Kenny update

For those who didn't see my blog Monday night (I know there wasn't much there but I wanted to get something up quick since it was big news) or Marc's report on TV on the 11 pm news, here's the full breakdown on Kenny's injury.
http://www.newbritainherald.com/articles/2009/11/03/sports/doc4aefdd439e4dd455086003.txt

Apparently it goes back much further than I thought. I'd like to apologize publicly for my comments about his lack of aggression down the stretch last year. Apparently he was playing on one leg. He didn't tell me either.

As for the questions of what happens now: I can tell you 2 things from my day-long trip to Detrick on Monday (thanks to both teams for letting me spy to see what kind of plays they're running and talk to the kids). First, there's one lineup where Robby is the 4. We'll call that the "small," lineup.
2nd, you're going to see a lot more pressing and trapping on D. The idea, I think (though perhaps this was going to happen even with Kenny) is since it will be harder to score on offense, to try and make some of those points up on defense.

A couple other notes, which I'll write more about as we get closer. (And I can already hear your keyboards going... don't panic, I haven't forgotten about football. But Kenny quite frankly is the big news of the day.) First, Chris Baskerville is in phenomenal shape. Can he translate that to production? We'll have to wait and see. But if he can run and be a strong presence inside, it will help the "Kenny void," as we'll name it.

Markeys greatly intrigues me because he's bulky and has some touch on his shot. He'll need time to figure everything out though. Vince is playing much better defense than what he did last year in practice, and can shoot the ball from across the street. Joe Efese strikes me as someone who can help defensively right away, though his offense has a ways to go. If those four players all contribute in the ways I mentioned, it could cover the Kenny void.
But that shows you just how special Kenny is when healthy. It will take a village to replace him. Replacing him defensively will be the hard part.

What does this mean for the year? Honestly, I'm not ready to say. The good news is this happened now, and they have the whole year to put a plan together. It's not like losing him heading into March. I don't think they finish worse than last year because others have improved and there are more weapons with the newcomers. Coach likes these challenges, too. Now the Devils have to grind. I promise he'll get every ounce of energy out of this group. But let's just say I'm backing off the pick I was going to make for how they will do this year.
I'll have to change my player of the year pick, too.

Unrelated note: I don't remember if I posted this stuff or not, it's been a crazy week. First, soccer scheduling changes. The women will play their semifinal at 11 am on the soccer field. The 2nd semi is right after, and there. The men will play their senior day game in the evening, I believe at 6, on the football field. Also, big congrats to the XC men for their NEC title.

More to come in the paper on hoops. I wrote a follow to the Albany FB game, don't know if it ran tonight, I wasn't in the office. I'll have a football game preview in Saturday's paper, but not sure about midweek stuff because of this development and soccer previews. Of course, if something huge happens like a Hunter level injury, we'll have it.

My busiest two weeks of the year just got crazier, Bear with me. Please keep questions coming to mstraubblog@hotmail.com , just don't kill me if it takes awhile to respond this week.