The Final Four: Workhorses

<p>The NCAA tournament has narrowed its field to four remaining teams – the illustrious Final Four.</p> <p>In recognition of that theme, Prep Hoops will announce a series of “Final Fours” this week.</p> <p>This will be four players selected for their demonstration of a specific trait, regardless of school size and graduation class.</p> <p>Here are Kansas’ Final Four Workhorses:</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>[player_tooltip player_id="1075931" first="Jace" last="Linenberger"], 6’7 F, Hays, 2022: Continued to be the feature man in the middle for Hays this season and increased his physicality. Was a double double machine, attacked both glasses hard, and battled doubles, zones, fronting, and a heavy focus to keep him out of the painted area all year. Played a ton of minutes this year and managed to be effective throughout and had his motor running hot all season long. The back to the back and face up ability pairing up in his game made him someone Hays could find a ton of ways to get involved.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>[player_tooltip player_id="1080188" first="Joe" last="Otting"], 6’4 F, Hayden, 2023: The big fella dishes out a pounding on the football field and did a whole bunch of the same on the basketball court this year. Was a physical presence for Hayden in the painted area, diving to the rim off screens, slicing zones, and catching and attacking in the back to the basket game. Otting went on a tear down the stretch helping pace Hayden soaring through the post season. Otting’s ability to go get fouled, go get a tough contested bucket, or grab huge rebounds made some of the biggest differences in big games. Otting logged a ton of minutes, and you could never tell with how hard he consistently played.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>[player_tooltip player_id="1139918" first="Charlie" last="Russell"], 6’4 F, Trego, 2022: Averaging 18.6 points and 8 rebounds a game for Trego, Russell brought it all to the table this season and was a big time workhorse for them. His production, minutes logged, and effort was the driving force to their late post season run. For his height, his motor and willingness to mix it up on the glass brought Trego their rebounding ability. Russell can stretch the floor out to 3 and stretch teams out. He was relied upon a lot and was super effective.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>[player_tooltip player_id="946261" first="Garrett" last="Lynch"], 6’4 F, St James, 2022: Loaded with guard and wing talent, St James had plenty of scoring firepower across the board, but Lynch did a great job of filling his role as the hard working, high motor, physical defender, and extra possession creator that helped them go far in the post season. Lynch was consistently one of the hardest workers and players on the basketball floor. He averaged nearly double digit rebounds per game in a big time conference and at a high level. Lynch was not always loading up the score sheet but was efficient shooting it at 50% from the field.</p>