With 5 (maybe more IF the Bears can win their Pac-12 Tournament opening game again) games left on the season, it was great to finally have some hope for the future (outside some recruiting fantasy) thanks to that Colorado game. Three of the four remaining games are pretty winnable on paper and Cal is likely to get another coin flip game to kick off the Pac-12 tourney (unless there is some format change this year due to the Pandemic). So I hope that the team will finish strong and gain some positive narrative going into the offseason.
One "blessing" to Mark Fox's recruiting "meh-ness" is that it's good that Cal won't waste the year from some blue-chip, one-and-done players on a season without fans.
While both Foreman and Betley have another year of eligibility thanks to this weird season, I am not sure we need both of them to be back between the possibility of playing the graduate transfer market and giving more playing time to younger players with higher upside.
Betley started out relatively hot but has kind of faded away as an effective 3-point option, plus his defense is not very good. Celestine's length certainly helps on the defensive side, granted though that his success stopping Wright might have been a one game anomaly. Need a larger sample size. Bowser seemed at the beginning of the season that he might be an effective 6th or 7th guy but he has not done much (but injury might be a factor here). Thiemann is a tall guy who is very raw and has not made much improvement from last year to this year, if any. I agree that the underslassmen have to step up unless Fox wants to go the grad transfer route again after the season. If we have to do that, then the rebuilding project will continue into a 4th season. Not sure how much wiggle room Knowlton will give to Fox before giving the ball to someone else.
Betley has followed the Kareem South playbook to a T, and shows again why it’s tough to have to really rely on mid-tier grad transfers from mid-majors/the Ivys...if he hits a shot or 2, we probably grab a home win over the LA schools. But player development under Fox has been sorely missing in large part, esp. Lars. Don’t mean to pile on the kid, but I’m hard pressed to remember a 7’-er that has brought less to the Cal table, given the minutes, than he has in his 1st couple of seasons. Hoping things just click for him at some point and the game slows down, but who knows. Was hoping for more from Kuany & Bowser, and hope they’re still in Cal uniforms next year.
I think the biggest difference (at least, offensively) between Mullins and Betley was that Mullins played around Ivan Rabb, Jabari Bird, and Charlie Moore, and as a consequence could pick his spots to take shots more than Betley has been able to.
Sueing and Vanover would probably turn this team into a Pac-12 average team, likely with an above average offense but a still below average defense, but I'm hesitant to predict more than that. Vanover is a truly plus player, a wildly efficient offensive player who can alter shots down low if used properly, but he still plays very limited minutes because I think conditioning (and thus mobility) is still an issue for him.
Let me be the first to say... GIVE CELESTINE MORE SHOTS.
With 5 (maybe more IF the Bears can win their Pac-12 Tournament opening game again) games left on the season, it was great to finally have some hope for the future (outside some recruiting fantasy) thanks to that Colorado game. Three of the four remaining games are pretty winnable on paper and Cal is likely to get another coin flip game to kick off the Pac-12 tourney (unless there is some format change this year due to the Pandemic). So I hope that the team will finish strong and gain some positive narrative going into the offseason.
One "blessing" to Mark Fox's recruiting "meh-ness" is that it's good that Cal won't waste the year from some blue-chip, one-and-done players on a season without fans.
While both Foreman and Betley have another year of eligibility thanks to this weird season, I am not sure we need both of them to be back between the possibility of playing the graduate transfer market and giving more playing time to younger players with higher upside.
Betley started out relatively hot but has kind of faded away as an effective 3-point option, plus his defense is not very good. Celestine's length certainly helps on the defensive side, granted though that his success stopping Wright might have been a one game anomaly. Need a larger sample size. Bowser seemed at the beginning of the season that he might be an effective 6th or 7th guy but he has not done much (but injury might be a factor here). Thiemann is a tall guy who is very raw and has not made much improvement from last year to this year, if any. I agree that the underslassmen have to step up unless Fox wants to go the grad transfer route again after the season. If we have to do that, then the rebuilding project will continue into a 4th season. Not sure how much wiggle room Knowlton will give to Fox before giving the ball to someone else.
Betley has followed the Kareem South playbook to a T, and shows again why it’s tough to have to really rely on mid-tier grad transfers from mid-majors/the Ivys...if he hits a shot or 2, we probably grab a home win over the LA schools. But player development under Fox has been sorely missing in large part, esp. Lars. Don’t mean to pile on the kid, but I’m hard pressed to remember a 7’-er that has brought less to the Cal table, given the minutes, than he has in his 1st couple of seasons. Hoping things just click for him at some point and the game slows down, but who knows. Was hoping for more from Kuany & Bowser, and hope they’re still in Cal uniforms next year.
I think the biggest difference (at least, offensively) between Mullins and Betley was that Mullins played around Ivan Rabb, Jabari Bird, and Charlie Moore, and as a consequence could pick his spots to take shots more than Betley has been able to.
Sueing and Vanover would probably turn this team into a Pac-12 average team, likely with an above average offense but a still below average defense, but I'm hesitant to predict more than that. Vanover is a truly plus player, a wildly efficient offensive player who can alter shots down low if used properly, but he still plays very limited minutes because I think conditioning (and thus mobility) is still an issue for him.