Miles has shown me a lot this year. The young guys certainly looked young/green/inexperienced early in the season. We've had some ugly losses (last night) and an inexcusable loss (Samford), but we seemed to have somewhat turned a corner after being 0-3, and have been pretty competitive since. Our out of conference losses take away Samford, have been good to really good teams (I know Carolina slapped Miami yesterday) with Nova, Cincinnati, Miami, and CU still isn't a bad team.
Recruiting has improved under Miles without a doubt. However, don't to continue to beat a dead horse, but we direly need an athletic 6' 9"- 6' 10" big guy, who can defend and rebound. With Miles' system and scoring would be a bonus. Without that guy, we are going to put guys like Morrow, Horne, and even Jacobsen in tough positions defensively.
A guy I know, who is lets say a media member (and I don't want to name him without his permission and note his opinions), and knows plenty about basketball, saw Horne play last summer at a tournament. He has the same fear that I have about Horne and Morrow. They are 'tweeners". They are big enough to be good players, but small enough that they can could be dominated, pushed around, and put into foul trouble against good teams in the BIG. It is going to be for a challenge for them to play the 4, but if they have to play the 4 and 5 in the BIG, we will continue to struggle in close games against quality competition. Especially when those teams like last night make the decision to go to the hoop.
So I'm hoping we get the kid out of Massachusetts who is 6' 10". He could instantly make all our front line players better, by allowing them to play what we want them to play, not need them to play. Also, I'm not in a hurry to run Hammond off after this year. He may not be a star, but he could certainly fill a role off the bench the next two years like many other guys his size do in college basketball.
If we get a decent "5" who can rebound and play defense to play with what is coming back next year, I think we could certainly be tourney bound. Without that guy, we should still have a good season, but likely an NIT team at best. It's too bad that we don't have that guy this year, as the BIG isn't as strong as some years in the past, and we'd certainly wouldn't be looking at having to be one of the bottom 4 teams that would have to play an early game in the conference tournament.