I watched the Blue-White game tonight and what I saw was a team that has talent but did not look like a cohesive unit. Granted we were missing three important players on the team in Young, Mika and Bryant. There was a lot of turn overs and wild passes. It was great to see Steve Cleveland back on the broadcast. You have to give him a lot of respect for serving a mission for the past three years just as he was about to take off as an analyst on ESPN. I hope he gets the chance because I think he does a great job calling a game.

I appreciated Cleveland mentioning how good Bryant can be. Some friends of mine still working in the Colonial Conference have told me that he has the ability to take over game and dominate. I said last year he would be the replacement for Collinsworth but with a decent outside shot.

It will be interesting to see where Young fits into this mix. He is probably the best defender in the backcourt and that may end up being his role.

One issue with this team is the 6 freshmen. You cannot have six players in one class on a team. Leifson will leave on a mission next season but Childs and Beo are four year players. You know that Haws will be a keeper.



Yoeli Childs

He is explosive off his feet. About mid way through the first half he had a rebound dunk that we rarely see from BYU players. Guilty of playing defense with his hands instead of his feet and this is a common trait of good high school players. They can get away with it in HS but need to be better at the next level.

His aggressiveness in the paint is something that we have not had in the past few years and I think he will play a lot of minutes and may end up starting .

Kyle Davis

Davis showed the moves that we have seen for the past two years. He will have his moments this year and there will be games where he will disappear. He will probably benefit more than anyone else from the presence of more big men.

TJ Haws

The potential is clearly seen and I suspect he will be a whole lot better by mid season. You can be sure that opposing teams will be asking who the 30 year old freshman is on the team. In the second half he started to be more aggressive and showed why he will be a scorer this year and in future years.

Nick Emery

The BYU announcers said this would be Emery’s team until someone else made a difference. I think they are correct. His three point shot is deadly and he gets it off so quick it is tough to stop.



Payton Dastrup

He comes to BYU with a lot of hype but he looked slow and out of shape to me. Perhaps he is suffering from post-mission legs and conditioning. He is a big body and in HS he could stretch the floor. Tonight he missed a lot of shots that you would expect a highly rated player to make. I think he needs to drop 20 pounds and get quicker.

Jamal Aytes

Looks a little better but he is still a below the rim player that has to get position and beat you with his physical size. There was nobody big enough to defend him tonight but that will not be the case once we move to real games.


Davin Guinn

I have heard a lot of chatter about how he could even get a starting spot on this team. I did not see that tonight. He is athletic but there are two many talented guards ahead of him. Unless he was just having an off night I still see him at the end of the bench playing at the end of games.

Steven Beo

Hard to tell what to expect from him. Has the range and size so you would hope he would develop. He will be a role player at best this season. He showed the ability to put the ball on the floor as well as hit the open shot.

Colby Leifson

He was the big surprise to me tonight. Late addition to the team and definitely has great range. He could be the Seljaas of this season. At 6’4 he could cause some problems for WCC guards. The announcers said he was a three-point machine in HS and you have to hope that will continue at BYU. By half-time he had 15 points and had everyone asking who is this kid. Based only on tonight he will see some minutes this season and if he shoots the ball like he did tonight they will increase. By the end of the game I became convinced that he will be getting 10-12 minutes a game, especially when we need some offense from the arc.

Zach Frampton and Braiden Shaw

Both will be non-factors this season and I would not expect either to finish their careers at BYU. Frampton has already served a mission so he may be UVU bound in the end.

I used to post basketball comments on Cougarboard but I don’t post there anymore. If someone wants to repost it I have no objection. There are some there that like to read them.

[cid:FDBD331E-84D4-4628-8488-16C62C4FCAAB]

John Haddow