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View Full Version : K Academy starts today (5/28)



Billy Dat
05-28-2014, 02:51 PM
There is usually a bunch of good stuff that comes out when the all the former players are assembled. Here are some initial ones:

Laura Keeley ‏@laurakeeley 15m
Talked to Austin Rivers at K academy today. Said once he got to the league, he better understood the need to be a leader, not a loner

Pic of Austin, Kyle and Mason
https://twitter.com/dukeblueplanet/status/471720887876857856/photo/1

Billy Dat
05-28-2014, 05:35 PM
Thank god for the N&O's Laura Keeley

Laura Keeley @laurakeeley · 16m
K did talk today about seeing big changes in the way #Duke plays. When asked something specific, said "You’ll see how we’re going to play"

Laura Keeley @laurakeeley · 14m
That's all I got for you guys. It was like K was giving a 10-second trailer for next year without actually giving away any plot points

Laura Keeley @laurakeeley · 13m
Jeff Capel will work stateside with USA Basketball but won't go abroad—has to hold down the fort in Durham while K is gone

Billy Dat
05-28-2014, 09:28 PM
Laura Keeley @laurakeeley · 13m
Jeff Capel will work stateside with USA Basketball but won't go abroad—has to hold down the fort in Durham while K is gone

FWIW, Keeley tweeted a response to a question of mine stating that Capel is the only Duke assistant who will be involved in USA Basketball. That means no one on the staff is traveling with the team, a huge departure from the past when at least 2 coaches from the staff worked with Team USA. It may also be because the worlds are so late and the kids will all be back at school.

MCFinARL
05-29-2014, 08:58 AM
FWIW, Keeley tweeted a response to a question of mine stating that Capel is the only Duke assistant who will be involved in USA Basketball. That means no one on the staff is traveling with the team, a huge departure from the past when at least 2 coaches from the staff worked with Team USA. It may also be because the worlds are so late and the kids will all be back at school.

Yes--and the staff right now, other than Capel, is a bit less experienced; maybe they need to be more focused on developing as college coaches before they start working with the US Team. For example, I love Jon Scheyer and think he will likely develop into a great coach, but it's hard to picture him telling Kevin Durant what to do.

Billy Dat
05-29-2014, 09:57 AM
Yes--and the staff right now, other than Capel, is a bit less experienced; maybe they need to be more focused on developing as college coaches before they start working with the US Team. For example, I love Jon Scheyer and think he will likely develop into a great coach, but it's hard to picture him telling Kevin Durant what to do.

True, although I think the role of the staff assistants, as played in past iterations by Dawkins, Collins, Wojo, Mike Hopkins, etc., is mostly to work guys out and help run drills. In one of K's books, there is a famous story about Kobe asking Dawkins to work him out after a light practice day during the 2008 Olympics run. Subsequently, Dawkins uncharacteristically missed a coaches meeting and as the meeting was breaking up, Dawkins appeared completely exhausted. Kobe had essentially made him work out with him for 4 hours of intense shooting, one-on-one work, etc. Dawkins described it as something he had never experienced before, and the other coaches were cracking up and spent the rest of the day busting on Kobe for "killing" JD. Naturally, Kobe was grinning from ear to ear.

Billy Dat
05-29-2014, 03:36 PM
The K Academy Press Access has yielded some interesting quotes from K:

http://www.heraldsun.com/sports/x1374786032/Coach-K-Were-making-some-big-turns-I-like-that

“There will be some physical changes here by the end of the summer,” Krzyzewski said. “There will be playing changes when you see us play next year. Not wholesale, we are averaging 30 wins a season over the last five years. But you have to adjust and this is a time when you don’t make a little turn. We are making some big turns. I like that.”

“He keeps us a little bit more current,” Krzyzewski said of Scheyer, who completed his Duke playing career helping the Blue Devils win the 2010 NCAA title. “He’s a young guy. We think he’s done a great job with our recruiting. He’ll be handling the perimeter. It’s a little bit different way of coaching, a little different look.”

“We are going to change the way we do a few things or how we run a practice, how we do our game preparation,” Krzyzewski said. “It’s been a very busy spring adapting to the newness of the culture you are in and also the newness of the different staff.”

“I’d like for us to be a smarter team,” Krzyzewski said. “Not that we were dumb. But smart in an instant. Smart while things are going on. Being able to make changes while the game is going on. We weren’t a team that could do that last year. I would hope that we would be able to do that and that means that we can do a little more.”

Also, unless I am mistaken, that is Will Avery on the right side of this pic. Nice to see him back!
https://twitter.com/alaatweets/status/472025921172811776/photo/1

Billy Dat
05-29-2014, 03:39 PM
Great pics and other stuff from Blue Devil Lair
http://duke.247sports.com/Gallery/K-Academy-2014-Photo-and-Video-Gallery-28864927

Kedsy
05-29-2014, 04:30 PM
The K Academy Press Access has yielded some interesting quotes from K:

Most interesting quote may have come from Rasheed Sulaimon:


“As soon as they step on campus we have to start building our chemistry,” Sulaimon said. “You can have as much talent as anyone in college basketball, but if you don’t have that mesh with everybody you can lose in the first round. So that’s what we are going to focus on when they step on campus.”

He seems to be alluding to last season. Does that mean he doesn't think the 2013-14 team had "that mesh with everybody"? To me, that's very interesting. And unexpected.

Billy Dat
05-29-2014, 04:56 PM
Most interesting quote may have come from Rasheed Sulaimon:
He seems to be alluding to last season. Does that mean he doesn't think the 2013-14 team had "that mesh with everybody"? To me, that's very interesting. And unexpected.

Yeah, my take on that, based on all of K's comments on the subject, was that HE, Rasheed, was a big part of the reason that the on court chemistry never developed because he wasn't ready to adjust his talents to the whole, and now K has drilled it into him that he needs to be a chemist this year, not a centrifuge (does that analogy work? come on Gross Chem people, help me out!)

Bluedog
05-29-2014, 05:14 PM
Yeah, my take on that, based on all of K's comments on the subject, was that HE, Rasheed, was a big part of the reason that the on court chemistry never developed because he wasn't ready to adjust his talents to the whole, and now K has drilled it into him that he needs to be a chemist this year, not a centrifuge (does that analogy work? come on Gross Chem people, help me out!)

Gross Chem is now a public policy building, I believe. ;) haha, but I liked the analogy. Good quotes.

MCFinARL
05-29-2014, 06:18 PM
Most interesting quote may have come from Rasheed Sulaimon:



He seems to be alluding to last season. Does that mean he doesn't think the 2013-14 team had "that mesh with everybody"? To me, that's very interesting. And unexpected.

This team may have fooled us a little bit because they apparently--based on appearances and their own comments--had very good off-court chemistry. But there is a difference between liking your teammates and knowing when and where to give them the ball, or how to support each other on the court, I guess.

Furniture
05-29-2014, 11:33 PM
Yeah, my take on that, based on all of K's comments on the subject, was that HE, Rasheed, was a big part of the reason that the on court chemistry never developed because he wasn't ready to adjust his talents to the whole, and now K has drilled it into him that he needs to be a chemist this year, not a centrifuge (does that analogy work? come on Gross Chem people, help me out!)

That's is definitely one way to read it. I agree.