Almost Here

With the football team being the joke of the Pac-10 and most of Division 1 Football, WSU fans will put all of their attention to Taylor Rochestie and the WSU Basketball team in the coming weeks. This is going to be an interesting season for Coach Tony Bennett and the Cougs as they look to their most impressive class of Freshman in school history to maintain the success of the program. Here is my breakdown of this year's Senior Class. I will follow up on the younger guys as the season draws closer.

No man will be counted on more than Rochestie this year as the floor general and a senior leader. He will now be asked to score instead of just handle the ball on the court. With limited depth at the PG position he will also have to log more minutes than in year's past. Rochestie just needs to maintain what he did last year. Clutch shooting, getting to the basket, drawing fouls and not turning the ball over. If he can score more and create on offense it may lead to an even bigger year for Aron Baynes who is said to have lost over twenty pounds heading into the season.

The lost weight should improve Bayne's quickness on the defensive side of the ball and also allow him to log more minutes. It should also improve his rebounding because he only averaged six last year which needs to be improved upon this season. Having DeAngelo Casto will be huge for Baynes because a super athletic weak side defender will now have his back in the post. Baynes excelled when Ivory Clark was by his side and he appears to have that once again with Casto.

Besides Rochestie and Baynes, Caleb Forrest, Daven Harmeling and Nikola Koprivika round out the seniors this season. With Forrest you know what you are going to get. High motor aggressive play on both sides of the ball, excellent mid range shooting, and good rebounding. He can defend a SG or a PF so his play will be key in times when Casto is either in foul trouble or getting tore up by a high caliber player.

Harmeling struggled last year and needs to improve his flow within the offense. He is a spot three point shooter but needs to show the ability to create a shot or teams are simply going to leave him open when he is not red hot from behind the arc. On defense Harmeling can guard the 3-4 positions fairly well. At 6'8" he is tall and long and is a mis-match for shorter SF's and slower PF's.

Koprivica needs to improve his offensive game as well this year. He was dreadful on offense last season shooting I don't even want to look it up from the 3 point line. However, he is said to be fully recovered from his knee injury two seasons ago, so his speed and quickness should be better. The Cougs desperately need his slashing style to draw fouls and create open shots for others. If Nik can contribute 10-12 points a game with 4 assists and 4 boards, we should consider the season a success for him.