Men's Hoops Season Preview Press Conference
10/16/2002 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Oct. 16, 2002
Head men's basketball coach Dave Bliss spoke with the media Tuesday to preview the upcoming season. Below are selected excerpts from his comments:
"Year number four we commenced practice on Saturday at noon. I think that what you always hope each fall is that you have addressed things that maybe caused your demise the year before, whether you're Oklahoma, Texas or Baylor. In our particular case, I think this year we are more athletic then last year. I think we have gotten back to being a comparably gifted athletic team for our league. This league needs to be athletic and strong. I also think that we have improved ourselves in the talent area. It's not that we did not have some talent last year; I don't think we ever really meshed as a group, and consequentially we did not have the season we would have liked to have had. This year again it is a matter of knowing that your team is capable of being better, but in this league everybody else is a really good basketball team. We are in a league that a lot of the early predictions have three of the top five teams from our conference. Two of those five are in our division, so it is business as usual in the Big 12. With some returning players that I think have all improved, we have some newcomers that we hope to blend in with them. We are excited for the upcoming year.
"I think the technical areas that we have to address that would involve quickness in that we need to be a much better rebounding team, and a much better defensive team man-to-man. I thought last year that was two areas that we dropped back from the year before. A thing that we started to really assess last year was that the year before, our two leading rebounders were both guards, which was unusual for a basketball team. DeMarcus Minor and Terry Black were our two leading rebounders, and we lost them. Our inside people did a good job of rebounding to a point but our guards did not rebound. We have to get to the point where our guards, with the quickness we have addressed, help us with the rebounding. In this league, you have to rebound from everybody.
"Our quickness on defense should help our man-to-man defense. I thought last year we really had some problems dictating the other team, and the year before I thought we could stop the other team. I thought last year since we were a younger team, we never really had the conviction that we could go out and stop somebody.
"I have not looked much at it (the schedule); you are going to have to play all the teams sometime. In the league we are in, you came to the Big 12 to play the best competition. Most of the magazines this year, the number one league this year is the Big 12. You are not going to find too many easy stops. I do know that if you start out with a tough schedule, you better have a head of steam going into that and hopefully our preconference schedule will allow us to do that. We have games that will help us get better. Last year I could tell as early as the Rice game that we had our limitations in areas that eventually hurt us and that proved to be the case. You go through the pre-conference, you learn a lot about your team. This year we have tough games against TCU here, SMU there, Houston in Houston. Games like that are great for the old SWC rivalries. We have got to make sure we are ready to go by that time. We actually have talked as a team that we don't have specific goals right now, other than to improve over the next three weeks, because at that time we will have a better chance to assess what is a realistic goal.
"Over the last few years, when we have had the chance to recruit freshmen we have had some remarkable performances by freshmen. For example, Matt and Logan their freshmen years, and Lawrence (Roberts) and John (Lucas) and Kenny (Taylor) all played well last year. The aspect of trying to blend freshman players with junior college players, to me, is the way to go. There is no doubt that programs like Oklahoma have done a great job with the junior college talent; other teams have chosen to go other directions. I'm really pleased how Lawrence and John have come back as I was with Matt and Logan last year, but again I think at this stage, after three practices, it's a little early to tell some things, but there is no doubt that Lawrence Roberts has played more like a junior than a sophomore.
"I think Lawrence has benefited from a lot of things, and obviously he is better able to answer the question himself. I think what Lawrence found out this summer is that because, as most of you know, we played Lawrence out of position, we played him as a three-player because we had so many who played a power forward. I think what occurred at that time is that he's a good power forward and he can do a lot of good things in there. I think that he stacked up well against other all-stars very favorably, so I think that that gives you great confidence when you go out and succeed against people that you already know that have a good reputation.
"We did not have some of the jumpers that we had the year before. But I think that the nature of our team was not a physical team, was not a battle in the paint area and I know this year we have already had more commotion down in the paint area then any year since I have been here. A large part of it is that Lawrence is stronger, Steven Othoro is stronger, RT [Guinn] is definitely stronger, and our guards that have gone in there have done really well. Terrance Thomas gives us a unique strength at the small forward position. So if we don't rebound better this year, it will not be because we are not physical enough. Steven Othoro is an important player to us because he gives us a tremendous physical presence that helped us beat teams like Iowa State and Kansas the year before. Steven lends a presence to a physical league that we did not have last year because of his injuries.
"Our best starters this fall... John [Lucas] is always capable as a shooter. Ellis Kidd has shown he can help in that area... Matt [Sayman] is shooting better than he ever has.
"Carlton Dotson has played well inside; he has picked things up pretty fast... He's capable of really helping us. Robert Hart adds some stability at guard.
"Our two freshmen: Corey Herring at 6-4 is the kind of guard we play against... Tommy Swanson inside has been beset with injuries the last few years. He's a slender 6-10 but competes very well. He's dones some things the rest of our players can't do."
