1. Here’s to hoping Oklahoma State will make things interesting with Kansas in the conference race this season, because Baylor and Texas don’t appear to be up to the task. Texas lost to Chaminade and USC in the Maui Invitational and scored a whopping 41 points in last night’s loss to Georgetown. Getting Myck Kabongo back from his suspension will certainly help, but he’s not that good — he won’t cover up all of the holes in this Longhorns team in time for Big 12 play, and that’s assuming he even returns for Big 12 play. Baylor had a nice win over an (overrated) Kentucky team in Rupp Arena, but the losses to the College of Charleston then Northwestern last night at home more than cancel that win out.
2. Speaking of Myck Kabongo, the Austin American-Statesmen was told by sources that they believe Kabongo will receive a 10-game suspension stemming from his trip to Cleveland last spring which may have been paid for by an agent. It would be similar to the Josh Selby situation at Kansas a few years ago, who was suspended until mid-December before finally stepping on the court for Bill Self. If their sources are correct, Kabongo would be eligible on December 19 against North Carolina at home.
3. West Virginia center Aaric Murray isn’t playing up to his potential right now and it is hurting West Virginia through five games as the team sits at 2-3. He called himself a “6” on a scale of 1-10, which sounds about right. He’s averaging 10.2 PPG and 7.0 RPG for the Mountaineers, which isn’t bad at all, but it’s not quite the numbers most people (including myself) thought he would put up this season after transferring over from La Salle. From what appears to be a stamina problem, he hasn’t been able to regularly stay on the court. He has played over 25 minutes just once this season, which came in the opening night loss to Gonzaga last month.
4. Iowa State is rebounding the ball better than any team in the country, but the Cyclones are having trouble holding onto the ball after grabbing those rebounds. Fred Hoiberg’s team is second to last in the conference in turnover margin (-0.29) and they have committed 130 turnovers through nice games. In their two losses to Cincinnati and UNLV, they averaged 15 turnovers, but even in victories over small schools they’ve also struggled to protect the ball. Last night, they committed 19 turnovers in their 83-72 win over Florida Gulf Coast. With the talent, depth, and rebounding ability in place at Iowa State, they have the potential to finish in the upper half of the Big 12 and make the NCAA Tournament — but not if they continue to turn the ball over at this alarming pace.
5. Yesterday, Jesse Newell of the Lawrence Journal-World delved deeply into the effect Jeff Withey‘s shot blocking prowess has had on the Kansas defense. If you like second-level stats, it’s a great piece to read. In short, Kansas is holding opponents to the worst field goal percentage on layup attempts (40%) in the country. 31% of opponents’ layup attempts have been blocked, also first in the country. It’s stats like these which are probably behind Bill Self’s current frustrations with his perimeter defense. When you have an All-American shot-blocker behind you, you can take more chances on the perimeter. You can play up tight on your man knowing there’s a good chance a guy like Withey will stop him if you can’t. Now they just have to do it.

KoryCarpenter (150 Posts)

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 5th, 2012 at 7:31 am by KoryCarpenter and is filed under big 12, microsites, morning 5. Tagged: aaric murray, iowa state, jeff withey, kansas, myck kabongo, texas, west virginia. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.