Next Years Team if Rob & Elias Stay

[Fonebone]

Suppose that this season for Elias turns out, over all, to be far below his full potential, and he decides to stay one more year. And, suppose that despite his great year, Rob decides to stay. With those two guys staying, all the other returning players, and our great recruits, what would be a reasonable expectation for next season ?

The point of this thread is not primarily to debate the odds that they will stay, though that is fine. It is primarily intended to speculate, that if they do stay, which is certainly not out of the question, how strong would that team be?

If this has already been disuscuss, my apologies.

[Fonebone]

Great Question

Great Question Fonebone - Keep up the good work.

Sincerely,

Fonebone

[wazZag]

I'm going to try to avoid causing this thread to be hijacked. In short, I think next year's team could be excellent, depending upon point guard play, and the emergence of a consistent 2-3 guard (Hopefully Bell, Keita, Manny or 'Hoff). The front court will have solid depth: Sacre, Harris, Dower, Olynyk, Spangler. I just hope the right combination of backcourt guys help spread the floor to help that depth flourish.

[U Zig, I Zag]

Great Question Fonebone - Keep up the good work.

Sincerely,

Fonebone

That team would have huge potential.

Elias may or may not stay. There might be some NBA issues next year, so he might be wise to avoid that. HOWEVER, I could see him maybe tiring of it here and wanting to go play Euroball, where he could make a good living.

Rob has to stay. He needs a few more things to work on. He could easily be a top 15 pick at the end of his senior year if he develops at a continually rate.

[VaBeachZAG]

Although Harris has recently been showing signs of improvement, he is still a long long way from even the most reasonable pre-season expectations. That said, even if Harris didn't improve one bit from where he is right now, next year's team would be far far better with him than without him.

[cjm720]

Suppose that this season for Elias turns out, over all, to be far below his full potential, and he decides to stay one more year.

The thing is, Elias started the season hurt and out of shape. I think it would suprise many to realize that his PPG and RPG in the last 7 games are higher compared to last season's totals and he's doing it with less time on the floor ...not by much, but up nonetheless (15.4 and 7.4 vs. 14.9 and 7.1) . Considering Bobby's improvement, I'd say that bodes well for our team and his future aspirations. As his conditioning improves and our guard play becomes more and more steady, he will begin to dominate when he wants IMO.

As far as the OP, they will only get better and we will dominate Two years ago I predicted a Final Four for 2011/2012 and I'm sticking to it!

[dnj116]

My question is, with the guards coming in next year, do we redshirt perhaps Dranginis in order to stagger our guards a bit? This is who we will have for 1-3 spots:

Meech
Marquis
Stockton
Elias (when playing the 3, and assuming he stays)
Monninghoff
Keita
Arop
Pangos
Gary Bell
Dranginis
Sarbaugh

So with all those options available, and I don't imagine anyone else will transfer out, I believe it would be wise to redshirt Dranginis. It would allow him a year to put on muscle, learn the system and not lose a year of eligibility to perhaps finding not enough minutes.

I would say an option for redshirting would be Pangos based on what he's said in the past of wanting another year of development, but I believe we could use his skills as a point guard immediately next year.

[thespywhozaggedme]

That's funny, I was thinking about this exact thing last night. If Rob and Elias stay, I would redshirt Dranginis and Spangler to spread the roster out. Imagine a depth chart of the following:

Pg: Meech,Pangos, David, Marquis
Sg: Kieta, GBJ, Hart
Sf: Matthis, Manny
Pf: Elias, Sam
C: Rob, Kelly

This team would be flat out sick

[CDC84]

How would you like to be a fly on the wall for GU practices next fall? Especially when the guards go at it?

[DZ]

With the incoming recruits, it is really hard not to get excited looking at the possibilities coming in next year, but.

Lets see if this year's little 'ol team can do something that a Zag team has not done in a long long time. EXCEED expectations in March! That is hard to do when there are unrealistic FF expectations every year - but with the rocky road at the beginning of the year, perhaps we are more realistic. Right now we are one bad loss from not having an "at large" bid.

What if we continued to improve and made an impressive run into the second week of the tournament, taking down a big name or two along the way?

Steven deserves it.

[ZagFanInNC]

Next year

Rob will be graduating at the end of the year and while I think he should return for his senior season if we go deep in the tournament we might see him and Elias leave...

That being said if they return for next year we will be awesome.

I think Pangos will RS because unless im mistaken he was considering a prep school as well as us which makes me think he would prefer to RS as a freshman.

GBJ is so sick there is no way he will RS and I dont think he will allow the coaching staff to keep him off the court even though we are heavy with guards.

I dont know much about Spangler so I cant really comment on that...

Because of the amount of guards we have I would also think that Dranginis would RS...

I think this will be the best GU recruiting class ever...
The future is bright at GU, hopefully we dont see a bunch of these guys transfer like the last few years...knock on wood...

[Zag 77]

Sarbaugh probably redshirt

Probably makes sense so that he comes on as a redshirt freshman walk-on replacing walk-on Hart.

[MickMick]

You never know until the players show up and Few runs them through some practices.

Bell is likely a lock to see a ton of minutes from the outset.

I think Dranginis may be a redshirt. He looks like a wing to me and the Zags will be deep with returners there. His scoring can be matched by Hoff, Keita is progressing at a nice clip, and Manny's rebounding ability gives him a unique niche at the position.

Of course some one from Dranginis, Manny, Hoff, and Keita is going to have to play a dedicated two guard position to relieve Bell. I think it will be Keita. Carter may have to move over as well.

I wouldn't be shocked if Spangler comes in and rapidly imposes his way into the rotation. In my opinion, KO is going to be seriously challenged.

A few people have Pangos as a question mark. I don't. I think he tops the PG minutes by the fifth game and never looks back. He is going to have a wonderful career here.

If I had to pick a guy that would be impacted the most by the newcomers, it would be Carter. I can understand why he hedged after his GU verbal to reconsider Oklahoma. He has about a half of a season left to find a meaningful role for next year.

[maynard g krebs]

A few people have Pangos as a question mark. I don't. I think he tops the PG minutes by the fifth game and never looks back. He is going to have a wonderful career here.

Agree completely. I don't understand the redshirt talk at all, especially considering that this is the only position of need on the team. IMO KP will be able to do just as well setting up the offense, esp. the post players, as Stockton is doing now, and doesn't have DS's weaknesses.

It's going to be fascinating to watch how the coaches manage the guard situation with the talented newcomers. I think the staff's biggest challenge next year will be getting the freshmen enough time to maximize the team's offensive potential while keeping the vets happy. If they can do that successfully, and RS and EH return, next year could be the best Zag team ever.

[WeSayZed]

My guess is that neither of them will be back, but if even one of them comes back I think we could be as good a team as we are now, or better. KO has quietly become a very productive player, and he’ll almost certainly be even better by the time next season starts. Right now he’s scoring at a rate close to our big three, and his rebounding rate is the best on the team. He also has our best FG% by a wide margin, and he’s 6/12 on his 3s. The only reason he isn’t playing more minutes now is because two of our big three are ahead of him at the moment, but next year he should see major minutes and he could put up some very big numbers. Even this year it wouldn’t surprise me if during conference play we try moving Elias back to SF and giving Kelly more minutes.

If we lose both of them, however, we could see a drop off next year. It’s hard to separate the hype from the reality when it comes to Dower, but the coaches did seem high on him at the beginning of the year. If he doesn’t measure up to his hype, however, I think we could still do well by playing Manny as an undersized PF. He might get outmuscled at times but you can’t argue with his rebounding, and he can score and hit the 3 as well.