This was my first view of the 2016-2017 team. They look very talented. Hawes is silky smooth and quick. Emery didn’t dominate but was definitely a leader. The two new freshmen, Beo and Leifson looked very good on offense. We definitely have guys that can shoot the 3pt shot. Childs is an amazing specimen. For a true freshman, he has the body of a senior. He is big, strong, and athletic. I was less impressed with Dalstrup. Big kid but needs conditioning so he can run the floor better. He is much bigger than I had imagined. Didn’t see Rose, Mika (ankle tweek), or Bryant. Steve Cleveland said Bryant looked very good before his knee procedure. Also said Guin, a walk-on, was sometimes the best player on the floor in practices. He looked very fast and athletic. There is a lot to be excited about.
Guin the walk on last year is on scholarship this year.
And it looks like he’s earned playing time.
Glenn, you’re got a good eye.
Here is what I learned:
Childs is the power forward that BYU has been lacking for decades. His reach has to be that of a 7 footer and he just scrounges balls out of the low post scrum. He was working on a triple double as the announcers said but one of the categories was “in Fouls” and that is not good. Hope he learns or he will be sitting a lot, just like Kaufusi.
I am not so worried about Dastrup, a lot of mission rust but you can tell he knows the game well and is a great passer…Davis on the other hand looks like a senior out there…Still a turnover machine when he passes. Aytes looked massive and he looked good but Childs is just better in every way. Coach Rose now has an answer for any type of team he runs into. Add Mika and Kaufusi…BYU can bang with Big East teams or play small ball.
And now for the Juice…Beo is fearless, will drive and shoot from anywhere. I hope he goes on a mission and we get many years out of this dude because, as you say, Haws is the real deal, it would be a true shame to waste any of his time at BYU riding pine. Leifson is Zac Seljaas…the kid is a 3 machine that can be trusted. I just hope we can find time on the floor for these guys and that we don’t lose any to transfers because these two will be buried in the lineup when you add Rose and Bryant. We have not seen a sniff of Rose or Bryant but they are the real deal, both can penetrate, both can shoot but their greatest talents are finding the open guy.
What we have here is a Golden State type of team with some Phi Jamma in there. They will run teams out of the gym, everyone shoots, with a whole lotta Brawn. I don’t know how Rose is going to keep everyone happy because there is so much talent in duplicate positions.
Well said.
This is a major concern.
Coach Rose used to be better at getting more minutes for more players on the floor. Hopefully he can get back to that now that he has the talent spread more evenly.
Nice bit of writing there Fish! You should consider a column for one of the local papers. Rose has to be licking his chops when he looks over his line-up. I suspect UVU head coach Mark Pope is licking his chops too hoping he can sway a few more of the BYU roster to cross over to the school across town. I hope Rose can manage everyone’s minutes well. Regardless, showtime is finally here and not a moment too soon as far as I’m concerned.
My (football) team had a game last night (I’m the head varsity coach at our middle school–in our town school football begins in 8th grade) and I FORGOT TO RECORD THE STUPID SCRIMMAGE! AAAARRRGGGGHHHH!!! Anyway, I’m pretty sure Steven Beo is NOT LDS in which case no mission in sight. Again, I didn’t see it, but I fear Leifson will just stand on the 3 pt line and will have zero game with the ball in his hands and be even worse on D. I loved Beo’s HS film…he may be versatile enough to be a good college player even though he plays below the rim…and I will just say that my “contacts” who are intricately involved with BYU’s basketball program have been telling me for a year that Childs has an NBA body and athleticism, with good scoring ability inside and out, and, thus, 80% of the battle is won. I think that last week we both labeled him an NBA dude so now the pressure is on for both of us!
PS The Good Guys played their best game of the year last night and won 40-0. D line just went crazy…wow it was fun to watch!
Glenn has replaced Larimer in this thread. I really am glad that you 3 have such high praise and expectations for this team. So will they make it to the elite 8 or is the final 4 their destiny this season? 
It seems like nothing changes as we approach each new season. Every year is the year BYU makes a run in the ncaa tournament. Why can’t we wait until they actually win a wcc tourney or league title? I have no idea.
Like I said, BYU will have to be a lot better than GU or SMC to win anything in the wcc. Being a little better won’t be enough.
We will see.
Better athletes=better team. Haws/Mika/Childs=better athletes=better team. Basic math, baby!
Jim is right about me. I am jumping on the bandwagon already and we haven’t played anyone yet. I guess my optimism is based on the talent we have on the front line AND back court. Other than Mika during his freshman year, Brandon Davies was the last inside threat BYU had. Our best years have been when we have had balance and that’s what we’ve got this year. By the way, tlarimer, you can see the scrimage on Roku (BYU app) or go to BYUTV.org and watch from your computer.
Thanks Glenn–I will watch it online this weekend. Also excited to see our exhibition game. It is not too early for Childs and Haws to be stars! And not too early to jump on the bandwagon!! We are not used to getting the best recruits in the country, but at this moment in time we have the most highly rated group of young players in BYU history.
PS Duke and Kansas and Kentucky make Final Fours with a bunch of freshman and sophomore “one and done” guys. I don’t know that we have ever had a more highly recruited group of players all together. Emery, Haws, Dastrup, Mika, and Childs were ALL recruited by multiple programs at that level. If those 5 were all playing at Kansas now, Kansas fans would expect a final four run. We may even be able to beat some WCC teams, even though far too often it feels like we are playing 5 vs 8 
One simple question, Jim: Are we better then last year? Just a little better or significantly better?
We will see our early train wrecks just because Rose has 9 new guys and so many freshmen straight out of HS or the mission so I am not interested in the “pre season”, just the WCC and Post season tourney. With Kaufusi coming off of football in late Dec, we won’t see the real BYU team until feb-march.
At this point, I am looking at just making the Dance. Cheers
They had better do well in the pre-season games because if they are a bubble team, the SOS is so low that pre-season losses wil keep them out of the NCAA tourney. Ken Pomeroy believes that Princeton is BYU’s roughest pre-season game and is a must win if BYU cannot win the WCC tourney. In his interview on BYUtv today he noted that BYU will not get into the NCAA tourney with less than 24 wins with this seaon’s schedule. He thinks they will be a lock with 27 wins. Those are some tough odds.
When I said I was not so worried about the pre season, I am referring to our weak schedule and that we should breeze by most of those games.
Every year I look at our schedule and circle all of our tough games I count 8 out of 31 games. Princeton will be tough because they have so many veterans coming back and we are sooooo young. With the WCC tourney, we have 2 more games so I see this as an easier road then in the past WCC years.
Princeton @ BYU Vegas odds 73%
USC in the spectrum 34%
maybe Alabama in Vegas
Colo @ BYU 65%
Illinois in Chicago 74%
@ SMC 39%
Gonzaga @ BYU 45%
SMC @ BYU 65%
@ Gonzaga 26%
I have to disagree with Pomeroy, it is not how you start but how you finish and if BYU loses to some early but comes on strong, they will be in the Dance.
One simple answer - I don’t know. I won’t know until we have played 10 games or so. Then I can evaluate and answer that question.
I think I can answer that question easily enough-
Over a year ago, before the 2015 season I wrote that on paper we lost Haws and his excellent FT % but BYU would be better because Davis would start for us and give us an inside game. I had hoped that KC’s FT % would improve or we would lose some close games. That fear was compounded by both Davis and KC blowing games from the FT line.
Last year BYU lost 6 games from the FT line with the Long Beach, Pacific, Pepperdine and Santa Clara games all were eye sores to our Dance chances. This year’s team only has Davis as a clanker. All of our primary ball handlers are high % guys.
I would add that TJ is hardly a true freshman. Lone Peak played in a dozen national tournaments in games larger then any they will see in the WCC. These guys are special.
just finished listening to Wrubel and Durrant.
Most exciting thing I heard…in hs Yoeli got technicalsl for essentially being too intense…a match for Emery!
Two talented players with fire enough to need to avoid technicals. Maybe the toughness factor will finally amp enough to get through the elves unscathed.
Given the depth at bigs I’d be tempted to let Mika and Yoeli loose at the beginning of the game and then sit both of them when they hit two. They would figure out how to play further into games and the rest of the bigs are serviceable.
I just finished reading the article on the BYU sports home page regarding pre season picks for wcc finishes. Gonzaga was picked first with 7 of 10 votes and St. Mary’s was picked second with 3 of the 10 votes. BYU got no votes for first and finished in 3rd place.
A couple of interesting things, assuming you can’t vote for your own team… Few obviously picked St. Mary’s to finish first in league, along with 2 other coaches. So while he publicly applauds BYU as a great competitor, he secretly believes they are not worthy of more than a 3rd place vote. There are 2 other coaches who believe the same. The other interesting thing is that BYU has been in this “recreation league conference” as some have called it, for 5 years now and they are still on the outside looking in. For the first time in its’ history, the wcc has 2 teams ranked in the preseason coaches poll and BYU is not one of those teams.
I’m hopeful of what this group of former high school national champions can do but my hope is tempered by past history and the fact that no matter what BYU does, they are still not seen as anything more than a good team that can’t win the important games, tournaments, etc.
Good locker-room fodder in my opinion. I would guess that the WCC coaches saw that BYU has only one senior playing except for Rose who is a graduate transfer. With all the new bodies and all the freshmen projected to get significant playing time, they probably think BYU will struggle out of the gate. Plus, there are four new head coaches in the WCC who probably don’t have much of a clue about the great young talent BYU has.
You don’t think they know about the high school national championship? Maybe that’s the case, I don’t know. All I do know is that BYU doesn’t get a lot of respect in this conference… not from the opponent’s players, fans or coaches and certainly not from the officials. I hear about it being a recreation league, playing in high school gyms, playing with sub-par officiating, etc. and I wonder why.