NH

I think Perkins’ dunk last year against Miss State is probably the best I’ve seen out of a Billiken

This was the period where we only had like 4 dunks a year and it was a big deal whenever you put them on YouTube.

I hear you, but I’ve been watching every SLU game for 20+ years and have never seen a scorer like Perkins. He is one of the best players in college basketball. We’ve done an awesome job replacing him, but Javonte is special. If he returns he will average more than 15 ppg, because he is the best scorer in this conference. If he can make good money overseas, I’m all for it. He seems like a great kid and he’s surely been a great Billiken.

No, only speculated. I think all SLU fans are in agreement that we want what’s best for Javonte. If a great offer in Europe presents itself, SLU fans will be happy. If he needs another summer/fall in college to rehab and rebuild his stock, we will cheer for him as loud as we can. SLU fans are completely supportive of Javontes future, whatever that is.

I respect your opinion on these players and you may be right. I don’t see Martin as having the ceiling that Barnes had. Jordan was a knockdown shooter in a way that Martin was not. I also don’t think you can play Yuri and Martin together in the same back court against most teams. I know you made the comparison to the Majerus backcourts but McCall, Jett and Kwamain all had much higher defensive upsides than Martin does (in my opinion). I would certainly take Martin but I also won’t begrudge him if he’d rather go to a school / level where he will play more.

They’re different players. I am more confident that Parker will get playing time next year than Williams. I’ve never fullly understood the fit with Williams though so the coaches may have a vision for him that I don’t appreciate

It seems unlikely given the season Gibson is having. When you average 18 a game on 44% from three it’s near impossible to lose your starting spot. I can’t see him starting over Nesbitt either unless JNezz just doesn’t improve at all over the summer, which seems a little unlikely to me. Parker will find a way to get minutes. He’s very much D1 ready. My question is just how quickly he can get up to speed defensively.

Yes, he would be the exception if you were to count him as a 4-star I usually go on the 247 composite rankings. Hasahn was, and continues to be, a fantastic recruiting get.

I would be very shocked if we land a 2023 4-star out of Texas. I don’t think we’ve ever landed a 4-star who was not a local player; it’s going take take some program momentum before this becomes a realistic goal. I’d be a little shocked if we landed a 2023 3-star out of Texas. But these are good names to keep an eye on should we ever see them in the transfer portal.

When he's locked in, his defense is strong. Has good instincts and he's big and quick enough to guard most wings he will face at SLU. He has a tendency to sometimes ball watch or not be active enough when he is an off-the-ball defender. I didn't see Perkins much in JUCO but I think Parker is probably ahead of Javonte on defense at this stage in their career.

Not to nitpicky, but this is not "missed in all the computations". All of the numbers I've seen support exactly what you say above, that Fordham is currently and always has been a decent defensive team.

Love was not under the radar. I think he’s referring to Jordan Barnes, who ended up going to Indiana State.

I don’t know if I completely buy that, but I do expect several coaches to use an opening like Louisville as leverage in order to get a pay raise. Mick Cronin will be making more than $3.6M next year if his name is linked with the job, you can believe that.

Beard and Cronin are pipe dreams for Louisville. They have no AD and no President; I don't think the job will be as attractive as they think it is. I've also seen Kenny Payne's name tossed around.

I’d be a little surprised if either of those teams finish top 4

I’ll be there!

Bol is going to be answering a lot of those questions about a lot of schools over the next two years. If I were him I wouldn't have very strong opinions on the schools yet either, just soak it in. Just my opinion, no inside info, but it seems like a longshot that Bol will end up at SLU. But in this era of the transfer portal it's important that we recruit good local kids hard in order to be well-positioned for possible transfers down the road.

I'm a big fan of the ShotQuality website. In general, I have been surprised on how high SLU has ranked on the ShotQuality leaderboards the last couple of years. If you buy into these metrics, it's a good sign regarding the coaching staff. One thing I like about ShotQuality is that it refutes the generalization a lot of analytics people make about mid-range shots being terrible. Davidson has the second lowest rim and 3 rate, but also the second best offensive shot quality. Fordham has the highest rim and 3 rate, but the 10th best offensive shot quality. In terms of dunks, Jimerson has missed a dunk, Okoro has missed 6, Nesbitt 2, Hargrove 3, so it's not that shocking that our dunk percentage is a little low. I posted the below graphic a while ago, but you can see the below values for how ShotQuality determines the SQ calculation (unadjusted):

If you are cringing and praying when people like Jones or Jimerson shoot a 3, I think that says more about how you are watching the game than it does them as players. I would encourage you to try letting occasional enjoyment creep into your viewing. Jimerson is a career 42% 3-point shooter and has had many good shooting games. Jones is a career 39% shooter and I typically am happy when he gets an open look from three. TJ has shot the ball pretty well from 3 for two straight years, so while he's not a sniper, I certainly do not cringe when he shoots an open 3. In general, I think we have a pretty good shooting team and so I am usually hoping for more jumpers, not fewer. As far as your other questions, your guess is as good as mine. I agree we cannot sleep on GW and that SLU will need to be more consistent if we want to secure a top four finish in the A10. I'm taking things one game at a time this year.

This is the best a Bills team has shot from 3 (and free throws) in a decade. Feels like I weird time to make this your first takeaway from a game in which we scored 91.

I did notice Linssen limping around all game. I'm just saying that if youre going to switch every matchup on defense, then there's no point in having Traore in there. He becomes a liability on both sides of the ball if he has to guard on the perimeter. If we wanted to switch everything we may as well have put Nesbitt or Jones or Strickland in there if that's the strategy. Or we could've just not switched the Traore matchup.

He made huge shots late in the Richmond, Iona and Auburn games. If he’s sitting for offensive reasons, then I think that’s pretty silly.

What’s the point of having Traore in the game at all if we’re going to switch everything? It certainly can’t be for offense, given that he hasn’t scored in his last 42 minutes.

I don’t understand why, when we needed a 3, we had Yuri, Traore and Thatch on the floor. I don’t know why Nesbitt didn’t play during crunch time but Rashad Williams got his first minutes of the game then. I don’t understand why we were switching everything when UMass was clearly hunting the 15 switch so Fernandes could iso a big man. I don’t get how that was not a foul on Weeks.

Here are the starting power forwards / 4 men / whatever one prefers to call them in the A10: Sam Mennenga, Toumani Camara, Makhel Mitchell, Jalen Adaway, Vince Williams, Nathan Cayo, Taylor Funk, Kevin Easley, D’Shawn Schwartz, Trent Buttrick. There are some good players on that list that I would take on SLU. But is there really anyone there that Hargrove/Nesbitt/Perkins couldn’t guard? Or is there anyone there that would be a significant upgrade over Hargrove/Perkins/Nesbitt if they came to SLU? I’m not so sure. I agree that I would love to land a big man who can play alongside Okoro and provide length, rebounding and shooting. But I think it’s going to be tough to find someone in the transfer portal that is an upgrade over the guys we currently have there.