slu72

Wouldn't be the first time a kid has come back to his original school. However, in this case, Pierre will likely have to perform a miracle transformation w/ Gordon. If this was ever to be a possibility, Travis should have CG examined by a team of psychiatrists.

Playmaking issue resolved: Yurimania!

Not that it really matters, but what other schools pursued Perkins?

Any more info on what happened at DePaul you can share?

NW Florida State College. The Raiders. New coach is Butch Pierre. Wasn't he a high flying AC at LSU or at some power 5 school at one time? I seem to recall his name being bandied about when we were discussing Crews' replacement. He replaced Steve DeMatao who joined Anderson's staff at St. John's. Kendrick Brown of the 76'ers is an alum. They play in a JUCO conference and had the player of the year last year. I really didn't get into the Wiki that much other than their athletic status, although it sounds like it's a 4 yr teacher's college. It's in Niceville, FL. Kind of ironic our guy Carteare, who is anything but nice, would end up in a town called Niceville.

W/O doing the math him hitting FT's at 80% would likely get him to 13ppg. Yurimania feeding him when he posts up a small guard ought to get him a couple of extra buckets. At that point any 3s he gets are manana from Heaven. I really don't get his poor 3 pt avg. quick release, good form, but they don't drop for him.

We all tend to overlook both Jacobs and Hankton. Probably because neither of them really contributed much last year. Jacobs especially looked lost with lazy passes and not much of a shot. Hankton pleasantly surprised us with some good minutes but then would disappear. Both had injuries that didn't help their cause. They're both kind of FR+1/5. Jacobs has the rep of being a quick get to the rim guard and a guy who can beat u down the floor. Not much was known about Hankton as he came in as a replacement for that effer Pearson. Both go in the waits and see category. Which the same can be said about our 5 FR. (Except for Yurimania)

So true. Yurimania will be starting by January.

Good read and vids were great. I don't think any of us have shown enough appreciation for Hargrove's energy and handles. His 3 pt shot looks good as well in terms of release and form, still to be determined how many he makes. Another surprise to me was Diarra's footwork down low. St. B's plays some tough competition and he looked pretty smooth on some of those spin moves. Have to temper my optimism, however, as the jump from even high level HS ball to D1 is a big leap. Yurimania's court vision is just so good it's hard to see how he doesn't get serious minutes especially if we're going more up tempo. With the athletes this team has I can't see how Ford doesn't try and speed things up, especially since we have the depth to do it. All in all can't wait to see this group get on the floor and how Ford puts all these pieces together. No doubt this is going to be a season filled with lows and highs based on our expectations. That said, I can't seem to recall a recent Billiken team with this much potential. I say that because we've got most of the slots filled for what makes up a good team. The PG (Yurimania, Weaver, and JGood), 3-4 shooters (Jimerson, Weaver, Hankton, Perkins), leapers and quickness (Hargrove, French, Jacobs), Defenders (French, JGood, Thatch), Mr. Versatile (JGood), and tall and bulky backup bigs (Diarra and Bell). Let the Games begin!

I get carried away. And so paragraphs get left behind.

I'm not really sure who are top targets were locally or otherwise. I always got the feeling the top tier St. Louis kids had their sights set on big national programs and had told SLU to forget it. Love and Fletcher come to mind. I do recall discussions about Kasabuke and Bradford plus a couple of Bradford's teammates from Mehlville. I got the feeling they were our top local targets. At this stage, assuming Stone falls through, I'd just as soon Ford waits until Spring rather than just offer a roster stuffer, ala Soderberg. Spring recruiting season has become as hot as the Fall period with Transfers, GT's, late bloomers, late signees, and foreign players. I'm just hoping we don't have a couple of guys wanting to check out after this season leaving us with 4 spots to fill. That would hurt, but how do you keep everyone happy these days? It's a problem a lot of teams face when you've got like 700 plus players entering the transfer portal every spring.

50-50?

Yurimania will be the top PG by season's end.

No doubt. A major get.

Baylor, MSU, and Auburn is some pretty tough competition. If Travis can sign this kid, he deserves coach (recruiter) of the year.