All Activity

You could take 3 weeks off the front and back ends of the MLB season and I wouldn’t miss a second of it. Greed has them starting and ending the season in miserable cold weather.

That ceiling is the result of today's NCAA basketball circus, not the program. The days of Cinderella in the tournament are over. Sure, you'll get an occasional first round upset or a brief run but it's all about NIL and transfers now.

I think we have to remember that these guys are still developing physically throughout their college careers. The adjustment from high school to college is already challenging enough for most. Add too much to their plate and I fear you will see a lot more injuries.

I agree that the landscape has changed a great deal and winning in the NCAA has become far more difficult for the have-nots. But I’m grateful Groce & Company with the support of Bud Wentz doesn’t share your opinion on there being a ceiling for Akron. Keep swinging guys!!

Expanding the tournament doesn't alter the calendar. Just instead of playing 2 Dayton games on Tuesday and another 2 on Wednesday they play 4-6 each day. What you initially proposed was shifting the schedule back multiple weeks. That would make it so earlier rounds would be in competition with the masters and later rounds would be in competition with events like the NBA playoffs or NFL draft. Conference tournaments and March Madness are the only games that 75% of college basketball fans even care about. I talked to fans sitting near me at Rocket Mortgage arena who claimed to be Akron fans, but they knew very little about the team and didn't go to a game at the JAR all season. If you want more regular season games that is still achievable. There are gaps in the regular season that teams don't play for 10+ days. Also, teams could play more than 2 games a week some weeks. I just don't think adding more regular season weeks is suddenly going to make people care more about the regular season. Most just care about the excitement of the single elimination tournaments and/or their office pool brackets. Without it they could care less.

Pretty much. They won't underachieve, but it's clear winning Saturday in Cleveland is the ceiling.

We'll get some good replacement players but they won't be NCAAT winning players because ceiling.

If CBB is worried about competing against The Masters, things are worse than I think. I think last year had the most Sunday viewers for The Masters ever. It was still several million viewers less than the final four. People watch The Masters because there is nothing else on TV and there will always be a certain number of people who like trust fund guys chase a ball around. Also, the final four isn't even played on Sunday. If CBB wants to expand the field, fine. They should get rid of conference tournaments if they do that. It would make the regular season more meaningful. Given players are professionals now, I don't think scheduling a 40+ game season would be unreasonable. 40 games is slightly less than half of NBA games. College football plays over half the number of NFL games. The expanded number of games would help weed out the field and give more time for the cream to rise to the top.

Let's assume Brisco leaves but everyone else returns, that gives you three rosters spots to bring in talent. My dream offseason brings in three impact players: 1) Center/post 2) Stretch 4 3) Scoring guard C-Transfer/Barre F-Transfer/Stankovic/MMK W-Mahaffey/Henderson/Halligan G-Transfer/Head G-Young/Perkins

I have the hottest of takes but we win if that goes in. We just got them in foul trouble and one big fouled out. If we cut it to one instead of missing and going down 7 immediately, we can pound inside more and take advantage of the foul trouble. Instead we're chasing and needing 3s. We had our chances yesterday

I thought I saw Texas Tech was something like 28th in 3-pt defense coming into the game. They did a really great job of contesting and running us off the line. If you eliminate the broken plays where we got a look off transition or offensive rebound before defense could get set, I think only Lyles and Evan were the ones consistently getting open looks. Evan wisely passed up most those looks. That was probably by design as Texas Tech could live with either shooting them. Scott hit some, but given his logo range it becomes a bit more challenging to limit him.

Tavari had 4 points on 2-10 shooting. I don't think we should judge the value of any of these players based on yesterday alone.

One thing to consider is John continues to have the chance to coach his son at UA - now what, only two years away from celebrating senior night with him at UA which you have to think would be incredibly meaningful. Another son in high school here. A lot of factors behind decision like this. Not to mention, his name could be floated around, certainly he’s established his reputation as one of the best mid-major coaches in the country, but competition for all of these jobs is fierce out there, no guarantee he gets any opportunity to leave.

Bowen is a good kid and a great shooter but he's pretty much one dimensional. To his credit he was better on defense this year. If he comes set and square to the basket he's deadly on his shot, but teams have figured him out to some extent and set up their defense so that he seldom gets loose.

On the big stage, Hardman played 21 minutes and went 0-2 with 1 rebound and 0 assists.

As @Illini Zip said it's not about getting more mid or low majors in. It's about getting more .500 P4 teams in like Auburn. It would be a similar setup to now. Just instead of bottom 4 conference winners competing for 2 spots it would be bottom 8 conference champions competing for 4. The same with the last 4 in for at-larges would become the last 8. This setup slide anyone below the bubble line 1 seed down since fewer low majors would make it to the round of 64.

Those 1 vs. 19 and 2 vs. 18 seed games would be glorious.

💯

I think Cody Head will help at guard and I have it on good authority that he will be back.

Beyond the immediate money, there is the ecosystem: play professionally somewhere, Bud invests it, grow your nest egg, have a good life after your playing days. I wonder whether that is ever part of the deliberations.

We have addressed the need to figure out the center position one way or another with another portal acquisition likely. But I would also like to bring in another lead guard for a single season to give veteran leadership like Evan did for us. But in this case to help out Young and redshirt freshman Tai Perkins in the backcourt. Also, I think Oggie witnessed enough winning this year to be hooked and is hungry to take on the off-season.

I had a chance to talk to the Mahaffeys' mom before the PCCC tournament game. She and the whole family were there in UA/Mahaffey gear. I told her how much we enjoyed having her kids and what a fine job they did in raising them. I spoke to both of them at the Tip-off Reception and could not have been more impressed. She indicated they couldn't be happier. Here's hoping that carries over to transfer "silly season."

And that's, frankly, why I have no worries this team will reach its ceiling more often than not. Groce gets the most out of these Zips teams.

I think the Zips went to the fast pace offense based upon the roster. When they had a dominant post player in Enrique things were slower as the offense went through the post. Once Enrique was gone, Groce realized a transition to the faster paced offense was in order. We can all remember how ugly things were at first after the switch. Okonkwo was brought in on the assumption the offense was going to be the same and his departure made no one close to the program lose sleep because of the changes that had been made. Groce will always adapt to his talent rather than try to adapt his talent to a specific scheme.

I know money talks, but I would be very surprised if the Mahaffey family as a whole isn’t bought in and invested in the Akron project.