After watching the second game, here are my brief thoughts...
1. Dilione gets to the rim in a hurry. Finishes with both hands, sees the court extremely well, and can shoot the ball from deep well enough. He will remind many of Cason Wallace or Jalen Hood-Schifino. Not as good a defender as Wallace (gets lost on switches a few times), but there is plenty of potential.
2. Awaka is proving why he's probably my favorite Vol in recent memory. He's everything I asked for when we courted Oscar Tshiebwe. He may not ever reach OT from a statistical standpoint, but they are eerily similar. He is going to be a big part of this team. Still has to play D without fouling.
3. Knecht can play. Shot is very pretty. He can score at all three levels and is deceptively athletic. Really gets up on his pull-up jumper in the lane. That shock won't be blocked often. Defense is a little lacking but he was pretty good on help defense.
4. Aidoo was super solid but not much competition for him either. He really outsized and outmatched the Lithuanians, but he looked sharp doing it. I'd still like to see him finishing some shots around the rim with authority instead of finessing, but he was as expected.
5. Vescovi was nearly invisible in game one, and not because he played poorly. He just didn't really assert himself, offensively. In game two, he made a concerted effort to be more of a threat and hit nearly every shot he took, if not every shot on his way to a team-high 19 points. Shot is so pure. We know what we have in him.
6. Gainey can shoot...we all sort of knew that. But he also can run the point in a pinch, as well, which was pleasantly surprising. He looked comfortable on the ball and he can also really shoot the ball. He is going to have a roll.
7. JJJ made some shots and played good D, but he was pretty reckless for a 5th year senior, especially early, with 3 TOs in the 1st quarter. He has to make better decisions and also be more judicious with his shot selection. He looked healthy, so there is that. It was just one game, so maybe it was just a case of knocking some rust off.
8. Mashack was great defensively. He made some shots on offense and has shown continued improvement. He needs to keep working on his ball-handling and outside shot, but his progression has been as expected.
9. Estrella looked like a freshman. You hope to not draw too many conclusions from this environment, but if he didn't have his way with this team, it's tough to project him making much impact on this team. I'd guess he may be a 5 -7 mpg game guy, at best based on this very limited sample unless we suffer a post injury or foul trouble.
10. DJ Jefferson flashed potential at points, but his shot isn't the greatest. A work in progress I guess. Still a lot of work to do on defense. He's a willing defender, but it hasn't quite yet clicked for him it doesn't appear from a team defense perspective.
