OT- Chris Wallace sighting

[Tammo29@xxxxxxx]

  I saw Chris Wallace at the game last night.
  No....not the Celtics game.  The Kansas-Missouri game.
  That makes three games in Lawrence for Wallace that I know of this 
season.... Arizona, Texas, and Missouri.
  That begs the question just who has Wallace been watching?

Of course Arizona has a number of prospects on a loaded roster. Gardner, 
Walton, Stoudamire, Hassan Adams. 

 Texas has the waterbug point guard TJ Ford and to a lesser degree banger 
James Thomas.

Missouri has a player in Jr. Ricky Paulding that a lot of people thought was 
really going to step up this season.  Unfortunately he is finding out what 
it's like the be the target of most defenses after being the third option in 
the past.
Junior Ricky Clemens is extremely quick, but has a tendency to jack it up 
from anywhere on the court Jason Williams style and has had some off court 
problems as well.  Jr. Arthur Johnson is one of the few legit big men in the 
college game.  He's big and strong and has a couple of really nice moves 
around the basket.
But I don't see him as 1st round material.
 
Kansas has their two preseason All-Americans Nick Collison and Kirk Hinrich.
At 6'-9" 255, Nick has been compared to Kevin McHale.  His footwork around 
the basket is so fundamentally sound, but he can also face the basket and hit 
a good percentage of his jumpers.  He had the same "soft" label that most big 
(white) men get when they are more finesse than power but I think he answered 
that with his 24pt-23rb night against Texas last week.

But the guy I think Wallace is looking at intently is Hinrich.
Although Kirk has played the 1-2 & 3 in college he will be a point guard in 
the NBA.  Last night he took over the point responsibilities for a struggling 
Aaron Miles and ended up with 24 pts on 10-13 shooting and 8 assists to 1 
turnover.
Kirk reminds me of Steve Nash. Once again, many people look at him and think 
slow white boy, but that couldn't be any further from the truth. He knows one 
speed, overdrive.  He is always pushing the ball.  If he gets the ball on the 
wing out on the break the opposition might as well just concede the two 
points, otherwise more times than not it's a three point play.  Roy Williams 
says he has the best lateral quickness of any player he's ever coached and is 
relentless in his physical conditioning.  This 6'3" guard had three dunks 
last night, the last one coming from his fourth steal late in the game when 
he was so tired he could barely walk off the court afterwards when Missouri 
called a timeout. So there is no question about his athleticism.
 He sees the court extremely well and has the pass first thought process that 
you want in your point guard.
But what might make all the difference for Chris Wallace is that Hinrich can 
really shoot and has shown deadly NBA range.  He shot 50% from three as a 
sophomore, 48% as a junior, and after struggling earlier in the season 
because of back problems as raised his percentage back up to 45% this season, 
despite being the only legit three point shooter on the team.

Wallace was sitting on press row, front row 3/4's court just one row and 
three seats away from me.  I didn't recognize him until he got up to leave 
with about 2 minutes to go in the game, otherwise I probably would have gone 
over and picked his brain at half-time.  

TAM