kreed5120

First off, Utomi was a key piece of our top 25 defense. He played nearly 34 mpg on that top 25 defense and was a versatile defender who played great team defense. Secondly, his shooting wasn't the problem. He shot 37.3% from 3, which is a down year for Utomi, but is still pretty damn good for a volume shooter. In fact, only 43 out of 351 D1 teams shot the ball better than Utomi's 37.3% clip. Your turnover complaint is revisionist history. Akron had the fewest turnovers in the MAC and despite Utomi being the #1 scoring option on the team, he was 4th on the team in turnovers per game with a modest 1.8 per game. You're really expecting Dailey to be the leader on a team he has never previously been a part of? Utomi and Ivey were the leaders on the team and both are now gone. I'd guess Cheese and LCJ will have to be the ones to step into that role now, not Dailey. I have no idea what Toles and Reece will do. Williams I have already shown optimism for. The MAC is going to be really bad this coming year so we might still end up contending, but I'd like our odds much more had Utomi stayed or we added someone who could have helped fill in for his loss. There is a reason Utomi had a long list of P5s interested in him. He plays great team defense, can guard multiple positions, and is a career 39.3% 3P% shooter. I think you really underestimate what he brought to the team.

I thought we could compete for a MAC title next year had Utomi returned. Watching Cheese and LCJ progress along with knowing we'd be adding Williams gave me hope we could make strides to improving our offense enough to win in a very weakened MAC. We already had the best defense in the MAC. Fast forward to now and I don't see a real plan. We have 4 graduating seniors on next years team and an additional 5 the year after. The goal should have been to try to win this upcoming season while the MAC is down and before he have to rebuild. Instead of going out and adding a grad transfer that could help replace Utomi's production, our prized off-season acquisition can't even play this season and we now have to spend 2 years worth of scholarships to get 1 year of eligibility. Looking at the scholarship chart @Illini Zip kindly tracks I just don't see where in the next 4 years that we'll be a serious contender for a MAC title. I'm expecting us to hover around mediocrity. I'm not ready to call for Groce head, but I'm certainly losing faith in him.

Dailey was good enough to be a consistent rotation player at Iowa, but he isn't a D1 caliber player?

He's been gone for a good 7+ months already.

You have to go back to John Mackovic (1988-1991) to find a coach that left Illinois with a winning record. Odds are whoever the coach was going to be they weren't going to be good.

I'd like to see the last scholarship go to a big that can compete for some minutes this season. The only true center on the roster is Riak. Sayles looked pretty bad last year (not to say he can't improve) and it's anyones guess what we'll get out of Reece as we haven't seen him play at the D1 level.

Personally, I'm not a big fan of the sit one year to play one year players. I'd much rather get a grad transfer who can play right away or a player with multiple years of eligibility left. That being said, I think he should be a productive player in the MAC. He has good size and athleticism. From what I read he's a defensive specialist. I would expect his offensive numbers to improve some playing against MAC competition instead of B10. How much they will improve is to be seen.

Yes, I'd say the likelihood of us losing an assistant to become an assistant at a larger program is far more likely than one leaving us to be a D1 head coach elsewhere.

They hired one of Oats assistants.

We would have gotten a lot of free tacos had they had that promotion this year.

Attendance honestly can't look any worse than it already does for those games. Honestly, I think it's a great idea. It might convince a few people who were on the fence about getting season tickets to actually get them.

I ventured back to the Duquesne fan forum. Apparently 9 of the 17 players he recruited to Duquesne have already transferred. Add in the 2 players that he inherited who decided to transfer and he is on average losing 5 players per year.

Out of curiosity I went over to Duquesne's fan forum and this gave me a chuckle.

I wouldn't place St. John's anywhere near the same category of those schools. All those schools have built a brand that the recruits come to you making it much easier to rebuild a program that is down back into a power house. Not to mention none of those programs are ever down that long. St. John's hasn't been relevant since the 1980s and even then its not like they were some power house. Hurley has the opportunity to take advantage of a downturn PAC-12 and legitimately build ASU into a top 3-4 PAC-12 program. I give him next to no chance of turning around St. John's. Villanova, Georgetown, Xavier, Marquette, and Creighton are all more committed to fielding competitive basketball teams. It's why St. John's has finished in the bottom 1/3 of the conference 12x in the last 16 years.

I'd agree if I felt he could actually win at St. John's. The Big East is pretty brutal right now and its not like his performance at ASU has been all that impressive in a much weaker PAC-12 (11th, 8th, 8th, & 2nd place finishes in his 4 years).If he moves I'm going to say he gets fired within 5 years. I would agree that moving closer to home could be the deciding factor in what otherwise looks to be a fairly lateral move.

I'd think it would be easier for Hurley to have sustained success at ASU. The PAC-12 is really down and wide open for the taking. St. Johns has a much tougher battle as the Big East is filled with a lot of really strong programs.

While we're discussing hypotheticals, I'd love to see us negotiate some home basketball games into these P5 body bag games we play in football. Obviously someone like Kentucky isn't going to come play at Akron, but maybe if we were willing to take a little less, we could get someone like Penn State or Northwestern. I know Kent has done this type of stuff in the past to get Oregon State to the MACC.

I believe we still have 2 years left on our Marshall deal so @Marshall is the only OOC game that I'm aware of. I find it odd in college basketball you don't see more OOC games scheduled in advance. It seems every offseason all teams are scrambling to fill holes in their upcoming OOC schedule.

Akron to play at Indiana in 2023 https://fbschedules.com/indiana-adds-indiana-state-akron-to-2023-football-schedule/

Ohio lost another starter in Antonio Cowart.

Jeff Goodman did a piece yesterday identifying the best players he felt were currently on the transfer market. He breaks out which ones are grad transfers and which ones aren't. Surprisingly I didn't see Ohio's Carter on the list (I may have missed it), but Utomi is included. A small scouting report is given for each player. https://www.google.com/amp/s/watchstadium.com/news/these-are-the-best-college-basketball-players-transferring-this-offseason-04-01-2019/amp/

Even in Utomi' "bad shooting year", he shot 37.3% from 3 on a high volume number of attempts. Its not the 40%+ we're accustomed to, but that's still pretty damn good. You combine that with his ability to guard multiple positions and being a key piece on a top 25 defense and its no surprise UNC, Xavier, and UVA has shown interest. He possesses a skill set that literally all 351 in D1 would like more of. He won't be a featured scorer on any of those teams like he was there, but there will be a spot on a lot of rosters for him if he's willing to accept being a role player.

Fire Groce for letting players graduate.

You act as though Akron is the only D1 school that is generous with heights.