kreed5120

I've watched parts of a few of the Sun Belt games over the past several days. Game attendance has varied between ~600-2,500 thus far. We give the MAC a lot of crap, but let's take a moment to at least acknowledge the one thing they have done right is the MAC tournament. They put on quite the show. We're easily hitting above our weight class when you see the attendance figures we put up compared to other relative conferences and even some, like the AAC, that you would expect much more out of.

Yes, I can see now that's where it got sent.

I wouldn't get caught up in trying to keep up with the Jones's. Infocision has financially hamstrung the football department. If you add in what we're spending on the stadium to what we're spending on everything else football related (coach, staff, recruiting, etc) we're near the top of the MAC. The problem is we can't both make debt service payments on the stadium while still having an upper tier G5 budget. That's why we just lost an assistant to Marshall. IMO NIL is a great equalizer for a program like Akron. Facility upgrades are immensely costly and don't correlate directly to success. Two of our G5 peers in the Sun Belt built new arenas in the last 5 years. This season they went a combined 15-21 in conference play. What matters for success and notoriety is players. We already have the training facility and fantastic locker rooms that are in the upper echelon of the MAC. IMO every dollar you spend in NIL equates to $10, $20, maybe more in facilities. You get a greater ROI in NIL.

I think Groce will survive financially without it.

What's crazy given the SunBelts absurd bracket is Georgia Southern has won 5 games in 5 days, which the announcers said has never been done before. They still need 1 more win to advance to the tournament.

Well, looking back through my email now and I'm not even seeing that. Perhaps my order didn't go through 😅

I think UMass fans would be thrilled if Frank Martin went to BC. Frank is by far the highest paid coach in the MAC and UMass has more NIL than any MAC team, but the best he can do is an 8th place finish.

Technically they are in the MAC until July 1st. Edit: That day can't come soon enough.

Kind of what I'm seeing in Marvin as well. If he can develop a perimeter shot like Freeman and Amani did their senior years I can see him getting a slightly more expanded role in getting minutes at both the 4 & 5 positions. Finding someone to replace Evan IMO is what will be the biggest challenge. He's kind of the glue that holds everything together.

Barre is already getting a few minutes this year and he's playing behind someone who is most likely going to be 2nd Team All-MAC. He has some heart health issues that the team has to monitor so I doubt he can ever be a 20 minutes a game player. An offseason of growth and I think he could give us 10-15 solid minutes next year. Briscoe I'm not as sold on. Even when Barre was injured he still didn't see the floor. I can't imagine Oggy came halfway a crossed the world just to be burried on the depth chart. I would be surprised if he's on the roster next year TBH. IMO we go into the portal to add 1 big (replace Amani), 1 wing (replace Evan), and 1 guard (help absorb loss of both Tavari & Scott)

My best guess is we target 1 big. MMK and Barre still have eligibility and I just don't see us starting 2 traditional bigs. More likely playing a SF at the 4 like we've done with guys like Mahaffey and Ali in the past and attempted to do with Harris before he got injured. Bigs are very expensive in the portal since there are so few. Okonkwo who put up pretty pedestrian numbers last season got a bag. When you're like a school like Akron, but hope to compete with high majors like Dayton or mid tier P5 programs like a Oklahoma you have to take a money ball approach to roster construction. If they're over paying bigs, but undervaluing undersized guards, like Tavari, you spend your money their instead. That's a big reason why I think Akron has gone to a 3 guard, 1 SF, 1 big lineup. It's the most cost efficient way to build a competitive roster. There is a surplus of 5'10"-6'3" guards. There is a shortage of 6'10" bigs who can move the court and aren't liabilities on offense or defense.

That's not who I intended to direct the insult, but I can see how it could come off as a stray. I'll be more mindful moving forward.

Earl Grant was just fired from Boston College and I think he would be another solid option as well. He had a nice run at Charleston prior to taking the Boston College job so he has shown he can win and compete at this level. Boston College is a tough place to win. No shame in not being able to cut it at the P5 level.

TBF Burno wasn't really canned. His contract expired and NIU elected to not renew. Firing and paying a buyout would require them at least pretending to care about their program. They instead treat it like an Olympic sport.

You're going to upset dozens of people with that comment.

It appears Buffalo will likely be without both Freitag and Pocknett. Hopefully we can build a nice cushion and are able to rest our starters for final the ~5 minutes.

I'm actually not as hostile about UB regarding that game as some. I've seen some ridiculous late game come backs in my time. UNI a decade or so ago blew a 12 point lead with <1 minute against Texas A&M in the Big Dance. We all know of Reggie Miller's infamous 8 points in ~10 seconds against the Knicks. IMO it's better that we're prepared for those scenarios now so that we're not taken by surprise in March.

TOS to WMU

There is also no such thing as MAC refs. The guy ref'ing an Akron/CMU game on a Tuesday night can spend the night in a hotel and make a two hour drive to Columbus the next day to work the OSU/MSU game. MAC pay isn't really great in comparison to the B1G. No ref is going to risk their career fixing games for Miami. Edit: I should say unless they are involved in illicit gambling rings.

Personally, I like Young in the game at the start because then he can guard the opposing teams best PG. He's our best perimeter defender.

I clearly need some caffeine.

I am still a bit nervous about Miami TBH. Particularly when they have Atlason on the floor. Akron likes to trap frequently on defense, but Miami moves the ball around well and can field a lineup of 5 terrific 5 point shooters to make us pay. Personally, I feel we should trap less and play more man to man defense. They don't have any post player that commands a double team against our smaller front court. What's important is being able to run them off the 3 and limit them to contested 2s.

Main stream media probably hasn't watched a MAC game that Miami didn't play in.

$855K buyout I'm seeing someone post on Ball St. board. That might be the largest buyout in MAC basketball history. Perhaps a sign Ball State actually wants to start committing resources to compete.

Yes, I agree their play likely declined. I'm more pointing out even a slight regression could make them lose often in the MVC. Akron can have a bad game and still win comfortably over half the teams in the MAC. You don't get that luxury in the MVC.