Burke still leads the POY race
Burke should take it. Indiana relies on Oladipo and Zeller and as we saw last night Trey carried this team by himself to the end. Again.
I agree that Burke has moved ahead of Oladipo due to their performances over the past two games. I am sure the head to head performances this Sunday will be quite important when the final votes are cast. Fair or not, the headline games are what stand out for the voters and the final game of the regular season to determine the champions of the best conference in college basketball is exactly that.
Seems fair to me. If they don't play well against top competition, then they don't deserve to be considered for POY. if you only feast on weak competition, then you probably aren't that good. Burke plays extremely well every game in the toughest conference in America, including against top competition. He's gotta be the POY
dipo--which I don't see coming--I think it's Burke by acclamation. I hope some of the bball team is conspiring as we speak about how to shut Oladipo down Sunday, and help secure the award for Trey.
I'm pretty sure this is s/...or maybe not. In any event, I would hope the bball team is focused on shutting down Indiana and winning the game. Again...probably s/.
vow not to let Oladipo go off on Sunday?
I think what he is saying, and I agree with this, is that it would be disappointing if the players focused on beating one player rather than on beating the team. Obviously there can be plenty of overlap there, but I would hope our team wouldn't stray from the game plan just to stop Oladipo.
But Burke is special. He is the only player to score at least 15 points in every B1G game. His bad game is a good night for most everyone else.
So...15 out of 64 voters didn't have Burke in the top 3. Holy bias.
They just think there 3 better candidates?
But that's simply impossible. Accxording to Dan Dakish Burke isnt even Player of the Year in the B1G, much less the nation.
All hail King Oladipo. As evidenced by the OSU game - when he's ready to take a game over....it's OVER.
Take Burke away from Michigan- we're a pretty average team, probably similar to minnesota. Take Oladipo away from IU and they can replace him with the highly over rated Sheehey and they're still in the B1G race. Burke means more to us than any other player does for their respective teams.
Dan Dakich is exactly the reason why I respect Jay Bilas or Kirk Herbstreit who (in most cases) display professionalism and don't let their personal fandom openly interfere with their jobs as analysts/commentators.
Sorry, I thought you said Jay Bilas.
Hahaha I see what you did there but Dan Dakich is a much worse of an Indiana homer than Jay is a duke homer - there are atleast a few times i can remember that he was not pro-duke. It could also be a case of recency bias.
went wrong with Dakich? When he first game on the scene I thought he had promising candor and good insight. This year he is an unmitigated jackass.
even Vitale didn't suck when he first came on the scene, but his ego arrived soon after and we continue to suffer some 30 years later.
I also agree on Bilas--he is (much much better and) more objective than Dakich so long as we can look past his Amaker-UofM brain fart.
Burke is #3 on the floor but #1 in America's heart
Oladipo is great but his PPG (13.7) is pretty underwhelming for such a serious NPOY candidate.
I think we win on Sunday, but say the Hoosiers squeek it out in a game where Burke is great and Oladipo is just OK. In that scenario, I would expect Oladipo to win the Big Ten POY and Burke the National POY since Midwesterners are notoriously provincial and put a far greater stock into the conference championship than national heads do.
I also don't understand the Oladipo love. He's a good player for sure, but he's not a big time scorer (though very efficient), and doesn't do anything else elite on the offensive end. He's a high energy athlete on D, but even his steals and rebound numbers aren't that great.
I just don't see it.
and I think he's had a few good games plus his tendency to create highlight reel material makes him easily to love from a MSM perspective
If Burke gets another stellar performance on Sunday, and especially hits 15+ points, I don't see him losing the award. No one in Big Ten history will have ever accomplished 15+ points in every conference game. Burke means more to our success than Oladipo does to Indiana's. in my opinion, there is no man in the country who is more vital to his team's success than Burke.
that IU is considered to have two players who are reputed to be on Burke's level*, you really wonder how they ever lose a game
*they aren't
Zeller is not even on the level of DeShaun Thomas, let alone Burke.
Oladipo averages 27.5 minutes per game. Tell me the last person to win POY under 30 minuites per game.
Kenyon Martin and Elton Brand averaged 29.3 in 1999 and 2000. But those guys basically averaged 20 and 10 for the season, which is huge in college.
Shouldn't even be a race. We are a top ten team, and might be a bubble team or worse without trey this season
As much as I like Burke, I would rather have him not be POY. For the conference, you bet. National POY puts a huge target on his back as well as the teams. Fly a bit under the radar as the Big Dance nears.
Because Burke doesn't already have a target on his back? He's played with that target all year and put up fantastic numbers. Him winning it would not have anything to do with how far we go in the tournament whatsoever.
Burke was left off 15 ballots? What the hell?
Also, come on man...who voted for Ben McLemore #1? This isn't based on who will go first in the NBA draft. And get out of here, Mason Plumlee got a first place vote.