I know you guys hate reading about our Ben Ball warriors in the middle of all the excitement of the ongoing football season. So I am going to throw up yet another report anticipating the most anticipated Bruin debut since the first game of Bill Walton. The LAT rolled out its college basketball preview today, which includes the following story on Coach Howland's most prized freshman to date at UCLA:
Josh Shipp, a redshirt junior who along with senior Mata-Real has been with Howland four years, gave a thoughtful analysis of Love the other day.
"The thing you've got to like about Kevin," Shipp said, "he brings it every day in practice. He impresses me every day. The outlet pass, wow."
Darren Collison, a junior point guard who was tempted by the NBA a year ago, came back in part to direct Howland's motion offense with the option of a real center as the fulcrum.
"As a freshman," Collison said, "you're not supposed to get everything the way Kevin does. But he gets it."
Collison, who has gained 10 pounds of muscle and says he took hundreds of shots a day to improve on his 44.7% three-point shooting, said there would be a trickle-down effect of Love's game.
"It makes it a lot easier on everybody else," Collison said. "Since I've been here, we've been mainly a guard team and it's been real hard to get some easy buckets in transition because there has been so much focus on the best shooters. So when teams could, they would collapse on us and deny the perimeter.
"With Kevin bringing an inside presence, and with Lorenzo the senior he is, it takes the attention off. Defenders have to help down low. We're such a good outside shooting team, it's going to make it much more easy to get our shots."
Well for those of you in Southern California, you get to wait just 3 more days till you get to see those shots at Pauley. While for rest of us we have 10 more days to go till our Ben Ball warriors officially arrive for the 2007-08 season."The thing you've got to like about Kevin," Shipp said, "he brings it every day in practice. He impresses me every day. The outlet pass, wow."
Darren Collison, a junior point guard who was tempted by the NBA a year ago, came back in part to direct Howland's motion offense with the option of a real center as the fulcrum.
"As a freshman," Collison said, "you're not supposed to get everything the way Kevin does. But he gets it."
Collison, who has gained 10 pounds of muscle and says he took hundreds of shots a day to improve on his 44.7% three-point shooting, said there would be a trickle-down effect of Love's game.
"It makes it a lot easier on everybody else," Collison said. "Since I've been here, we've been mainly a guard team and it's been real hard to get some easy buckets in transition because there has been so much focus on the best shooters. So when teams could, they would collapse on us and deny the perimeter.
"With Kevin bringing an inside presence, and with Lorenzo the senior he is, it takes the attention off. Defenders have to help down low. We're such a good outside shooting team, it's going to make it much more easy to get our shots."
Now everything was not perfect in Times coverage today. If you are too impressed with Pucin’s reporting ability after reading the Love article, think again. It looks like Diane is warming up for the season, by writing a clueless take on basketball scheduling. Pucin has an idiotic piece on the "different philosophies’ of Coach Howland and Timmeh’s scheduling. I am not going to bother excerpting it because it is that bad. She takes digs at UCLA’s scheduling by mentioning up front how UCLA’s OOC schedule doesn’t include many high profile teams. Yet somehow she forget to mention prominently in the article how UCLA’s schedule includes a home game against Texas, possible matchup with Michigan State, and of course a grueling Pac-10 schedule that will get us ready for the tourney. Her analysis (calling it "analysis" would be charitable) also leaves out how UCLA and Southern Cal are in completely different places when it comes to what kind of opponent they need to schedule to raise the profile of our program.
Just a total ridiculous piece from Diane, and I am sure this will not be her last one either. I just don’t understand why is it so difficult for LAT to assign a reporter to UCLA beat, who actually knows something about the game unlike a moron such as Pucin. Anyway, despite Diane's idiocy and usual UCLA bashing, I still keep reading UCLA related articles in LAT, which has couple of more Ben Ball related items, which includes a scouting report and a quick look at our roster.
Thank God for Ben Ball.
GO BRUINS.