* A reminder that KHS Class of 72 classmate, Ken Lilyblad, died on February 26th. In raising funds for Ken's memorial service, the Lilyblad family has $4,000 as its goal and are over halfway there . If you feel moved to add a donation, here's the link to the family's GoFundMe page: https://gofund.me/ed61f871.
1. I resumed my efforts to build some leg strength and some stamina after my winter layoff from walking. Right now, it seems best to walk for about twenty minutes. The current sunny and moderate weather makes this project much more inviting.
2. I enjoy listening to books on Audible when I walk. For quite a while, I'll be listening to Isabel Wilkerson's history of the great migration of African-Americans, from 1915-1970, out of the South and into the Northeast, Midwest, and the West. It's entitled The Warmth of Other Suns. I was interested in this book before I read Rising Tide. As I read Rising Tide, though, one of the book's central concerns was how the landowners in the South wondered what they would do for a labor force as African-Americans began to migrate to the north and the west. Now I will learn more about why and how this migration took place.
3. After watching Baylor defeat Oklahoma State late this afternoon, 81-70, I began to imagine a game between Gonzaga and Baylor, should it ever happen. I tried to flip around my usual way of thinking about such a matchup. Normally, I contemplate all the challenges Baylor will present for Gonzaga: they are an active, athletic defensive team; they have several players who shoot a pretty high percentage from beyond the three-point line; they have depth; they love to run the floor when they turn other teams over; they have disrupting and active players inside. Baylor doesn't have overwhelming height inside, but their inside players are versatile, relentless, intelligent, and disruptive.
All of that will present great challenges to Gonzaga, should the two teams meet.
But I wanted to flip this question around and ask what problems, what challenges does Gonzaga present to Baylor? Would Baylor be concerned about containing Drew Timme inside? Do they regard him as a potential scorer against their active and physical inside defenders? How does Baylor regard Gonzaga's ball movement, their fluid offensive sets? Any special problems there? How about Gonzaga's versatility, their depth, the way they get points from multiple players (so does Baylor, btw), both starters and reserves?
I can see, if I were Mark Few, what would keep me awake at night about playing Baylor. But I wonder what about Gonzaga would keep Baylor coach Scott Drew from sleeping? Coach Drew would have to think Baylor has an advantage in terms of physical strength and he'd have to know he has a better three point shooting team than the Zags, but what would Gonzaga bring anything to this matchup that offsets these advantages? What would make Scott Drew toss and turn on the eve of this game, should it happen?
It's hard for me to predict what would happen if these two team were to meet. I have a much stronger sense of how Baylor plays against top-notch teams since the Big 12 is such a powerful conference; Gonzaga, on the other hand, plays in a weaker conference. They don't get challenged game after game by very talented teams the way Baylor has.
Will this matter?
I don't know.
What I do know is that both Gonzaga and Baylor will face stern tests from different opponents in the NCAA Tournament and just getting to a game (it would have to be in the Finals) between these two is far far far from guaranteed.
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