Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Midseason Kansas Jayhawks Player Evaluations: Flory Bidunga, Zeke Mayo Killing It, Wings Struggling

Episode Date: January 2, 2025

Kansas Jayhawks Basketball: Unpacking Player Performances and Team DynamicsAre the Kansas Jayhawks basketball players living up to the preseason hype? Host Derek Johnson takes a hard look at the Jayha...wks' roster, evaluating standout performances and unexpected challenges. From Flory Bidunga's great play to Dajuan Harris to Zeke Mayo's surprising offensive contributions, the episode covers key insights into the team's guards, wings, and big men. Johnson also examines the impact of Hunter Dickinson and KJ Adams on the court, questioning how their roles might evolve as the season progresses. With a focus on player stats and team strategy, this analysis offers a comprehensive view of the Jayhawks' current standing.Tune in to discover how these evaluations could shape the Kansas Jayhawks' path to success this season.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!Rocket MoneyCancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to RocketMoney.com/lockedon today.GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONCOLLEGE for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Download Gametime today. What time is it? Gametime.FanDuelThe NFL Playoffs are almost here, but it’s not too late to get in on the regular season action with FanDuel because right now, new customers can finish the season strong with TWO HUNDRED and FIFTY DOLLARS in BONUS BETS if your first FIVE DOLLAR bet wins. Visit FANDUEL.COM to get started. FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)

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Starting point is 00:00:00 On today's Locked On Jayhawks, we're going to take deep dives into every player in position for KU basketball. How have they done so far and what has fueled their games to this point in the season? You are Locked On Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. of Locked on Jayhawks. We had our KU West Virginia recap. We'll have a KU UCF preview coming later this week, also right here with LOJ. And on today's episode, we're going to be evaluating the KU position groups and players to this point of the season and evaluating, you know, whether it was preseason expectations to where they are now or how this season has gone. We're going to talk about it and go a little bit deep with some fun stats into each player and kind of get an
Starting point is 00:01:04 understanding of where things are right now at this point of the season for these different players. Let's start right here with the guards for KU. And we're going to start with DeJuan Harris. DeJuan Harris so far this season is averaging 10.3 points, 5.8 assists, 1.6 steals per game. He's only averaging 1.6 turnovers per game. The turnover number is much down from where it was a season ago um and the the shooting percentage from the floor 45 that's good 85 at the foul line also good three-point percentage hasn't been quite to his career norms at 31 that's the one number that you're hoping to kind of come up um but you look at it with dewan like i think overall he's had a
Starting point is 00:01:41 very good season i know there have been some games they've lost where you know he hasn't had the best shooting games and you look at the Creighton game certainly coming to mind there you look at I guess in the Missouri game he was you know below 45 percent on two-point shots he was 20 percent on three-point shots the West Virginia game he you know didn't necessarily have his best shooting game overall going 29 percent on two-point shots but I think a lot of it hasn't necessarily I I mean, it's the, the lack of spacing provided for him by the lineups with KJ Adams and Hunter Dickinson that has made it a little tougher on him. But overall this season, DeJuan Harris right now ranks 94th percentile in assist percentage, 97th percentile in assist to turnover rate. He's 79th percentile in steal rate
Starting point is 00:02:23 defensively. We've seen him look, I think he's gotten blown past uh every so often here there he's more of a gambling defender i don't know that he's been as good as the guy two years ago but i think he's been better than the guy last year defensively and i think he's overall been a positive defender for you on that end of the court and uh when you look at it with him i think it's very interesting because he's shooting you know 63 at the rim so far this season that was something where he struggled in last year he's done a lot better with kind of the floater mid-range shots he's 18 of 41 from within the three-point line but outside of four and a half feet of the rim so like he's done a good job in those areas if the three-point shooting can come around for him i think it would be everything you
Starting point is 00:03:04 would hope for from a dewan harris season this year i think statistically it's all there so i think if you're comparing the preseason expectations this would be one where i would view dewan harris as being you know um as having a passing grade right as as being somebody who has lived up to expectations and maybe even slightly beyond it to this point of the season i what about zeke mayo? Zeke Mayo so far this season, 14.7 points per game. That number has really skyrocketed lately. Four rebounds, 3.2 assists, not getting a lot of defensive numbers, 0.6 steals, 0.2 blocks. He's shooting 47% from the floor, 38 from three, 89 at the foul line. I think with Zeke Mayo, you're getting more than
Starting point is 00:03:44 you could have envisioned with him coming in because even when he came in and even when there was the high praise from Bill Self in the offseason, there still was, okay, what exactly is he going to bring to the table? He has been KU's most consistent offensive player. I mean, 27, 25, 26. Those are the three scoring efforts of his last three games. He has taken over offensively for ku he's shooting um you know two point shots in the 81st percentile nationally three point shots in the 71st percentile nationally and that's on high volume he's got uh 70th percentile assist to turnover ratio nationally so like he's been just really good for ku overall and he's shooting really good at the rim he's
Starting point is 00:04:22 shooting good mid-range he's shooting good from the corner he's shooting good from above the break like he has been KU's most dynamic offensive player most consistently I know he's not leaning the team in scoring that would be Hunter Dickinson but I think uh Zeke has just been the most dynamic offensive player this team has had so this would be an A for me um in terms of what he has provided this season and compared to preseason expectations now the last guy on the list is Diggy Coit. I don't know that coming into the season we expected him to have a huge role, kind of expected the Jalen Coleman-Lanz role, where maybe he's playing some games, maybe he's playing other games.
Starting point is 00:04:53 Some games he might play five minutes, others he might play 20 if he's on. We've seen a more consistent role for Diggy Coit. He's played in every game. He's played 18 minutes per game so far this season. And with Diggy Coit, he's been excellent three- per game so far this season um and with diggy coy he's been excellent uh three-point shooting so far this year he's shooting 43 on three-point shots he's averaging over five points per game over two rebounds 1.6 assists interestingly enough he has really struggled though on two-point shots so he's shooting 43 so far this season on three-point
Starting point is 00:05:22 shots that's in the 88th percentile nationally. That's in the 88th percentile nationally. He's only in the 13th percentile nationally in two-point shots. So I do think the adjustment to bigger height and length has bothered him in some of those shots, but he has been a good three-point shooter for this team. He's also done a really good job avoiding turnovers. He's in the 99th percentile in assist-to-turnover ratio. I mean, when you go across the board with those Kagan guards, Mayo, Coit, and Duane Harris, that's a lot of really good assist to turnover ratio, which is kind of a thing that Kansas has done well to this point in time. And so when you look at it with Diggie Coit, I think the defense has maybe been better
Starting point is 00:05:57 than you might have expected. It'll be interesting to see because he was a big part of that lineup along with when they played Flory next to Hunter in the West Virginia game, what that means kind of moving forward. But I think this would also be an A compared to preseason expectations of like what you were expecting from him. Like I think DeJuan Harris has met expectations, maybe slightly above. If you look at some of the production, I think Zeke Mayo has been above expectations. I think David Coit has been above expectations in terms of what you were going to get from diggy and then the last guard we have to get to on the list we're just doing scholarship players obviously is uh shaquille moore which that's been kind of a a different thing he's had to deal with an injury he's had i mean there's been a lot of rumors about what was going on there but he's back into play now but only five games played only 5.8 minutes per game uh 1.8 points per game he is shooting 60 from the floor but I don't really want to go into the numbers that much more because it's such a small sample size. This would definitely be one where it is below where your level of expectation was before the season started.
Starting point is 00:06:57 I definitely thought he would be be somebody because he is a good defender that would really help you out there, that he does have some balance and athleticism that this team hasn't always shown all the way through, that I thought he would have a good role on this team, whether that was 12 minutes a game, whether it was 18, 20 minutes per game. I didn't expect him to be somebody who's only giving you five minutes when he's going out there. And even just as much as last week, we heard from Bill Self talking about it's more ideal for DeJuan Harris being a 28 to 30 minute per game guy.
Starting point is 00:07:29 And that Shaquille Moore is the backup point guard. And so that inherently would mean, okay, he's playing 10 to 12 minutes. But that just hasn't been the case at all. So I don't know what is going on there. I don't know if it's more of a Bill Self thing. I don't know if it's more of an injury thing. I don't know if it's a Shaquille Moore thing. I don't know if it's more of an injury thing. I don't know if it's a Shaquille Moore thing. But that was somebody who I think you were in the preseason kind of counting on being in the rotation and being a very real ball handler, kind of player with a lot of juice off the bench that
Starting point is 00:07:54 could give you some extra push and some extra defense that hasn't really happened for whatever of those reasons it entirely is. But overall, you look at this guard position. If you were to say the guard position for KU, with DeJuan Harris, David Coy, Zeke Mayo, Shaquille Moore, I think this has probably been the best position for KU on the team. I don't know. I guess it's hard. Hunter Dickinson has the most production on the team statistically. Flory Padunga has been awesome for KU. So maybe you would say the center position has been the best.
Starting point is 00:08:24 This has certainly been a better position than the wing position. If you're comparing what you thought you were going to be getting from this position to the preseason expectations, I think again, it's been less what you got from Shaquille Moore, but if you've gotten more from David Coit and more from Zeke Mayo and about on par from DeJuan Harris, I don't know that you can necessarily say that this position group has been a fault or has been one that hasn't necessarily lived up to the billing so far this season. Let's get to those wings coming up next. Cause I think that'll be an interesting conversation.
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Starting point is 00:09:52 Locked On College Basketball for your second listen as well. All right, let's move on to the wing position for KU. So with Ryland Griffin so far this season, he's averaging 19.4 minutes per game. He has missed one game due to uh i think it was uh illness in the creighton game right uh six and a half points per game two and a half rebounds per game 1.2 assists he's shooting 43 from the floor he's shooting 33 from 378 from the foul line obviously just the raw numbers are light from where you would have expected him in the regular
Starting point is 00:10:21 season both in terms of the uh counting numbers and in terms of the like you would have probably expected three-point shooting to be higher than 33 percent now how much of it is okay if teams are just not respecting you know you're playing this too big lineup and they're condensing the pain they're saying basically okay we're gonna let other people shoot but we're gonna try to take away rylan griffin and then he's maybe forcing shots and he's not getting in there as much as he might have hoped that's entirely possible to uh kind of playing into it so far but you know what's interesting here with rylan griffin he's in the 90th percentile in two point percentage so far this season and he still is above average nationally in three point
Starting point is 00:10:57 percentage so you're still getting good stuff there no he doesn't take a lot of twos necessarily but he's hit him when he needs to when he needs to kind of counter there um and you look at it and i think what's very interesting is the lineup that has had dewan harris zeke mayo rylan griffin kj adams hunter dickinson has had a really good net rating this year it's a plus 41 net rating basically which that's in the 86th percentile of all five-man lineups nationally that's been a really good lineup but we've only seen it for 77 minutes this year for kansas through 12 games so you're really only seeing the dewan zeke griffin kj hunter which in my mind if you are going to play kj next to hunter for extensive minutes i think the best guy you can throw out there with them is rylan griffin he's the best shooter right
Starting point is 00:11:41 whereas aj store is more of a slasher now maybe if you want to do that duan zeke and diggy coy that can make some sense but i think that just i don't know and also the the um duan zeke griffin store lineup with dickinson or flory at the five we haven't seen that enough either and then i think that would help him um also but this is again one of those situations where it's a little bit of the chicken and the egg like has there been enough leash has there been enough leeway has there been enough playing time given to rylan griffin you could argue maybe there should be more you could also argue that okay he's playing 19.4 minutes per game it's not like he's not getting any playing time and he just hasn't lived up to the billing but is he getting as much you know leeway to make mistakes as maybe he should
Starting point is 00:12:22 be and if you're playing the long game where you're trying to be the best team possible in march did you already mess that up by not giving a longer leash in the early portion of the season in november and december it feels like we're having that conversation every year um under bill self and bill self i still think the world of he's an unbelievable college basketball coach but i think that has been kind of a fair criticism here in the portal era for how things have gone there but um obviously this has been one where it's been below expectation with what you're getting from rylan griffin and again it's kind of eye of the beholder who you want to blame for why that is happening uh aj store i think would fall in the same bucket here as with rylan
Starting point is 00:12:58 griffin um the the counting stats not nearly there 20.3 minutes per game, 7.3 points, 1.9 rebounds. He's only shooting 39.8% from the floor, 33% from three, and 73% at the foul line so far this season. And again, this is one where it's like a little bit of, okay, well, you know, Bilsuff still is giving him 20 minutes per game, and that comes with him having just a 45..8 effective field goal percentage that's 38th percentile nationally over the last five games he has a 30.3 effective field goal percentage that is in the fifth percentile nationally that's not good he's not getting rebounds which he's never
Starting point is 00:13:38 really been known for that necessarily he's only in the 35th percentile two-point shooting he uh isn't really getting to the free throw line he's only in the 35th percentile in two-point shooting. He isn't really getting to the free throw line. He's only in the 32nd percentile in true shooting percentage, only in the fourth percentile over the last five games. He is in the zeroth percentile over the last five games in terms of assist to turnover rate and assist rate. So I say all this to be like, okay, you know, yes, again, could there be a little bit more leeway? Probably, but it's also got to be hard if you're're that coach and you're seeing all those bad things happen. And with AJ Storr, maybe he's not as good of a defender as you would have hoped necessarily to where you can understand why maybe Bill Self is playing him 20 minutes per game as opposed to playing 30 minutes per game. I was picking between, to me, who makes sense to give the longer leash to, if you could only pick
Starting point is 00:14:26 one between Rylan Griffin and AJ Storr, I would pick Griffin because I think the three-point gravity and the volume, I know they're both shooting around the same part right now, but I do think the ceiling of what potentially Rylan Griffin can be and what he brings to your offense spacing-wise is a little bit better of a fit with how you want to do this. Now, you know, if we're talking an ideal world, maybe that would be KJ Adams becomes your super six man, becomes your Kevin Young type players coming off the bench. And then you're starting store and Griffin, or you're starting, you know, a third guard and one of store Griffin.
Starting point is 00:14:56 And that's cool too. I just am not expecting it to happen. Like we can have a conversation about what you think should happen or what you like best. Bill Self's going to continue rolling KJ Adams starting at the four i i feel good about that i feel like that's going to happen not necessarily saying it's the right thing i'm just saying i feel like that's going to happen and so if that's what you're going to do i think rylan griffin makes a little bit more sense but i think in both these cases store and griffin it's been below what you've expected i think maybe even more so with store because i think the expectation was even
Starting point is 00:15:24 more to be like one of the two best players on the team and that uh certainly hasn't happened and then ricky's passport would be the last one here a little bit shorter on this one 11 games played 5.9 minutes per game not a ton to talk about in the stats um when he's been in he hasn't you know had like a big impact necessarily but he's not playing a ton of minutes we'll see what ricky's passport looks like possibly next year right can he be somebody who takes a big leap and is ready to go next season i certainly thought we were going to see enough flashes from ricky's passport this year that you were going to be pumped to see him possibly as like a starter next year i don't think we've seen that which has been unfortunate and i
Starting point is 00:15:56 think overall if we're evaluating the wing position for ku i think you probably are 0 for 3 on players hitting their preseason expectation or being above your preseason expectation. Maybe this was your expectation for Rookies Passmore that, you know, it was just going to be kind of a spot-minute type freshman season and there's not much he can show, and I can lend an ear to that. But certainly this has been KU's worst position so far this season and one where I think everybody has been below expectation
Starting point is 00:16:24 to this point in time. Now, if you think everybody has been below expectation to this point in time now if you wanted to add KJ Adams to this group as a wing technically even though I view him more as a big man but he does play the four and I think you'd be 0 for 4 on on players maybe surpassing their preseason expectations but we'll get into KJ with the rest of the bigs next this is Locked on Jayhawks. And our episode of LOJ is brought to you by Game Time. I love going to live events. It can be sports, music, theater, or comedy.
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Starting point is 00:17:51 All right, continuing on here with L-O-J. What about the evaluating the big position? So with Hunter Dickinson, 15.1 points per game, 10.4 rebounds, 2.6 assists, 1.4 steals, 1.4 blocks. That is incredible efficiency. Obviously, the points isn't quite there to what it was 1.4 blocks. That is incredible efficiency. Obviously, the points isn't quite there to what it was last year. He's also playing less minutes per game, and I think more teams have condensed the court against KU consistently. 54% from the floor,
Starting point is 00:18:14 69 at the foul line, 30% at the three-point line for Hunter Dickinson. So I think statistically, he is still having a very productive season i also think statistically it's not quite what it was last year so maybe it's a little bit below expectation from that standpoint when you look into you know where he ranks he's in the 80th percentile in offensive rebound percentage nationally right now he always ranks well in defensive rebounding rate nationally he's done a good job avoiding turnovers for a big man um and he's also been a great passer this year 93rd percentile in assist rate so far this season and he's in the 86th percentile to assist to turnover rate he's also in the 91st percentile steel rate 83rd percentile
Starting point is 00:18:56 block rate so even though there are certain deficiencies in his defensive game and certain things that he doesn't do well um and certain times where you question the um i don't know lack of mobility or the lack of hustle at times he is at least an active and aware and lengthy defender that can still make some plays happen for you and i do think when you you give him a player like flory badunga who you know hunter's not the guy who's going to oh somebody got beat on the backside hunter's going to come over and block a shot as a help defender to cover up for someone that's not really his game but flory can do that and so i think the beauty of the flory and hunter lineup from the west virginia game was that you had that
Starting point is 00:19:36 good pairing and i think it helped hunter on the defensive end as well that i would like to see that lineup even more moving forward but nonetheless i think the big thing here with hunter he's only in the 59th percentile in two-point percentage. It feels like he has missed more gimmies, more shots than he normally makes this year than in previous years. Maybe that's just, you know, I know he had that injury at one point earlier in the season. Maybe it has something to do with the condensed court a little bit more.
Starting point is 00:20:02 He's in the 57th percentile for true shooting percentage. So as much as that's slightly above average, as much as you're asking him to do on offense you would like to see those numbers go up to where they were kind of the season before i also think you have the questions about the defense but like i said that is a little bit match dependent he just got kind of carved up a little bit against west virginia but again when you have the lineup with flory i think he was better on that end but you can't deny the production from hunter dickinson as much as you might have questions of some of those things that like i don't think i you know i'm not going to say this is necessarily below expectations for failing grade or something like that from where the preseason expectations i don't think
Starting point is 00:20:36 it was above expectations i think it's just kind of it's hunter is the same guy that he was last year for for better or for worse there are different circumstances around him. And I think, I guess I said that we'll work into KJ Adams here. I said this on the West Virginia recap episode. I think both Hunter Dickinson and KJ Adams are good players in different respects that you can have on winning teams, very high-level winning teams, and make it work by building personnel around that. But it's very hard when they're both on the same roster, right?
Starting point is 00:21:13 And so that's why I think you could evaluate each of these players individually as we get to KJ Adams here and say that they've lived up to expectations from the preseason expectations. They've been at their expectation level but the position overall of the big man position has been maybe less than what you would expect at the same point in time has it been KU's best position I don't know let's get into that here okay with KJ Adams you're talking about 29 minutes per game which um yes that is a third on KU in minutes per game um 8.8 points per game, 3.8 rebounds, 2.1 assists,
Starting point is 00:21:45 0.6 steals, one block. He's shooting 55% from the floor, 78% on free throws. Credit to him there. He's had a really good free throw shooting season so far. He is in the 96th percentile in assist to turnover rate. So again, you're talking about another KU player who ranks really well there. You were talking about 66th percentile in block rate.
Starting point is 00:22:04 So he's actually done pretty good with that. He's in 79th percentile for free throw percentage. But here's where the problem comes in. If KJ Adams, so you already know that teams are going to sag off of him and they're going to basically condense the paint and it's going to make things more difficult for you on offense. And so if KJ is not hitting his floater or his elbow shot, that makes it even harder. It gets even harder when KJ is not hitting this too, is right now he's in the 49th percentile for
Starting point is 00:22:34 two point percentage. And over the last five games, KJ is in the 15th percentile nationally in two point percentage. So teams also don't even have to respect it from a post-up perspective. They don't really have to respect it from a, oh, this guy's going to drive on us and finish over us perspective right now. And that is an increasingly problematic venture to where you could say the same thing. If Flory's playing next to Hunter, you could say that as well. Well, they don't have to worry about Flory shooting the jumper. They can just sag in the paint as well. But Flory is going to be better at crashing the offense glass. Flory is going to be able to finish over a four man who is probably smaller than him. Whereas right now, KJ hasn't been finishing as well. I do think KJ has had his best season defensively at the same point in time. And I go back to that Duke game like you don't win that game without KJ Adams. He was great against Cooper Flagg. And so it's hard to remove some of the moments like that.
Starting point is 00:23:22 And it is a little bit dependent on the matchup for for just how problematic it is again i said earlier maybe kj would be better in a kevin young role maybe it'd be better if he's playing 20 22 minutes per game right maybe he starts the game or he comes off the bench i guess it doesn't matter the minutes probably matter more than who actually starts the game and who finishes the game is going to matter even more to that respect as well so it's hard for me because i think with kj you look at the stats they're probably lower than they were last year i think the defense like i said has been better but it just feels like with teams repeatedly doing some of the same stuff defensively with
Starting point is 00:23:53 clogging up the paint it makes it feel like it's been below expectations to this point then you have florida who uh 12.6 minutes per game 6.3 points 5.4 rebounds per 40 numbers are off the charts this dude's shooting 83 from the floor so far this season if he was even playing 25 minutes per game if you just extrapolated it out which i know that's not how it works because you can't maintain that energy level when you're playing more minutes but 25 minutes per game on pace would be over 12 points over 10 rebounds almost 11 and one and a half blocks per game. He's been phenomenal. I think, honestly, like, I don't know. I think there were high expectations for him, obviously,
Starting point is 00:24:30 but you didn't know the cap, the limit that he'd be playing with Hunter on the team. And the fact that he's in the 99th percentile in effective field goal percentage, in the 90th percentile for offensive rebound rate, which, by the way, I don't think I went over that one with KJ Adams, which for KJ, his offensive rebound rate is 46 percentile so there's that advantage that that you know i was kind of talking about there um he's in the 99th percentile is flory in two-point percentage and he's in the 91st percentile in block percentage i think he's been above expectations and uh he's been as high of expectations even as there were with what he was coming into as a mcdonald's all
Starting point is 00:25:05 american and the number one center and all this stuff i think he's lived above it so far to this point and then the last one would be zach clements which um eight games played 5.3 minutes per game so not a ton from the stats department either but honestly like we're at the start of the season to he's had a couple games where he's come in for a few minutes and i thought like been decent been solid for you i would say slightly above expectation but it is such a small role that it doesn't have as big of an impact so overall i think the big position maybe you would say slightly less than expectations coming into the year because you know the stats are down on hunter a little bit from a scoring perspective kj stats are down even though the defense is better even though florian's act
Starting point is 00:25:42 had been a bit better than you expect they're playing way less minutes than those other guys. So it is interesting though, because if you are saying who's the best players on this team, I do feel like the bigs comes in. Here's an interesting question. And we'll leave you with this one before we wrap things up on the show. If you were having a draft right now of players on this KU, the best players on this KU team, right? I'm not talking long term. I'm just talking this year. Even though Flory is only playing 12 minutes per game, where does Flory go in that draft? Could you make an argument Zeke Mayo is one and Flory Badunga is two? I don't know if that would be the answer, and I haven't really thought this through. I'm just
Starting point is 00:26:22 bringing up this question right now, but I do find that very interesting to say the least. All right, that'll wrap up this episode of the show. We'll have a KU UCF preview for tomorrow's episode. See you then on LOJ.

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