2 big questions of the OSU off season.

I really want to see a discussion on next season, but this is one off season we will have to watch closely. Who sticks around that extra year they were given? Who transfers out and who transfers in around the Pac-12?

In my early glance at the way to early rankings at the Pac-12 and NCAA, if Aleah returns I put the Beavers in the top 3 in the Pac12, and top 12 nationally. If Aleah doesn't return, they will probably still be top 5 in the Pac12, but doubful they would have any chance to challenge for first. Still should be a top 20 team.

I would expect Kennedy to be 100% before the season, but how rusty will she be? We've witnessed most players seem to take a while to get back to playing as well as they did before the injury. I'm not sure Taya has made it all the way back yet. Her shot did improve this season, but her rebounding was not as strong as her Sophomore season.

The outlook for the next few years is very good for the Beavs. Let's hope nothing derails this train.

A couple of things in regards to Taya’s injury. In my opinion a torn hamstring requiring surgery is a much more serious injury than a torn ACL. Even so, I didn’t find Taya’s play this year that much different than her prior seasons. She’s a solid defender, that is effective offensively if she knocks down 3s. She’s never really done much outside of that offensively, and her rebounding uptick was when she was the tallest player on the floor for the Beavs when we played Maddie Washington at center.

As for KB, a point to remember is her first game for the Beavs will be about 21 months post injury. For Kat it was 11 months post injury. That is a huge amount time to continue to strengthen the leg and feel comfortable on the floor.

Can we expect talented Freshmen to improve in their Sophomore season?

YES.

wbosh15 wrote: "Even so, I didn’t find Taya’s play this year that much different than her prior seasons. She’s a solid defender, that is effective offensively if she knocks down 3s. She’s never really done much outside of that offensively, and her rebounding uptick was when she was the tallest player on the floor for the Beavs when we played Maddie Washington at center. "

Have to say that I agree with you on this.
Taya is a solid player, executes her role very well. She passes and outlets very well. But, except for her squared-up 3s, she has very few offensive skills. She has never learned to dribble penetrate to the basket; she virtually never posts up a smaller player. When she nails her 3s she is a great help to the Beaver offence, but without the 3, her point production is very, very low....

Taya is, in some ways, a coaches dilemma. She does so many things right you don't want to take her out, but she produces so few points you want to insert someone with point-power.
In a nut shell, Taya's game is best when someone else scores. When someone else doesn't score the team collectively suffers because Taya is not adding to the point production.

I like Taya's game. She distributes, she rebounds when she has to and she makes few turnovers. She works hard and is a team-first player. Her limitation is that she cannot produce points.
If you have a team that is scoring challenged she becomes something of a problem. If you have a team that scores well, she's a premiere addition.

Personally, I don't know what Coach is going to do with her next year.
GO BEAVS!!

If you compare KB's freshman numbers and Taya's sophomore numbers they are amazingly similar. The two differences are that Taya was the better passer and KB the better defender.

And on Taya's having literally twice as many rebounds her Soph. year vs her Junior year because she's two inches taller than Maddie? Have you heard of this person we call Mik? Soph. Taya went after every rebound she could, Junior Taya stuck her hands in the air and hoped the ball would fall into them. And again, if it's all about height then why did all of the guards outrebound our two forwards?

Taya did not play the 5 defensively often. Jo played it for roughly half them game (19.7 minutes per game) and Washington (16.3 MPG) played it for much of the rest. Occasionally Thropay or Morris would step in, but Rueck rarely went with Taya at the five. 

If you look at the percentage of Taya's FGA that were threes:
2017-18 -- 99 of 198 (50.0%)
2018-19 -- 124 of 220 (56.4%)
2020-21 -- 63 of 89 (70.8%)

Or if you look at her FGA/game
2017-18 -- 6.00 FGA/game
2018-19 -- 6.47 FGA/game
2020-21 -- 4.45 FGA/game

IMO, I thought Taya clearly looked to score inside the three point line far less this year than she did in her first two seasons. Stats also suggest that thought given over 70% of her shots were outside the three point line this year compared to around 50-55% in her first two seasons.

Taya was never really someone who looked for her offense, but I thought she was overly passive this year and her low FGA shows that.

Regardless, I thought we really needed some scoring from the 3/4 positions from Ellie and Taya this season and neither really stepped up. Next year, hopefully Talia, Greta, Sasha, and Savannah are able to provide a lot of scoring from the 2/3 positions. A more efficient Kennedy Brown would add a lot to the 4/5 positions

Great post beaverwbb fan...Always glad to read posts that dig up the actual info -- and then present it in a way that's easy to understand...

Now, the questions become : why did Taya take so few shots this year? and why were so many of them beyond the 3 line?
GO BEAVS