trueblue32

No Brewton is definitely an off-ball guard (albeit small) unless he significantly revamps his game. He's played off-ball at Coastal Carolina (next to DeVante Jones) and off-ball in JUCO (Zachery for one year, and whoever else the year prior). In his D1 career he's had a 7.4% assist rate, for reference Segu more than doubles him at 18% (and I wouldn't even define Segu as a pass-first PG).

Generally I find the releases from UB Athletics to be kind of generic, but it seems like this was more of a targeted recruitment with how out of the blue it was, so I'll be interested to see what Whitesell envisions Perry's role to be. I had assumed that Perry played PG at Fordham but I watched his minutes in a game I found on Youtube, and his highlights and at least the role he played at Fordham was clearly used as an off-ball guard. For those looking for videos on him: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuwR2-kXz04 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QQiAVep4u4 Shooting guard is certainly the position most in flux as of now so maybe he was pitched on an open competition with Jack and Brewton for minutes and we're just hoping to find production in some combination from them.

Interesting, only got 18 MPG on some dreadful Fordham teams. At least it’s some experience if Curtis Jones isn’t ready to be in the rotation from day 1

Yeah that's a limitation of a tool like that, it sees Bertram played 40% of minutes last year and it assumes he will see a similar amount of playing time. What Bertram's good at is shot-blocking and being a strong drop coverage ball screen defender, but he obviously has a lower ceiling offensively (and age-wise) than Skogman. I think Skogman taking a jump in those areas is one of the keys to the team reaching its ceiling. Similarly, I think Mading could provide more playmaking and shot-blocking upside in a role similar to what Fagan played last year, but we will have to see how he acclimates to a step up in physicality. Fagan and Bertram are good safety blankets to have knowing that they can hold their own in the MAC, but them losing minutes because of one of the unknowns stepping up is what unlocks an outcome ending in an NCAA tournament berth in my opinion.

He transferred mid-year and enrolled for the spring semester so I would imagine that qualifies him as staying with UB this year, although it's a weird case and I admittedly do not know that for fact. Either way I don't imagine we go over the 13 scholarships. Coaches already say it's hard to keep 13 players happy with playing time, etc.

Updated scholarship chart: Zachery leaving and Blocker committing clarified a lot in terms of the depth chart, clearing up PG minutes and giving us more wing depth, as well as if the staff was looking to use the extra COVID scholarships. We're sitting at the usual 13 now, and I would imagine we're probably at a final roster, barring some surprise late developments. Seeing how the rotation pans out from the 3-5 will still be interesting as the staff seems to put an emphasis on developing perimeter skills for the big men. We are huge for a MAC team and they showed willingness to play big last year. If Hardnett continues to develop his jump shot I think there's a path for him to get minutes at the 3, and we have to see what Mading can bring in year one, but he could potentially get some looks there. This is an exciting group, barttorvik.com's RosterCast has us at 64 (leaving Zachery in as a JUCO PG stand-in because Curtis Jones is not in the system): I could see a wide range of outcomes, but maybe we're on the bubble if things break right. Saint Louis in Cancun is a winnable game that would look nice on the resume, Bonaventure and Ohio should both be good resume games too.

Brewton's not a PG, I think Jones or Zachery is doing the primary creation while Segu is on the bench. We don't really have a 3 backing up Williams, which makes me think Jack could play some minutes there since he's 6'5", which would open some minutes up at the 2 for one of the PGs to play off ball. That's where it starts getting confusing though haha, I think most of our guys can play a couple of positions other than like Segu and Zachery stuck at the 1, Brewton at the 2, and Bertram at the 5

This made me want to try to theorize the rotation and minutes allocation, and I ended up quitting because there's so much depth and so many new pieces lol (and I wasn't even trying to factor in Blocker potentially). It's a good problem to have after the last few seasons. Assuming Segu is getting ~30 mpg, I would think the winner of Jones and Zachery gets between 10 and 20 mpg cleaning up Segu's back-up minutes and potentially earning some minutes off the ball if they show utility there (size and shooting wise this is probably more likely for Jones) or Whitesell wants to run some 2 PG offense à la Bearden and Evans. I don't think he gets the minutes or the usage to get to 10 PPG, plus we don't know how quickly he will be ready to play at the D1 level. His last full season was the '18-'19 season at the JUCO level

WR Trevor Wilson as well

Yes I have him down for 4, I just marked everybody's last year (the bonus COVID year) as a question mark (red outline) since they will most likely graduate, and they may not come back (like Graves and Nickelberry this year)

My chart went out of date within a matter of hours. Updated: We add a 6'6" kid and our average height went down lol. Crazy size for the MAC

If we get Blocker, I think a reasonable case could be made that (on paper) this is the best recruiting class in school history. Obviously the Williams/Segu class is the most high end talent. However, the depth of three 3-star HS kids, a solid JUCO player (with 4 years of eligibility), and Maceo Jack would be up there in terms of total talent infusion to the program. Hopefully he ends up back in WNY, keeping the local talent is big.

Correct, it prevents schools from having to run-off returning seniors if they are overcommitted. In future years the hard cap of 13 returns though

No he just played his freshman year in JUCO so he will be a sophomore, but like the kids at D1 schools, it didn't count against his eligibility. He very well may be planning to play all 4 of his eligible years here, but I would imagine he's on track to graduate in 2024. Then he would have a choice to make about '24-'25 like Brock did this year. It's more or less semantics, but without the precedent I notated the COVID years differently since we don't know what percentage of kids will take the extra year/if they will stay at the same school. My gut says younger kids, and kids that may not be pros will probably use it but the Mballa/Williams/Segus that were planning on making money professionally soon will not use it.

Didn't really want to create a new thread for this, but here's a scholarship chart I've been using to keep track of what we still have available, with my assumptions that Fagan is returning and Zachery is still on scholarship: If we are in on Estrada and/or Blocker still it looks like we would be taking advantage of the bonus scholarships for COVID year seniors with us already sitting at 13 scholarships.

Figured I would bump this thread since it's UB Giving Day: https://ubgivingday.buffalo.edu/

Same high school that Segu went to too, for whatever that's worth

We've officially offered Curtis Jones

His brother Madison Cone is a football player that transferred to UB from Wisconsin. Tough list but that should help. Was the #102 recruit and #9 PG per 247. 2 (or 3) years of eligibility

Yeah that's why I'm not that concerned about the lack of recruiting news. The music's going to stop at some point and there's not going to be enough chairs for everyone. To succeed at the mid-major level you need to find inefficiencies in the recruiting market. Seems like there's going to be talented seniors and/or transfers looking for scholarships in the summer and it'd be good to still have some scholarships available when that happens. Even going into the season with open scholarships isn't terrible, less guys to keep happy, while also keeping flexibility with mid year transfers (Maceo Jack, Torian Graham, Javion Hamlet)

No they don't https://www.ncaa.org/about/resources/media-center/news/division-i-council-extends-eligibility-student-athletes-impacted-covid-19

For those desperate for recruiting news

-I agree about the first point, obviously. -It's easier to say that it's a deep team when you see how Segu, Williams, and Graves have developed. We don't know what Hardnett will become, or what Robinson would have become, it seems Gallion was a miss. Williams and Segu posted freshman year ORtg's of 94.1 and 89.5 respectively, compared to a D1 average of 104.3. -Williams is the third best player behind Isaac Bonton and Efe Abodigi. I didn't say third leading scorer. He was a 15% 3 point shooter last year, over a full year he's probably somewhere between. Still he improved, good for him, more evidence that giving up on underclassmen is silly. That would probably be the fourth best team in school history, and right around the caliber of Oats' third year team which was a fun year, which is all I really care about. As I said, unreasonable expectations and such. I'm sure the ticket office appreciates the concern though.