Quickzips

No one has forgotten Ronnie Steward. He is likely to be the lead point guard until such time as some one like Hitchens can sit Ronnie down. Hopefully that will be amajor task.As things stand today Ronnie Steward will be the point guard when the season begins. Ronnie was to be the starting point guard last season until the hip flexor took himdown. By the time Ronnie was healthy it was way late in the season and far too many missed practices. The original plan was Ronnie on the point backed up by theveraitile Steve McNees. Dials would have been the two guard. Middleton was comfortable with coming off the bench as the "sixth man". The later addition of DarrylRoberts was to be a plus. And, it indeed was.As for "needs development" ... bosh. Every kid I saw at LeBron's Skills academy "needs development". Few college players ever get beyond "needs development".For that matter, few NBA players get beyond "needs development".One incoming freshman has some maturity and grade issues. He likely will find himself "red shirted". I am speaking of Andrew Parrish a sweet six-seven bangerwho loves to rebound and block shots. While the Zips could use him this Fall his long range potential is worth investing a red shirt on.Due to the size (five true freshmen) of the incoming class along with the two freshmen who were red shirted last year (Steve Swiech and Ronnie Steward) we canexpect at leas two and possibly three of the freshmen to be red shirted. It is way too early to even guess who they might be. I have some thoughts on just whomwill be red shirted, but its not time to put my foot in my mouth.From what I have seen of the kids they are in great shape. A couple have added height (CMac and Nate for sure). Most have bulked up nicely. Bardo and Swiechlook like giant pro wrasslers. No one is going to move either of them off the blocks.I hope the high school coaches have a highly favorable opinion of the incoming kids. If they don't they are just plain wrong. I trust KD and his staff to find anddevelop talent. After four seasons I think it is safe to say the The Zips coaches are among the best in finding and in developing talent. They certainly have thehard earned respect of ALL the major-major college coaches I talked with during the LSA.Mid season last year I wrote that we would be pleased with Darryl Roberts and Brett McKnight when they came online. Was I wrong? Heck no. They were stellar.This season they both will be better. These guys came to play. They will earn their minutes.One player that intrigues me is Jimmy Conyers. I think Jimmy is about to have a coming out party. He can bang and defend. A pick up in his shooting game andhe can expect major minutes.In my opinion, the Zips are badly under rated. I wrote about this before. Watch the rags and media pick the Zips as a bottom feeder in the East. No one will pickthem higher than fourth. See where the Zips finish. My prediction is that the Zips will play well enough to get a first round bye and knock down over twenty wins.A trip to the NIT is with in range.After last year I'm just glad to have 3 legit point guards coming into the fold. Granted, they are all young and don't have the experience, but odds are that at least one of them will be able to step up and lead this team for the next 4 years. Dials did a commendable job last year, but you could tell it was a little bit like trying to force a square peg into a round hole. I still think McNees is more of a 2 guard and with Steward, Hitchens and Sullivan coming in this year and Dials and Cedrick no longer around to play the 2 I really hope that he plays more over there. I'm VERY intrigued for down the road seeing Parrish and Zeke out there. You wanna talk about a shot blocking duo? That combo would be a nightmare for opposing post players.As far as redshirts go, I have to believe that one or two of the guards would be included in that redshirt list. With Steward, Hitchens, Sullivan, McNees, Roberts, McClanahan and even Conyers (who I also think should be playing more 2 guard than SF, especially with Nate and B.McK at SF) the numbers just seem to indicate that one of the freshmen (Hitchens, Sullivan or McClanahan) will redshirt. Sullivan seems like an obvious choice because Ronnie is certainly going to get playing time and I think Hitchens is just too talented to let him burn a year on the bench. McClanahan might be another one. Parrish may be another redshirt candidate to allow him to focus on academics. I really think that either him or Cvetinovic will have to see some playing time though. We're rather thin behind C.McK at PF.The other thing I'm real interested to see is just how good the Swiech/Bardo combo can do inside. The MAC and particularly the MAC East lost a LOT of good post players this year (Ohio/Williams, Miami/Pollitz, Can't/Quantance, WMU/Reitz, Akron/Wood). I think the team that can find a consistent inside threat the quickest will have an edge up on the East race. Ohio already has a bit of an edge with a veteran like Tillman, and I think we've got a little edge too based on how well Chris came along last year. That will definitley be something to watch though.

Our defense got a free pass last year because of how woeful we were on offense (see QB issues) and because they were respectable at Ohio State. We still have no clue how to defend against mobile QB's, or get pressure on pocket passers for that matter and I've never seen where having 5 DB's in our base defense has been that big of an advantage against the pass like it's supposed to be.

It's hard to think about exactly how much injuries played a part in our season last year, and likely will next year. I absolutely believe we go a lot further last year if Steward is healthy and manning the point by the MAC schedule> Dials and Cedrick then get to split time at the 2 guard keeping them both rested and healthier. If Wood doesn't go down for a month with another knee injury I'm sure we probably pick up another win or two. I even wonder if Sweich would have been able to play a bigger factor, particularly in Jeremiah's absence, if the decision to red shirt him and give him another year to heal up from his leg issues wasn't made so early. Not only that, but how huge would it be for us going into this season if Ronnie and Steve had some quality minutes under their belts from last year? It's interesting to think about, but at the end of the day, we had a pretty good season, and there's a lot to look forward to in the coming years.

I know it's a great catch phrase and everything, but I'm honestly not worried about being, "the Gonzaga of the East." We need to focus on making our own legacy, not trying to mimick someone elses. This program is definitley headed in the right direction. We have a great coaching staff. I think one of the things that often gets overlooked with our program is the kind of stability KD brings. Not only is he a great coach, but he's an Akron guy through and through. Recruits coming in here don't have to worry about whether or not this guy is gonna bolt for TCU or Bradley in the next couple years. That spills over in to great recruiting which we are already starting to see. I hope and believe that Zeke is just going to be the start of a long line of blue chip recruits that fall our way. I've said it before and I'll say it again, the true test of Zeke's value to this program will be determined by whether or not he represents a new trend in Akron recruiting or simply a one time, stars line up kind of situation. The other big thing that could take this program further, and I have a feeling we will see it sometime in the next 5-10 years, is a new basketball ARENA. The JAR is the only thing that I can really see long term holding us back. We're not at that point yet. Heck, we haven't even been able to fill it regularly. I expect us to get to that point though, and when we do it won't be too long before we need to start looking at a bigger arena.

I don't think I can even put into words how valuable it would be to this program to start landing a top 50 prospect every year. Zeke can be the start of it, but for his commitment to have long term value to this program after his playing days are over with UA he needs to be a trendsetter, not an outlier. Hopefully Prather can be the next big recruit in the trend. A wing with some size is a big need for this program down the road, though I am intrigued to see what McClanahan can do.As far as Roberts goes, I wasn't even aware that he wasn't on scholarship. I really hope he can keep up with the academics and get the rewards of it. He was a big key for us down the stretch getting more and more minutes and giving Dials and Ced who were obviously banged up some relief minutes. I don't really know where he fits into the plans over the next couple years, but I'll certainly be rooting for him.

Playing time is an interesting discussion. I think it's true that a lot of these kids don't realize that they are going to sit for at least a year if not two or more before they get a shot to play. That said a record number of "one and dones" (NCAA freshman who enter the NBA draft after just one year of college ball) were just chosen in the first round of this years NBA draft. The new NBA rules have a lot to do with that. Kids who would at one time jump right from high school to the pro's now have to go through a year of college. Obviously if they are talented and legit enough to make the jump to the pro's from high school playing time in college isn't going to be much of a problem. It's the kids just behind those 5-10 elite talents that would benefit most from taking the offer from a lesser known program and getting the early playing time. Otherwise, as you said, they just end up going into a program where top 50-100 recruits are common and they have to claw and fight just to try and get into the rotation. I dunno. Just something to think about I guess.

On the Cavs Summer League Roster.http://www.nba.com/cavaliers/news/summer_league_080708.htmlGee, ya think the Cavs are desperate to keep LeBron happy? In all seriousness best of luck to Romeo and Dru. Doubt they have much of a chance at making a roster, but it's still kinda cool to see 'em on there.

Great to hear about Zeke's emerging offensive game. Other than his weight that's been one of the knocks I've seen on him. Nice to see that he's really working on it and that the improvement is as obvious as it is to people in the know who follow this kind of stuff. I'm honestly not that worried about the weight. When a 16-17 year old kid goes through the kind of growth spurts that I assume Zeke has been going through it takes a bit of time for the body to catch up. If he can come in here in the 220-225lb. range he'll be just fine. The Marshall clan has the right idea though. It isn't just about putting on weight, it's about adding lean muscle. Anyone can get sloppy fat, it takes some effort to build lean muscle like that.

Is it bad that I can't help but wonder how high Zeke Marshall 7'0" C Akron will be on this list come next year?Ohh, and in case it hasn't already been mentioned. I can't wait to see Hitchens on the floor for the Zips. From everything I've seen this kid is going to be a major steal for us.

I really looked forward to playing Bubba O'Sham and the rest of the Bubbacats every year. Now they might actually put together a decent program. Especially if they lure Boals away. Damn, Damn, Damn. Somebody go kidnap Boals and hide him out in an underground bunker at an undisclosed location until OU hires someone else. Damn.

Can't complain about this at all. Just another step forward for this program. Man am I looking forward to the next couple seasons around here. Increased support from LeBron. A top-notch coaching staff. Better and better recruits every year. This program is going to have some special times in the very near future. Just glad to be a part of it.

To me the major flaw in the rankings of this site are that they are strongly tied to the number of recruits that a program signs. Morehead State is a great example. They signed 8 recruits. None of them have better than a 3 rating from that site and they average out at 2.6 rating per recruit, but because they signed so many players they are placed well ahead of programs like Texas (101) which only signed 2 players, one rated at an 8 and the other rated as a 4 for an average of 6. You really can't rate one class higher than another based off of pure volume. I'd also like to know what kind of criteria they use to determine these ratings, but that could be said for just about any recruiting service where a number or star rating is used.

This picture has been floating around for a while now. As of now it doesn't seem like there is much more to this than wild speculation, but you never know. The football stadium started off essentially the same way back in the day and look where we are now. Either way, I'd say we're around 5 years away from seeing any kind of major movement on this front if it's going to happen at all.

I want to be optimistic about our football program. I really do. We've got a brand new, shiny, on campus stadium fast approaching and combined with our practice facilities and the administrations commitment to the program you would think there is no reason to be a pessimist. Yet, I am. I just don't see where Mr. Brookhart is taking this program anywhere bigger. In my mind we've already seen the peak of the Brookhart era when we won the MACC a few years ago. Since then we haven't brought impact players into the program who can sustain long term success. Those impact players we have brought in either haven't made it to campus or have since left the program. Our offense has consistently gotten worse over the last three years. Our defense is still hit or miss and I'm not just refering to tackling. About the only real improvement we've made over the last couple seasons is in the kicking game and even that is lackluster. I really hope I'm wrong, but I just can't see where this program is going to see a quick turnaround.

It's simple, when JD can't play fast and loose with his recruiting efforts anymore, recruiting subpar students and malcontents, he's no longer the brilliant recruiter he once was.

What a disappointment. I really HATE seeing anyone associated with our athletic programs involved with this. There's no justification or excuse for it. Seems as though Mr. Brooks is getting a HEAVY dose of reality. In the last year he's gone from a full ride at Niagra to walking on with us to playing pickup games at the jailhouse. I hope for his sake he can get his life straightened out, but unfortunatley it is probably too little too late. The U definitley needs to cut ties with him though. You can't have something like this dragging all the progress this program has made right back down.I know it's kind of selfish, but my initial thought was thank god it wasn't a guy we were going to be relying on this year like Nate or one of the McKnight brothers.

Just kind of off the wall thinking here. IIRC there's been a lot of talk about the Big East completely realigning with some of the basketball only schools breaking off from the football/basketball schools. I wonder if you wouldn't eventually see something like that happening with the football/basketball schools (Pitt, Cincy, Louisville, Connecticut, Rutgers, USF, Syracuse and West Virginia) splitting off and adding 4 more schools from elsewhere (maybe Akron, Memphis, UCF and ECU?) to make a 12 team conference. Then the basketball only schools (DePaul, Georgetown, Marquette, Notre Dame, Providence, St. Johns, Seton Hall and Villanova) would split off and add maybe 2 more schools (Xavier and UMass come to mind right away) to make a 10 team basketball powerhouse conference.

It's important to note that we would be considered a replacement for that runner up in basketball who would be leaving for the Big East. A move like this would add no real benefit to basketball at all. Without Memphis CUSA is no different than the MAC. A 1-bid league that can only hope that once in a while they get lucky and that one bid wins a game or two. I'd have no problem with Can't making that move. It doesn't benefit Can't the same way it doesn't benefit us. It's a HUGE increase in travel expenses and all it adds is a couple more midling bowl affiliations. Sure they are in a little better weather area, but how exactly is that a benefit for us? Are the Liberty Bowl, the Texas Bowl, the Hawaii Bowl, the New Orleans Bowl or the Papajohns.com Bowl really any more prestigious than the GMAC Bowl, International Bowl or Motor City Bowl? Is it any more likely that our fanbase will show up at those bowls than the ones we are already affiliated with? Heck, will our football team even be competitive enough to make those bowls? The only thing it possibly adds is the opportunity to move up to the Big East if you can make a good showing in CUSA, but you have to wonder how many more teams the Big East will be looking to add after Memphis and ECU. I just don't see where it makes sense.

Thanks for the updates. I was really hoping we had one more scholarship to give. I'd really like to see a SG with some size. Right now we've got what? McNees at 6'1"? I wonder if maybe you'll finally see Conyers switch over to his natural SG spot. If I recall thats where he was recruited to play but depth issues and instability combined with already having Dials and Cedrick at SG kind of forced him over to SF to backup Nate. Now we've got Nate and Brett McKnight at SF and a lot of question marks at the 2 guard. I dunno, just thinking out loud here.

I'd love to get the hell out of MACland, but CUSA isn't the answer. Without Memphis hoops they are in no better spot than us right now. They're a 1 bid basketball league with a bunch of meaningless bowl games in football. They are probably a better Soccer conference, but the travel costs would easily outweigh that and quite frankly we do just fine on our own (which we pretty much are in the MAC anyways). I dunno, I just don't see where CUSA offers us a better opportunity. I don't doubt that we are gonna start looking for another conference soon here. With the amount we are investing in athletics and with the MAC going down the tubes so fast it's actually making that little whistling noise it's inevitable. I just don't see CUSA being any better a choice than the MAC.

I really really hope that this is just the start of bigger things to come for Basketball recruiting wise. Success tends to breed success. Even though we maybe haven't had the tourney appearances to show for it, the string of 20 win seasons and a couple of impressive NIT wins definitley helps. I'd love to see us landing a top 100 recruit or two every year. I'd LOVE to see Ray Chambers in here after his 2 year JUCO stint. Him and Zeke in the front court with Brett McKnight, Humpty and maybe McClanahan (who I have high hopes for as well) would be a real nice starting lineup. The future is bright for the Zips.

Ok, I've been curious about this and I have to ask. We all know about the big Zeke announcment and have had time to let it sink in by now. But where do we stand for '09 recruiting otherwise? Technically we have 2 seniors on the roster next year in Nate and Conyers. Conyers may be eligible to apply for one more year if I remember right, but there was also some speculation that he would leave the program all together. Any more news on that? Do we have any more scholarships to give for next year? Any idea who we may be looking at if we do???

What were his rankings before this update? Don't tell me they actually went UP after verballing to a MAC school. I was under the assumption that going to a MAC school automatically reduced your ranking simply by virtue of going to a MAC school. :blink:Rankings are based on the recruits High School, Camp, and AAU level play. College choices are not factored into the rankings.Tell that to the hundreds of recruits each year that see their star ranking drop from 4 to 3 or 3 to 2 overnight, a change that magically coincides with either a verbal commitment or the signing of a letter of intent to play for a mid-major.

The LeBron angle has already come up some over at the Can't boards, although not as drastically as one might expect.http://www.ncaabbs.com/showthread.php?tid=298080Ohh and I love the one genius who says, "#11 center is nothing to brag about. I wouldn't be too concerned."Let me translate that, "Holy shit, #11 center in the class of '09, man I wish we had him. If we had him all Can't fans everywhere would be proclaiming ourselves ready for a final 4 run. I'm shitting all over myself because Akron landed this guy."

$150 million dollar investment hmm....What could it be? You really have to wonder. I'd assume that anything that we invest in from here on out is going to contain more student residence halls. The University has been committed over the last few years to keeping more students on campus and it seems like every time we build a new dorm we fill it up just as quick. Outside of that I have no idea. In years past you would think maybe a new Student Union, new practice facilities, a new rec center, new football stadium. Well, guess what, check, check, check and check. They're all there already. The two most obvious choices are something involving the medical industry or a new basketball facility. I also wonder if maybe another satelite campus is in the works? I dunno, but I'm definitley looking forward to an announcment.Ohh, and thank god for LP. Without him this campus would still be nothing more than a glorified community college. The man just gets things done.