The one you’re most interested in, no doubt, is Kadin Shedrick, so we’ll start here.
Shedrick, at Texas, is putting up nice counting numbers – 13.3 points per game, 4.5 rebounds per game, 1.6 blocks per game, 66.7 percent shooting.
Most of the damage, it needs to be pointed out, has come against the Longhorns’ guarantee-game opponents.
Texas has only played two games against teams ranked in the Top 150 of KenPom – UConn and Marquette.
Shedrick didn’t play in the UConn game, an 81-71 Texas loss on Nov. 20, and in the 86-65 loss to Marquette on Dec. 6, he scored six points (1-of-3 FG, 4-of-6 FT) and had two rebounds, a block, an assist, two turnovers and three fouls in 23 minutes.
I’d put this one on, the jury is still out.
Shedrick, you may remember, got out to good starts numbers-wise the past two seasons at Virginia, then lost his starting job by mid-January of each of those years as the schedule got tougher.
Next, to Isaac Traudt at Creighton.
The 6’10” stretch big is the one we’re going to miss.
The way Tony Bennett wants to play these days, he’d almost certainly be using Traudt, who is shooting 51.6 percent (16-of-31) from three this season, big-time this season, and in the future.
Traudt, at the least, would be the first big off the bench this year behind Jake Groves, and I think there’s a good chance that he may have been the starter at the five spot.
As it is, Traudt, who transferred after a redshirt year at Virginia because he was homesick for his native Nebraska, is getting 16.0 minutes per game off the bench for Creighton, scoring 7.0 points and grabbing 2.8 rebounds per game.
The rebounding number is a concern for a 6’10”, 235-pound big, I’d say.
Finally, to Papi, Francisco Caffaro, the seven-footer who landed at Santa Clara.
Papi is putting up Papi-like numbers: 5.6 points and 5.5 boards in 18.5 minutes a game, shooting 52.9 percent from the floor.
Caffaro put up double-digits in his first two games – 13 points and eight rebounds in the 77-69 win over Utah Tech on Nov. 8, 10 points and five boards in the 82-59 win over Saint Francis on Nov. 11 – and hasn’t done much since.
Papi had two points and five rebounds in the 89-77 loss to Stanford on Nov. 14, four points and three rebounds in the 88-82 loss to Oregon on Nov. 24, and zero points and five boards in the 86-56 loss to Ohio State on Nov. 25.
That’s the Papi that we know and love.
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Chris Graham
