As far as I can tell we have quite a few good athletes. If the raw ones could master the fundamentals and develop some offensive skills we could be pretty good. My worry is the fundamentals and skills may not come quickly enough. If we have to wait till they're seniors then we'll never have enough players who are ready.SFCityBear said:
Hope you are right. Normally, I would not expect the freshmen to be ready to contribute a lot, and it would be a big plus if they can. Fox seems pretty high on Newell, and I hope he is right too. I like Anyanwu, who is pretty raw, but aggressive, and just needs some fundamentals and some skill scoring the ball.
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Cal Basketball
Mater Dei Coach Gary McKnight Talks About Cal's Two Recent Additions
This summer, the Bears picked up a pair of players from one of the nation’s top programs in Mater Dei (Santa Ana, CA) High school combo guard Devin Askew and wing Jack McCloskey.
The pair’s route to Cal was not the traditional route, though the traditional route is becoming less and less common for many players in the era of the portal.
Cal will be Askew’s third collegiate program after his transfer from Texas after being rated a consensus 4 star out of Mater Dei as a prep and originally playing for Kentucky.
As an early entry freshman at Kentucky in 2020-21, the 6-3/200 Askew averaged 6.5 points, 2.9 assists & 2.6 rebounds per game, starting in 20 games for the Wildcats. As a soph at UT, Askew averaged 2.1 points and 1.3 assists in 14.9 minutes per game over 34 games played. At Cal, his minutes should increase significantly as should the green light to shoot and create scoring opportunities.
“Devin’s a very good player,” said McKnight. “He had a remarkable three years with us on the varsity before he left before his senior year to enroll in Kentucky. His junior year in the playoffs, he went for 45 against (2021 3rd overall pick Evan) Mobley. He was just on fire. He’s a guard who can shoot the ball. He’s a tough kid who likes to be a leader. He’s a very, very competitive kid.
“He played point for us and we went against some of the best guards in the country but he’s a scorer so he’s kind of a combo, where he can play one or two.”
McCloskey is a 6’7” wing who played his senior season at Mater Dei after a transfer, earning several postseason honors. He’ll be a preferred walk-on at Cal to start his collegiate career.
“Jack comes from a family of athletes,” said McKnight. “His dad played for Loyola Marymount during the Hank Gathers/Bo Kimble years.
“Jack came to us his senior year from Santa Margarita High School. He had a great year. He made 2nd Team All-CIF and 1st Team All-League. Our league -the Trinity League- is a very tough league. He’s a good athlete. He can get up and dunk it pretty easily, with a varied skill set. He’s a very good shooter. He’s a quiet kid, a smart kid. He has a lot of skills.
“Nowadays, a preferred walk-on is like before the portal a guy who would’ve had a scholarship. Teams now are going to look to the portal first and then there’s kids still left over in the portal. And if they take a high school kid, if they do well they’ll often lose them in the portal after a year or two and if they do bad, they picked the wrong kid. But Jack will be a guy who will stick. He’s low maintenance and will work his ass off for them. I think he’ll be a good addition and I’d hope coming from our program, he’ll be prepared and will have been through any drill possible and he’ll be ready to go.”
The men’s basketball schedule has yet to be announced but is expected to kick off with a pair of exhibitions in early November.
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. The team has the "makings of being noticeably better than the 11/12 place way too early conference projections. However who knows, as its purely a dice roll on how the team will perform. I do think that both new guards will contribute good scoring and hoping that Kuany/Sam/Newell trio, contributes more scoring than thought. Team should be quicker and better defensively across the line up, with added depth to allow more consistent ball pressure. And as Coach Fox alluded to, increases the ability to play up tempo. 