Brock Harding
- Thread starter Franisdaman
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To play defense like Oklahoma does or any other blue bloods, Fran has to have more then a few athletic players. Playing Patrick, Krikke, Payton, and Dix doesn't fit the defensive matrix. Every team that Fran has at Iowa has always fallen short of a full house.
Probably not, but let's see how Freeman, Dembele and Harding play, before we give up on that goal. If the defense around the basket doesn't improve, we will lucky to win more than a few games.
Dix is the best perimeter defender on the team.
Fran has Bowen on a very short leash for some reason.
No. Both Harding and Freeman will be a Big Timers on the college level at least. Also agree with Bowen's talent assessment.
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And that says A LOT.
Freeman to me is the perfect balance of Woodbury and Garza. Offense AND defense. It takes a year or two for a freshman center to really dominate, but I think he will have a similar impact on the team.
Offensively, Harding is a step up on Gessel, but I don’t think he will ever be as good as a defender as he was.
Freeman needs about 25 lbs of muscle, but I don't think he has the frame for it. Nevertheless, seems he will be a very good Hawkeye. Need to see more of Demble.
BirdistheWord
HB Legend
Actually, I never said he was a pass first point guard (I said he has "pass first point guard skills.")..though one could argue he is a pass first pg. But he is one of the best passing point guards I have seen since I have been following Iowa basketball (1986-Present). In this day and age, of course scoring will be expected/required, but the way he involves his teammates is damn fun to watch. Agree that he still has to adapt to B1G play, I am sure he will have his ups and downs but either way he was a steal.
He's this years Toussaint but without the turnovers to justify the short leash.
Different skill sets, I like this team a hell of a lot more with both of them on the court vs the zero pg starting lineup.
I really wish we could just go into rebuild mode now because the freshman and sophs have a lot of potential.
Playing these upperclassmen is just a waste of a year.
I was enjoying Bowen, Harding, and Dix on the floor at the same time in the second half. Spacing and pace seemed to gel.
Not sure it’s a waste but I agree the freshman need PT this year to advance the possibilities of next years team.
These games don’t matter. The season restarts against Wisconsin. I think a lot of us want to see what Harding can do with 30 minutes in a game that matters.
And what did Harding do in last nights game that makes you think he should get more minutes than Bowen? Or other than one good game, what has be shown to deserve more than 10 minutes? You don't get playing time on "potential" or High School results. You earn it with results on the court during practice and games.
From my viewpoint he should be giving Perkins and Bowen a few minutes of rest each half, 10-15 minutes tops. His olay defense isn't much better than JBo's as he reaches around players who beat him off the dribble too much. And his shooting has been subpar.
Brocks lateral quickness is actually very good he's just doing a lot of pickup game bullshit that is common to most of iowas players due to lack of instruction.
Toussaint used to do that reach around shit every other trip down court.
The shooting is what bothers me more. To effectively play at his size you have to be able to hit from deep.
He's always fading to one side which is not something he's good enough to pull off. That's got to stop.
Bowens shooting needs to improve significantly too, he has too hit that wide open shot or defenders will just stop closing out. Right now they don't know.
Both of them have got to get better at shooting if they're going to be a starting backcourt next year.
I agree, if the shooting doesn't improve they will get the Conner McCaffery treatment in BIG10 games.
Because Bowen has had the opportunity to play big minutes against power 5 teams and Harding hasn’t. It’s not like we are benching Michael Jordan or Patrick McCaffrey so Fran should be fine with it.
I don't think Bowen has shown any more than Harding. He drives better, but doesn't finish often and doesn't really look to kick to shooters. Most of his assists seem to come in transition. Both need to improve both 3 point shooting and a pull up game when penetrating. Harding makes some bad passes that he got away with in high school but I like the fact that he tries to make something happen and doesn't play soft. Both need to play a lot more minutes than they are getting. One should be at the point all 40 minutes. Last night they each played 13 minutes. Good game to get everyone acclimated to that and Fran pisses it away to play the same shit combinations. This is a development year but the only youngster who will get the minutes deserved is Freeman.
Bowens shooting the same percentage as Perkins from the field.
Sometimes I feel like people on here are confusing Bowen with Ulis.
Bowen has shown he can go around defenders, get to the rim and finish or get fouled. And he does kick to the 3pt line to open shooters fairly frequently.
Harding has shown he is a true pg and a fantastic passer with great vision hitting guys cutting towards the hoop.
Both are decent defenders and not great shooters.
They're different players that do different things.
I agree one of them should always be on the court and they play pretty well together too.
in the end, they are both Hawkeyes & I hope they are both successful. We need em.
I saw a HS highlight video which appears to show him go off two feet and kinda dunk it/kinda roll it over the rim, fwiw.
Bowen seems like a likely transfer candidate at the end of the season if he doesn't get more minutes. Not saying he will, but we've seen this story before: player loses starting spot then starts losing minutes to a younger player at the same position.
I personally would like to get Bowen much more involved and eat up Pryce's minutes. Pryce has looked completely ineffective on both ends of the floor this season (other than the NIU game) yet he averages 10 minutes a games. Of all the freshman, he clearly looks like the one least ready for B10 competition - even Ladji can give us some spot rebounding minutes.
Here's what I would love to see: Start Bowen, bring Pat first off the bench, give Pryce's 10 minutes to Bowen and Brock in B10 play.
Bowen played great on Friday and yes, I'm a Harding fan, but in the end, I'm an Iowa fan and it's the end result that us fans are after.
This year, every game is going to have a different hero or hero's and Iowa will need every player available going forward if this season is to be successful. Happy New Year everyone!
Problem is pryce fits frans mold of the 6’6” shooter with limited mobility, so he’s going to see the floor lol God forbid we put some athletic guards on the floor!
I just don’t understand why bowen seems to be getting the joeT treatment, he’s really limited his mistakes this season and is dishing it out pretty well. Is showing that he can be an effective scorer off the bounce. And his defense is actually pretty good comparatively. This all really just boils down to fran having to have pat on the floor.
Oh and i will just add, look what JoeT is doing at TT and what he did at wvu last yr. What could have been if Fran just loosened the reigns. I personally don’t trust Frans evaluations of pg’s at all!
Really? So you think this will be a more successful team if they sit down Perkins, Sandfort, McCaffery and Krikke? Our top four scorers and the top two rebounders. Interesting concept.
Fran doesn’t know how to deal with guys who's game is primarily driving the ball. He just doesn't like it.
He wants to run his stupid weave.
Harding played 20+ mins against ISU and was terrible.
Bowen had very limited minutes last year. He has more experience than Harding, but not by much. I like Harding a lot, but when you look at the stats, it is very debatable whether he is a better player than Bowen right now. He had an impressive game against a lousy team. I would like them both to get important minutes at PG.
Playing one upperclassman is definitely a waste, and a hindrance to improvement.
Probably more than one but if 3 out of the 4 are really leaving after this year, (which I doubt actually happens) then there isn't a whole lot to be gained by continuing to to give them most of the minutes while getting blown out by every conference opponent.
The underclassmen could make for a pretty good team next year so I'd much rather get a head start on that.
