Norm Peterson

Those NDSU homer announcers needed to STFU about Pelini. I listened to the whole thing and was just astounded at how dickish they were being. And I'm not a big Pelini guy, either. But there's a game going on out there and they'd rather be talking about the Youngstown coach. And keep going back to it. And keep going back to it. And continue to inject their personal opinions about what should happen to Pelini (flags, fines, etc.) rather than just calling the game. I found that really annoying. Glad I'm not a Youngstown fan. I'd want to go slobberknock those announcers.

And a shooting guard towards the bottom of the Rivals 150 takes an unofficial for the football game and tweets out "GBR" and you think to yourself, meh, can't we get anyone better? How crazy is that?

Nearly a double-double for Nick F. Very happy for that kid. Really rose to the occasion. Unlike last year, he really took advantage of the opportunity and had a good game.

From the looks of things so far, can't say we're worse off without 'em. I think the players have made it clear (particularly Benny and Shavon) that there's a more supportive team chemistry this year than in years past.

Thanks to the mod for moving this to uneblinstu's thread. I'm going to start with some guys at the bottom of the rotation: Bakari: You know, I think that kid might be better than I've given him credit for. He didn't have a lot of minutes in Spain. I figured he was just going to be a role player with limited minutes and wouldn't need to pay too much attention to him. But he's better than I thought. He makes some real heads-up plays when he has a chance. He makes some good passes. He's a strong athletic kid. And he shoots the ball pretty well from deep. I think he's a very competent combo guard. I still think he should have redshirted just to balance out the recruiting classes. Nick Fuller: Nick has clearly earned some floor time. Really elevated his game since last year. He just needs to get over a psychological barrier to shooting well in games. He just can't find his range when the ball is live. In shoot-arounds and pre-games, he's money. He just seems to out-think himself when he's in the game instead of just letting it go with feel. But, overall, he looked good. Went hard after the boards. The game seems to have slowed down for him a lot. Jacobson. That mid-range jump shot he hit late in the game revealed something I've thought about the kid, which is that he's got a decent jumper and I think he has decent range with it, too. If he gets to 6-9 1/2, which he predicts for himself, I think he needs to have a feel for the low post, which he doesn't yet have. But his hoops IQ and shooting ability to go along with his length could be a big weapon for us down the road. Jack "Zucchini" McVeigh. What can you say? Long, lean and very under-rated. Has been the best of the freshmen so far. Ed and Glynn, the 2 4-stars. They both had somewhat off nights. Ed needs to slow down a bit on his shots. Those missed FTs were all rushed. Then, he slowed down just a touch, took his time on that last one and hit it. Same with one of his inside, point-blank shots. He was trying to get the ball out of his hand almost too quickly and didn't even give it a chance to go in. Glynn needs to put a little more air under the ball when he shoots it. But I think you see the potential there with both of them, and it's pretty apparent why they had the rankings they had. They're just at a higher level of athleticism. Shavon. I think Shavon was working at trying to shoot through a slump. He'd been shooting poorly through the exhibition and tonight and then, 2nd half, from the deep wing, dribbled out and let go of a deep three that you just knew was good the moment it left his fingertips. I think he's getting it worked out and I'm confident he'll end up finding his range. Tai. With all the other guys contributing around him, there wasn't much opportunity for Tai to pad his stats, but I don't think that's ever really been his goal. He played solid, physical D. And did most of what he needed to do on offense, except nail that corner three. White. Keep it up, big fella. As long as you're hitting like that, the boys are going to keep feeding you. Love having those guys who can hit the corner three. But Andrew isn't a one-trick pony. He was able to get open for other looks as well. Showed a little bit of ability to dribble drive. That pull-up on the break was nice. Benny. Nice game. Solid D. Made some Glynn Watson-esque passes that he usually doesn't make. Hammond. Had a couple of nice offensive moves there to score some points. Not a dominant inside presence. Still needs to gain a ton of weight. But he's not a liability like I would have worried about him being last year. He's a much better player than a year ago and I think his ceiling is a lot higher yet than where he currently is. Someone to keep an eye on as the season progresses. You can see the ball movement is just so much better this year and you aren't sitting there pulling your hair out that our best offensive player keeps taking ill-advised shots. That's nice. 45% from deep. That's nicer.

Whadya mean we should have beat them by 40+? In the HHCC, you only picked us to win by 32. I don't think anyone overshot the margin of victory in this game. Everyone -- and I mean everyone who made a guess -- picked us winning by fewer points than we ended up winning by. And we played at least the last 5 minutes if not more with only freshmen, walkons and Nick Fuller. So, even though this was an overmatched opponent, I think it's reasonable to say the team played well. Certainly didn't disappoint.

Whatever. I think it's a cool story and good for the kid. And if people want to enjoy it, put a positive spin on it, have a little fun with it, there's no skin off my back letting people enjoy watching this story unfold. It's an unusual story. And if he never pans out and doesn't play any more minutes this year than Sergej Vucetic did when he was a freshman, there's still no harm done letting folks enjoy watching this "Cinderella story" begin to unfold. So, why harsh people's mellow about it? I don't get that.

1. Clay Travis. LOL. Clay Travis is concerned about Clay Travis. 2. These guys get paid a lot to run a University. If they weren't capable/motivated to address issues before this week and their response this week was to fall on their swords instead of addressing the racial issues of their campus, it's real hard to feel like they got a bum deal. 1. I don't know who Clay Travis is. Ad hominems aside, what about his reporting is incorrect? 2. Exactly what issues were they supposed to address? The initial complaint -- which came from a guy whom we now know subsequently mislead/lied to people about the KKK being on campus that night -- was that the student body president was called a racist name by some unidentified passer by while off campus. What is the university president supposed to do about that?

Can someone help me come up with a list of big men walk-ons we've had over the years? A few years back, there was Ben Nelson. There was another kid in that same timeframe who wasn't around long. There was also a transfer walk-on who was injured when he arrived and then was gone just as quick. Before that, we had Tony Wilbrand and, if you want to count him as a big man, you could add Bronson Schliep. Any others? Going back to the turn of the century, perhaps?

It's funny to me, this Borchardt kid. Seems like every year we'll have some posters on this board wondering and speculating if there might not be a football player who could come over after football season and add depth in the post. Some big lineman who used to play basketball. Hell, I think earlier this year people were asking about Zach Sterup. And posters were genuinely wondering if he might not be able to provide some depth. http://huskerhoopscentral.com/topic/7447-football-help/?hl=sterup Lo and behold, here comes Tanner Borchardt. And Borchardt was a football player. He just wasn't a football player for Nebraska. But there you go, there's your football player who can add some depth to the post, maybe.

I don't get this whole "hype" thing, like we're all sitting around building this kid up into something he's not. Nobody -- I repeat NOBODY -- has declared him an All-American. But he certainly is intriguing, is he not? I mean, he happens to fall into the one area that might be considered an area of need. And then he played pretty well in the few minutes he got in the exhibition. And then Coach Miles has since made comments about how he might actually play this year because he's shown some moxie and ability. I haven't seen anyone go overboard and declare him a starter. If anyone's going overboard in a reaction to this its anyone who's trying to throw a turd into the punchbowl of people who see this as an intriguing development.

Is that jersey blue or is it black? Hmmmm? Argue away.

Glass just half. But the half is beer. Or red koolaid if you prefer: Roster was pretty good. Very solid players at every spot. Depth. Athleticism. Abundant skill. If you could say there was a weakness at all, it would be that we didn't have a lot of size in the low post, but you go to war with the Army you have, not he Army you wish you had. And, then, all of a sudden, out of the clear blue sky, a 6-9, 270# guy just happens to fall in our laps. After the feeling came back in our toes, we stood up and realized, hey, this kid has some skill. Dayum. Maybe if he gets into basketball shape, he might even be worth some minutes. Whoda thunk it? Wasn't lookin' for it but I sure as hell ain't gonna turn it down.

No, but I've got money on Barchardt getting 2 out of 3 falls.

If this kid ends up seeing minutes AND if this ends up being a pretty good team, this is going to be a national story. This is Rudy and Hoosiers and The Blind Side and Teen Wolf all wrapped into one.

Keep in mind, he's just now in 10th grade, so don't be too hard on him when you look at his film:

They photo-shopped some pretty buff arms onto that skinny kid's body. He's 6-8, 205#, and arms like that? I don't think those are HIS arms.

Sorry to bump my own post. It's just that it was on the tail end of the last page and my point, which I think might have been lost, was that with this signing, we have only a couple of very small pieces left to add to the puzzle that will make this a very formidable roster.

Stupid phone. That was supposed to say up-arrow.

Swan, I am on my phone right now so I will have to wait to apply for an aero you tomorrow. Don't let me forget.

AOL isn't much better, picking us 12th with this review: 12. Nebraska Cornhuskers The Cornhuskers didn't come close to living up to expectations last season, and now they will have to play without forwards Walter Pritchford [sic] and Terran Petteway, who were the heart and soul of the program. It's all the more painful because both guys bolted for the pros early, and it was a bad decision for both. Now head coach Tim Miles has to rebuild his program, and he has brought in six newcomers to do the job. Senior Shavon Shields and Kansas transfer Andrew White will both help ease the effort. "Pritchford" the "heart and soul" of the program? I would have picked a different couple of body parts, actually. This guy (whoever it is) obviously knows a lot about our basketball program. It's like they write these things but you read them and think, "Do they know about the things we've seen?" Did they see any of what we all saw of our kids playing in Spain? The newly-found aggressiveness and confidence we thought we were seeing in Tai has certainly carried forward. Andrew White has delivered so far. The freshmen have lived up to their billing. And now that our supposed "heart and soul" turned pro, Shavon should return to being more like Shavon.

Probably don't bother reading Athlon's Big Ten preview. They pick us 13th with this penetrating analysis: 12. The Gophers add a sub-par recruiting class to a team that lost a dozen Big Ten games and its top two players. 13. The Cornhuskers underachieved last winter and lost their star power when Terran Petteway went pro.

Hooper, so you think you can tell all of that from only watching him for 5 minutes in an exhibition game against weak competition? I agree. Wish he'd been a preferred walk-on and been in the S&C program all summer.

Yeah, I saw that one coming. (Even though I only saw him play for 5 minutes in the exhibition.)

As soon as he takes foot on the court in a regular season game, his scholly becomes one for athletics rather than for academics. Does he still have to maintain his GPA? Because they're not going to commit a hoops scholarship to him for 4 years. And the Regents is gone if your cumulative GPA drops below a certain figure.