DocCas86

I agree an incongruous list. I am not going to try to fathom the explanation. It is possible that the list is not accurate. Just passing info along, take from it what you will.

I do like possibility of team first players with solid fundamentals. The only reference I have to CCCAA is Lucas Saleh, so I don't have a real sense of his abilities.

https://americanriver.prestosports.com/sports/mbkb/2023-24/players/nickgravesplei Current offers from NAIA schools. Interest from us and a couple of Ivy League schools. I don't know if this goes anywhere.

The MAC is taking some hits, roughly 30 in portal, latest transfers include Sullinger and Moss.

Thank you for the extra information. Both Adams and Smith may end up transferring any way, but was trying to determine if the were eligible for exemption.

I certainly don't know either. I understood whether they stay at the same school they attended their senior year vs any transfer during their career, but that is an interesting wrinkle you raise. If either stay, hoping the rule applies, and we have three scholarships available regardless of what they choose.

This may be a stupid question and may end up being moot (if Adams / Smith transfer). However, at one point, players were getting additional year of eligibility and it was not counting against the 13 available scholarships if they stayed with the same school. Here is an excerpt from a story I found from 2021 In other words, if you have 13 basketball players on scholarship and three seniors stay for their extra year, you still get three additional scholarships for 2021-22. If a senior transfers to another school for that extra season, he or she counts against the allotted scholarship limit (which is 13 for men’s basketball). Another excerpt: COVID Blanket Waiver When COVID-19 hit, the NCAA had to think fast. They came up with something called the COVID blanket waiver. In simple terms, this gave many student-athletes an extra year to play. That's why you see so many athletes taking an 'extra' 5th year to transfer schools and go for their master's degree while still playing in the NCAA. Remember that this waiver was only for active athletes during the 2020-2021 academic year, and soon this waiver will become obsolete. Does this rule still apply or did it expire? Based on what I highlighted in prior sentence, it seems like it may apply to both Adams and Smith since they were active during the 2020-21 academic year. If so, any chance we keep Adams and/or Smith and have three scholarships still available?

Gordon is one example of the transfer portal challenge. He put up good numbers at Iona, but only stayed one year. That said, I feel you have to accept that risk, and blend in some portal players.

Shows ESPN+ on ubbulls.com.

That is quite a lengthy list. Per Barttorvik.com - here is how he stacks up vs. some others: Over 55% of his FGA are 3-pointers - shooting at 35%. The other MAAC player Leffew - has very similar stats - slightly better STL stat. I am sure if Cage thinks Dinkins is a a fit - he is reaching out.

I don't know about injuries - ETSU fan forum chatter is it was not a surprise - reaction similar to Kanye on this board.

He was not efficient in getting to the 8 points FG% of 0.311; 0.167 from 3. Did fairly well from the charity stripe. I wish him well.

Tre Dinkins is listed as CG by barttorvik 2.4 PRPG!, averaged 15.4 ppg shooting 36.5% from three and had 3.6 assist per game. Defensively may not be ideal with only 1 steal per game and turnovers are a little high.

I like the sound of defensive menace. The Bulls definitely need to up their defensive game.

I think tomorrow's game between Akron and Ohio will produce the conference winner as they are the two best teams remaining.

I looked back at my comments to see if I overhyped any of the FR. I will admit that I was guilty of focusing more on the positive, but I did mention defensive shortcomings. I was being a little defensive in response to 'borderline D2' characterization. That said I decided to compare Sabol to Osojnik who was on all freshman team. First I want to acknowledge that any of the statistical comparisons are based on a limited number of observations. I still feel that it is appropriate in this comparison to compare MAC stats - despite it being a smaller sample - as I feel that it is a more apples to apples comparison. The first reason it is a better comparison, is Strength of Schedule - UB had a tougher schedule than EMU. The majority of the stats are pulled from Sports Reference and include non-D1 opponents. Second - Sabol played more in OOC than Osojnik. So Sabol's overall stats get skewed downward by including more stats when he was still adjusting to the D1 level. Without further delay, here are the comparisons. So my overall assessment would be Sabol was a slightly better offensive player, but Osojnik was better defensively based on RBG, STLG and BLKG. I have no qualms with MAC picking Osojnik over Sabol - but would say that Sabol is much closer to the top of MAC FR than he is the bottom. Hopefully this presents a balanced enough view.

Your point is a definite consideration. My overall point was not to compare and contrast Hodgson to Halcovage or the players they recruited. Rather it was comparing the approach of going with transfers vs going with freshman to construct the roster.

I get where you are coming from with respect to transfers - but I still feel this past year's team had too many FR. Here is a snapshot of UB vs Ark St rosters Hodgson added nothing but transfers to two existing key returnees. GHIII went predominantly with FR. I don't think it is a stretch to say, if Hodgson had UB's roster, they would not have been beating App St in semi's and and if UB had Ark St roster, the results would likely have been better than we saw. So what about next year - assuming Ark St does not have any transfers - they will be returning a good core, plus they added some FR this year. If (a big if) GHII keeps the most of the FR for four years - perhaps they could be very good. Time will tell. I feel like you have to blend in transfers - maybe focus mostly on JR / SO transfers.

I would attribute the poor results to a lack of overall experience. However, I feel that the four freshman put up numbers during MAC play that were respectable when comparing them to past UB FR. Here are how they stack up against past UB FR - using only MAC conference results - as this is a more apples to apples comparison in my opinion: Some observations: Only Graves and CJ had higher ORTG than Boldin during their FR year. Sabol's 3 point percentage is comparable to CJ's with almost 2x the attempts. (Don't get excited I am not saying Sabol is the next CJ! - just that he had good numbers from 3 pt.) McVeigh didn't attempt a lot, but he came on late with his 3 point shooting and shot in excess of 40% in MAC conference play. Wilsons numbers are not great, but I felt he played better down the strecth. So offensively - I feel like the freshman held their own. Defensive performance was another story - I don't know how much poor defense is attributable to being FR, vs ability - but I would hope each of them would improve defensively over the next three years.

I agree with this. Two things I recall hearing over the past year: Last summer - I recall GHIII saying something along the lines that he was not quite prepared for what it took to be successful in the transfer portal. He did go after Panzo and Gordon. Panzo shot nearly 37% from three on 7.5 attempts per game and would have improved upon the teams 3 pt shooting. Another deficiency from the roster was an experienced PG. UB was mentioned in connection to Kyree Brown, an experienced point guard who average 4 Assists per game from New Hampshire. It was ultimately determined that he had used up his eligibility. Also at some point in the NIU game - they mentioned GHIII will be utilizing the transfer portal more this year. So I think they are certainly aware that they need to use portal more. As for execution, one could say he / his staff were not successful last year in the transfer portal and this does not bode well for this year. Another possibility is that they learned from last year and are better prepared. As others have stated, I am waiting to see the team he puts together to make assessment, but I do get the pessimism of many on the board.

Offensively Halcovage brought over the Villanova philosophy of being a 3 PT team. 41% of UB's field goal attempts were 3 pointers (compared to 44% to 48% for Villanova in recent years). Problem was for a variety of reasons (Chatman is not a 3 point shooter, reliance on FR who lack experience / confidence(?), Adams' regression) they shot horrendously from 3. I am not an x and o guy, so would be interested in opinions on how Halcovage could have coached differently to help. I know one thing he did is dial back the number of threes. A glimpse of what could have been, over the last 5 games, Sabol, McVeigh, Fulcher and Wilson shot a combined 46% from 3. The other big issue for this team was defense. I am no expert, but my thoughts are lack of team quickness, youth and coaching. I don't have enough knowledge to say what the biggest factor is. So I look forward to hearing more perspectives. The first test for GHIII will be who enters the portal. This is a critical off-season, with challenges, but also opportunity. I am hoping the staff learns from this past year and is able to put together a much more competitive team nextyear.

My dark horse is BGSU, but at some point Toledo does have to break through. Just looked at one predicted bracket and they had Toledo as a 15 seed.

My prediction is Ohio wins, they seem to be peaking at the right time, but it is hard going against Akron's senior laden team.

Hoping you are wrong...would like to see all four freshman stick around for another year. I guess we will see soon enough how much of a rebuild GHIII has to do. It is going to be a major effort for sure.