The importance of big men - UW Hoops

[NowherePoke]

Watching the Sweet 16 and Elite 8 over the weekend it became apparent that despite all the talk you occasionally hear about how College Basketball is a guard's game, it is ultimately still a big man's game. The skill set of the impact big man may be a little more dynamic than in the past but it is still critical to success.

The teams at the top of College Basketball are there largely on the back of their impact big men (Kaminksy/Decker, Harrell, Karnowski/Wiljter/Sabonis, Cauley-Stein/Lyles/Towns, Ashley/Tarczweski, Okafor, etc.). There are some exceptions of course (Notre Dame, although Auguste is no slouch), but size still matters in College Basketball.

This got me to thinking about the Pokes and the importance of big men to our program. Looking back over the last 30 years (roughly corresponding to when the NCAA was expanded to 64 teams) the Pokes have reached either the NCAA or NIT on 10 occassions (4 NCAA/6 NIT). 9 of those 10 teams featured impact big men that were either 1st or 2nd team all conference players. A quick look:

86 NIT: Leckner (WACT MVP)
87 NCAA: Leckner (First Team All-WAC, WACT MVP)
88 NCAA: Leckner (First Team All-WAC, WACT MVP)

91 NIT: Slater (First Team All-WAC)

98 NIT: The exception, Jeron Roberts was the driver on this team and led the team in rebounding from his guard spot. Ugo was on the team but not yet the force he would become

99 NIT: Udezue (Second Team All-WAC in the era of 16 teams which is impressive, averaged 20.5 ppg)

01 NIT: Davis (First Team All-MWC) and Uche (Second Team All-MWC)
02 NCAA: Davis (Third Team All-MWC) and Uche (Second Team All-MWC)
03 NIT: Uche (First Team All-MWC)

15 NCAA: Nance (First Team All-MWC)

Obviously those guys didn't do it alone with guys like Dembo and Bailey being the go-to guys in their respective eras, but in general the Pokes have only had success when they have an all-conference type front court player. There have been quite a few Wyoming teams with solid guards that never went anywhere (Ewing era, Straight as a Junior and Senior, etc.), but the only impact big man the Pokes had that didn't play on a winner was Theo Ratliff. All I can say about that is: Joby Wrong.

Bringing it back to the current state of UW basketball, it's interesting to consider Coach Shyatt's tenure and big men:

1. Since coming back to Laramie, Shyatt has signed 11 big men in his first 4 classes (not counting class of 15 which hasn't arrived on campus yet). Of those 11, 7 have transferred out of the program. 4 of those never played (Jones, Ajayi, Vernon, Williams) and the other three had no real impact (Sellers, Marshall, Haldorson).

2. However, of the 4 that stayed, one was the best player of the last decade for UW (Nance), another was a starter on a NCAA team (Cooke) and two have a bright future (Herndon and Barnes).

3. Another interesting fact, during that 30 year period Wyoming had 8 separate post players earn 1st or 2nd team all conference honors. Of those 8, 3 were recruited by Shyatt (Ugo, Davis, Nance), one was coached by Shyatt (Washington) and another has a sort of tie (Uche, because of Ugo). Pretty impressive considering he has only been the coach for 5 of those 30 years.


What does all this mean? Hell if I know, but IMO the future of this program rests on the development of our 4 young bigs (Herndon, Barnes, Moemeka, Naughton). I do expect us to sign a JC big in the spring, but that will be a stop gap. The future is on these 4 guys. Let's hope it is a good one.

 

[BeaverPoke]

Interesting, and good stuff.

Why don't these big men stay?
Is Laramie not the place to be for these big dudes? Something about the demographic, or just coincidence of the players who have left?

Thank you Larry Nance and Derek Cooke for staying and leading and winning.

 

[joshvanklomp]

Why don't these big men stay?
Is Laramie not the place to be for these big dudes? Something about the demographic, or just coincidence of the players who have left?

Part of it might be the offensive system, which is definitely more guard-heavy.

 

[BeaverPoke]

Why don't these big men stay?
Is Laramie not the place to be for these big dudes? Something about the demographic, or just coincidence of the players who have left?

Part of it might be the offensive system, which is definitely more guard-heavy.

I don't think that has anything to do with what I am talking about.

I am talking about a couple of these student athletes at UW that are just complete arrogant tools and think they deserve everything without putting in work. The ones that everyone knew they were going to leave the program the first day they stepped on campus.

Nothing to do with basketball. Everything to do with character.

 

[ItSucksToBeACSURam]

Why don't these big men stay?
Is Laramie not the place to be for these big dudes? Something about the demographic, or just coincidence of the players who have left?

Part of it might be the offensive system, which is definitely more guard-heavy.

I don't think this plays as much of a part of the situation as character does. Shyatt recruits players that he thinks will fit his scheme. I think players show up here and think they're going to be the cats meow and be shown the red carpet treatment like its recruitment still. They're not expecting to show up and get to work. Plus Laramie doesn't have the clubs and swagger of other places that feed some kids ego. Thats one reason players (like Muhammad at SJSU) choose shitty schools over Wyoming, the environment feeds their egos more.

 

[kansasCowboy]

I kinda feel bad for the 90's group, in Joby Wright and Ratliff, they were an extremely competative bunch. They lost SO MANY close games it wasn't even funny. They were right on the cusp of being a quality team, they just couldn't get the close ones.

 

[BeaverPoke]

Why don't these big men stay?
Is Laramie not the place to be for these big dudes? Something about the demographic, or just coincidence of the players who have left?

Part of it might be the offensive system, which is definitely more guard-heavy.

I don't think this plays as much of a part of the situation as character does. Shyatt recruits players that he thinks will fit his scheme. I think players show up here and think they're going to be the cats meow and be shown the red carpet treatment like its recruitment still. They're not expecting to show up and get to work. Plus Laramie doesn't have the clubs and swagger of other places that feed some kids ego. Thats one reason players (like Muhammad at SJSU) choose shitty schools over Wyoming, the environment feeds their egos more.

Couldn't have said it any better.

This past signing day for football I got on twitter and was looking at some kids the Beavers were offering just to get a feel for the players. The Beavs were in a battle with the Gators with one kid and his twitter was full of dozens and dozens of people tweeting this kid about how great he is. His timeline was full of retweets proclaiming how amazing of a football player he is. You would have thought this kid had just won Super Bowl MVP the way people were talking about him. You never would have guessed he was just a 3* D-End with a handful of offers to his name.

So many of them just have the dream of playing college ball, which is great don't get me wrong. But I think a lot feel that the work is done when they sign with a college. That, and I'm sure a lot of them want to live the normal college kid lifestyle at times, mixed with the celebrity lifestyle at the same time. They want the living to be easy. They want the red carpet rolled out for them for every class they go into.

I'm sure nothing hits their ego as hard as being the BMOC since 5th grade then walking into a class with 300 people and literally 95% of the people not even realize they were there. All of this, then go to practice and find out you are 3rd string and Larry Nance Jr. is making a fool of you on the court.

I can see why it wouldn't be the most fun place for a big man who has always had it easy.

 

[kansasCowboy]

After seeing the success, fun and dunks Nance and Cooke had in their careers here under Shy, future bigs might want the same thing.

 

[NowherePoke]

Why don't these big men stay?
Is Laramie not the place to be for these big dudes? Something about the demographic, or just coincidence of the players who have left?

Part of it might be the offensive system, which is definitely more guard-heavy.

I would disagree about it being more guard heavy actually. From my eye test, the primary offensive option in each of Shyatt's four seasons since coming back has been a frontcourt player (Washington, then Nance). KenPom's usage stats back this up as our leader in Possessions used was Nance this past year and Washington in Shyatt's first two years. Last year was a slight exception as Adams was slightly ahead of Nance, but if you strip out the last 7 games where Adams had a ridiculous usage after Nance was hurt you see that Nance actually had a higher usage rate when both him and Adams were healthy.

Contrast that with previous Wyoming coaches Heath Schroyer and Steve McClain. KenPom's stats only go back to 2002, but in the 10 seasons prior to Shyatt's return (6 for McClain, 4 for Schroyer), a guard led the team in usage every single year, sometimes by a very large margin. I think if stats were available going back to 99 or 00, you would probably see early McClain teams had frontcourt players as their highest usage (Ugo in 99, Davis in 00), but after that it was very guard heavy.

 

[NowherePoke]

Interesting, and good stuff.

Why don't these big men stay?
Is Laramie not the place to be for these big dudes? Something about the demographic, or just coincidence of the players who have left?

Thank you Larry Nance and Derek Cooke for staying and leading and winning.

I think the primary reason is that we have recruited too many guys that can't play at this level. Not to be harsh, but let's take a look at the transfers:

Marshall: Bounced back to a JC, put up modest numbers and ended up at D2 CSU-Pueblo. Was fairly productive at CSUP, but still clearly not a MWC caliber big.

Ajayi: This one just cracks me up. Transferred to FIU and never played but made a big deal of leaving Laramie for Miami. Left there to go to Collin Co JC here in Texas and pretended he was in Dallas instead of the suburban wasteland of Plano, was actually productive on the court at JC. Signed with Eastern Michigan out JC, so his grand journey brought him to Ypsilanti. Now, I am not big on degrading towns/places, because we end up on the receiving end of that type of thing too often. However, let me assure you, Ypsilanti's status as a shithole is well earned. He played there two years averaged about 2 ppg and 4 rpg off the bench and will graduate and transfer to his 5th school in 5 seasons. Probably could have helped a MWC team off the bench and if he had been receptive to Shyatt's coaching he might have developed into a productive player like Cooke did, but his attitude issues wouldn't allow that. This was more of a character recruiting mistake than a talent mistake.

Sellers: Plenty of discussion around him on this board, but just really lacked the athleticism to play at this level.

Haldorson: Transferred to D2 Fort Lewis where he was a role player this past year. Role player at Ft. Lewis = no chance in hell of being a contributor in the MWC.

Vernon: Transferred to CSI JC and had a decently productive season (9 ppg, 6 rpg or so) on a team filled with D1 players. I expect Vernon will sign D1 again (Big West, Big Sky) and be productive. Probably could have helped us, again more of an attitude than a talent issue.

Jones: Transferred to Skagit Valley JC in Washington where he was a modest contributor in the 2nd half of the season. The level of play in the WA/OR JC leagues is way below that of most of the NJCAA, so if you can't dominate at that level you probably can't play in the MWC. IOW, Jones couldn't play in the MWC.

Williams: TBD


Overall, I think the primary issue is not so much retention of players as these guys are not exactly lighting the world on fire after they leave UW, it's about recruiting talent initially. Hopefully with the renovated AA (Phase 1 anyway) and NCAA tourney bid we can start to see an uptick in recruiting.

 

[seattlecowboy]

The more I look at this Chris Boucher kid from Northwest and the fact we didn't even recruit him bugs the heck out of me.

He is the best big man in the JC ranks nationwide and made first team all america.

We don't get an opportunity to be able to recruit a kid that good in our home state very often.

It has to have had something to do with his credits not transferring or something we don't know because otherwise it makes no sense that we didn't go after him. That would have been a huge get IMO. His stats are crazy.

Not that we would have landed him for sure but seems we could have at least given it a shot. Instead he is going to end up at probably a one of the bigger schools helping them out. Frustrating to me.

 

[denverpoke]

I believe they flew out yesterday to see him..J Shyatt's twitter message yesterday on flying out to see future pokes..

 

[seattlecowboy]

I believe they flew out yesterday to see him..J Shyatt's twitter message yesterday on flying out to see future pokes..

They flew out to see Chris Boucher?

 

[NowherePoke]

The more I look at this Chris Boucher kid from Northwest and the fact we didn't even recruit him bugs the heck out of me.

He is the best big man in the JC ranks nationwide and made first team all america.

We don't get an opportunity to be able to recruit a kid that good in our home state very often.

It has to have had something to do with his credits not transferring or something we don't know because otherwise it makes no sense that we didn't go after him. That would have been a huge get IMO. His stats are crazy.

Not that we would have landed him for sure but seems we could have at least given it a shot. Instead he is going to end up at probably a one of the bigger schools helping them out. Frustrating to me.

Well, a couple of thoughts on Boucher:

1. I wouldn't really describe him as a recruit from our "home state". He played at New Mexico JC last year (originally from Montreal) and only played at Northwest this year.

2. We really weren't looking for a JC big in this class last summer. At that time, the staff wanted to sign two HS bigs and gained commits from two (Moemeka and Naughton) in early August. We really didn't have another big man scholarship to give in the class (We needed one more wing at that point, which became Turner at first and then Marshall).

3. By the time we knew we needed a JC big in this class (probably around semester time would be my guess based on when Williams was no longer on the sideline), Boucher was already being offered/recruited by Big 12 and other high majors.



Of course, this assumes that we didn't try to recruit him. We may have done so and he wasn't interested. We may have just been too late, for reasons I noted above.

 

[seattlecowboy]

The more I look at this Chris Boucher kid from Northwest and the fact we didn't even recruit him bugs the heck out of me.

He is the best big man in the JC ranks nationwide and made first team all america.

We don't get an opportunity to be able to recruit a kid that good in our home state very often.

It has to have had something to do with his credits not transferring or something we don't know because otherwise it makes no sense that we didn't go after him. That would have been a huge get IMO. His stats are crazy.

Not that we would have landed him for sure but seems we could have at least given it a shot. Instead he is going to end up at probably a one of the bigger schools helping them out. Frustrating to me.

Well, a couple of thoughts on Boucher:

1. I wouldn't really describe him as a recruit from our "home state". He played at New Mexico JC last year (originally from Montreal) and only played at Northwest this year.

2. We really weren't looking for a JC big in this class last summer. At that time, the staff wanted to sign two HS bigs and gained commits from two (Moemeka and Naughton) in early August. We really didn't have another big man scholarship to give in the class (We needed one more wing at that point, which became Turner at first and then Marshall).

3. By the time we knew we needed a JC big in this class (probably around semester time would be my guess based on when Williams was no longer on the sideline), Boucher was already being offered/recruited by Big 12 and other high majors.



Of course, this assumes that we didn't try to recruit him. We may have done so and he wasn't interested. We may have just been too late, for reasons I noted above.

+1 .... Agree with you on all points.

Probably didn't know we were going to need another big at the time the scholarship became available and by that time it was probably too late and yeah we may have tried and he wasn't interested. Dude can ball though. I will be interested to watch him play next year where ever he ends up to see how he does.

 

[Cosmic Cowboy]

Just doing a quick glance around some recruiting pages and I see that there are still some quality bigs available to recruit. If there ever was a year to do it well its right now. We have that NCAA tourney and MWC tourney momentum on our side. I hope Shyatt further wows us with an awesome pickup! I'm not gonna put anything past our staff but, this has been that one weaker area in their efforts imo...getting the bigs.

This is a really sensitive subject for me too. I've hated it watching SDSU routinely beat us in this area for like a decade. More then anything I'd love to see a Cowboys team that fucking OWNS the paint game in, game out. A team that dominates on boards, blocks some shots, and has a physical presence in there. Hell right now I'd settle for just having 3 quality bigs that can play at MW level. Is that too much to ask? With Herndon this year it was almost like 2.5 quality bigs as he was just tad too slight for some big situations down there. Nance and DC though damn.......ewwwwwwww I'll be missing U.