sailor, so now Robin’s girlfriend can hit a golf ball farther than me? Now I truly hate him.

As for fouls, officiating, as always will be huge. Rick needs to plant a seed early that handchecks and perimeter bumping is just as detrimental as posts getting fouled jockeying for position.

Sailer, Ted Valentine, Ed Hightower, and Curtis Shaw would be outstanding doing a Knight vs. Huggins game. As for the strategy comment, you’re dead on, there are several different ways Barnes can go. I didn’t even go into using his bench fouls with Chap, Wangmene, and GJ. They are certainly a viable option, especially if we get any kind of a lead.

wulf, thanks man.

HJ, yeah, you probably ran into them at SBSW.

Barton, your depth perception comment is right on point. The Carrier Dome is one of the main reasons Syracuse’s zone has been so effective. Hopefully it doesn’t effect our shooters. I think our open post offense will serve us well getting to the rim. I don’t want to see DJ et al trying to finish over the trees. Any runouts that we can get especially with our bigs outrunning their’s will be huge in countering their aggressiveness on the offensive glass. We already need a team rebounding effort, hopefully our big men getting down the floor will bear fruit against their plodders. And yes, I really look forward to our zone. I like our matchup defending and rebounding against their personnel groupings.

Bragg, thanks big daddy. How’s your calcutta going?

mk92, thanks for stopping by. Hopefully you have some time to post more before Friday and certainly beyond. Good thoughts all the way around. Your points one by one:

1) yes, they did play a bunch of zone. My point was that I doubt Johnson was all that happy with the results. It wouldn’t shock me if they played it vs. Texas, but I think the litmus test last Saturday vs. Marquette didn’t go so well.

2) They might not be confused, but you can’t let them get into a rhythm knowing when and how fast help is coming. Their ability to pass out of a double team is certainly daunting.

3)I wasn’t intimating Washington was a garbage time player. I was just saying he was more of a role player/defensive player used for matchups. You would have to agree that Hill is a much more dynamic offensive player, but Johnson goes to Washington because he’s a better defender and plays harder. There’s nothing wrong with that.

4)On Robin, maybe you’re right. My friend Sailer has certainly been impressed with his improvement, and Robin seems to have made himself some money with his offensive play the last month or so. But in the Marquette game he was a virtual none factor offensively after the first 10 minutes of the game. If Barnes had his druthers he’d want to make Robin try to beat him from 10 ft out. And Robin just might.

5) Yes, me too. I was just talking about Texas attacking the corner with a pseudo-5 man. I know Stanford won’t trap regularly, but they just might situationally if they catch Connor in the corner.

As for the Cardinal issue. I don’t think I ever contextually referred to them as the bird. That’s why I stuck to the singular instead of the plural. I apologize if you thought I was giving you the bird. Ha.

Seriously though, thanks for stopping by. Give us some more if you’ve the time.

A couple of points:
(1) Stanford played a lot more zone against Marquette than you give them credit for — basically the entire 1st half and part of the 2nd. They stopped when McNeal got hot (Marquette was icy from beyond the arc in the 1st half). They also played some zone against UCLA, though not nearly as much. So, I expect you’ll see some zone from Stanford in this game, though it’ll probably vary possession-by-possession because UT’s 3-point threats are better than Marquette’s.

(2) Brook and Robin are both very intelligent players and are able to recognize defenses and are excellent at passing out of the post (or to each other) before the doubleteam hits. So, I’m not sure that switching defenses is likely to confuse the Lopi. Brook does have a tendency to try to do too much at times even in the face of the doubleteam (thus, the lower shooting % than you would expect).

(3) You understate Fred Washington’s importance to the team — while he’s certainly a role player, he’s not a garbage time player. He’s a lousy shooter to be sure, but he is a decent slasher (Goods slashes from time-to-time as well but doesn’t always finish). More importantly, he brings the ball up a fair bit of the time (2nd most to Mitch Johnson). Finally, he’s by far Stanford’s best on-ball defender.

(4) Robin Lopez has a bit more offensive game than you give him credit for. His game has really come on the last few weeks and he actually shoots a better % than his brother. Reliable range out to 10 feet. And, he’s serviceable from the FT line (around 70% — not bad for a big).

(5) Finally, I’d be surprised if Stanford does much trapping at all on defense. Stanford’s approach this season has been to play straight-up (mostly man, but some zone) and force you to use a lot of clock before settling for a bad shot.

Should be a great game!