Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Will the Kansas Jayhawks Basketball Defense be Elite + Things to Watch for KU in Puerto Rico Trip

Episode Date: July 28, 2023

Who will be the best defenders on Kansas Jayhawks men's basketball in 2023-2024 and what areas could they have weaknesses? Overall, will Bill Self's KU team have an elite defense? Plus, things to watch for in the trip to Puerto Rico from Hunter Dickinson to KJ Adam's fit and more.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!LinkedInLinkedIn Jobs helps you find the qualified candidates you want to talk to, faster. Post your job for free at LinkedIn.com/LOCKEDONCOLLEGE. Terms and conditions apply.eBay MotorsFor parts that fit, head to eBay Motors and look for the green check. Stay in the game with eBay Guaranteed Fit. eBay Motors dot com. Let’s ride. eBay Guaranteed Fit only available to US customers. Eligible items only. Exclusions apply.FanDuelMake Every Moment More. Don’t miss the chance to get your No Sweat First Bet up to TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS in Bonus Bets when you go FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON.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) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's Locked On Jayhawks, who are going to be the best and worst defenders on this KU basketball team in 2023 to 2024? And we'll finish things off. KU's starting their Puerto Rico trip coming up in a few days. Things to watch out for, things that we're going to be watching and interested in for those three games down in Puerto Rico. You are Locked On Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Me as well, Monday through Friday from 3 to 6 p.m. on KLWN in Lawrence with Rock Chalk Sports Talk. Thanks for making Locked On Jayhawks your first listen every day.

We are free and available wherever you get any of your podcasts. Thank you to all the everydayers out there tuning in to all the shows. You can also find us on our YouTube page. Like and subscribe to the show. We'll get back to Monday monday through friday episodes starting next week once a day so those everydayers will really be profiting there with uh some of that after a bit of off-season talk here uh today's episode who's going to be ku's best and worst defenders on this team and the biggest things i'm going to be looking out for and you know that

might be biggest takeaways that we can have from ku's trip to puerto rico at the beginning of august with three games they're set to play. Let's start with the conversation on the best and worst defenders completing our series that we've talked about. If you missed it, we had a conversation about who will be the leading scorer, who will be second on the team, who will be the leading rebounder passing players,

and who will be second in both those regards. Will KU be a good pattern and rebounding team on a couple of previous episodes here with locked on jay hawks um the deep ball will be very interesting for this team overall you know you start with having dewan harris and kevin mcculler and bill self as your head coach you feel like the insulation the start of a great defense is there based on some of what ku has uh but who will be the best individual defenders i think you just start right there and it's hard to pick anyone outside of dewan harris or kevin mcculler now in terms of who won the award big 12 defensive player of the year DeJuan Harris would be the guy that you would go with who wins that award.

I was one of those people who actually argued that Kevin McCuller was KU's best defender last year. And it's not a knock against DeJuan Harris. DeJuan's excellent on the defensive end of the floor. I just thought that with Kevin McCuller, you not just get great defense like you're getting with DeJuan. You not just get somebody who's really good at stripping the ball away and, you know, making chaotic plays, but with Kevin, you also get the blocks and with Kevin, you also get more positional versatility. You know, DeJuan's going to fight you if he's on a bigger player, but with Kevin, you can realistically feel good about him guarding two through four. And if he gets switched on to a point guard, you're going to be like, okay, if he gets switched on to a better, you know, he's going gonna battle his butt off and still have good length he could

come away with one of those strip plays where he kind of grabs it and he's falling back and then saves it inbounds with dewan you have a little less positional versatility with him being a point guard to where i thought kevin mcculler and you look at how many plays that kevin mcculler made to make up for somebody making a mistake um and how many clutch defensive plays the oklahoma state game the texas tech game um that come to mind where he made big plays down the stretch that to me kevin mcculler was the best defensive player in the big 12 and on ku last season but again i was fine with duane harris being the guy because he was probably to me number two in those categories and i think if you're just

looking at like duane harris versus point guards kevin mcculler versus small forwards okay i could understand taking duane harris there kevin mcculler versus small forwards. Okay, I can understand taking DeJuan Harris there. Kevin McCuller, though, because of the positional versatility, that's why I'm taking Kevin. Now, it's funny. Kevin was actually the semifinalist for the National Defensive Player of the Year Award, whereas DeJuan Harris, even though he won Big 12 Def player of the year was not a, a finalist or semi-finalist for the Naismith defensive player of the year.

So that was kind of funny how that worked either way. You can't go wrong with, with whichever guy that you want to talk about. And I think both are excellent defenders and two of the top five defenders in the conference and, you know, two of the best, whatever, 15, 10, 20, however you want to go defenders in the entire country. So you want to answer there i think is a very great guess and now outside of that who would be maybe the third best defender on this team i can't imagine and anyone else will be as good as those players if they are you could have a legendary defense this year um i can actually see you know it's funny with with hunter dickinson coming in part

of the knock against him was yeah but how can he defend in space how can he defend in pick and roll i can actually see you coming away being like yeah but hunter dickinson is the third best defender on this team because we do know hunter dickinson is a very good positional defender like if you try to post him up get him on the block he is a good center one-on-one defender uh the big question becomes how is he going to defend in space i think with bill self with his scheme probably running a drop coverage certain things they're going to do on ball screens that they did with david mccormick who you know is hunter dickinson any less mobile than david mccormick um who was having to deal with like an injured foot throughout his last couple years at ku i don't know probably not so maybe you can mitigate some of the quote-unquote weaknesses

there for defending in space and if he is a pretty good shot blocker like you know rim protection wise shot blocking numbers are similar if not better than like David McCormick and he is a good one-on-one defender maybe he could end up being a solid defender for you this season but I guess if you do want to bring in the questions about defending in space like maybe that would eliminate him there um Arterio Morris is someone I expect to uh pressure the ball very well he's very athletic he's got good length for uh kind of point guard type so you know maybe that's somebody who could be that el marco jackson very athletic very lengthy maybe he could be that also though with el marco it's probably not like even guys who come in as really good athletes as freshmen

can struggle defensively because there are a lot of things you have to learn um and like Grady Dick for instance was a good athlete had good length and I thought he tried hard but it takes time to get to know on that end of the floor like Andrew Wiggins was a pretty good defender at KU but there were still times he would fall asleep off the ball there are still little things that you have to learn in the college games that wouldn't be my pick but he had the potential to do it kj adams is somebody who he's athletic is all get up he's got all the length in the world um you know now he's going to be better off if anybody tries to take him in the post if he's guarding fours that ain't going to work as well as it did with fives and to be clear he was actually pretty good defending fives inside

especially giving up the uh the size that he did there question is going to be can he keep up more consistently with guards if he's switching on to them but he has all the potential in the athletic makeup that he could be that guy so i think if i was going with that number three guy honestly i'd probably go arterio morris i think he's going to be great at ball pressure but i'd be cool kj adams either way if we're talking about here you have elite defenders and kevin mcculler and juan harris i think you'll have plus defenders or at least above average defenders in arterio morris and kj adams um and then you'll have to me at least like average defenders in hunter dickinson and el marco jackson you have all the makings of being an elite defensive team like this is all all the makings of, you had Bill Self in there too, with his game planning,

his scheming, what he can do for defense. This to me feels like a very clear top 20 defense, probably top 15 defense, top 10 defense maybe. And with even the possibility of being like a top five defense, you go back to the national title team two years ago, they were around the 2025 range headed into the tournament. They ended up being like a top 15 top 20 defense once all things were said and done i think this defense is going to be better than that one um because you have dewan and kevin kind of leading the way there can the offense live up to where that one is i don't know that's the part where

it kind of remains to be seen but this should be a very very good defense and you have a lot of good options to kind of go to what about players that could be picked on on the defensive side of the ball? Who would be maybe some of more of your concerns on the defensive end? We'll get to those players coming up in just a moment. First, though, this episode of Locked on Jayhawks is brought to you by LinkedIn Jobs. These days, every new potential hire can feel like a high stakes wager for your small business. You want to be a hundred percent certain that you have access to the best qualified candidates available. That's why you have to check out LinkedIn jobs. LinkedIn jobs helps you find

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so you can quickly prioritize who you'd like to interview and hire. You want to add the right team member, just like Kansas is looking to add, you know, maybe that 11 scholarship player is going to fit in perfectly. Just like KU football scours the transfer portal in the winter, looking to add that final addition to round out the roster. It's why small businesses rate LinkedIn jobs number one in delivering quality hires versus leading competitors. LinkedIn jobs helps you find the qualified candidates you want to talk to

faster. Post your job for free at linkedin.com slash locked on your job for free at link.com slash locked on college. That's linkedin.com slash locked on college. Post your job for free keyword free terms and conditions apply. Who will be some of the players that maybe are going to have more defensive questions on this team here in 2023 to 24. I went through a lot of players there. I went through,

I think what six players as part of the guys I mentioned to, you know you're two at the top and then your other four have a chance if you do get in a specific matchup where you are on a stretch five or you are on a small ball team that has the ability for the five man to dribble to space the floor who's really athletic and can run up and down the court then hunter dickinson there becomes questions there can he defend that guy in space can he get out defensively and guard the three-point line now the beauty of what kansas is running if a team does have that in the five man but the four man isn't as much that they could just invert it and put kj on the movable five man and put hunter dickinson on on maybe a less you know if the four man's not as

good as shooting at the five so they can invert a little bit but what if you're playing you know one of those teams that is more four or five and it's one of those things that you know you look at some of the mid years of bill self it was uh you get to the ncaa tournament like you think back to the northern iowa game games where you're playing maybe more mid majors and they have that stretch four stretch five and it gave issues but then against the bigger teams you had no problems this team feels like more in that to where in the ncaa tournament in past years because you played a more wing heavy lineup you haven't had as many troubles with teams that may stretch four or stretch five the wing teams are more matchup proof this team has a chance to be dominant but in that specific matchup in an ncaa tournament that could become a little bit

problematic so that would be one thing that i would highlight the other one here and i i don't mean to like pick on people or whatever because you know whatever uh nick timberlake that hasn't been his strength defensively so far in his career. I'm just going back off the numbers. Synergy has him in the fourth percentile in defense last year. Not very good. Now, part of that, when you're the best player on your team and you're having to be counted on to score a ton and be the primary option on offense and you exert so much energy on that end it is hard to you know have to use up as much energy on the defensive end of the floor it just is so with nick timberlake coming to kansas he's not going to be the guy who's firing up all of the shots like he was at towson he's going to fit a more specific role

does that give him more energy and more effort to exert on the defensive end? Absolutely it does. So I actually am, even though you do have questions about, well, it's a jump up in competition. If you struggled defensively again at Towson and the CAA, doesn't that mean it's going to be worse in the Big 12? Well, ethically, yes, it's going to be worse, but because you're going to have that better role

and because you're going to have more required of you to get on the court to play well defensively i think nick timberlake's defense will be better than what he showed last year that said better defense for nick timberlake might end up being below average defender in the big 12 if he's hitting threes if he's doing well on the offensive side of the ball it doesn't matter you have enough other good defenders that you're going to have insulation around him that you're going to be able to make up for it and that you're just going to want that offense so it's not overly concerning but that could be something that maybe hinders

his playing time right like arterial morris might end up starting over Nick Timberlake because, you know, Timberlake might be the better shooter. I do think Morris is underrated as a shooter, but on the defensive side of the ball, Morris probably is the head of Nick Timberlake and Bill self loves that. He trusts that. So that could limit Nick Timberlake's playing time. If he only ends up playing 10, 15 minutes, that could be why now we also saw isaiah moss who was you know maybe a

below average defender in his time at ku be a starter by season's end on that team that you know would have been the number one overall seed headed into the ncaa tournament and that's just because they had such good defensive insulation around him with doke and garrett and dotson that they just needed the three-point shooting and the defense they were able to overcome it that could be the case for nick timberberlake this year, too. So it's kind of interesting in that regard. But overall, this should be a very good defense. They have all the traits in the world to be a good two-point defense.

When you have a big man inside with Hunter Dickinson, a good ball pressuring team with Harris, Morris, Jackson, McCuller, a good team at forcing steals. McCuller and Harris are both good at that. And they should be good at rebounding. That is an unheralded part of the defensive side of the ball in terms of like you obviously rebounding is not unheralded but you don't necessarily attach it with defense you know how you finish out a stop you know how you actually get a stop you grab the defensive rebounds you end the possession last year's team wasn't great at it neither was the team before to be honest but um you should be pretty good at that this year.

McCullers is a good defensive rebounder. I think KJ will be better at it this year. Hunter Dickinson is a really good defensive rebounder that you should be able to finish those out. The real question will be defending the three-point line, but that's usually the question with all teams and with Kansas teams under Bill Self in general, especially if there is a stretch team. But outside of that, there's a lot of things going the way of the defense. I don't want to get too what to watch out for in KU's trip to Puerto Rico in just a second. First, though, Locked on Jayhawks is brought to you by eBay Motors.

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That's how it works, though, at eBay Motors. That's great. Because just like in sports, confidence is the name of the game when you shop on eBay Motors. And with over 122 million parts to choose from, you'll be back in the game in no time. After all, it's easy to bring home a win when the right parts are guaranteed. Get the right parts, the right fit and the right prices on ebaymotors.com live ebay guaranteed fit only available to u.s customers eligible items only exclusions apply what to watch out for for ku's upcoming trip to puerto rico they're going to be playing three games as part of the trip to Puerto Rico uh the first I believe they head down there on like August 1st or August 2nd but the first game

is on August 3rd that'll be Thursday August 3rd they'll be playing at 11 a.m central time you can actually listen to the game on KLwn and 1059 kiss in lawrence um the 1059 kiss signal stretches to peak on kansas city too then they'll be playing again on saturday at 4 p.m again same thing goes there will be a half hour pregame and post game on klwn and 1059 kiss and then they'll be playing their third game on august 7th at 11 a.m again half hour pre-post on klwn and 105.9 kiss through the jayhawk radio network and uh you know when you look at this it'll be interesting the competition they're playing it's a professional team um and then there's a i believe the professional team

is from puerto rico and then there's the uh bahamian for the bahamas national team that there are players like buddy healed and deandre ayton and like Clay Thompson, Michael Thompson, his brother that are on the team. I don't know which of them is going to be playing, but if you get any of them or all of them playing, then it becomes a real test of being like, if you can play well against a team with those NBA stars, boy, would that, would you walk away from that being like, wow, this team could be really good. Or if any individuals do well against, you know, like if Hunter Dickinson did well against DeAndre Ayton, it'd be like, oh my gosh, this guy's unbelievable. Right. But I think from holistic approach, how is the team playing around Hunter Dickinson and utilizing the two big lineups with KJ? How is that working? I think KJ Adams in general is the player that people are most going to be excited to watch in this thing.

What does he look like not playing as a center and next to another center? Do we see more dribbling skills? Do we see more passing skills? Do we see his ability as a perimeter defender? Do we see some of his mid-range jump shooting ability? That'll be very interesting. Does KU play any other two big lineups with Parker Brown or Zach Clements next to Hunter Dickinson? I think that overall is going to be the biggest

thing mainly once we go back to kj adams how well do arterio morris and omarco jackson shoot the basketball that'll be a big question and uh something that you know it'll be a small sample size so we won't be able to take away a ton but if it looks good better to look good then go like oh for nine or something like that uh from bill self perspective how much tinkering and different lineups will we see early on versus Bill Self trusting guys? You know, once the ball gets rolled out, Bill Self loves to go with the guys he trusts.

In a setting like this, though, he will give more leeway, but it still wouldn't surprise you if you still saw high minutes for the guys he trusts more. So we're going to be able to take away from that, possibly, and be like, okay, it's pretty clear who this is the guy. And to that who's going to be the fifth starter if we assume dewan harris

kevin mcculler kj adams hunter dickinson will it be arterio morris will it be el marco jackson will it be nick timberlake now it could be different now than at the start of the year keep in mind arterio morris has been having to do with this uh court case stuff in down in austin and that's caused him to maybe miss some time to where maybe Arterio starts game one, but at this point in time, maybe Nick Timberlake or Elmarco Jackson had more at the team that they start, but if Arterio's starting right now, that probably is pretty indicative of how much more Bill Self would trust him at this point in time. Who's the eighth guy is the other conversation. I think Parker Brown at this point in time, but maybe it will

be Jamari McDowell. Those are all things that I'm going to be looking out for, and then just is the other conversation i think parker brown at this point in time but uh maybe it will it will be jamari mcdowell those are all things that i'm going to be looking out for and then just individual player performances does anyone step up does anything add does anyone add anything to their game does anyone look physically or athletically different or better or does the three-point stroke look better on a player like kevin mcculler little things like that what we're going to be looking for we won't be able to have overarching takeaways, but you can have more takeaways for this than you can the camp scrimmages or late night in the fog because there's not coached-up plays.

There's not coached-up schemes in those events, and your players are going at it against each other. So it's like, well, if this player does good, is it because he did well or is it because your other player didn't do well? But in this event where you're playing other people, Bill Shelf's coaching you, you have certain schemes, you have certain plays you're running. Yes, it's not a full playbook

from what you're going to get to the start of the season. This will be more indicative of the regular season than those other scrimmages that KU runs over the summer and once we get closer to the offseason will be. All right, that's going to do it for this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. We'll be back next week, and we'll start doing our Monday through Friday thing again,

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