[franfranParticipant]

any news of LeBryan Nash this summer?

will be in the preseason, marcus smart?

Any news on the team?

 

is that tomorrow, I’ll go to a game of Oklahoma State, because they come near where I live in Spain and I have some questions 🙂

 

what I know is that Philip Jurick will not play.

[providencefriars1Participant]

This is a very talented basketball team on paper. They had a lot of talent last year but could never put it together so this year we can see if they have matured. LeBryan Nash and Cezar Guerrero didnt live up to expectations last year, but they should have better sophomore seasons. Marcus Smart, JP Oluwukemi, and Michael Cobbins round out a very athletic and explosive starting five.

Right now this is an NCAA Tourney team, but if they cant jell and improve their chemistry they could be looking at a dissapointing season and potentially put Travis Ford on the hot seat.

[mikeyvthedonParticipant]

Unfortunately was suspended from the team indefinitely after being booked on charges of possesion of marijuana and paraphernilia. He has pleaded not guilty to these charges and has a court date set for August 20:

http://collegebasketballtalk.nbcsports.com/2012/08/07/oklahoma-state-suspends-center-philip-jurick-indefinitely-after-marijuana-arrest/

This link has a nice breakdown of the trip:

http://www.okstate.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/080612aaa.html

Their first game is tomorrow against the Sant Nicholas Basketball club in Sabadell. They play another game on Sunday against the Barcelona Select team, also in Sabadell. Their next two games will be next Tuesday and Thursday in Las Palmas, playing the Gran Canarias U20 team and Select team respectively.

As far as Marcus Smart goes, I know he looked pretty good playing for the USA U18 team at the beginning of the summer. He started all 5 games averaging 7.4 ppg, 3.4 rpg and a team leading 4 apg. He did not shoot particularly well for the tournament (41.4% FG, only going 1-10 from 3), but heard that he impressed coaches with his toughness and polish. I really like him as a prospect, he goes all out and is indeed tough as nails. Would not be surprised if he had a much better freshman season than LeBryan Nash had last year.

With Nash, have not heard a lot about him this summer. Just think it was a great decision to come back and work on his game, maybe translating to the wing a tad more. He is an ideal college 4 man, just definitely needs to work on his long range shooting, ball handling and decision making. As Iggy-Nixon pointed out quite a bit last year, he was kind of a black hole (rarely passed).

He is built like an absolute tank, thought he would have an immediate impact and be a likely one and done player. Definitely had an impact, but it was not always positive. He played his best games against teams that lacked size up front, particularly the 27 points he dropped in a big upset over Missouri (who had no size, other than Ricardo Ratliffe trying his best at C when that was not his natural position). I still have hope for Nash to improve this season, if he has his head on straight he could easily go as high as the lottery. A more likely scenario would be mid first round, just seems he is a bit of a tweener who needs to prove he can play on the wing.

JP Olukemi is coming back from an ACL tear. No doubt he will get some PT and was missed during Big 12 play last year. Will be interesting to see how he adapts, guessing he will like playing with a guy like Marcus Smart. Mike Cobbins has some definite potential to be a solid contributor for the team as well, thinking he might play quite a bit of undersized C and should be the teams leading rebounder again.

All in all, I expect a vastly improved team from last year. Smart was a major get and while they have to account for the loss of Keiton Page, they were a young squad last season that has a lot of returning pieces that will have worked on their game. Truly think that Marcus Smart will be the key, might not lead them in scoring (would not count him out, though I think Nash might indeed lead them in that category), but he will provide leadership and a winning attitude. They have some really solid guards and if they can get a tiny impact from their bigs, this is a legit NCAA tournament team.

[franfranParticipant]

 thanks you very much

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