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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.

I agree. He also got better at making back cuts when the opponent would try to deny him the ball on the perimeter.

This is kind of my thoughts as well. Eric might draw a little more attention than one might expect because of his size and ability to guard multiple positions. I feel of the two he's the one more likely to be lost because someone desperate comes in last minute and offers him something absurd that we can't match.

I would like to see Bowen return to see if he could develop other parts of this game besides 3 pointers, driving to the hoop, rebounding, jumper. I thought his defense got better as the season progressed.

Favorites went 16-0 yesterday. Edit: article to supplement - https://www.msn.com/en-us/sports/other/march-madness-betting-favorites-go-16-0-in-friday-s-slate-for-first-time-since-1992/ar-AA1Z6lue?apiversion=v2&domshim=1&noservercache=1&noservertelemetry=1&batchservertelemetry=1&renderwebcomponents=1&wcseo=1

Huge, if so!!

I’m opposed to increasing the field. I don’t want teams under .500 getting in and that’s exactly what the large conferences would be pushing for. I do have a problem with other things like the NET and every once in a while the committee goes insane, but the tournament is still the best event in all of sports, IMO. Now my friends have been using the term “March Sadness” due to the increasing lack of Cinderella stories. As for changing the calendar, I think every hour of every day have been fought for and negotiated between sports executives and media so much so that it would be nearly impossible. Spring for one has been owned by the Masters for decades.

Even if he signed it's still not a guarantee. I'm almost certain Oats signed an extension with Buffalo and then was in Tuscaloosa a month later.

If I'm to be honest I'm not sure there is much college basketball could do to grow in popularity. March Madness does extend into April already. The Final Four this year extends from April 4-6. If they pushed it to start in April then you would be competing directly with the Masters (April 6th-12th), NFL Draft (April 23rd-25th), NBA Playoffs (starts April 18th), and MLB opening day (it already overlaps slightly here but bulk of tournament is over beforehand). IMO March Madness wouldn't be what it is today if it had to directly compete with those other events that I mentioned. You might disagree and that's okay. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion.

From Nate Ulrich of the ABJ: Groce 'not even thinking about' job market after loss "In a one-on-one interview after Akron was eliminated from March Madness, the Beacon Journal asked Groce whether he plans to interview elsewhere this offseason. "What I would tell you is right now I'm not even thinking about that," Groce said. "I don't answer those questions, obviously, especially today when today's the day about our five seniors. This whole deal should be all about them and all about the team and the success that we've had. So, that's my comment at this time.""

If Groce left, I think they'd offer it to Dustin. He'd then have to decide how much he wants to be a head coach. He could be the head coach at UA or head assistant at a P5 where he's likely get paid better than as HC at UA.

He had a year at OSU where he played 17 minutes. That's the year they're trying to get disregarded.

In the postgame yesterday, the radio guys said they may petition for one more year for Bowen. I didn’t realize that might be a thing.

What is interesting is that Groce seems to prefer the fast pace style, but our closest shot at winning an NCAA Tournament game was playing at a slower pace - the final score of the UCLA game was 57-53. But maybe that was our closest shot because we had a future NBA player on the roster.