With the benefit of hindsight, it is pretty clear to me that the loss of Naz Long probably was 4 losses - maybe more. He gave us another defender on the perimeter, 5-7 minutes of relief for Monte at point thus keeping him fresher, and another offensive weapon, making us truly 7 deep once Burton got eligible.
We were never going to be as good a we thought, me included, because we weren't looking at the warts when the season started. Interior depth and play was marginal at best. And when McKay went basically wacko, we were a very limited interior team, particularly defensively. But I never saw a loss to UNI, 2 conference losses at home and the loss at Tech and don't think we would have lost those games with a healthy Naz. We might have won another game or so from other close losses, but this was not a team that realistically would have been competing for the conference crown. But it wouldn't have been the 6th place team, either.
And, of course, we go into the NCAA tournament with a injury (Monte) that impacted what we did have. We need some thicker and more athletic players.
We were never going to be as good a we thought, me included, because we weren't looking at the warts when the season started. Interior depth and play was marginal at best. And when McKay went basically wacko, we were a very limited interior team, particularly defensively. But I never saw a loss to UNI, 2 conference losses at home and the loss at Tech and don't think we would have lost those games with a healthy Naz. We might have won another game or so from other close losses, but this was not a team that realistically would have been competing for the conference crown. But it wouldn't have been the 6th place team, either.
And, of course, we go into the NCAA tournament with a injury (Monte) that impacted what we did have. We need some thicker and more athletic players.
