Transcript:
Stevie Shaughnessey: Hi, and welcome to Home Stretch, the Daily Utah Chronicle’s sports podcast. My name is Stevie and I’ll be your host. Today we have Kyle Garrison on to talk about the season preview for the men’s basketball team. Hi Kyle, and thank you so much for joining us today.
Kyle Garrison: Hey, thanks for having me. I’m excited to be here.
Stevie Shaughnessey: So in your recent article, you talked about the basketball season preview. What do you expect from the basketball team this season?
Kyle Garrison: Yeah, so this is Craig Smith’s third year as the coach; he came over from Utah State a couple years ago, and last year was a little disappointing. I think people, in his second year, expected us to be a little bit better. But as this year, kind of the roster has become his own roster, he’s been able to build it from the last three years where he wants it to be at. I expect us to be middle of the pack in the Pac 12 again, but maybe a little bit higher, and last year, we finished seventh, and I think this year, we can shoot for closer to five, four. There’s not a lot of teams in the Pac-12 that bring a lot back, and I think we bring a lot back, plus we improved our roster through the transfer portal and just in recruiting in general. So I think we should be pretty solid this year, hopefully better than last year.
Stevie Shaughnessey: What do you think that the team’s strengths and weaknesses will be this year?
Kyle Garrison: Yeah. So, I think one of our biggest strengths is our guard depth. We bring back Rollie Worster and Gabe Madsen, who were starters last year at the one and the two, and we also added a transfer. His name is Deivon Smith, he’s from Georgia Tech. He’s a little smaller guard, but he brings a lot of energy, just a do-it-all kind of point guard. He can “dish the rock,” he’s a good rebounder, he can score at all three levels. So I think being able to just have guard depth off of our bench is [going to] be really big, and I also think at the center spot as well. Obviously, we have Branden Carlson, who was our best player last year, he returns for his graduate year, and I think that being able to have him come back, plus, we last year had a freshman who made a lot of impact. His name’s Keba Keita, and he’s coming back for his sophomore year. He’s going to be improved a lot. He was pretty raw last year, and I just think that those are two strengths. One weakness, I think, that we’re [going to] have is at our wing spots. Our depths a little bit lower than we would like it to be. We lost Lazar Stefanovic last year, he was probably our best stretch three. He transferred to UCLA, but we did get Cole Bajema, who is from University of Washington. He’s pretty much the same prototype as Lazar. He can do a lot of the same things as him. He can shoot the ball, spread the floor, he’s 6 [foot] 7 [inches tall], got a good wingspan, he can defend, and I think that he is going to take a lot of those minutes at the small forward, but behind him there’s not a lot of depth, and I think that being able to fill that spot will be huge for this season. But I think that’s, if we had one weakness, that’s what it would be at.
Stevie Shaughnessey: What are you hoping to see them do to overcome these challenges you just mentioned?
Kyle Garrison: Yeah, so some key players: Gabe Madsen is the one guy that I really look at as kind of the X factor. The three-point line has become such a, such a just like a strength for teams in college basketball. If you can shoot the three, you can win games, and last year he shot 37% from the field, he led the team in three-pointers with 62 threes on the year, and I think that he’s going to come in and he’s going to just build on those numbers. So being able to shoot the three is [going to] be huge for us. That’s why a guy like Cole Bajema is really nice to have. He also shot 37% from three last year at Washington. He’s familiar with the PAC-12 play, he knows what he’s going to do, and he knows he’s going to come in and have an impact right away. So I think that being able to shoot the three is [going to] be huge for us [and] be efficient with it. Last year, we didn’t have a lot of guys over 35% from three, which really hurt us. We were below on the bottom tier for three-point shooting in the Pac-12. I think being able to improve on that is going to just take us to the next level, and I think it starts with Gabe Madsen and Cole Bajema for sure.
Stevie Shaughnessey: Who do you expect, kind of some of the leaders to be on the team this year?
Kyle Garrison: So I look at one guy in particular: Rollie Worster. He is a four-year guy. This is his fourth year, he started at Utah State with Coach Craig Smith, and he was able to transfer over when Coach Smith got the job here. This’ll be his third year in the system, and I think that he’s a vocal leader, and he’s also just a crazy good floor general. He averaged 5.1 assists per game last year. The year before he only averaged three and a half, so he’s been improving every year that he’s been here, and I think Coach Smith trusts him and is [going to] give him the ball, put the ball in his hands a lot, and I think with that comes, you know, the vocal leadership and just making sure his guys are in the right spots at the right time, making sure they’re running through their progressions, making sure they’re running through their plays correctly, and I think that really starts with him. But, obviously guys like Branden Carlson and Gabe Madsen are four-year guys, they’re leaders, they’re older, they’ve seen what it takes to be successful. They’ve seen the ups and downs, and I think those two guys, those three guys right there are going to be super big contributors to just the leadership role of the team. Also, Ben Carlson is Branden Carlson’s brother and he has seen, he played at Wisconsin, this is going to be his second year at Utah but he transferred over from Wisconsin, he’s seen Big 10 basketball. He knows what it takes to be an elite program, and I think that he’s another guy that’s going to be a sleeper when it comes to just, he gets on the floor, he gets rebounds, he doesn’t stuff the stat sheet, but last year he played 19 minutes a game, and he did a lot of really small good things that you don’t necessarily see at the end of the game in the box board, but he is just an all-around playmaker and I think that he’s also going to be a big leader for this team.
Stevie Shaughnessey: What are some things that you think maybe need to be changed or need to be stuck with the season?
Kyle Garrison: So I think last year, we got too stuck in running the same sets over and over again, and when I watched the Arizona game, when we had, you know, a really big upset, it’s probably one of the biggest upsets in college basketball last year, we knew that coming in, they were not going to let us run our sets, they were going to pressure the ball at half court, they were going to make us uncomfortable, and we got out of just being so stagnant and started moving more and just getting in and out of the half court set a lot easier, a lot quicker, a lot more efficiently. So I think letting the guys become more of like a flow offense instead of just, every single time we get the ball [it’s a] set play, just moving the ball off the court quicker, and that starts with Rollie Worster. I think that he’s a guy that can get the ball up the court, I think he’s a guy that can make plays all over the floor, and I think that being able to let him kick it to our wings and get it down to Branden Carlson and get it down to Gabe Madsen as well, is going to help us just become more of a well-rounded team, instead of just being so complacent in our offense.
Stevie Shaughnessey: And this year, who do you think is going to be our biggest opponent?
Kyle Garrison: I think Arizona again. They’re just a powerhouse. Arizona brings back some guys, they have some freshmen last year that didn’t play a bunch, but guys like Kylan Boswell is going to be really, really good again for Arizona. And then you look at USC. I’m not sure if Bronny James is going to play this year, but if he does, he’s a stud, and even aside of that they have Isaiah Collier, who was the number one recruit in the country last year, and he decided to go to USC. Plus, they have that one other guy, I’m blanking on his name right now, but he’s another guard that is just a playmaker. He averaged like 16 points a game last year, and he’s [going to] come in and he’s [going to], you know, he’s [going to] make plays happen. We play them twice. So I think Arizona and USC, and then UCLA is always going to have a solid program. Their coach has been able to put together solid teams for the past five years. They’ve always made deep runs in the tournament, so I think those three teams have the, just the upper edge overall. I think they’re probably one, two and three, in everyone’s preseason polls and that’s what they have in their minds so, I think those three teams are going to be tough.
Stevie Shaughnessey: What do you think the biggest difference will be this season from last season?
Kyle Garrison: I think that having more guard depth is going to be something that people see that they weren’t expecting. Last year, we really, really relied on Madsen and Worster to just absolutely control the offense in every aspect. Having a guy, a four-year guy who played at Georgia Tech, Deivon Smith. He, like I said, do-it-all. He can do everything. He’s going to come and he’s going to take the pressure off of Madsen and Worster and he’s going to make the offense run a little bit smoother, just because, you know, it’s college basketball. It’s hard to play. It’s 35 minutes a night if you’re a starting point guard. I mean, you’re asked to do a lot, and I think that having a guy to kind of take that and relieve that pressure from them is going to, not only just like, help the point guards, but it’s [going to] help the offense as a whole. I think that guys like Branden Carlson and guys like Lawson Lovering, who was another transfer, are going to benefit from having a guy who’s going to come in and shake up the offense. He’s going to be different. He’s not going to do the same things as Rollie, but he’s going to do different things that could be better or worse, you never know. So I just think that having more depth in general is something that to look for this season compared to last year.
Stevie Shaughnessey: Great. Well, thank you so much for your input today. Do you have any final thoughts about the season or just anything you want to mention?
Kyle Garrison: I think that we got it. I didn’t mention one guy, Wilguens Jr. Exacte, or Wilguens Exacte Jr. He’s another guy that was here last year, he was a freshman, so he’s pretty raw, but he came in and he averaged 3.6 points a night on 12 minutes. So he can rebound, he can score the ball, he can do a lot of things that we haven’t really had in the past year. He’s very athletic, and I think that he’s [going to] come in and make some, make some noise for sure. I think that we just need to keep our nine guys, our eight, nine guys set, and as long as we stay healthy, I think that, you know, this team’s going to be a lot better than last year and is [going to] make the jump that I know Craig Smith wants to and knows that he can. So, just look for Utah to kind of, you know, we’ve had a lot of historical success at Utah for basketball, and I think that this is a year where it’s kind of make or break. We gotta, we gotta get back to the ways that we used to be and I think we can do it. I really do.
Stevie Shaughnessey: Awesome. Well, thank you so much for your input, Kyle, and thank you for joining us on the show today.
Kyle Garrison: Thank you for having me. I appreciate it.
Stevie Shaughnessey: Thank you for listening to Home Stretch, the Daily Utah Chronicle’s sports podcast. Make sure you stay tuned for new episodes coming Tuesday’s bi-weekly.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
Producer and Host: Stevie Shaughnessey — [email protected] | @steviechrony
Guest: Kyle Garrison — [email protected] | @kgarry21
