Very nice draw for the Dogs.
Agree, best choice out the potential 4 seeds
Reminds me of the Baylor draw a decade ago. Physical rebounding team in the premier conference.
Were able to put Bez/Simmons on Wade Taylor. Need Samson to play big.
they offered samson in high school.
ironically one of only sec teams i havent seen play.
i think molloy can help you here too. put your mouthpieces in boys.
i likely will go but regardless at 7.5 i will let it breathe before i hit the bid.
flights from atl arent cheap but the regional final is here so worst case i will see yale when they get here😂
Interesting twist: if they win their first round games, Yale would play Danny Wolf and Michigan on Saturday.
UC - San Diego will be a popular upset pick. Conservative prediction: Yale makes the Sweet 16 by beating TAMU and UC-SD and rematches Auburn and then we bail out.
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i know buzz well as a coach but not his team.
my favorite is watching a practice when he was at va tech before the acc tournament one year.
his shootaround was run like a normal practice. it is all about defense and not surprised when i look at their statistical profile.
he won’t take yale lightly. not in his dna. i do hope his team does
i actually buy the sec’s hype this year. i know too many kids in that league and i know what money buys now.
auburn is a lot better than last year. 2 starters over 24 and great additions from high school and the portal.
a&m just got them. i cheer for us to make this stressful
I mean, look: when you’re an underdog, you want a variancey team, right? Texas A&M gives that variance. Most games, they couldn’t hit water if they were to fall out of a boat — I don’t think I have ever seen a team in the top 25 be 317th in the country at eFG%. That is just putrid. More’s the point, that’s bad enough that they could brick themselves out of a game, which is what an underdog wants to hear.
Of course, their ORB numbers are insane — 42% — but that feels to me like something that Yale could mitigate a bit given the team’s skillset.
Plus, their best player is their PG, which plays to our personnel strengths (i.e., Bez can guard him).
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i agree with your logic.
we were going to be a 13 so this is about as good as it gets.
vegas agrees starting this at 7.5.
i really i am caught up in the sec hype cycle given i am immersed in it day to day.
this being said i can only look at the micro and any individual case study i have on evaluating kids in high school pre portal and post portal is seeing the talent accumulate into this conference.
the ooc stats are gnarly. the suits my bias on nil and the haves vs have nots so maybe i am an easy hype buyer. we’ll see
so i start big-how good is the sec- and then i break it down from there in assessing a&m. i havent watched 1 minute of any game this year but i have done a statiscal download.
buzz runs those kids so hard at shootarounds there’s no way they can hit anything in a game😂
the altitude is interesting also. we played at CU once in my time. it makes your lungs hurt
I really *hope i am caught up in the sec hype cycle.
The hope (belief?) is this SEC team is the one we can match up with. Two big guys are both shorter than Samson (although probably have 30 pounds on him). Townsend is stronger, I’ll ignore the quick twitch stuff. Put Bez on their one creator. I can convince myself Poulakidas will get easier looks than the 2nd half of Ivy where hes been schemed to hell. Yale +250 ML
yea. i have a theory that if you can deadlift ~600 as a d1 player then you are hard to move in the post. okereke and ragland did their best to challenge my assumptions.
regardless we have 2 of those. townsend and molloy
samson is pushing 240 now from what i hear and he is a legitimate rim protector at any level.
i dont see crazy height or shot blocking which is good to your point.
Okereke might be up there with the 600 pound deadlift. What a beast.
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Cannot believe he was a walk-on at Cornell. What a get.
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i just watched a few minutes of the auburn-a&m game.
payne is a beast down low as is the 4 man. he moved broome off his spot which is hard to do.
granted he’s almost 25 but johnni has as strong a base as any 6’10 guy in the game.
this being said the game within the game is likely can townsend be effective finishing over these guys. he is short but built like a fire hydrant so we’ll see.
and can samson flush this weekend and give us what he did at purdue etc against power 4 big guys.
i also dont discount molloy i just would rather it be in a rotation rather than due to foul issues
A&M’s best player far and away is their PG Wade Taylor, who’s very emblematic of their terrible field goal efficiency. It’s not outlandish to imagine that Bez is going to lock their playmaker down.
However, what I hope is that a win over A&M encourages even more talented recruits in the future to consider committing to Yale. Two NCAA wins in as many years and strong conference finishes in the last ~6 years would solidify our reputation as the current premier program in the Ivy League. JJ’s staff has been masterful in developing under-the-radar talent, imagine top ranked recruits (Abdou Toure welcome home haha)
i assume our best players somewhat negate theirs. otherwise we have little chance
we have to board with the big boys and score down there. they are also monsters on the glassso we have to match it
lastly the big challenge of a step up in competition is typically most apparent in the post as noted but also the sec tweener or swingman vs the ivy. they have some chad baker mazara clones at least athletically. they dont score it like him though you can see the crash action on offense against a team like auburn which is loaded athletically
we got very lucky baker mazara got thrown out of the game early last year. i dont know their personnel well other than 10 mins of the auburn game and they played well in this one hitting timely shots and some 3s when it mattered.
this wasnt their mo per se
simmons is playing well so this is part of our answer as is celiscar who is but a baby age wise compared to sec portal men but has the game and athleticism to give us needed minutes banging with them
also a bit of trivia…isaac’s brother played defensive end for a&m this year. good gene pool!
lastly (i promise, busy week) but i hope the weight room helps us here.
they are all power and the swing forwards have real length-6’7 225ish types
but our dead lift champs and even samson with his massive lower body (for his weight and height) and elite length
help us relative to our roster listings or even last year when we had wolf and knowling who both got bullied a bit in the tourney in both games esp sdsu.
will watch some tape when i can to learn more abt personnel and buzz is good for interviews fwiw. i hate that i respect him so much but he is always a good, fun listen.
he will break down yale well for the media unlike bruce (who i also like) who cldnt pronounce poulakidas’ name until he put 28 on him
we have a great incoming class for this IL.
when danny wolf can make $1.5mm to go to michigan while also enhancing his nba stock; we have to celebrate any continuity in this era.
my concern would be keeping nolan groves and courtney wallace jr in this class while also hoping Isaac celiscar and samson aletan etc graduate from Yale.
there are no guarantees because you’d have to be a fool not to use James Jones and his staff as a talent evaluator if you are portal U.
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