I jumped on the zoom with Coach Amir and players Jayden Reid and Kasen Jennings.
Head coach Amir Abdur-Rahim
I really like this group and this group is about strength in numbers. It is not about repeating, yeah we want to win and have success, but it is about this group finding its own identity. It will be great to get Kasen Jennings back, as steady as they come and tough as they come. It was great to have him in practice at the end of last season, but he wanted to come and play and he had to call his mom to talk him about of playing.
Jamile Reynolds is great to have in the fold, local St. Pete guy.
If you got great players who work hard, people will come who represent the university in a great way. I love coaching this group and they are about working. To sell out this lower bowl already has really helped these guys.
On putting together the non-conference slate, it was really difficult, when I sat down last March my phone was ringing off the hook last year, this year it wasn’t. When you have Jayden Reid and Kasen Jennings sitting next to him on our team, you don’t want to play us. Getting Florida on a neutral site and playing in South Carolina and playing at Utah State is big. We were 8-1 on the road last season and we have to create our identity on the road and remain a unit and together on the road. The familiarity with each other that is what it takes, Jayden ad Kasen seeing each other, these dudes will run through that wall just like I do. It’s about getting all 15 guys bought into that mindset.
On adding some size, I like the pieces we added, our Achilles heel was defending the 5-spot and (unsure) was a man in the AAC Tournament and we had to play without Corey Walker and then adding Reynolds who has won and he is a local guy and we want to keep adding that flavor, the Tampa Bay guys, Jamile is a mean dude.
On the freshmen, they are freshmen, every freshmen isn’t Jayden Reid, having Jose Placer and Selton Miguel next to him last year gave him confidence to be who he is and he made mistakes and played through them, CJ and Cam will have similar leeway, the best compliment, Jayden was coached harder than anyone on the team the first 2 ½ months of the season and if our young guys can have the same type of success. They are freshmen, We won’t too much on them, but they’ve got work to do, I’m excited about this group.
Jayden Reid
Having that early success you might get complacent, I was looking forward to the offseason because I knew there were so many areas I can get better at and I wanted to get into the weight room. I knew I had stuff to work on and I wanted to help make us be the best team we can be this year and not talk about last year.
The connection runs deeper than basketball, we are all here because of basketball, but it is a chance to built relationships with guys from all over the country, we have a calmness tighter when we are together and we can rely on each other on the court or when it is life or death.
Kasen Jennings
It somewhat feels like a homecoming, this group is built off family, having those guys around and coaches around it is definitely like a homecoming.
Connection is everything especially for our group, it will win us a lot of games and allow us to stay together in hostile environments and execute the game plan. We’ve been preaching it since the new guys got on campus this summer and they are all buying into it.
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