Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread

[logjam]

want!

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1517717231072911365

I was surprised he was 50 special mention instead of the 1st 2 teams...

 

[DeeSunmu 11]

A lot of college coaches would disagree with you. He raises the floor. He’s the safety net. And that’s not a knock on Kofi he is a tremendous talent. But you become very one dimensional in offense and defense with a guy like Kofi on the floor. Again not a knock…he has been dominate on offense.

I'll start by saying, i LOVE our coaches. But how much of the one dimensional wasn't due to poor feeds and Kofi not passing out well (lack of talent through practice)? Again, i love our coaches, i just feel we didn't utilize kofi efficiently at times, which may be on talent, coaches, or both.

 

[Illini808]

What happened when when shots weren’t falling outside?

Bingo. ie both ncaa tournament games... our offense was horrid and put up 53&54

Brad will have his style. Different look than what we're used to but it'll be fun

 

[DeeSunmu 11]

I'll start by saying, i LOVE our coaches. But how much of the one dimensional wasn't due to poor feeds and Kofi not passing out well (lack of talent through practice)? Again, i love our coaches, i just feel we didn't utilize kofi efficiently at times, which may be on talent, coaches, or both.

May also be based on my extreme love of Illinois and thinking every offensive possession should end with points and every defensive possession should end with no points too

 

[DB11Headband]

Whats your thoughts on Gardner in 23 and Brown in 24. Possible?

Quite

 

[Illiniforlife]

A lot of college coaches would disagree with you. He raises the floor. He’s the safety net. And that’s not a knock on Kofi he is a tremendous talent. But you become very one dimensional in offense and defense with a guy like Kofi on the floor. Again not a knock…he has been dominate on offense.

Agree with this 100%. Kofi is a one of kind player and one that Illini nation is so thankful to have and help us get back on track. But you can do so much more now on offense and defense. Defense you can play ball screens differently (depending on Dain movement). You might not have to down every ball screen and give up free mid range jumpers. Also it allows for more movement offensive. With the players and shooters we should have the amount of split screens and actions to confuse defenses on switches should go up a ton. Basketball is a different game than it was 10 years ago even 5 years. Still thank you Kofi and Ayo for putting the Illini back on the map

 

[illiniballknower]

What happened when when shots weren’t falling outside?

You realize you are arguing against Kofi's floor raising ability, not his ceiling raising ability right? I agree that an offense run through Kofi as a playmaker can be bad if shooters are not hitting their shots. However, if surrounded by playmaking slashers like last year's Curbelo and Ayo, he lifts the ceiling of the offense due to his rim finishing and rim gravity.

 

[fulton steamer]

I'm not sure why people get so defensive with regards to Kofi. He was amazing and the Illini may never again have a player of this stature. Having said that, is it not true that our offense was very one-dimensional? Every time down the floor our first option was to dump it into Kofi. If the referees let three guys hack, lean, and hang on him it made it very, very difficult for him to succeed. Once this started happening we would do the weave until someone took a three. Also great.... if we were hitting. If not, it was a very tough game. How is that in any way a knock on Kofi? Sure you can say he should pass it out. But I think THAT is also quite difficult to do with six arms all over you. I don't know of one person on this board who didn't love what Kofi could do---and did. That does not mean that a different system, with longer, more athletic, better slashers, and better 3-point shooters won't be an improvement.
Oops. I see Illiniforlife just made the same basic argument.

 

[21ChampaignSt]

Which is even more evidence that he is a ceiling raiser, thank you. His elite off ball skills like play finishing and offensive rebounding helped him score 37 points per 100 possession on 65% shooting WITHOUT being the primary option.

It might also be evidence that as a team, we're less dynamic when he's our primary option, hence the belief that we could have a higher ceiling without having to force feed him the ball. Guess we'll never know.

 

[Fighter of the Nightman]

Again, they were 8th in the country on offense in 21', that's a pretty high ceiling. Kofi's rim gravity plus play finishing and offensive rebounding make him lift the ceiling of an offense. If Curbelo was healthy all year and was able to utilize the pick and roll with Kofi more like last year a lot of you would stop downplaying his absence.

I think our problem was adjusting. When a team planned us extraordinarily well like Loyola or Houston, we had a harder time moving toward a different scheme.

 

[Joel Goodson]

Quite

Love that Gardner's dad is a coach.

 

[logjam]

Or it won't be. Fact is nobody has any idea what will happen if RJ ends up as our best player. You're projecting minimal improvement, others are projecting linear improvement with more minutes. At this point, given the lack of vets, this whole discussion comes down to whether you tends towards optimism vs. pessimism when confronted with the unknown.

Name checks out...lol

 

[Illiniforlife]

You realize you are arguing against Kofi's floor raising ability, not his ceiling raising ability right? I agree that an offense run through Kofi as a playmaker can be bad if shooters are not hitting their shots. However, if surrounded by playmaking slashers like last year's Curbelo and Ayo, he lifts the ceiling of the offense due to his rim finishing and rim gravity.

There were times Kofi clogged the lane so much for those guys too. If we could have had Kofi pop with Ayo and hit a 15 to 18 footer Ayo would have been even better which is crazier to think. For example against Loyola it would have been harder to trap Ayo on the ball screens. So yes his rim finishing was good but it was also limiting and at times to one dimensional.

 

[idoc13]

A lot of college coaches would disagree with you. He raises the floor. He’s the safety net. And that’s not a knock on Kofi he is a tremendous talent. But you become very one dimensional in offense and defense with a guy like Kofi on the floor. Again not a knock…he has been dominate on offense.

This is a ridiculous. There isn’t one coach in America who wouldn’t take Kofi on their roster next year. Averaging 20 and 10 and he doesn’t raise the ceiling of our offense. Give me a break..

If he was easy to gameplan, we wouldn’t have won a big ten championship this year.

Mike Tisdale was a safety net. Kofi was an elite college basketball big man.

 

[DeeSunmu 11]

This is a ridiculous. There isn’t one coach in America who wouldn’t take Kofi on their roster next year. Averaging 20 and 10 and he doesn’t raise the ceiling of our offense. Give me a break..

If he was easy to gameplan, we wouldn’t have won a big ten championship this year.

He is terrible to game plan for......IF our shooters are hitting shots

 

[illiniballknower]

Oh and by the way, when the shooters were hitting their shots in December, Illinois's offense was literally unstoppable. But no, let's base our downfalls of a sample size of two games, one to a team that we were the underdogs by 6 points without Grandison and the other against one of the best defenses in the country.

 

[logjam]

but he apparently doesn't have a face, that's a pretty big concern!

That was just a neck picture...looks promising...

 

[illini0440]

I'll start by saying, i LOVE our coaches. But how much of the one dimensional wasn't due to poor feeds and Kofi not passing out well (lack of talent through practice)? Again, i love our coaches, i just feel we didn't utilize kofi efficiently at times, which may be on talent, coaches, or both.

They worked with Kofi on passing out of the post all the time….he’s gotta do it in a game though. And it’s a factor of Kofi not being able to stretch outside and space the floor

 

[Fanview]

I'll start by saying, i LOVE our coaches. But how much of the one dimensional wasn't due to poor feeds and Kofi not passing out well (lack of talent through practice)? Again, i love our coaches, i just feel we didn't utilize kofi efficiently at times, which may be on talent, coaches, or both.

Kofi averaged 20ppg and 10 rebounds. Not sure how much more efficiently they could have used him. But knowing he can't spread the floor as well - we were one dimensional for sure.

 

[DeonThomas]

Bingo. ie both ncaa tournament games... our offense was horrid and put up 53&54

Brad will have his style. Different look than what we're used to but it'll be fun

Good point(s).

Our offense was essentially stifled during the tourney both years.

 

[illiniballknower]

Kansas just won the National championship with a top 5 offense with their centers averaging about a 6 AST% and 1 made three combined. But no Kofi limits the offense, can't win big games with him.

 

[GrapplingIllini]

A lot of college coaches would disagree with you. He raises the floor. He’s the safety net. And that’s not a knock on Kofi he is a tremendous talent. But you become very one dimensional in offense and defense with a guy like Kofi on the floor. Again not a knock…he has been dominate on offense.

Didn't Jeff Goodman say something like this in twitter a few days ago? It was a reply to someone's tweet about Kofi leaving. Pretty sure it was posted here.

Found it:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1516773292060856328

 

[fulton steamer]

I don’t think he was saying Brad doesn’t want Kofi. I think we can all agree we would want Kofi and wouldn’t be back like we are with out him. But he is saying we have hit the highest we could with him. So now with out him and the players we are getting and way the team could shape up next year and years to come we could get further in the tournament (sweet sixteen or elite eight).

This. Exactly!

 

[DeeSunmu 11]

Kofi averaged 20ppg and 10 rebounds. Not sure how much more efficiently they could have used him. But knowing he can't spread the floor as well - we were one dimensional for sure.

20 pts 10 reb is nice. But when it leads to 10 TO's trying to get him the ball, and or he ends up shooting 60%, and or gets fouled and hits 0 or 1 free throws, you can get to to 20 and 10 without being efficient. Don't get me wrong, i love kofi, i just feel like we could've been better with him. I think some is on talent of the team and some has to go to coaches. That's why i asked someone with more knowledge what his thoughts were, bc i will concede, I'm no genius

 

[Fighter of the Nightman]

Oh and by the way, when the shooters were hitting their shots in December, Illinois's offense was literally unstoppable. But no, let's base our downfalls of a sample size of two games, one to a team that we were the underdogs by 6 points without Grandison and the other against one of the best defenses in the country.

Jesus, no one is downplaying Kofi. People are saying WHEN our shooters were cold, it was easier to swarm Kofi and dare us to hit threes … which is the point about having a hard time adjusting. No one didn’t want him back, we’re just looking at LITERALLY ONE positive about a change in playing style, and people are taking it as a personal attack on the King? GMAB.