LAWRENCE — The toughest part of a transition like this, from Hunter Dickinson’s perspective, is trying to figure out how everyone plays.
Dickinson, who transferred from Michigan to Kansas ahead of the upcoming college basketball season, pointed to how guys like to get the ball in different spots. The senior center noted that they’re trying to figure things out in practice. It’s something that just takes time.
But, Dickinson added, it’s not like that’s something he feels is going to drag on for too long. He explained that he thinks guys have already done well, when it comes to knowing their roles and what the coaching staff expects. And that bodes well for a team many think has a chance to contend not just for Big 12 Conference titles, but a national championship.
“I think we’ve got a good mix of vets, but also some young guys with some good basketball IQ,” Dickinson said. “So, I’ve already seen the growth from my teammates.”
Then with Michigan, Hunter Dickinson celebrates during a game against Wisconsin on Feb. 26, 2023.
Dickinson is one of a number of newcomers on head coach Bill Self’s roster. During the 2023-24 campaign, there will be more scholarship players going through their first season at Kansas than those who’ve been through it before. But while there are so many new faces, there are also enough veterans returning that can help ease that transition.
On top of the fact that there are veteran transfers such as Dickinson and Towson’s Nicolas Timberlake, a super-senior guard, Dajuan Harris Jr., Kevin McCullar Jr. and KJ Adams Jr., are all back from a team that won the Big 12 regular season title this past season. The trio are all projected starters at this point, Harris and McCullar as guards and Adams as a forward. Along with another returner in forward Zach Clemence, they can help all the newcomers adjust to the way the Jayhawks operate.
McCullar noted they won’t know everything about how well they gel together until they are faced with some adversity. It’s a fair point. But he noted that it’s not as if the process starts then, because it starts the first day they met.
“It’s been great, just chilling with (Dickinson) off the court, getting to know him,” McCullar said. “He’s a great guy. He wants to win, and that’s why he came to Kansas is to win big games and stuff like that. So, we’ve just been kicking it, having fun.”
Clemence’s return, along with the addition of Santa Clara transfer and forward Parker Braun, also provides Kansas with some much needed depth. As Dickinson highlighted, the Jayhawks were thin when it came to how many bigs they had available at times this summer. So, practice won’t be as demanding anymore on him or walk-on forward Dillon Wilhite.
Maybe Self adds another player to the roster ahead of the start of the season. Maybe the way the team is constructed now is how Kansas will look to compete for another national title. But if the Jayhawks are going to continue to click the way Dickinson and McCullar have been saying they are, they’re trending in the right direction.
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Jordan Guskey covers University of Kansas Athletics at The Topeka Capital-Journal. He is the National Sports Media Association’s sportswriter of the year for the state of Kansas for 2022. Contact him at [email protected] or on Twitter at @JordanGuskey.
This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: Hunter Dickinson is confident Kansas basketball can develop chemistry
