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Speaker 1: Here's your host, Ben Critical.
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as always here on your Utah ESPN radio Never because Wednesday,
February eighteenth edition of Cougar Sports two PM Along the
Walls DS front and we finally we got our prayers answers.
We finally have the moisture. We finally have the snowfall.
You know what, I'll take it, I hadelujah. I've been
praying for it. My little my son Malachi has been
praying every single night for snow, and he got it.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 1: We finally got it. So we needed it, much needed
uh and much appreciated.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 2: We needed it badly so. But be safe out there, guys. Uh.
You don't need to travel too quickly to too fleet Lee.
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They got to buy three get one free deal going
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need it, no doubt about it.
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Speaker 1: Let's get right into it.
Speaker 2: Let's fire it up the ESPN the Fans starting lineup,
and I can introduce you to my co host and
the rest of the starsht Gash joining us for this Wednesday,
February eighteenth edition of Cougar Sports as welcome in the
Rugby Star of an Age by god At Brigham and
now the bucket getter for ESPN the Fan, the MVP
of the Media Frenzy Basketball Tournament. Just a couple of
years ago.
Speaker 1: Let's welcome Ronald the Three and Man Weaver to the show.
What's Up Rodnie?
Speaker 5: Look, I can beat you pick up basketball. I don't
know about star on the rugby field. I have a
lot of teammates. There were all Americans that won Roody
Schultz Awards, So I'm.
Speaker 6: Happy to see those guys.
Speaker 1: Take the top of it.
Speaker 5: Baby, I'll take the Okay, I'll take the compment. I
do have a clip I need to send you guys.
It's playing with my my brother friends. It won't go
to the Internet because there's a certain tunes that won't
be allowed, but I need to send it to you
so you guys can see what I talk about.
Speaker 6: And it was an honor Jimmer.
Speaker 5: When I played pick up Last Stars, I only shot
logo threes been from half court and uh this was
one that happened and ended the one on one game
and I made it. So shout out to Jimmer for
inspiring the logo three.
Speaker 1: Still, let's go from the logo Jimmer for that.
Speaker 2: Let's welcome in uh Brett always bringing the hammer, Habit
time show, What's up Habitime?
Speaker 1: Did you guys see Mick cronin last night?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Man, he's crazy salty pet three. Oh raise your man.
Speaker 6: He is uh.
Speaker 1: He is always pissed off about something.
Speaker 4: He feels like the he feels like the Walmart Dan Hurley,
like he's trying so hard to be Dan Hurley, but
like it's first of all, I don't get why he
ejected his own player, and second of all, are you
raising your voice to it?
Speaker 1: I don't.
Speaker 4: I think he thought in that moment that everyone was like, Wow,
you're such a loser for asking the question. He's like, oh,
everyone's recording, don't you realize that? And then it's like, yeah,
but dude, you're the one who looks like a jerk
right now.
Speaker 1: He's just he's an old curmudgeon.
Speaker 2: And maybe you're right, maybe he's taking a page out
of uh of one of the greatest coaches in college
basketball modern era.
Speaker 1: History and Hurley.
Speaker 2: You know, there's been other like just curmudgeony, like angry,
antagonistic head coaches over the years. I think Bobby Knight
was always engaging with if you guys, you know, pull
up some some Q and as with him.
Speaker 1: But he was also an all time great. It's mc
cronin an all times right. I want a lot more
than Yeah, yeah, mc.
Speaker 2: Cronin has you know, mke coronin has had a steady
I think trajectory to the position where he's at right now.
UCLA is a basketball school that is a basketball university.
The football program has always been neglected. They should be
better than.
Speaker 1: They have been. But that is a basketball school. That
is being your own player for hustling.
Speaker 2: I think the reason why he did it, and now
I'm trying to give him some grace because it looked
like a flagrant, like if it like sped up, if
it's real time, if you watch.
Speaker 1: It like I'm watching it right now, and I don't
feel like that's worthy. Are you watching? No, I'm watching,
I'm watching the cliffs. So it looks like and I
don't know which player it was, but it looks like
he's like legs almost went out from under me.
Speaker 2: It looked like I think he thought, remember he's on
the far side. He thought it was an egregious, like
flagrant type of foul.
Speaker 1: But it wasn't. It was actually pretty clean.
Speaker 4: But how do like, how does that help you, like,
because let's let's just say, for arguments sake, let's say
it is a flagrant too that the officials are gonna
look at it, see it an ejective. How does ejecting
your own player do anything other than make your own
players hate you and then you're the biggest story on
the internet and you like an idiot.
Speaker 1: He's trying to This is his mentality.
Speaker 2: This is how in my study of Mick Kronin over
the last few years has been uh one that has
intrigued me because some coaches are always trying to create
this competitive, antagonistic like accountability. I'm and like, have you
ever watched Oh man, there's that. It's that drumming movie.
Oh no, not drum dumb drumb line.
Speaker 1: Uh, it was, Oh my gosh, uh oh whip Whiplash.
Speaker 2: That's who Mick Cronin wants to be. Have you guys
watched Whiplash? So the a young promising drummer en rolls
at a cutthroat music conservatory and his teacher, his professor,
his instructor, I wanted I can't remember who lazer Jakie
Simmons just just ridicules and demolishes you, and he pushes
you to like new heights and greatness and you hate
him during the process.
Speaker 1: You abhor him. Uh and then at the end of
it all, you're like, oh, thanks for pushing me to
almost suicide, you know what I mean, Like you made
me the drummer, that you made me the basketball player.
Speaker 2: And he just wants to get the credit. He wants
to be the whiplash instructor. That's who he wants to be,
and all right, more power to you. Maybe he has
Like tom Izzo is always an interesting study because he
gets after his players and he holds him accountable, but
he does it in a way that like there's a
mutual respect.
Speaker 1: I don't know if there's a mutual respect with with.
Speaker 2: U c l a player, right, because he seems to
go out of his way to create enmity between him
and his personnel.
Speaker 4: Well it's between him and the media. It's like he
just hates everybody. Oh he hates everybody. Think this young man,
I don't know.
Speaker 1: The name of it is.
Speaker 5: I have it Stephen Stephen Jamerson the second twenty four
center sixteen.
Speaker 4: I think they were down I think like twenty four
points to Michigan State and he's hustling on a fast
break to not give up easy points. Yeah, he's hustling
to be the conversation with you get down there is Hey,
appreciate the hustle. That looked like it may have had
something extra on it. Let's not mess with that. But
I appreciate the hustle. Not hey, you're hustling when you
were down twenty. What you should have done is let
him score. That's the message I get when you reject
the guy for something like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree.
Speaker 2: I mean I think, look, I try to have grace,
to try to have a little bit of perspective, to
put myself into their shoes, and in real time, like
when I was watching it, I was like, Okay, it
looked like it could be a flagrant and it looked
a little bit aggressive.
Speaker 1: But then when you go back and watch it like
it was, it was clean. He got clean.
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh heay, may But so he went out
of his way to just to just piss off another person.
Speaker 1: In his life. Yeah, right, he's like. And then he
did a postgame and postgame, can I have the sound club?
Speaker 6: Can we get the sound clubs?
Speaker 1: Please? Okay? Here we go. Okay, so he's being interviewed
by the media post postgame interview. All right, here we go.
What was your thoughts in the student section, channing Hooker's name.
I could give a rats ass about the other team
student section. I got the overall the way that I
would like to give.
Speaker 7: You a.
Speaker 1: Kudos for the worst question I've ever even asked. All Right,
did you like the should take it? Do you really
think I'd care about the other I don't think you
care about they are here? You are Come on, dude,
no reason, Yes you were. Everybody's standing here listening to you.
Speaker 5: Everybody this is on camera, they can hear you.
Speaker 1: I answered the question.
Speaker 5: I could give a rat's ass about the other team
student section.
Speaker 1: I coach U c l A. I don't care about
Michigan State students who cay.
Speaker 2: I mean, he's the guy that grew up fighting for
his This is what it said, like he was fighting
for his life, Like he's fighting for prominence, he's fighting
to be relevant.
Speaker 1: And so everything you say into is potentially like contention,
Like it's there's contention and enmity between anything you say
and do, because he's gonna he's just gonna give it
back to you. He's like, are you rising your voice
at me?
Speaker 2: Like he streamedline that I mean a pretty docile question
into a competitive, contentious enmity ridden situation where he's competing
in like in a fight or flight mode every second
of his life.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense.
Speaker 2: He's constantly complaining, constantly creating urgency, constantly creating a fight
or flight mechanism in anybody that he engages with and
is a highly stressed I have been around neurosurgeons and
like orthopedic surgeons in the o R setting that that
have a little bit of that, Like they're like, it's
so high intensive because they there's like a lot of
liability involved and things like that, so it's it can
get pretty you know, things need to go smoothly in
the way that they want it all the time. But
this is like next level, this is insane and Bronco
Menenhall would create like these adversarial situations too, where he'd
kind of push you and he wanted you to push
push past like psychological barriers and physical barriers that you're like,
I just want to give up or I want to
like but he he's constantly trying to be alpha.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense.
Speaker 2: He's constantly trying to be alpha and like exhibit dominance
over everybody, and you either you know, bend the knee
or there's this like constant contention, and I wonder what
he does with his s idea, like is he kicking
out media members that that don't go in line with
what he wants and what he says. I mean, it
sounded like that was that was very like in our
post games. Uh, you'll hear me maybe this last year
Jackson Payne. We're asking the opposing coach, what do you
think of the environment?
Speaker 1: Why? Because the fans, by fans want to hear about
what the opposing coaches think about their environment. It's a
validation thing. It's like, oh, they like our environment, Oh
we have the best. Haven't you commented on the Baylor
environment just a couple of days ago? Was there? Yeah,
It's like it's a docile question.
Speaker 4: I've heard dumber question like that's And also let's keep
in mind he actually never got to finish his question
because he was interrupted the first time. And when he
restated it, when he was told some dumb question and
he tried to did he say that's a singular question
or something? He said, that's this this the most the
most singular, dumbest, the dumbest question he's ever heard in
a or he's ever been asked, well.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Like he's going like even docile questions that are soft
tossed that he what nck cronin knows that you're just
looking for a quote for your local newspaper or your
digital digital print agency, right whatever your media aid agency
and entity is.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense?
Speaker 2: He knows you're phishing for a specific answer, and he's like,
I don't give an h I don't give a rat's
petuit about your question. It's not a good question, but
he'll give you. He Actually, the thing is, he gives
you plenty to write about. So it's a media member.
You may piss and mona complain and feel like, oh,
you know, but you just gotta freaking we just play
that sound bite. We don't even cover UCLA. Now they're
in the Big ten. We're talking about it, and everybody
else is talking about it because he's willing to give
you quotes. So don't get mad when he gives you
a quote that you just weren't expecting, even though you're
fishing for a just like a nice easy warm up,
like you maybe create a little bit of you know,
synergy with him, maybe build up to a tougher question.
Speaker 1: Nope, he's not even gonna let you do that.
Speaker 4: Friend of the Show Kyle Knswerth tweeted out, I don't
know why any player plays for McK cron and I
would never play for that.
Speaker 1: Dude.
Speaker 2: Well, I can guarantee you he doesn't recruit that way.
He does not recruit that way. He loves you up.
I'm gonna ask a lot of you. I'm gonna I'm
gonna mold you. And this is look at my Look
at all the guys I put in the NBA. Look
at all the guys I.
Speaker 1: Put in the NBA. That's what I'm gonna do for you.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna I'm gonna refine you, Mom and dad power
broker like I'm gonna.
Speaker 1: Get the most out of him. That's what I do best.
That's what he's saying.
Speaker 2: And then you get in right, You're committment is like
now you've now you've stepped into the fire. I'm gonna
make you walk on hot coals every day.
Speaker 1: Every day. That's walking on hot coals with make cronin.
Does that make sense?
Speaker 2: Can you imagine me coming in to like us being
nine sixty yes, be on the fans team and just
like just like creating, just poking you guys, like just
getting efty, just dejecting the show for I don't even know.
Speaker 1: What kind of comment is that, Brad, What kind of
comment is that? Really?
Speaker 7: Too?
Speaker 1: You're out done?
Speaker 6: Wait? What?
Speaker 1: Oh on what what did you say? It was the
dumbest comment I've ever heard. I really, what's your IQ?
What's your IQ? You know? Can you image? Just like,
are you raising your voice to me? Are you raising
your every Everyone can hear it. We're on the radio
right now. I don't know why you're raising problem. This
is just radio. Why are you getting so why taking
it personal?
Speaker 6: It's not a big deal.
Speaker 4: Don't you realize how embarrassing it is for you to
say that in front of all these people who are listening.
Speaker 6: Embarrassed.
Speaker 1: Man, We're all embarrassed for you. All right, we gotta
get to the nitty gritty. Check out the rest of.
Speaker 2: Our ESPN, the fans starting a lot to appreciate everyone
showing up, showing out today, Big Grammon on the data
aggregation and newsletter. We're gonna get into k Y Kevin Young,
Media availabilit media availability sound In the lead up to
the Arizona game, as well as discussing Iowash State UH
at three or five h We're gonna get in some
college football talk. It's also stay tuned in the question
of the day. We got roster updates, all of the
new acquisitions, all the new transferportal places if you new
names on there, as well as true freshmen that are.
Speaker 1: Coming at either off missions or coming out of high school.
We'll get into that.
Speaker 2: And guys that were most intrigued by We're gonna get
into a couple of Cougar bites as well. Former BYU
quarterback Jason Beck and now the Michigan offensive coordinator, was
on the From the Logo with Jimmer Fredett Show and
discuss why he left Utah for Michigan.
Speaker 1: Stay tuned for that.
Speaker 2: Also Brian Jefferies' voice of the Ears on the Wildcats
at four five, Brandon sy Gurney at four thirty, The
Daily Heraldians counterpart the g Man He'll join us at
four thirty, and then Brian Logan former BYU great at
five o five, and then Emma Kawa talking college basketball
at five thirty.
Speaker 1: All that and more here on your Utah ESPN Radio Network.
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Complete circuit electric, Complete circuit Electric Utah dot com. All right,
Ky Kevin Young, head coach of BA basketball, addressed the
media yesterday. Let's delve into it in the preparation for
U of a first and Iowa State games. How much
confidence do you have right now? And Rob right the
third to step up with Richie out for the season. Ky, Okay,
we're gonna get to that here momentarily. Some breaking news
though that rates the Big twelve basketball. This is not
good news for b for the Big Twelve already you
lost Richie Saunders. B YU has been devastated by injuries.
We've never seen anything like it.
Speaker 3: It.
Speaker 2: There are BYU fans that feel like BYU basketball has
been cursed this season. I don't know, I don't know
if there's voodoo dolls out there, what have you. But
the Big twelve is also getting decimated by injuries.
Speaker 1: JT.
Speaker 2: Toppin of Texas Tech, one of their stars ruptured his
ACL versus as U.
Speaker 1: Right, is it didn't happen in the ASU game, right,
or it happened to practice.
Speaker 6: I no ASU game.
Speaker 1: It was ASU game, right, So just give a little
more insight. I was watching this game.
Speaker 6: It was crazy.
Speaker 5: He went down beIN on a drive. He knocked innes
I forgot who the defender was and he just immediately
threw the ball at a balance and collapsed, grabbing at
the back of the knee, just like Richie was in
the pass. And the difference with Richie, you know Richie's
he walked off on his own power a little bit.
JT did not put any weight and he was in pain,
in tears the whole time. Going back to the locker
room and Grant mccowsm was trying his best to say
stuff in post game, but I think it was pretty
evident that that was the ac of the minute it happened.
Speaker 2: I mean, this is horrible for the Big Twelve on
so many fronts, right, Like you can sit here and
talk about how good the Big twelve he is, and
it's a gauntlet, and it's the Big twelve and the
Big Ten, but you need to.
Speaker 1: Be running on all cylinders.
Speaker 2: Texas Tech is per Kin bobbed the seventeenth best team
in the country in nineteen or seven.
Speaker 1: They lost.
Speaker 2: ASUSU has been competitive, look, but they're one of the
bottom dwellers at the Big twelve.
Speaker 6: Now.
Speaker 2: You know, anybody seems to can beat anybody in the
Big twelve, whether it's football or basketball right now.
Speaker 1: But this is not good. This is not good. This,
this is a setback for the Big Twelve and obviously
for Texas Tech. We wish JT. Toppin well in his
ACL reconstruction and his recovery.
Speaker 2: But devastating news for Texas Tech and the Big twelve
because Tech Tech could have won some games in the
NCAA tournament.
Speaker 1: They are talented, they are very good.
Speaker 2: Now from a BYU standpoint, you do got Texas Tech
coming to your friendly confines to end the season. That
looks a little bit more like a W So if
you want to you know, silver linings here, it's like, okay,
well we lost Richie, but you don't have JT. Toppin
are We're already kind of thin with our bigs and
keV has been a little bit dinged up. Me Hilo
has been inconsistent. Hadeem has stepped up defensively, still looking
for an offensive type of element to his game. And
Abdullah Ahmed has been just a rebounder, passer and hopefully
a putbacker. But we're a little bit thin there. We
don't have enough productivity.
Speaker 1: Uh. And JT.
Speaker 2: Toms one of the best bigs in the Big twelve
in college basketball. So it's a little bit easier of
a game without him. Now let's get back to it.
How much confidence do you have in Rob right the
third to step up with Richie out for the season?
Speaker 1: Khy not hearing it?
Speaker 7: Yeah, first, let me address address Richie if you if
you guys don't mind, you know he uh, in a
lot of ways has been the flag bear of just
the Kevin Young era, so to speak. You know, just
from day one, you know, when he committed to coming
back here, and then everything that he did last year
and this year, you know, in a lot of ways,
just a poster child of everything that we were trying
to do here. And so for that, I'll forever be
grateful for Richie. I think he's everything that's great about
a college basketball player. The amount of people include booting
opposing coaches within our league that reached out to me,
you know about Richie in the last couple of days,
I think says a lot about him.
Speaker 6: Thing I love about him is just how much of
a self made guy he is.
Speaker 7: He's he's got himself to the point he's at because
of sheer work and motor and effort and uh want
to and and paid his dues and got a lot better.
You know, it's rare in this day and age, you know,
for a guy to do what he did here at
b YU. And then lastly, just his commitment to b YU,
you know, his commitment to the community, to the university,
the mission of the university.
Speaker 6: You know, he's a BYU legend and forever and always
will be.
Speaker 7: And I just want to thank him and his family
and everybody that's associated with him for the type of
young man he is.
Speaker 6: Now to the question you asked about Rob scoring more, Yes, I.
Speaker 7: Mean we're gonna need we're gonna need him to, you know,
be a play finisher a lot, a lot in conjunction
with the play maker. You know, I think the way
he's shooting the ball both from three, you know, and
at the basket has been extremely impressive, and it allows
AJ to play on the ball a little bit more
and gives us another kind of guy who can kind
of space the floor and be a, like I said,
a play finisher. So you know, Rob and AJ and everybody,
quite frankly is gonna have a lot.
Speaker 6: Of things on their plate.
Speaker 7: And I know those guys are you know, those two
in particular are built for this type of thing.
Speaker 1: So let's break this down. Let's start with Richie first.
Speaker 2: I loved how he deemed and dubbed Richie Saunders the
flag bearer of the k Y Kevin Young era.
Speaker 1: You hear us discuss a lot.
Speaker 2: I mean, look, I've been doing this show since you know,
two thousand and eleven, twenty and twelve, and we've constantly
discussed the terminology that Bronco I feel initiated Bronco Man
and ahole former head coach would be Way Football, he dubbed.
He created a mantra that the tudent athletes needed to embody,
in particularly the football players. They needed to be the
flag bearers of the university, obviously abiding by the the
the regulations, the the.
Speaker 1: The honor code, right embodying that net spirit.
Speaker 2: Morally, ethnically, spiritually of Brigham Young University and also magnifying
like their their familial name too. I mean, you represent
more than just you know BYU when you're at buy
you represent your family. Like anyone that falls short, you're
doing a disservice to your family as well. You're a
flag bearer for your family, for the faith many times,
and for the university. And so Richie Saunders completely encapsulated
embodies everything that you want in a young man. Every
single dad out there, every dad that has a son
or daughter right, they want them to be like unto
Richie Saunders, a kid that's willing to go to the
gym the local church at four point thirty five am
to get shots up throughout his youth, you know what
I mean, that's a special thing.
Speaker 1: And a dad the two that's willing to go and
do it.
Speaker 2: But a self starter, a humble, hungry and obedience yet
you know kind of still you know, an individual that
has his own personal vision of what he wants and
his path and he's willing to to make sacrifices in
order to get there.
Speaker 1: And he was the hardest worker on the team. And
so that's why it's so devastating.
Speaker 2: I think in a number of fronts, and he chose
Richie Saunders, chose Kevin Young and BYU over Kentucky and
his former coach Mark Pope that recruited him and got
him to BYU. And I know, I know Richie grew
up being a Bay fan of all those things loyal,
strong and true.
Speaker 1: But still, I mean those those entities.
Speaker 2: The money comes calling, the limelight comes colin the biggest
stages in college back like, it's.
Speaker 1: Hard to turn that down. It really is. So the
flag bearer, Richie.
Speaker 2: There's been a few players in in BA football, BA basketball,
has Dad really encompassed everything that you want in a player.
Jimmer is one of those guys right on and off
the court on football, Taysom Hill on and off the
football field. There's there's there's really some of these iconic
people and you hate to see their careers cut short
due to injury. Taysom was one of those guys, obviously,
and Richie was one of those guys that whose career
just didn't.
Speaker 1: End up maybe with the grand finale that they deserve.
Speaker 4: The coolest thing to me about Richie is I've pulled
up his stats from his entire career and you just
go and look at what he was able to do
his freshman year and growing to his sophomore year and
to his junior year, and now to his to his
senior year.
Speaker 1: Like, this is a guy who in the you kind
of outline this.
Speaker 4: In the world of college athletics, this doesn't happen because
as soon as any other school sees, hey, you might
have something, but your school is not giving you the
status of being the number one guy. We're gonna come
calling and take you somewhere else where you are the
big man on campus, somewhere else.
Speaker 1: And never once was that ever.
Speaker 4: I mean, Richie probably I'm sure was offered that at
some point where they were like, hey, there's other guys
ahead of you, we'd love to have you and.
Speaker 1: Let you play more minutes over here and maybe throw
you more ani al money. I don't know.
Speaker 4: Basketball was always about basketball for Richie Saunders, and it
was always about getting better. And there's no part of
Richie Saunders that was ever born on third base. There
was no part of this guy that was ever given anything.
He had to earn and work for everything. And so yeah,
it's a bummer that this story didn't get the fairytale
ending that we probably would have wanted, which would have
been Richie Saunders playing in the Nsanabillity Tournament. But you
know what, last time I checked, there are a few
college coaches who have an NBA rolldecks, like guys like
Kevin Young. And I'm sure Kevin Young and Richie's team
are going to find a way to get him drafted somewhere,
because again, it's not like once he goes to the league, oh,
you just take away this gift or this talent and
Richie's over. No, no, no, Richie can do everything and
he'll find a way to make his minutes mean something.
So it is a bummer that Richie doesn't get to
finish this season the way that he would have liked
to or the way that we would have liked to.
Speaker 1: But I'd be willing to bet.
Speaker 2: This is not the end of the Richie Saunders story. No,
I mean, I look, he's going to continue to play.
He's gonna come back bigger, stronger, faster, better than ever.
And it's just unfortunate that it ended this way.
Speaker 8: Vig your thoughts to your point, every one of those
guys you mentioned have solid pops that yeah, took them
under their wing and were there for them, mentored them,
you know, And a good example for Dan's out there
and a.
Speaker 1: Big brother too. Yeah, TJ was pivotal in Jimmer's uh development,
I think yep.
Speaker 8: But a good indication of of how important, as you mentioned,
and kudos to you, how important it is to have
those guys, those mentors, your your dad out there, you know, uh,
following a good lead there.
Speaker 2: Hey, I always say it, Uh, mammals need mentors. We
all we all need mentors, man.
Speaker 1: Uh. And the best mentors, Uh, they they they produce
high level people. That's uh, that's just what happens.
Speaker 6: Guys.
Speaker 2: Let's think a brief time out. We'll be back with
more soundbites from Ky. We just got into one there
because it was so impactful and uh, actually, let's let's
do one more here. Let's do one more here, number
two before we go to break, Ronald, let me know
when you got a cute up okay, with Richie being
a b AU guy and bleeding blue, the transfer portal
and college basketball atmosphere doesn't have guys like that anymore.
Speaker 1: How important is it to find guys like that to
build your program? You know?
Speaker 7: It's a it's a great question, and one if I
was a lifelong college coach, I would probably have a
better answer for you. I mean, this is the iteration
of college basketball that I know. You know, I can
only imagine what it was like back in the day
when you can you know, you could have you know,
the same players for three to four years.
Speaker 6: I mean, that's you know, that's that's amazing, you know.
Speaker 7: I think in the NBA world, I think about the
Spurs and the Bulls and the Warriors and these teams,
even some of my short stints, like with with the
Suns where we had where you're getting the same guys
year after year. I mean, that's how you build continuity.
And it's very it's very difficult in this day and age.
Speaker 6: And so you ask how.
Speaker 1: Important is it.
Speaker 7: I mean, if you can do it, I think it's
wildly important. How likely and realistic is it? That's a
whole other question.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 6: I do think at b YU specifically.
Speaker 7: You know, there's guys that are drawn to b YU
for for reasons that are greater than basketball, and maybe
we can build on, you know, some of those young men.
We have a couple coming in and you know, in
this recruiting class. But even that that's not a that's
not a shoe in right, I think you still have to.
You know, at the end of the day, you still
have to help young men get better. You have to
prove to them that you know what you're doing so
they're invested in your program. And then like it or not,
the economics have to match for both parties. And that's
a challenge, there's no getting around it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so you know, i'd have to maybe listen to
do he say, Hey, he's not a shoeing in the NBA?
Speaker 6: Is that?
Speaker 1: Is that what he said?
Speaker 2: Is that Richie beut regarding Richie? Is that what he
was alluding to? We have to listen to it again. Yeah,
let's go back real quick and read between the lines here.
But one thing I'll all point out, with Richie's injury
and Brodie Koslowski season any injury, and Dawson Baker season
any injury, and Jared McGregor being on the bench, there's
not an LBS basketball player on this thame at b YU.
Speaker 1: It maybe that it doesn't matter to me.
Speaker 2: It's like, hey, you've signed up for the signed to
be a part of buyus. It's an ambassadorial tool, not
only for the players that you're attracting, but for the
players going out and having an impact in the community.
There's not an LDS player on this roster now that
can that's eligible to play.
Speaker 4: I think that's I don't know if like it's kind
of cool and not at the expense of anybody else.
That's time what I'm saying, But like, it's just cool
to be able to say, like, hey, you don't have
to be a member of the church to play at
BYU because now they're at a point where they're not
playing any guys who are members of the church.
Speaker 1: And guess what, who cares?
Speaker 4: It doesn't matter, that's not what it's about, because nobody's
sitting here saying that, oh well, AJ's not a great
member of the community.
Speaker 1: He's an incredible member.
Speaker 4: Of the community, and whatever his religious background is or is,
it doesn't matter. He's an incredible member of the community,
as is Rob Wright, as is the rest of the
guys on this team.
Speaker 1: So I think it's uh, I think that's a pretty
interesting fact. Edn't thought about that. Go ahead and play
one more time, And then I have a couple of
other thoughts here.
Speaker 7: How important is it? I mean, if you can do it,
I think gets wildly important. How likely and realistic is
it that's a whole other question. Now I do think
at BYU specifically. You know, there's guys that are drawn
to BYU for for reasons that are greater than basketball,
and maybe we can build on, you know, some of
those young men. We have a couple coming in, you know,
in this recruiting class. But even that, that's not a
that's not a shoe in, right, I think you still
have to you know, at the end of the day,
you still have to help young men get better. You
have to prove to them that you know what you're
doing so they're invested in your program. And then like
it or not, the economics have to match for both parties,
and that's a challenge, there's no getting around it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, So you're talking about recruiting there, and so.
Speaker 2: The the the LDS recruit that wants to stay there
for four years, that's not a shoe in. You want
to be able to do that. You want to have
to trevid Nell stick around for four years. But you
also have the Tanner Tilson's that go to UVU and
then go to TCU. You also have maybe a Dallon
Hall who's been there for three reasons, Like look, I
want to be a primary point guard. I'm going to
Virginia and getting some getting some money, and and that's
okay too. I remember going back to the you don't
have an LDS player that's going to be playing in
the NCA Turner in the Big twelve tournament.
Speaker 1: Okay, you don't have any LDS guys. Is it a
big deal or not a big deal?
Speaker 7: For some?
Speaker 2: It may be a big deal for others, it's not
gonna be a big deal. As you pointed out, really
good point. It's like, hey, this is not just about
acquiring the best LDS town Now, I will say, typically
BYU has gone out to get they need to get
the best LDS talent and retain them, develop them and
then they can win. That being said, it hasn't necessarily
been a recipe for NCAA tournament success. You've gone to
more nca tournaments without a Final four, you know, appearance.
I remember how big of a deal I think Mark
Pope and his staff made about And I think, Ronald
you remember this, you were you were part of the show.
I remember when like Jackson Robinson, Rudy Williams, Gideon, George
Fos Traiory and it may have been a tiki ali
a tiki start. Oh yeah, it was Alex Barcelo who
got the start as well. Yes, it was yeah, yeah,
well no, it was two thousand. I thought it was
twenty twenty two, twenty twenty three, the year maybe.
Speaker 5: Jumping another year because Alex, Gideon and Fus and Rudy
at one point I think we're all or might have
been the year.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was only there for one year. I think
it was a No.
Speaker 2: Number one was that I can't think it was an
all African American or African starting lineup, right that that
was one element, And then there was maybe a like
the starting lineup had no LDS guys in it.
Speaker 5: Oh yeah, that was the year before the non Alds
and next year was the African American one.
Speaker 1: Na I got you. Yeah yeah. Does that make sense
that it was two fold?
Speaker 6: That's crazy.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, look, this is this has never happened.
Speaker 2: It's happened in the modern era once again, a modern era,
I would say, I.
Speaker 1: Called it anomaly. This is this has never happened before.
Speaker 2: And like I said, some people say there's a good thing,
some people think it's it's a bad thing. You still
I think, k why his coaching staff are trying to
figure out, Okay, what does our the composition of our
team look like going forward. It's gonna be determined by,
you know, what's available talent wise. I remember talking to
a few individuals that were associated with the prior staff
and they kind of felt that there was a drop
off in LDS talent.
Speaker 1: For a while, you didn't have the TJ.
Speaker 2: Hawesers and the Eric Meekos and the Jimmer for Dads
and the Brandon Davies coming through. There was a little
bit of a drop off there after Kyle Collinsworth and
Tyler Hawes went to their respective professional pass there was
a bit of a drop off.
Speaker 1: And then we've seen a resurgence as.
Speaker 2: Well over the last few years of high quality players.
But right now those players are not to be seen
everyway because they're all injured. For Ernie Coauselaskia four star,
injured Richie Saunders, an NBA draft prospect, injured Dawson Baker.
In my opinion, one of the more crafty scores in
college basketball suffer an ACL injury. Jared McGregor just a
role player, so it's it's factual. I'm just giving the facts.
My opinion of it. I still think that. I remember
talking with Coach Giles at Eastern Arizona Junior College, my
head coach, and he was discussing his idyllic kind of demographics.
Speaker 1: He wanted to build the core culture based off of.
Speaker 2: A lot of LDS football players, similar to what Rix did,
similar to what Snow has done, similar to what Dixie did,
and that was it was a great The WSFL was dominated,
dominated by Rix, Snow, and Dixie, and everybody else was
trying their best to compete. Glendale was good at times.
I was part of Glendoe community counts, but Eastern was
good at times. Arizona Western was good at times. New
Mexico Military Institute was good at times. But like so,
he was trying to it was an LDS city Thatcher
Safford President Kimball was born and raised there.
Speaker 1: He was trying to get like a third core.
Speaker 2: LDS dudes at Arizona at a utah out of Colorado
where we can find him. Couple that with, you know,
he had a little bit of a Polynesian pipeline too.
We had some crossover there with culture, et cetera. And
then he'd bring in like the traditional Arizona guys because
you have access to them, and then he would pepper
in like he went out to Miami, got a bunch
of skill guys there, California skill guys as well.
Speaker 1: That's kind of how he he situated it there.
Speaker 2: And I found it interesting because he was trying to
comprise in a perfect way in his mind the demographic
and what he wanted to see from the culture and
how he was going to execute that culture.
Speaker 1: How is k why going to do it?
Speaker 2: Do you take the best available type of player or
do you take the best available type of player that's
going to work and stay at BYU? I think the
coaching staff at BYU is going to have to figure out,
as football is figured out earlier, the ability to retain
and develop, to get old stay oled because football looks
to be getting old and staying old and retaining really
well with their core culture. Can that be done at
BYU for BAU basketball in order to get to the
heights that they want to get at.
Speaker 1: That's the question, and I.
Speaker 2: Don't necessarily have the answer, but it's very intriguing. We
got some good players coming up. Dean Rukers baller, right,
There's some really good players that are signing with BYU.
Speaker 1: We'll see how it plays out.
Speaker 2: We'll go to break, don't go anywhere more to get
to That was a great segment brought to you by
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Speaker 1: When Ben Critalism breaking down, Cooky some amounts of film
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The best BAA licensed peril in the business. For those
that don't know. The Big Twelve Conference today announced that
Grammy Award winning global icon DJ Khaliy will headline the
Big Twelve Basketball Tournament after party presented by Venmo, an
official partner of the Big Twelve.
Speaker 1: The event will take.
Speaker 2: Place at KC Live in the Power and Light District
on Saturday, March fourteenth, following the conclusion of the men's
championship game at Team Mobile Arena Tea Mobile Area Arena.
DJ college appearance will mark his first ever performance in
Kansas City. And this is what I believe the Big
twelve state of the Big Twelve Tournament. Sorry, this is
DJ Khyli the Big Towel tournament for one of the
biggest and best, and I'm looking forward to bringing that
energy to the tournament after party with the performance and
connecting with fans.
Speaker 1: Young world, The world is yours. You are now and
you are the future. Keep going. We the best, said
DJ Khalid thoughts commentary follow up, gentlemen, all right, Big twelve.
Speaker 4: I realized that I came in a little heated last
week when you announced an announcement and I didn't feel
like it lived up to the standards. To me, this
is what you should have led with. Yeah, because this,
to me is a bigger deal than the led cord.
I like you said, DJ Khaled is a global icon.
Speaker 1: Everybody.
Speaker 4: You may not know every single one of his songs,
but everybody knows DJ Khaled we the best music. All
I do is win, win, win, No matter what, I
like this. I think this is a lot of fun. Again,
this was teased a little bit by Bretty Normark because
he said we want to celebritize the Big twelve tournament
and make it a destination that people want to come to.
I think they should have led with this and then
announced the court afterwards as an accent to this first announcement.
Speaker 1: But nonetheless, I'm happy. I tip my cap to the
Big twelve. Good move.
Speaker 2: This is DJ Khaled going to social media and discussing
his role in the after party earlier today.
Speaker 3: Yo, check this out. This is DJ Cavin Kansas City.
You ready, You ready for what's about to happen the
Big twelve Tournament at the party in side Kansas City
Live Powerlight District. I'll be performing live, my first time
ever in side Kansas City and I'll be performing live.
Is going up March fourteenth, the Big twelve Championship. Win
with us or watch us wing young world. The world
is yours. You're now, You're the future.
Speaker 1: Keep going.
Speaker 6: We the best.
Speaker 1: Another one.
Speaker 5: Shy, Yeah, all I do is with you?
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, there you go.
Speaker 2: You know what that's I'm the one reminds me of
I think I'm the one came out in twenty seventeen
after this song.
Speaker 1: Do you know Kent Jones don't mind? So pull up
that song real.
Speaker 2: Quick, because like I feel, I always get there like
this ear for like certain beats and they're I don't
know if that's a copycat beat, but.
Speaker 1: Oh I do know this song it is explicit. Yeah,
well yeah, we got we gotta we gotta pull it
from the log obviously, we gotta get the edited. Uh, the.
Speaker 2: Okay, So yeah, tell me if this feels if it's
the same vibe as the I'm the One song, It
totally I'm like, this totally feels like it's a great song.
Speaker 1: Ken Jones, that song came out in twenty sixteen, and.
Speaker 2: Then I'm the One came out in twenty seventeen, right, Yeah,
it could be a little copycat action.
Speaker 4: Can I say one more thing about DJ Khaled I
don't like coherently his sentences don't make any sense to me.
But I will say at the end of that sentence, dude,
I just feel like I want to run through a brick,
Like it doesn't make sense. I don't know what he
actually said, but I'm like, yeah, you know what, I'm
with that.
Speaker 1: I'm with that.
Speaker 2: Hey, man, he's he's got his vibe, he's got his brand,
he's got his followers, man, and look, brett Ormark's going
to maximize that.
Speaker 1: He's gonna tap into it.
Speaker 2: He's trying to find new demographics, new markets, new people
to invite into the Big twelve, celebritized, monetized basketball world.
Speaker 1: That's what he's doing.
Speaker 2: And so all you wrestling fans there, they may have
you may have acquired a few guys, right, so now sorry,
I'm the music guy that like is always like trying to, like,
you know, listen to songs.
Speaker 1: I'm like, wait, was this copy the beat? Similar? Does it?
Does it feel that way? Now? I hadn't thought about it.
Speaker 6: Before you said that.
Speaker 1: When I hear it, I like this song, I do, like,
I really like this song. I get this song Trump's
on the one, I like the on the one. But this,
this is, this is the song I think about when
I hear I'm the one.
Speaker 5: Hey Ben, I'm gonna have to post another video of
me dancing in the studio during the show to the
Twitter you sent it to me like a week ago,
because that's what's happening right now.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I mean this is this is this, This
gives me a vibe. I mean, oh my gosh.
Speaker 2: We probably played this probably three times when this one
dropped over like a three month period because we were
jamming out to it.
Speaker 1: Don't mind.
Speaker 2: Ken Jones also a Band of the Day rotchby Royal
Army dot Com being swaye created by fans four fans.
Real quick, let's get back to the sound bites K
why your head coach for the BAYU Cougar basketball team.
Discussing this B Way men's basketball team, you of A
and Iowa State, K, Why what are the one or
two aspects that make these freshmen so good where they
can just take over games?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 7: I mean I don't know if I could say, could
point to one thing that those disc freshman class would
have in common as it relates to their high school careers.
You know, I think this is just a historically good
class and it's all been I think you have to
give the coaches throughout the our league and the country
credit where you know, to empower freshmen, you know, to
put them in positions so that they can showcase what
they can do. I think that's you know, easier said
than done, and and and to these this class is credit.
I mean, they've all answered the call and then some right, So,
you know, I don't know, I don't I don't know
if I would point to one thing from their their
high school careers. I just think it's a historic class
that that we you stumble upon, you know, every every
so often.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, look, there's always hope when you have
two potential first round the number one overall pick and
another potential first round NBA draft pick and Rob Right
the third who we were discussing player comps, and I
think JT nailed it on the head. He's Tim Hardaway.
That's the player com for me that one. Yeah, he's
Tim Hardaway man. Uh. And that's Tim Hardaway's senior, not junior. Uh.
Speaker 2: But uh, you mentioned Rob Right? Uh is gonna pick
up on the scoring front. What about those other guys?
Canard coasted, Mehilo Boom, what about them?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 7: I mean that everyone's gonna have more opportunity. You know,
I think you saw it in the Colorado game. That
was an extremely difficult game, just from an emotional standpoint,
one of the hardest games, if not the hardest game
I've ever had to coach in, if I'm being honest
with you. But I think you saw where other you know,
multiple guys have had to step up. Tyler comes in
right out of the gate, bangs two threes, you know,
Coachitch bangs the big one.
Speaker 6: Me high hits one.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 7: You know, I think I think Moo Canards playing a
little bit more within himself and and I'm gonna try
to unlock him more. I think I've probably done him
a disservice by trying to make him, you know, a
strictly a catch and shoot guy when he has a
lot more to offer that. I think we're gonna see
a lot more of now. And then we you know,
we've got to explore other lineup combinations that we haven't
looked at. And that's some things that we've looked at
in practice. So you know, everything's on the table.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 7: I think where I draw the most excitement is I
Actually I don't know, man. I think I do better
in situations like this back against the wall type of mentality.
Speaker 6: Uh. I've kind of operated that way my whole life.
Speaker 7: And uh, you know, I'm as energized as I've ever
been as a coach, and I'm really uh taking this
challenge head on. And and uh, I know a lot
of people are writing us off, and I'm kind of
you know that, and so.
Speaker 6: Are our guys. And when you've got a group of
guys like we do.
Speaker 7: Who are good young men, I think that they're going
to rely on each other and band together. And I'm
excited to see what this iteration of it looks like.
Speaker 1: There's something to that.
Speaker 2: I think that final comment, there's a good culture within
that locker room. There's not a whole lot of narcissism,
ego centrism that's like me, me, me, me me, and
they're filling down. There's a good culture there that they have,
and good kids, good young men. The leaders still, I mean,
Robin aj even though young, they're not that you can't
lean into maybe Richie as much anymore and setting the
tone maybe in practice and putting in that extra work.
But these are all good kids and there I think,
you know, that was one of the things that stood
out to me. If they're coachable and if Ky truly
has his back against the ropes, they're back against the
wall and he's he's relishing and making doubters into believers
with a sense of urgency. He's going twenty four seven,
three sixty five. He's cramming right now. You know, he
may have been a little bit like there was not
a sense of urgency through the first half of the season.
Speaker 1: All of a sudden, you know, there it turned, It
flipped the script.
Speaker 2: He started attacking them in the post game, saying their
defense was I don't know, he said atrocious or I
can't remember all the adjectives he used to describe the defense,
the lack of intensity, effort, all those things. But the
guys who I think responded well to that sense of urgency.
I hope that k Why, I know k Why is
more than capable of coaching up guys. He took accountability too.
Though I have done Canard Davis Junior a disservice by
make trying to make him into a catch and shoot player.
We all, we could all see it, that Sean Marion,
you know, looking shot of Canard like that, that thing
that wasn't going in.
Speaker 1: I don't care how many shots he.
Speaker 2: Made at SIU with no one guarding him, but that
Sean Marion stuff just didn't work.
Speaker 1: Now, he's got to get he's got to get to
the rim. He's got to get to the free throw line.
Speaker 2: He's got to go win another ways defensively, rebounding, and
be a great basketball player. He can't pass up every
shot that's wide open. But you want you probably want
Coastick and Mahai Loo and and Maras taking more of
those shots than Canard right now, because he is shown
to be a subpar three point shooter, below thirty percent
three point shooter this season.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the other thing I think is.
Speaker 4: And we talked about this with Bear a little bit,
like Bear likes getting hit, he likes the physical contact
and sometimes that's what gets him going. And I wonder
if Canard, when you know your whole job is, I
don't do anything but sit here and shoot threes as.
Speaker 1: Soon as you miss too, he was picking popping, you're.
Speaker 4: Freezing cold because you're like, I don't I don't have
any other opportunities to do anything to really get hot.
Whereas we've seen him in a number of games this
season sparingly, but when he's around the rim, when he's rebounding,
when he's getting put backs, when he's finishing at the rim,
he's really good. And so maybe that's what you do
to warm him up in other ways so that when
he gets the three point line, he's not only thinking
about making most of this opportunity at the three point line.
Speaker 2: That look, this is the thing that kay Well is
talking about there. Like to start the season, you had
a healthy for the most part, Kaba. Your high pick
and roll game with Lobb Lake City was on point.
You could get with Rob Ritchie Aj. All of a
sudden there was a concussion. No more pick and roll
is much hand issue. Caba has done. Caba has not
been good. So that takes me to pick and roll. Okay,
well let's go our pick and pop. Who do we
need at pick and pop?
Speaker 1: Who get it? Threees?
Speaker 2: Well, Cannard is supposed to be to catch this you guy,
they're really not closing out on He got plenty of volume,
couldn't hit. He tried to force that didn't work out,
and like he he wanted to keep the defense, defensive
effort and length out there, which why Canard is probably
getting a lot of PT and Canard's got a pretty
good handle. Carnard is a good basketball player. Is a
reason who he's playing so much, and they keep kind
of forcing him along. They don't want him to lose
his confidence his swagger either. They want to keep on
giving him opportunity. So I get that you're gonna need
him at the end of February and through March. So
I thought that was interesting, right, I thought, you know
he k Why as a competitor. I can't wait to
see just how good he can coach up this team.
This is going to be Look, there's plenty of talent
on the roster, but k Why is making his money
this year. Remember he said in the college football season,
Aaron Rodgers's gonna earn his dollars this year. And he
got himself a pay raise because he earned it on
the offense side of the ball. With Bear coming in
after losing Jake and LJ kind of being a little
bit deemed up finding a way to win in the
Big twelve. You only lost to Texas Tech twice, like
a rod made his Hey, k why you got to
go make your money. Now we're gonna see how good
you are.
Speaker 1: Coaches that have a lot of ego, they will when
they're losing, Like we still have the guys. We can't
get them here. We don't have enough money, we don't
have you know all those things, right, they're gonna we
just think we don't have the guys, you know what
I mean.
Speaker 2: And And now because k I had polaty of talent,
now he's like, okay, he had he can go out
and get not every anybody, right because there's still some
limiting factors and getting all of the best talent to
b YU whether it's N I L or Honor Code
or what have you.
Speaker 1: But he's got a lot of talent on this roster.
Speaker 2: He went out and got guys that they thought would
fit in roles and uh and and now he's got
to coach them up. Good luck because if now, if
you get to the sweet sixteen, it's like that's a win.
If you get to the sweet sixteen again, it's like, k,
why you.
Speaker 1: Earned that that that W two?
Speaker 3: You know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Those players respond to him that way.
Speaker 2: This will be a really good study because if they
go one and done in the tournament, then you then
you can ask the question. Okay, and I'm not saying
that this is that I have an answer for it.
But people will ask questions, how good of a coach
is kay? Why he's got two first round potential first
round NBA draft picks and he can't get to the
round of thirty two?
Speaker 1: Does that make sense? Yeah? I understand all the season
ending injuries. I understand that, and there's grace for that.
Speaker 2: But some people will say, it's like, well, you got
plenty of talent. Still you're still a top twenty five team.
You're a top twenty five team right three, You're you're
you're on the outskirts almost you're on the periphery.
Speaker 1: But you know what I mean, Like.
Speaker 2: He's gonna he's gonna make his money this year, and
we're gonna see just how good of a coach Kevin
Young is. I I just think that there may be
some He's talked a lot, and he's gonna talk a
lot about it more as we go on in the availability,
But he says back against the Wall a couple times,
and he seems like pretty fired up about the fact
that these guys just know that nobody believes they can
win anything anymore. I just wonder if man, they're just like,
you know what, fit, let's just start shooting Alexi shoot it,
Tyler shoot it.
Speaker 4: And I think there may be just something about like
you don't know what you don't know, and they may
just be like, hey, you know what, what do we
have to lose? We're playing with house.
Speaker 1: Money right now. Nobody thinks we're gonna win anything anyway.
Speaker 2: Ronnie pull up the transfer from Jonathan Tabanari. I think
send it to Hammer time. We should put this out
there because JT brought up a really good pull of
the day. He said, do you want to go all
in on defense or do you want to go all
in on offense?
Speaker 1: Right now?
Speaker 2: And by that it's like Hadem right, he's gonna play more,
right like adul Ahman, getna play a whole lot more,
you know, just defense, defense, defense, or do you want
to see coastick? Do you want to see them Russ?
Do you want to see them high low Moore? All
guys that can shoot and spread the floor and you're
gonna run like a two three or one three one
zone behind it and interchange that.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense? Which route do you want to
go on?
Speaker 2: I'm all in on offense and just getting shots because
it's exciting, and chicks dig the deep ball, right, and
we all in march madness.
Speaker 1: We just like to see threes raining down on heads,
right like we love this.
Speaker 4: I think this is the quote you're referencing. He said,
there's two possibilities in my mind. Option one, you start
ty them or Uss or a Lexi. Coast shoots and
tell them they're the greatest shooting in basketball history and
Steph Furry has nothing on me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they shoot everything. You forget defense. It's a race
to one hundred and forty points. And the time they
scored ten plus.
Speaker 4: Asked about the booster gives them ten thousand dollars just
buckets pure offense.
Speaker 2: Well, the reason why you can do that is you
have two and even three I would say, penetrators. We
have Rob Ryde who can penetrate. You have aj that
can penetrate in in the crew double teams. And I
think even Knar when he puts it off the bouts
versus other you know that two three spot. I think
he actually can get a guy on his shoulder and
have a have a lane to the rim, get to
the free throw line, and start meriting maybe a double
on occasion when he's getting to the rim and getting fouled.
Speaker 5: I'm listening to you guys, and I just want to
jump in.
Speaker 1: Can we have Ben in? Okay? Ben, you weren't that
I know you were.
Speaker 5: You always take your wonderful vacation to a place I
won't say, I'll let you say it. And you and
you gave the reins to Brett and I to go
to Redmans Farm and to interview these players. And we
interviewed a certain player that said, and we all talked
to him when he came on the show, that says,
he started talking trash to.
Speaker 1: Igort hitting threes.
Speaker 5: I don't I don't need just the offense, can I
get some Tyler Maruss what mag energy? You know, my
favorite moment of the season last last year was was
when a certain report had asked questions about the players
chirping at Arizona in the line and what mag And
there's a photo of the watch. He's standing there with
the me mugg as a black dude, like I dare
Caleb love to do something talking to him, what you're
gonna do?
Speaker 1: Do something? Do something?
Speaker 5: Not only do I lock you up Until the last
two minutes of the game till Tony Padilla wanted to
get involved with his foules. I was hitting threes.
Speaker 1: Can we get some of that?
Speaker 5: Like, can we get some some trash talk, like we've
missed seeing that from this team, Like a guy that
is gonna hit threes and get a technical foul Like
I'm not saying that usually that's good, But can Tyler
hit a three tonight and it turn around with Arizona
bench and look at Tommy Lloyd and put and point
to his vein like do something, Like there needs to
be some type of like I need some more fight
like AJ has it. You know, you see him, you
see it from Rob, But I need these other guys
and they need to get confident. But I would love
to see Tyler Ben rain threes in the talk crap
to the other team, like I need you to be him,
have a hymn moment and stand on business.
Speaker 1: We don't. We haven't seen that yet.
Speaker 5: We seen like puppy dogs in the cage, Like I
need the rod Rilers to come out tonight for real,
for real.
Speaker 2: Sure, sure, I agree with you there. Let's get to
a couple more sound bites here before we go to break.
What do you expect khy from Arizona coming off two
straight losses and being down coepete.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean, I don't look that that's gonna be
a That would be a goo great atmosphere if they
were still undefeated.
Speaker 6: The fact they've lost too, it doesn't matter. The bottom
line is, it's not like, oh, we're.
Speaker 7: Gonna play extra hard because we've lost. You Once you
play the game, you play the game. You got to
execute the game plan.
Speaker 6: So every team needs wins this time of year, especially
in our league. The standings are tight, they're you know,
everyone's playing for something. So I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't.
Speaker 6: I've never bought into like you know, I say it
to my guys all the time. I wake up motivated
and so I don't need extra motivation. I'm sure they
don't either. We're hungry, they're hungry. It's gonna be a
good ballgame.
Speaker 1: Oh, b Yu a heavy dog in this game? Is
it still a twelve and a half over unders? Pretty much?
Speaker 5: You dropped to eleven and a half, but it might
be back up to twelve and a half.
Speaker 1: I'll check, yeah, double check on that. Let's get to
a couple more soundbites here.
Speaker 2: Ka, wellhy, how are you embracing the underdog mentality and
how have you discussed that with your guys as people
have written you off?
Speaker 7: Absolutely, you know, absolutely, you know I met with Rob
and Aju separately. You know, I think those are two
guys that you know, you know in a lot of ways.
Can can you know, cement their their legacy in college
basketball with how they handle this this this time period
between now and the in the end of the season.
Speaker 6: What kind of impact can they have? Can they elevate
a team?
Speaker 7: You know that's motivating in of itself, and so with
the whole group though, Yeah, it's it's uh, you know,
it's a band of brothers.
Speaker 6: It's it's it's digging in. It's some guys that hasn't
gone their way to this point. All right, well guess
what you want? More opportunity? You just got it. So
now what are you gonna do with it?
Speaker 7: And so again I I'm I'm extremely motivated knowing that
it's not gonna be easy. But you know, nothing's ever
really that easy. So you know, you got to figure
it out. That's the bottom line. And and like I said,
I told our group yesterday, Man, this is not new
for me.
Speaker 6: I've been doing this.
Speaker 7: I coached in the minor leagues is for nine years.
I've had my best player called up day game multiple times.
I've lost multiple players throughout seasons. Like, you got to
figure it out, you got to just on the fly.
And you know, I try to say that to them
so they that they would have confidence to understand that
they have a staff that you know, and it's not
just I've got several guys who' kind of their career
path was that and so drawn upon those past experiences
for me, give me gives me some confidence, and I
hope he gives a group confidence as well. And you know,
based on what I've seen in practice the last two days.
I think you know our group is ready.
Speaker 1: Let's go. K Y says the group.
Speaker 2: Freddie has met individually with the team leadership, and uh, look,
I keep on hearing broncoisms here. He said band of
brothers and also mentioned flag Bears earlier in the the
sound loved Me some Bronco Mendenhall isms coming out from
k Y.
Speaker 1: Last couple of sound bites from Ky.
Speaker 2: How do you think the injury affects Richie Saunders draft stock?
Speaker 7: Yeah, no, it's it's a it's something that it's going
to take a lot of due diligence, you know from
from his agent, you know from me as well talking
to different people.
Speaker 6: I do know that there's a boatload of people that
love him, you know.
Speaker 7: The good thing for Richie and I you know, what
he did at Kansas I think probably helped his draft
stock more than probably anything else that could have happened
for this season. And look, I mean today, in today's
day and age, you know, what happened to his knee
is not the end of the world by any stretch.
People come back from it all the time. You know,
it'll be interesting, It'll be interesting to see. I'm hopeful
that maybe it gives him a little bit more control
in terms of what team he actually goes to, which,
in my estimation, is one of the most important things
any player going into the NBA could do is to
go to the right team, the right fit, the right organization.
But we'll work hand in hand with his agency. I'll
do anything I can to help him. I love that
guy and absolutely just wrecked that that happened to him.
But I think everyone that's followed Richie Saunder's career knows
that if there's one guy in America that could could
work through some adversity and come back stronger, it's it's
Richie Saunders.
Speaker 6: And I think you know, everybody would agree with that.
Speaker 2: Look, there ain't no hip of violations in in the NBA.
Like they're gonna evaluate your MRIU. They're gonna strength test you. Uh,
They're gonna weigh him, measure him and make sure that
there's no U issues with that knee. If they if
they do spend some money on them, if they do
want to draft him, But I do think it impacts
it no doubt. I mean, they can get him as
a you know, they don't have to draft them. Quite honestly,
they're not gonna have.
Speaker 1: To real quick.
Speaker 2: My buddy just text me, Kevin Young is crazy if
he's comparing the importance of winning in the Big Twelve
to the G League when I'm sure.
Speaker 1: I've heard you say that the Big twelve is just
college basketball or it's just the G League with Big
Twelve logos.
Speaker 2: Like what's interesting is like, I I'm the players that
are coming to college basketball are not the good G
League players.
Speaker 1: They're not, Like, that's what I said.
Speaker 4: The NBA he averages forty points a night and twenty
boards a game, then I'll have a problem.
Speaker 1: None of these guys are that good, Like all the
all the best G leaders are like, nah, they're probably
all out of l they're Alex Caruso. Yeah, yeah, they
getting into the league.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I guess what my buddy's saying is like
Ky is stating like, well, I was told like five
minutes before tip off that I had to X, Y
and Z. That's what he's getting as, like the pressure
of coaching in the G League is nothing compared to
the pressure he's experiencing now in the Big Twelve at
the highest levels of college basketball.
Speaker 4: Yeah, but I bet you big, I bet you G
league coaches. I bet you know what they'd say, Oh,
that's nice, you're coaching in college. This is professional basketball,
which I don't know what the argument is, but I
bet you they would say the exact same thing across
this is that.
Speaker 1: This is what I'd retort to my buddies, like like,
he was the highest paid coach in the NBA and
he's coach playoff game, So I mean like he's.
Speaker 2: We know that Ky is battle tested. Like I said before,
Ky due to the nature of his personnel right now,
everyone getting injured, which really we got to evaluate that,
like why the h are they getting all injured when
we have like a strength conditioning staff that's coming from BNBA,
nutritional staffs to come from the NBA. What are we
doing as far as pre pregame potentiation stuff. Are we
getting too much neuromuscler fatigue?
Speaker 4: Do we have issue anyway? Like we can get into
that later situation. There's a substation there nearby.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's something that we need to evaluate their due
or due diligence on.
Speaker 1: But Kate, why is gonna make his money this year?
We're gonna see how good of a coach he.
Speaker 5: Is, and can I jump into like, look, there's some
similarities when he's bringing up the comparison. Okay, you're losing
your player five minutes before the game, your best player.
I mean, we've heard it from how many coaches of
Richie Sconin's being on the scout. There's no disrespect to
aj Aj. I'm being I'm being so honest too, And
you know I heard this from a Big twelve source.
They're kind of like, leave, leave, leave de Bonsa and
stop Saunders. That's kind of what the message is, right, Like,
we've we've heard it from how many post games that
we played it done? And I'll go back and I'll
pull it from Kelvin Samson, I'll pull it from Tad Boy.
These coaches fear fifteen more than they fear three because
they're just like, well, he's gonna to do what he does,
so look there is comparison of with that.
Speaker 1: But I just mind people.
Speaker 5: I want people to know, don't your buddy included everybody listening,
don't act surprised and shocked if this coach comes out
and wins tonight after having two and a half to
three days with Richie being gone and then he gets
these guys to lock in, Like I'm like, I just
I don't want because that's what peoplere gonna do. They're
gonna downplay a win today, or they're gonna go typical
be fan.
Speaker 6: Look, I knew what you've.
Speaker 1: Been talking crap the whole season about him. Which one
is it? B? WHYU fans?
Speaker 5: So that's all I'm saying, Like, don't hop on the
ship because the ship sailed in the beginning, But y'all
was trying to jump off with your life jackets and
now you want back on. That's all I don't want
from people because I don't know. I just trust Kevin Young.
And this feels like a game where Arizona blood in
the water, back against the wall and Kevin Young's like,
what do we have to lose? Y'all have more and
we're gonna stomp on your throat And just kind of
feels like he's given that energy as a guy who's
uber competitive.
Speaker 1: Yeah, clarification, there's not pressure to win is the G League?
Speaker 6: Right?
Speaker 1: It's not as high pressure.
Speaker 2: But like I said, I'll keep on going back to
I mean, has he coached in playoff games high high,
high level playoff games?
Speaker 1: No doubt about it.
Speaker 2: I mean, they lost in the NBA finals I think
in twenty twenty, twenty twenty one, and he was on
that that that coaching staff lost in the West Western
Conference semifinals the following year, lost to the Western Conference
semifinals the following year, and then lost in the Western
Conference first round in twenty twenty three, twenty twenty four.
So high quality games, high pressure games, no doubt about it.
Let's see what kay Y can do. Final two questions
to k why before we call it a segment? Has
Arizona added any wrinkles or changed anything since you last met?
Speaker 6: A few small wrinkles?
Speaker 7: But you know, one thing I respect about Tommy is
you know he's gonna do what he does and you
know you're gonna have to stop it. And so I
think there's a lot a lot to be said about that,
you know, I think in terms of what could impact
what they do or don't do differently, I mean, they're
dealing with an injury with Cole Pete. You know, his
status seems up in the air for different different things there.
Speaker 6: So we'll see. I think for for the large majority, they're.
Speaker 7: Gonna do what they do, and you know, this is
a game where, Yeah, we gotta definitely worry about the
game plan, because that's what you gotta do in every game.
But this is a game where we gotta we gotta
make it about b YU, you know, we gotta make
it about us and not worry so much about what
they're gonna do.
Speaker 1: Boom baby, love that breakdown.
Speaker 2: On last thing, AJ said in his in his post
game that he's extremely confident the guy's coming off the bench.
Where do role players draw their confidence from.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I think that's a huge comment for him to make,
and it, you know, belief is a beautiful thing, you know,
Like if I can quote dil Jet Taylor, a great
coach here at b YU that you know, that's pretty
much your big mantra is just how much she.
Speaker 6: Believes in her athletes. And so I've learned a lot
from her on that.
Speaker 7: But but but yeah, guy like AJ, who's as talented
he as he is, to have, you know, belief in
our guys. You know, I think it speaks to what
he sees every day in practice, as you mentioned. But listen,
I wish Richie was still healthy, There's no getting around that. However,
you know, I'm a I'm a silver linings guy, you know.
I think it takes the pressure off some of the
guys coming off the bench knowing that they're gonna get
a little bit extended opportunities.
Speaker 6: People know, I think we have to do it a
little bit more.
Speaker 7: Obviously I was going really heavy on on on uh
not not using the bench a ton, and now we
don't have a choice.
Speaker 6: And so there's a lot.
Speaker 7: I've seen this in the NBA world, man, where you know,
people go out and and and and and other guys
step up. I've seen it time and time again. And
so you know, AJ adding fuel to that fire in
a good way. I think just as uh, the more,
the merrier they go. That's the segment. And uh it
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