Later, he told me that he felt he should have finished his sentence, “…I will let the refs come up into the stands and kick your ass.”

So I don’t know how well Jordan can hoop, but I know he can get the respect of a bunch of obnoxious sports parents.

He isn’t exactly a smallball coach.

On the rebounding, Barnes’ “worst” rebounding teams haven’t been that bad:

http://kenpom.com/history.php?c=Rick%20Barnes

The 2007 and 2008 squads gave up a few more defensive rebounds than was typical, but they still got to work on the offensive glass.

You don’t have to have a ton of size to hold the defensive boards. Just ask Stew Morrill or Brad Stevens. Although doing some of the things they do to get those rebounds (sending 5 to the defensive glass) will inhibit your ability to run. Still, it all really boils down to boxing out, and then finding the ball. If you do these things, you don’t need guys who are 6’10". (Although 6’10" guys do help, and I am sure Stevens likes having Andrew Smith on the court.)

Barnes’ teams haven’t rebounded as well defensively as Butler or Utah State, but they have done a good job on the glass. I would be really surprised to see a Rick Barnes coached team that doesn’t rebound at least a little bit. In fact, I predict if we don’t rebound this season (particularly on offense) then we will be really awful. I don’t think we will get enough offense without a fair number of second chance shots.