Preseason Bonanza!

I’m really excited for this season to start.

Just got done watching the hour-long season preview Fox Sports Ohio put together. And boy was that fantastic! Gave me that extra oomph to get me ready for the season. (Not that I wasn’t ready) Hope everyone got/gets a chance to see it. Anyways, Friday can’t get here soon enough.

 

Since we haven’t been posting that much we decided to make one long uber-post concerning all things Xavier Basketball and the fast approaching season.

Recruiting

We don’t follow recruiting too closely here at the MB. Mainly because a National Player of the Year, such as David West, can be so lightly regarded coming out of high school. Basically all I know is what I read on the message boards. I am attached to the name on the jersey. The players come and go but Xavier does not. Although, that doesn’t mean I can’t develop huge man-crushes (cough cough, Justin Cage) on certain players. With that being said, this is Xavier’s best recruiting class (on paper) ever. Plus, I don’t want to have a ton of knowledge on the players abilities coming into the season because that’s part of the surprise when we see them play the first few times. That’s why sports have always been the best reality television.

 

Goals

Our roster is a bit odd this season in that the frontcourt is experienced and obviously the strength of the team while the backcourt consists of talented, yet inexperienced players. It makes things a little confusing for us fans because we aren’t really sure what to expect from this group and what goals could and should be attainable.

 

I’ve always thought the main goal of any team should be to win the regular season conference title. That is the foundation from which future success is built upon especially for a program like Xavier’s. X has won 14 conference titles since 1981. Would Sean Miller be able to get the commitments from the types of players that are now coming to Xavier without this past success? I highly doubt it. The non-conference games get the attention of the fans and media, but Xavier’s future success depends on how well it does within the conference. At least in my opinion.

I believe the goals this year should be to win the A-10 regular season title and get into the NCAA tournament. Anything after that is gravy. And by the way, I hate preseason awards. When they showed the preseason “awards” on the preview show earlier today it made me groan. What is the point of giving out awards when no one has earned them? Especially, to players that haven’t played a single minute of college basketball. Whatever.

 

Players

As stated above, our roster can be separated into two parts. Young backcourt and experienced frontcourt. Will there be growing pains? Perhaps, but one thing that really got me excited about this year’s team were the player interviews conducted for the preview. Watching and hearing BJ describe Jamel as “fast as a deer and strong as an ox,” was both hilarious and telling at the same time. The players seemed to genuinely enjoy describing their teammates abilities, which one would hope leads to great team chemistry.

Just a few random thoughts on the players:

-I hope CJ has developed a bit of an outside shot. Obviously it didn’t hinder the team too much last season so I’m not real concerned about it but the longest shot he made last year was a free throw.

-I’ll be very surprised if we don’t see another marked improvement from Jason Love like we did last year. He is that glue every successful team needs.

-To quote Derrick Brown on Brad Redford, “Seriously, best shooter I’ve ever seen….I’m not joking” ‘nuff said

-Apparently Terrell Holloway goes by the name “Tutu.” Not quite sure to process that one yet.

-Also, Terrell and Jordan Crawford use the numbers 52 and 55. Will be an unusual backcourt pairing hopefully this season, but probably next.

-Obviously, the big elephant in the room regarding the early part of this season is the status of Derrick Brown. Apparently, he will be out for a “while.” Therefore, we will address this situation in a future post.

-I’m almost more interested to see Jamel McLean play than Kenny Frease simply because Kenny will probably take a bit of time to develop into the force we all hope and know he can be, whereas Jamel will have more of an immediate impact on the team and how well we do this year, especially now with Derrick being injured (tear).

 

Schedule

This year’s schedule reminds me a lot of last year’s in that we have a very tough non-conference slate of games to get us ready for the A-10. Obviously, the big one is against Duke on December 20^th. Duke is sandwiched in between games against UC and Butler. That is a huge three game stretch over the course of 10 days. Games against Auburn, Virginia, and LSU are also big games as well if we are to build a strong resume for the field of 65. Plus, I just love beating big state schools for some reason.

 

Having said that, I’d be surprised if we didn’t lose to one team that we as fans would deem “unforgivable” at this point in time. But it always happens. Miami ring any bells? But in the end all one can ask of a schedule before a game is played is that it gives us ample opportunity for a number of quality wins. This schedule has that in spades.

 

But guess what? It’s effing basketball season! The best time of the year! We have no excuse to miss a game because every one of em is on television. That is more than a little exciting. And I get to attach myself to a group of guys that probably don’t realize how much they affect my well-being (and that’s a good thing) for the next 5 months. Although, I don’t think I realize how much they do either. Oh well, the more you know…..

 

 

Let’s go X! 

              

And just for good measure….Screw Dayton, UC and everything they stand for!