kreed5120

There was an interview over the summer with Bud. He said he was helping getting the football NIL setup. That would have been after the 2024 recruiting cycle. The question is what will be on hand for 2025.

I think you misspelled needing a war chest of ~$3 million annually for NIL. Players aren't going to care if us poor folks have to sit on wooden bleachers. They're going to care if their $250k NIL check clears. The amenities players care about about, like locker rooms and practice facilities, are new.

It very well could be true. The account also only has a handful of followers so I'm also not sure it should be taken as gospel.

From the sounds of former interviews he already is spending the bulk of his time being the volunteer GM for the basketball program. Personally, I think his time and effort is better spent on his passion project over running an entire D1 athletic program, which he has little to no experience doing.

Depending on the program, there is anywhere between 500k-15 million reasons why.

I felt our best performance of the season was our game 1 loss to Arkansas State. We got dog walked our previous 3 losses and this game we choked away a 15 point lead. Fortunately for us the MAC is dog crap. Unfortunately for us even if we win the MAC, whatever 2 seed we face in the tournament will physically dominate us.

If a break happens, I think it will be the SEC and Big 10 forming a ~40 team league. There are only a handful of programs left outside those two conferences that they would want.

Personally, I quit caring for the random bowls. Back 10 years ago maybe 1 player would sit out a bowl game to prepare for the draft. Now star players skipping the games is far more common. To me it makes the games feel more like an exhibition than a meaningful game.

I think that's the problem. All schools want quality bigs that can play. There is a large surplus of talented 5'10"-6'5" guards/wings. There are only so many 6'10+ bigs who can run the floor and aren't a liability on the court. Most of those get eaten up by the big schools. We were fortunate for the past few years having a 6'7" walk-on who played like he was 6'11, but had the quickness of a wing. Those guys are far and few between at the mid-major level.

A four team playoff realistically was the correct size as most years there are only at most 3 or 4 elite teams. The problem is you had people crying thinking their team was unfairly left out and stood a chance had they made the field. Even with a 12 team field you still had Bama fans crying they were robbed. There will never be a way of pleasing everyone. Edit: Under the current format where Arizona State and Boise State were gifted the 3 and 4 seed over far better teams, the quarterfinal match-up between OSU and Oregon might ultimately be what decides who the national champion will be.

If one wishes to take off their Zips blinders, Kent has by far and away looked like the best team through the first ~10 games. It's more of a product of the rest of the MAC looking like dog crap as Kent still looks very much flawed. How you want to rank any of the MAC teams after that who knows.

I feel that's just college football in general. Most games aren't competitive. Penn State - SMU right now is a blood bath.

Yeah, tbh I expected more out of Okonkwo. I didn't think he'd contribute much offensively, but the highlights that I saw gave me the impression that he would be a force defensively and eat up boards. I guess that's why they call them highlights though. They typically only illustrate the good. Please don't think I'm placing all the blame on Okonkwo. I just thought he would be a big enough defensive presence that he could make up for shortcomings elsewhere. That doesn't appear to be the case so we'll just need more from everyone else. Hopefully Groce can find a solution.

The University acquiring Quaker Square was a huge issue with the city at the time. If I recall correctly the city tried to fight it. Akron had plans for expansion as they thought their 25k enrollment was going to grow to 50k. Instead it collapsed to ~15k. @GP1 is right the University shouldn't be in the business of redevelopment. One can't go back and undue what was already done, but they should look to offload properties and other assets that no longer fit the revised vision of the university. Use the assets to reduce the debt burden and reduce upkeep costs. Perhaps a developer will come in and make the community more attractive for potential students. The University holding decaying assets with little to no use does nothing for the university or city.

I didn't realize the Horizon League started conference play so early.

I feel a lot of the love of the portal is to do with the fact many schools are tired of spending 2 years developing a player to get 1 year of production out of them. It's better to spend a scholarship on someone who can contribute immediately as there is no promise of said player being around in the future. Edit: I feel most coaches would prefer the way the system was before. There is just no longer any loyalty of players to a school. Coaches are forced to adapt to the portal or be left behind.

I don't think anyone would notice regardless. At least not at Akron

That was my thoughts exactly

Replacing NIU with UMass is a huge net positive for hoops.

It could be a rough 2 weeks ahead unless this team learns how to box out and defend.

Yes, we've played 3 teams thus far in OOC play who have a pulse. We lost all three games and were ran out of the gym in two of them. Fortunately for us the majority of the MAC is the same caliber of the cupcakes many here complain about us scheduling OOC.

There typically is a long break this time of year because we don't schedule games during finals week, which makes sense.

I honestly don't follow the Horizon enough to know. My comment was based off them being 4th in the Horizon in NET when I looked earlier in the week.

A middle of the pack Horizon team at that.

Right now Milwaukee has more offensive rebounds than we have defensive. You're not going to win many games when you allow your opponent to rebound 50% of their misses.