Atlantic 10 and National College Basketball Rumor Mill

[RiseAndGrind]

2 minutes ago, wgstl said:

I dont even know who the dukes HC is but still>>>>>>>crews

Keith Dambot. Lebron's old high school coach. He's a great coach too. 

[billikenfan05]

50 minutes ago, hmart23 said:

I'm guessing this is one of the reasons a few people have been high on the Duquesne front line. 

buncha skinny stiffs. Swingle looks fat though.

[johnbj14]

1 hour ago, hmart23 said:

I'm guessing this is one of the reasons a few people have been high on the Duquesne front line. 

That sure is a nice collection of wingspans. French, Gordon, Santos, and DJ will still be too big for them. Bills by 20.

[RiseAndGrind]

2 minutes ago, johnbj14 said:

That sure is a nice collection of wingspans. French, Gordon, Santos, and DJ will still be too big for them. Bills by 20.

All I see is Brett Jolly, Bryce Husak, Austin Gillmann, and Brett Thompson in that picture 

 

[Old guy]

That is correct, Crews (in his second year and third year) could have produced a similar picture showing player's heights (and ? wingspan) and since they were not particularly good players it would have meant nothing.

[NextYearBill]

2 hours ago, RiseAndGrind said:

All I see is Brett Jolly, Bryce Husak, Austin Gillmann, and Brett Thompson in that picture 

 

out of reactions. great post

[almaman]

3 hours ago, RiseAndGrind said:

All I see is Brett Jolly, Bryce Husak, Austin Gillmann, and Brett Thompson in that picture 

 

No Big Chill?

[Box and Won]

BUT CAN THEY DUNK

[MusicCityBilliken]

Fortunately that big stiff, Verhoevan, who had a career game against us, transferred out, 

[MattyMo213]

Kostas gets picked with the last pick in the draft. Most likely from pure upside

[cheeseman]

On 6/19/2018 at 1:54 PM, almaman said:

No Big Chill?

The Big Chill could play

[Taj79]

Some end of June updates from around the league ......

A bunch of two-star recruits signed with Duquesne, Richmond and St. Bonaventure.  The highest ranked of any was three-star Dominick Welch.

Duquesne transfer Tydus Verhoeven is transferring to UTEP.  Jordan Pierce (Dayton) to Odessa College(?).  Former SLU target Omar Silverio signed with Rhode Island (I believe he previously committed to Santa Clara).  St. Bonaventure lost 6'7" rising junior Josh Ayeni to transfer.  No landing place yet.  Others still on the transfer list with no landing spot in sight include Chris Baldwin (Umass); Gerald Blount (St. Joe's); John Crosby (Dayton); Perris Hicks (Fordham); Jalen Johnson (Saint Louis); Tyler Maye (VCU);

Transfers in include Ryan Daly (Delaware to St. Joe's Red Shirt); Blake Francis (Wagner to Richmond RS); Rodney Chatman (Chattanooga to Dayton RS); Cheddi Mosly (Boston U to La Salle Grad Transfer); Scott Spencer (Clemson to La Salle RS); Ibi Watson (Michigan to Dayton RS); Noah Yales (Yale to Richmond GT): and of course our guys Isabell and Wiley in with Bishop and Graves out. 

A lot of teams seem to still be shorthanded with open scholarship still out there.  Davidson is three scholarship shy right now; Dayton is two shy of a full load but two of those filled scholarships are redshirters Watson and Chatman meaning their roster is quite short with nine scholarship players.  St. Joe's and the Bonnies are also short two.  Fordham is full, however, I don't know what that means, same with La Salle although two there are also redshirting.  I mean, no one goes to Fordham or La Salle  to play basketball.  Mason, GeeDubya, Rhode Island  and Umass are all short one. Richmond is over-committed by one.  And VCU is full up.  Despite beign full up, VCU has seven open offers and two or three of those guys are four-star recruits.  So who knows. 

And then there is Duquesne ------ Duquesne is going to be a total unknown.  They currently show 15 guys under scholarship.  The only guys returning are Mike Lewis II and Eric Williams, which were both All A10 newcomers in the recent past.  .  The remaining 13 (that's a full roster folks) include five redshirt transfers and eight true freshmen.  And based on traditional designations of guards and forwards, nicely balanced.  I will watch with great interest to see how Dambrot works this magic next season. 

 

Finally, GeeDubya hired Greg Paulus, former Duke PG, former Syracuse grad transfer QB, as an assistant coach.

 

[CBFan]

3 hours ago, Taj79 said:

Some end of June updates from around the league ......

A bunch of two-star recruits signed with Duquesne, Richmond and St. Bonaventure.  The highest ranked of any was three-star Dominick Welch.

Duquesne transfer Tydus Verhoeven is transferring to UTEP.  Jordan Pierce (Dayton) to Odessa College(?).  Former SLU target Omar Silverio signed with Rhode Island (I believe he previously committed to Santa Clara).  St. Bonaventure lost 6'7" rising junior Josh Ayeni to transfer.  No landing place yet.  Others still on the transfer list with no landing spot in sight include Chris Baldwin (Umass); Gerald Blount (St. Joe's); John Crosby (Dayton); Perris Hicks (Fordham); Jalen Johnson (Saint Louis); Tyler Maye (VCU);

Transfers in include Ryan Daly (Delaware to St. Joe's Red Shirt); Blake Francis (Wagner to Richmond RS); Rodney Chatman (Chattanooga to Dayton RS); Cheddi Mosly (Boston U to La Salle Grad Transfer); Scott Spencer (Clemson to La Salle RS); Ibi Watson (Michigan to Dayton RS); Noah Yales (Yale to Richmond GT): and of course our guys Isabell and Wiley in with Bishop and Graves out. 

A lot of teams seem to still be shorthanded with open scholarship still out there.  Davidson is three scholarship shy right now; Dayton is two shy of a full load but two of those filled scholarships are redshirters Watson and Chatman meaning their roster is quite short with nine scholarship players.  St. Joe's and the Bonnies are also short two.  Fordham is full, however, I don't know what that means, same with La Salle although two there are also redshirting.  I mean, no one goes to Fordham or La Salle  to play basketball.  Mason, GeeDubya, Rhode Island  and Umass are all short one. Richmond is over-committed by one.  And VCU is full up.  Despite beign full up, VCU has seven open offers and two or three of those guys are four-star recruits.  So who knows. 

And then there is Duquesne ------ Duquesne is going to be a total unknown.  They currently show 15 guys under scholarship.  The only guys returning are Mike Lewis II and Eric Williams, which were both All A10 newcomers in the recent past.  .  The remaining 13 (that's a full roster folks) include five redshirt transfers and eight true freshmen.  And based on traditional designations of guards and forwards, nicely balanced.  I will watch with great interest to see how Dambrot works this magic next season. 

 

Finally, GeeDubya hired Greg Paulus, former Duke PG, former Syracuse grad transfer QB, as an assistant coach.

 

Thank you for the A10 updates.

It is a great feeling to have no available scholarships and the players with those scholarship will bring SLU the A10 championship.  We are back

[TFord and TRavs]

9 minutes ago, CBFan said:

Thank you for the A10 updates.

It is a great feeling to have no available scholarships and the players with those scholarship will bring SLU the A10 championship.  We are back

Back and better (more talented) than ever. 

The upside of this roster in terms of pure, raw talent is far better than the Jett years. Remember we were top 4 in the conference with 7 scholarships, missing 4 of our top 5 players. 

[Taj79]

I like where the Bills it right now, of course right now versus November or January seems light years away. 

The front line, formerly French, Foreman and Anthony is now French, Foreman, Santos, Gordon and maybe Hankton.  Maybe Hankton because is he a stretch four or an inside guy.  Who really knows.  Plus the current roster STILL shows Welmer on it.  And like many other already spoken, I'll believe that when I see it.  Still trading Anthony for all these guys would be the steal of the year if it were a baseball trade.  Kind of like Herschel Walker to the Vikings from the Cowboys.  After praying neither Foreman or especially French would get into foul trouble last year, now the urgency is not as dire as then.  That alone is a two grade plus up for me. And then there's Gordon.  Can't wait to see what that brings.  My hope is that the let him play ala Hughes and not hogtie him ala Douglas years ago.  Every time Douglas made a mistake that freshman year, Grawer would yank him and engage in the proverbial "teaching moment."  I say let him play and teach from the film tomorrow.

The guards were Roby, Hines and Goodwin last year.  And we threw Goodwin out for the stretch run.  Now we have Goodwin, Isabell, Wiley, Thatch, Jacobs, and likely Thor.  I like the numbers game here but the question is still who fills it up consistently from long range to keep defenses honest and give the interior guys the room to move.  Is that Isabell and Jacobs?  Does Goodwin rediscover his mid- to long-range shot?  I hear Thatch is not a shooter and I know Wiley was not a gunner here at Maryland his last few years.  Thor is a guess at this point at best.   I think we have more weapons --- all we had last year was Johnson and a wildly inconsistent Roby.  So I am thinking it is not hard to go up a notch or two from there.  Then add in Hankton and Welmer from deep --- that was something we did not have with the three mentioned of Foreman, French and Anthony.  I think our spacing for the big guys will be critical this year and that improves with shooting skill.  So I am looking at three or four positive notches to last year.

Then there is the obvious plus up with just more bodies on the bench.  Bess is your slasher 3 and it sounds like Thatch is that as well.  Wiley did not do much of that at College Park even when healthy.  But a signing of his stature can't but help.  No more will we worry about if there is a capable replacement for the front or back court.  The selection of bodies will be great.  Plus, losing Hines is addition by subtraction.  The most limited guard on the roster appears to be Thor but sight-unseen I'll take him and this roster way over ever having to watch Aaron Hines play significant minutes ever again.  And not the kid's fault -- {dead}'s fault. 

As the league shapes up, the main competition should be the Joeys and Rhode Island.  Rhodey is defending champ, can't knock that there until we knock them off that pedestal.  A lot of pundits will like the Joeys only because of what's coming back but let's remember that was hurt all last year.  Both Bo Kimble and Charlie Brown were decent before injury, who knows afterwards.  If they do return hale and hearty, the five man frontcourt of Longpre, Funk, Lodge, Oliva and Edwards is large enough (size wise and roster wise) to be able to go toe-to-toe (or bulk to bulk) with anyone.  Martelli has not shown a great deal of patience with Lodge or Edwards; the others are at best Euro-fours, shooting from distance.  The backcourt is okay --- Nick Robinson and Chris Clover will support Kimble much like they did Newkirk but neither has set anyone afire yet.  Their only recruit this year is four-star point Jared Bynum and the question will then be if he and Kimble can compliment each other.   Don't know.

The wild card will be Martelli.  I think it's time for Phil to be put out to pasture but who knows.  He won two years ago with DeAndre Bembry.  It seems he's back every other year.  This is one of those years.

Middle of the road but could surprise to me would be Davidson and Mason.  You never really know with the Bonnies and brownindian sent me a picture of that team bulking up in the summer weight room.  They were impressive from that end.  VCU appears to be hurting with Marcus Evans down and out.  They'll win mostly at Siegel but be challenged elsewhere.  Duquesne is a mess, Dayton is a mess, Fordham, Geedubya, La Salle and  Umass as well.  Richmond is unique with Mooney and Princeton ball.  Look sliek a three-horse race with us and the Joey's and Rhode Island as I see it.  Protect the home turf, win where you should on the road, and steal a few at notorious tough places of the past (YouDee, VCU, Duquesne).  Anything less than an A10 first round bye is falling short for me as it stands right now.

Now ...... that is now.  We'll evaluate the preseason OOC, then the regular season, then the tournament,.   Lots of time for lots of things to change.

[Taj79]

St. Joe's loses 6'6" SG Nick Robinson to a late transfer.  Robinson, out of Chicago, entered St. Joe's with some promise.  Didn't do much his freshman year even with the injury to Shavar Newkirk.  He played in all 31 games and average 5.2 ppg.Which, if you listen to some, is huge as Martelli usually let's freshmen marinate on the bench for at least two years unless spectacular.  Last year, with Kimble and Brown out, he played in 31 of32 games and raised his average to 7.7 ppg.  This transfer likely doesn't affect Martelli's starin  five for 18-19 bu *** does weaken a backcourt that only had three to begin with along with a four-star freshman.  This weakens the Joeys in my opinion and lowers their power ranking for next year.  Still likely Top Three but no room for error or injury.

In other news, Rhodey got ita firsat commit for 2019 in 6'7", 195# SF Mehli Long out of Virginia's Masanutten Academy.

[Old guy]

Taj loved your long post above. I did want to add a note to what you described. New players take some time to make a transition from team to team and an even larger amount of time to transition from HS to D1. I would not be surprised to see some of the new kids, particularly the ones out of HS, looking a bit lost during the initial games. This is OK. Goodwin did look a bit lost in the initial games last year, but by the time we were playing in conference he was confident with his game. I would not be in the least surprised to see this happen again this year with some of the new kids we have. I believe things will turn out very well for us as the year progresses.

[majerus mojo]

[bauman]

Taj, reading all your transfer information in your 6/25 post, I was surprised that J Johnson has not found a home yet.  Pretty late in the process for regular transfers, although he won't be able to play this year so I guess missed summer workouts are not a major concern.  In looking back at the timing of his announcement it seems like he would have had a pretty good feel for where he was going before leaving SLU.  Maybe he just saw the quality of recruits Ford is bring in and felt that playing time was going to be an issue for him.

[Billiken Rich]

I've been thinking that too....

[VeniceMenace]

On 6/22/2018 at 6:20 AM, cheeseman said:

The Big Chill could play

Yep, ask Luc Longley

[Taj79]

A way-too early look at what's coming back at St. Joe's, who this writer believes has a shot to make noise and contend for the A10 title this year. He does give front-runner props to us and Davidson right now.  He is a graduate of Davidson (so not a Joey Brackets homer) and also started the Groce Report last at Illinois. (Math not a strong suite as he says five reasons for the Joeys to be good but only offers four).

http://www.a10talk.com/4-reasons-why-saint-josephs-could-be-an-a-10-title-contender-in-2018-19/

Counterpoints from my point of view:

1) Bynum --- freshmen have to be special to play for Martelli. Sure, DeAndre Bembry was a stud but Isiah Miles spent three years cooking on Phil's bench.  Someone listed at 5'9"  has Fatts Russell written all over him and Fatts was adequate but a cog at Rhodey.  Let's see who plays the two-guard ...Bynum or returning-from-injury Kimble.

2) No argument here.  But the return-from-injury question looms large.

3) Funk and Longpre are essentially the same player.  My definition of Euro-big man.  More adept at the three than the lane.  Same with Olivia.  It could make for a long night on the defensive end for opposing bigs ....or it could make for a long night on the offensive end if these guys are cold.  In any case, it would look like Phil is going with a reverse offense ala Davidson ---- the bigs shoot the three while the guards drive.  Can you say crosstown Villanova?

4)  The Hawks starting two can compete as a backcourt but the depth is nowhere to be seen.  Only Chris Clover is on the bench what with Nick Robinson transferring closer to home base Chicago.  In essence, these guys have to carry them to compete --- once again Phil has done nothing to improve traditional bigmen Jai WIlliams or Markiel Lodge.  One injury and the Joeys could tank ............... again.

The case is a valid one; lots of questions no matter which team you cover.

 

[slu72]

I'm really beginning to become a Davidson hater. 

[Taj79]

Also on A10 talk .... a three-part interview with A10 "newcomers."  The three parts focus on Osun Osunniyi  of St. Bonaventure; Samba Diallo of Umass; and the aforementioned Bynum at St. Joe's.  Osun was a two-star recruit; Bynum and Diallo four-stars although Diallo was injured most of last year.  I can't help but wonder .... why no Carte'Are Gordon or Jermaine Harris of Rhode Island.  Gordon and Harris has national rankings; the three chosen did not.  Hmmm.

[gobillsgo]

15 minutes ago, Taj79 said:

Also on A10 talk .... a three-part interview with A10 "newcomers."  The three parts focus on Osun Osunniyi  of St. Bonaventure; Samba Diallo of Umass; and the aforementioned Bynum at St. Joe's.  Osun was a two-star recruit; Bynum and Diallo four-stars although Diallo was injured most of last year.  I can't help but wonder .... why no Carte'Are Gordon or Jermaine Harris of Rhode Island.  Gordon and Harris has national rankings; the three chosen did not.  Hmmm.

They tweeted at Carte’are a while back asking if he wanted to be interviewed for a piece. I don’t know if he ever responded, but I’d assume not if they didn’t do one.   Not that I’m trying to defend A10Talk. I don’t think they ever give us enough love until they get ripped apart on twitter for pure stupidity, such as saying Duquesne would have the best front court in the league.