Big night in the world of college basketball, both locally and nationally. We'll get to the five o'clock out of the program. We're gonna hand it over to Bill Riley and Sean Mooney for pregame coverage of you Top men's hoops tonight as they take on West Virginia at the Huntsman Center byu is An Ames to take on Iowa State.
Our next guest, the Seer of college basketball, the smartest college basketball guy around, good enough to join us with not a lot of notice on a Tuesday, Ken Palm, Ken Palmroy, Happy Tuesday, sir, how are you.
Hey, Spence. I'm doing great, looking forward to the upcoming madness sies we get into singule elimination basketball.
Yes, indeed, it's a great time of year and Ken, obviously this news is not finalized, but I do have to get your take on the reports from college basketball newsbreakers like Rastein and h and Goodman as well our very own Sean O'Connell also reporting that it appears Alex Smith is in line to be the next head coach of the University of Utah. I know you know, Alex well, should this become the deal and should this become official.
What's your thought on the fit.
I think it's a great fit, assuming you mean Alex Jenson and not Alex Smith.
Did I say Alex Smith again? I've done that four times on the show. Alex Jensen. Yes, Alex Jensen, that's okay.
I think yeah. I mean it's you know, obviously the ties are strong and the loyalty is there, and I think, you know, the modern game, there's probably less difference between running or assisting in an NBA program and a college program at this point. So so yeah, it'll be great to have Alex back up on the hill and looking forward to a new era of UTES basketball. Hopefully it goes well. I mean we were, you know, when Craig
Smith was hired. We thought that was the right hire too, and and you know, he checked all the boxes and ultimately it didn't quite work out. So you never know about these things. But it does seem like like Alex.
Is the right choice at this point based off of the success of Kevin Young and the b YU basketball program. You know, once upon a time, But can I believe I said Alex Smith again, I've said that like five times there.
Once upon a.
Time, the idea of an Alex Jensen or a guy like Kevin Leaving the pros for college seemed like kind of a silly thing. Do you think we're going to see more of this as a result of the change to the sport where you know, players can.
Kind of come and go in a way they couldn't prior to.
And maybe Alex had done his calculation and once upon a time I thought he'd be an NBA head coach. I'm surprised that he never got that opportunity. Maybe still work, Maybe he still will. He's forty eight years old. But do you think the success of what Brigham Young has been able to do by hiring essentially an entirely pro staff, is that something we're going to start seeing maybe more commonplace in college hoops?
Possibly? I think, you know, if you get you can get the deal worked the right way for sure, And like you said, like there's still probably a past for Alex to if you have success here, to to jump back to the NBA if he wants. But yeah, I mean, especially if you can kind of detach yourself maybe from the recruiting part of it. You know, if you have a separate general manager that we're seeing a lot of schools go to now that can kind of organize the
recruiting aspect of things. Uh, you know, I think that's always the the drawback of coaching at the college level is the amount of work you have to do to get players, Whereas you know, you're really not doing that much work as a assistant coach or a head coach
in the NBA. So as we had to that more, you know, more of that kind of a model, I think it does become a more appealing job for some of these guys in the NBA who realize that, hey, there's only you know, thirty head coaching jobs in the NBA. So uh, even if you even if you are qualified to be an NBA head coach, really hard to get one. You look at the openings that happened in the NBA every year, and a lot of those openings end up
going to guys who have already been head coaches. So it's just really tough to break in.
At that level.
And so maybe you know, that's backing into the calculus here for Alex wanting to come back to the college level.
Ye, what are your thoughts is when you heard the news that Craig had been let go and you know, ultimately Craig is very young. I think he has a lot of coaching ahead of him. And also the thoughts on because they were picked to finish last in the conference and they might finish you know, eight, nine, ten,
We'll see how the rest of the season goes. There's there's a case to be made ken that he actually did a pretty good job and in my opinion, he just didn't have the talent that a lot of his peers did in the Big twelve.
So what are your thoughts on Mark Carlin deciding to let Craig go.
I think he sund it up pretty well there. It wasn't really surprising that he was let go. I mean, the program had kind of stagnated, and as you mentioned that there may be and there are reasons for that outside of craigsmith coaching ability. I mean, Craigsmith that succeeded at multiple previous stops, so it's not like he just suddenly forgot how to coach. And as you mentioned, they also you know, probably overachieved this year given the roster.
You know, they're finishing the season pretty strong. The timing was really what was surprising. Come off with the wins against Kansas and Kansas State, and it was almost like, you know, administration was just waiting for for the next loss to to let him go, and they didn't. They didn't get that against Kansas or Kansas State. So it did happened after the use of the f game. But Craig, you know, he's gonna he's gonna get another head coaching
job somewhere. It seems like fairly obvious that will happen. It might be at a lower level, but Craig can still coach, and uh, you know, he's always a great personality, a great representative of your your program. Not that matters if you can't win, but I think if he, you know, goes to another program, maybe at a slightly lower conference that has you know, better resources at its level, you know, I think there's no reason for him, you know, not to be successful again. It kind of reminds me of
the ten Miles situation. Obviously, those two guys are are connected from uh, you know, previous years working together. But you know, Tim Miles gets fired at Nebraska, he ends up at San Jose State pretty quickly, and Craig Smit, I think, is going to have that opportunity as well.
All right, moving off the coaching news, there is a Utah basketball game tonight, and you know, I'm sure it's going to be tough for coach Eiler to keep this team focused. And this is a group of young men that have been through a lot over the past couple of weeks, certainly losing their head coach, and they were able to get a win against a very depleted Arizona State team. Actually, before we get to West Virginia, Bobby Hurley, is he in trouble when it comes to his job?
And why are they rolling around with like five scholarship players right now?
Yeah, that's a good question. So he may be in trouble. I mean it's you know, he's found the similar kind of trajectories as Craig Smith dead, except Bobby Hurley has done it over you know, the course of ten years of Arizona State. So yeah, I mean, there's they suffer from the same issues that other programs up are from where they you know, they don't have the resources necessarily to compete with you know, the better schools in the league.
That's holding Bobby Hurley back a bit. But even so, you wouldn't wonder why they would continue continue on with with Bobby Hurley given the complete, you know, lack of recent success, and I don't know why they don't have more more scholarship players to lean on. This seems to
be been an issue. It's not just the first time that's happened at Arizona State where they've kind of gotten at the end of the season and gotten beat up with some injuries and whatnot, and you know, just don't have the depth to uh to roll out of, you know, a seven or eight man rotation by the end of the year. So I don't know what's going on with that either, but obviously that's the program that is in
a in a tail spin this year. And uh, you know it's I'm not heard, I'm not an insider on coaching news spent, but it would seem to be, uh, it would seem to be the time for for Arizona State pitching.
So West Virginia in town and i West Virginia beat Iowa States back at the beginning in Big twelve play. They also beat Kansas, but I guess everybody's beat Kansas. They also beat Arizona. They have like randomly three really good wins. They got dog walked at the Marriott Center by you smoked them. And this is, I don't know, a sneaky big game because both these teams are eight and ten in Big twelve play, So of course you want to get the win and try to get the
best seat you possibly can. Tell us, what do you drop against tonight as West Virginia roles in the town.
Yeah, well, I mean, first of all, West Virginia is in the Mets for a not large of it still, so this is going to be a big game for them. This is one they could really use. What would probably be you know, one of those nice quad one wins because it is on the road, so that to start. And West Virginia. Speaking of head coaches that have done well, Darian Debrees in his first year, you know, it was really surprised, you know, people across the country with the
way West Rnius performance year. They were not expected to be a tournament team. They got to transfer Jamon Small from Oklahoma State, who was really one of the best scorers in the league. Six y three guard for them, and they play with the autstanding defense or defensive ranked fifteenth in the country, and that's really what kind of has carried them this year. Along with a pretty strong
home court advantage. So that's the story on them. They also daring Breeze's Sun Tucker to Breeze early is probably the best player on the roster, but you got injured early in the year and has not played it will not play the rest of the year. So just an incredible, you know, coaching job, first of all. And it will be a challenge to score some points against this team, and it's going to be a grind, grinding, low scorings game probably played in the sixties.
Tonight, all right, b YU with a really big one tonight.
But before we get to what BYU has in front of them when it comes to a big game against Iowa State tonight in Ames, let's just get your thoughts on the latest with what BYU has been able to do. They've won six straight basketball games, they've won ten of their last twelve, and you know, the West Virginia game ken was interesting because they could not hit the broadside of a bar in the first half. They did not hit a three in the first half. They lit it up in the second, but a lot of it was
paid points, a lot of it was foos. And you know, now they find themselves after winning McHale, following up to win against Kansas, I feel like certainly a lot for the tournament and potentially getting a top four seed, which give you a double buy into the quarter So before we get to tonight, what has gone so right for Kevin Young and his BYU basketball team as of late.
Well, you mentioned, you know, being able to being able to have a successful offense really without greade three point shooting. This is the team that takes a lot of threes. There're seventeens in the country in terms of the percentage of field goal times from three point range. There's seventeenth in the country from the number of points they get from three point range. So in one sense, the offense is you know, it's really clicking. It's it's clicking with
getting threes. But they're also top five in the country in terms of two point percentage, and that's huge. I mean, just a well oiled offense right now. They don't necessarily do anything else great, but they can shoot it and that space is the floor. And you know, they obviously have two very effective big men in terms of trayory
and in Kava Cata Uh. You know that allows them to finish you know on lobs and and when you have that kind of space that is generated by the shooters, really hard to for those you know defenders on the wing to help on take and roll and so you know, you can still be effective, eve when they're not hitting three. I think people are always going to respect the three in any game, whether they're going it or not, because they know the YU pretty much has three or four
knockdown shooters on the court at every time. So they're playing with house money tonight. I mean this winning streat because you know, put them easily into the tournament. Uh,
it's been impressive. It's turn the heads of a lot of people, and uh they're going to have probably their their toughest task at the night or you know this this run tonight in terms of going you know to Iowa State on senior Night, an Iowa State team that's finally fully healthy after uh some injuries and roster issues over the past you know, a month and a half, and so it's gonna be a really tough tough game
for BYU. But I said, they're playing with house money, and so even making this game competitive I think would still step them on a course. For you know, big expectations in the NCAA Tournament.
I always stayed an eight point five point favorite. I thought that line was rather large. They had kind of a weird run where they lost a random game on the road to Oklahoma State. They got got by Houston, but Houston's awesome. They just smoked Arizona and you know, they went through the stretch three straight ls Arizona, k State, Kansas and lost to West Virginia, as we already outlined. So tell us about the Cyclones. What's b YU up against in a tough place to play Ames Iowa tonight.
Yeah. So the Cyclones, I mean, they've just been on this upward trajectory ever since TJ Osselberger took over as the head coach four years ago. And you know, his expertise has been on the defensive end. Last year they had the top defense in the country. They had the fifty second best offense. I curely have the ninth best defense in the country and the twenty first best offense. It's easily his best offense since it has been in
Arizona State. Like the complete package is coming around and he's been one of those coaches that's kind of magically figured out how to retain players. They're thirty fifth in the country in terms of the continuity of minutes from last season, so they got guys back from last year as a very experienced team. And even though they still you know, they're calling card is still in the defensive end, they can now score and it's a little bit more of a you know, modern basketball offense in terms of
being able to make some shots from distance. They're not a you know, a team that shoots a lot of threes, but they are ninety third in the country in terms of the number of threes they make, and so the offense is more of a well rounded pack is not necessarily led by any sort of stars or anything like that. There's a bunch of like solid guys who don't given
a night can you know, to beat the star. But for the most part, it's you know, five to seven guys who are willing to share and you know, kind of more of an average role and that's turned out to be a very effective formula for them.
Where do you see this game tonight and aims kind of hinging like what does BYU need to do well in order based off of what you know about both these two teams in order to pull off, which according to Vegas, would be a pretty sizable upset.
Yeah. I mean, one thing that Iowa State does well and really gets them going is forces turnovers. And it's not nearly, not necessarily a Byu specialty to avoid them. I mean we've talked, you know, over the course of the year about Diego or demon and obviously his role in the offense. He handles the ball a lot, He triggers the offense his passing instincts in his court vision. His reads are i'd say above average, certainly above average for a person of his age, but sometimes he has
trouble executing on those reads. And and you know, he commits a fair amount of turnovers, and it's can be important for by you to limit those tonight. If you can force Iowa State play in the half court, you know you're gonna have a much better chance of limiting what they do offensively, and obviously limning those turnovers will you know, obviously lead to more shots for Uyu. I mean, that's really probably the story of the night is can b Yu get up as many shots as Iowa State
they can do that, it'll be an interesting game. You know, Bio states looking at you know, ten or fifteen more fieldgal attempts in the box score. By the time the night is over, it's going to be a real struggle. So I'd say, you know, watch watch Diegor and see, you know, if he can limit the turnovers tonight by you could could hang around here.
Let me revisit something we talked about a couple of weeks ago, and I think at the time Ken your answer was Arizona. I've got Kenpalm dot com up, of course, proud subscriber for a number of years. And the second highest rated Big Twelve team you have now is Tech Texas Tech. If I asked you who the second best team in the Big twelve is right now, is it Texas Tech or is it somebody else?
It's probably Texas Tech. I mean, it's hard to really deny what they've done. You know, it's a team that itself has been somewhat surprising. Uh. They were actually ranked fourteenth in my pre season ratings, but we've unrated in the THEA people to start the season, so to some extent, they've been surprising. But you know they've they've answered, you know, all the questions pretty much over the course of the season.
Obviously their most recent game. You know, they go to Kansas and get a victory, and I know everybody seen in Kansas, but Kansas is still a pretty decent team, especially at home, and for Texas Tech to go in there and get a win, you know, says a lot.
Uh.
They themselves had some issues with with injuries in terms of chance McMillan and Darian Williams, a couple of their starters being out, but they got them all back for the Kansas game, and so they do look extremely tough. I mean, I still like Arizona. I like what they do as well, but Texas Tech is a very tough team, and I think as we've seen the bigger stample size this year, uh, it's harder to de I they're legitimate claim to being the second best team.
In the league.
I'll ask a similar question, but I'll ask it differently, non non Houston Big twelve basketball team built to make an NCAA tournament run.
Who's that.
I'd go with Arizona, I guess is the next best choice, just because I prefer teams that are a little better offense. So, I mean, we talked about Iowa State and they've obviously they've improved their offense, but Arizona States needs to be more built around their offense, so potentially a better chance for a deeper run. But we're kind of splitting hairs here. I mean, you know, I think, well, Arizona and Iowa
State are are teams that could could go far. And I mean, you know, I think it's an outside shot that b Y you could be that team as well, just given the fact that you know their offense can be very explosive, and that upside I think is kind of intriguing. Although there's obviously a extremely long history of you know, you not making deep tournament runs that would would maybe cause you to have some reluctance to have him go deep in.
Your bracket, and that's where I wanted to go next. Are you more confident? Like Byu was a six seed last year? I think it was the day day Grant kid in Ducane.
That got him round one.
Jackson Robinson was like the only player making shots. But I thought Byu was built for something somewhat exciting last year. Do you think Kevin's team is better because right now Lenardi has them as an eight seed.
They were six seed last year.
Is this team built for either a better Big twelve tournament run or an NCAA tournament run in your mind, Ken.
Well, they're probably more like a Big twelve tournament run is a little more likely, just because there's you know, it's just such a quick event and you know, you're almost just there's not a lot of scouting, and he was kind of reacting to what you know over the course of the season, and so I think that favors BIU more than the situation where there might be more detailed scouting in a few days prepare for a team and and kind of limit what YU does offensively and
try to make them do things are not comfortable with. And certainly the memories of last year, I mean, they just linger, you know, like they were. They weren't just a sixth seed. They were they were one of the biggest favorites as a sixth seed in their first game and in tournament history. And the game wasn't competitive like it was. There was almost never a time in that game where you thought you why he was going to win.
So that's a little concerning, and I don't I think this team might be marginally better than last year's team, but I don't know that it's like that much different. So so that is the concern. Like clearly, like there's some things you like, Like you like the shooting, you like the fact that their experience and they're an older team, and you think all those things would lead towards success. I would also say you did not want to be on the eight or nine line in this year's tournament.
I mean, the one seed this year are as good as they've ever been, you know, certainly in the last fifteen twenty years. So that's an issue too. Like you get you get past that first game, and all of a sudden, you're you know, facing historically like dominant Auburn or Duke or Houston. Like that's that's no pointo either.
Speaking of teams on the eight or nine line.
One with this the Utah State Aggies according to the bracketology number nine right now according to Lenardi, you have them at fifty six in the Ken Palm. And you know, as we've talked about that that basketball ethos up there, that basketball community up there. Man, they you know, coaches roll in and they seem to win. And I'm not taking anything away from any of them, because every year is different.
But tell me your thoughts on year one. Jared Calhoun up and Logan.
Well, we oh, yeah, I mean there's yeah, there's nothing to take away from what he's done up there and the season that they've had. I mean, it's been outstanding. You know, Obviously losing the last couple of games is taking a little bit of shine off of that, especially the way they lost Colorado State really just not being competitive and to a certain extent, the boy they speaking was that way as well. I mean, it's a team
this year. I mean record aside, like the record has been great, but record aside, like their metrics have always kind of lagged behind their record and hinted at maybe some future struggles that you know, some of these other Mountain West teams might not experience, you know, down the stretch, and we're starting to see that, you know, they are pretty safe for the tournament, and I think, you know, big picture, like, you you know, rewind things back to
mid October and a tournament bid is an excellent season. I mean, you just got to you know, anytime a first year coach can come into this situation and almost completely turned over the roster, it wasn't one hundred percent turnover like it was last year under Danny Sprinkle, but just under the circumstances, a great season for the Aggies. But the overall metrics are as I said, lagging, and you know, hopes of a deeper tournament run or I
don't know if they non existent. Anybody can do it almost, but only a lot less likely than they are for BYU.
It is March, Ken, which means two things.
My birthday, which I know you'll remember, and then of course college basketball. A lot of us have our attention on brackets and such, and you are the guy for this.
Where can people go get their work is their.
Families, coworkers and friends are asking them to fill out brackets comprise of teams that they have not watched for one second all year.
They can go to kenbond dot COM's Man's Up where all the stats are and if you want even more stats, you can pony up twenty four to ninety five or a twelve months description, so it'll get you set through the tournament and good all the way through March the next year, so you can enjoy all this good data for next college basketball season as well.
It's an excellent resource. Ken. Thank you, my friend, happy March and we'll chat.
Soon, all right, Thanks Ben, appreciate it.
Kenpom dot com it's where you go. I've been a subscriber for years. It helps me do this job that it helps me fill out brackets and it is very much worth your twenty four bucks at kenpom dot com is where you find. Brought to you today b our friends at Ogden Clinicalveley Dermatology.
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