5/9/24: Mo Egger with Rick Broering

Rick Broering is with Musketeer Report  and the NKU radio crew joined us to discuss the offseasons so far for the teams he covers.

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Away from four o'clock. This isESPN fifteen thirty on mowegor thank you for
joining us today. During the collegebasketball season, we chat once a week
with our buddy Rick Boring, MusketeerReport dot com color man on NKU basketball
broadcasts, the co host of theSkinny podcast. College basketball has like an

(00:21):
off season now that's like worth payingattention to. And there are players coming
and going, and it's I thinkit's a lot of fun. But we
need people like Rick to help ussort through it, especially from the standpoint
of the teams that he covers.And so in the aftermath of Sean Miller
landing another player in Cameron Fletcher,I thought it thought it was a good
idea to get Rick on the showto sort of talk about the last few

(00:43):
weeks or so for Sean Miller's program. And it's always nice to hear Rick's
voice, which we're about to rightnow. What's up well, And we've
had even more news in the lastfew hours break more added even another trance
for a seventh transfer here of thetransfer but it's been a wild transferred portal
season so far with Musketeer, Let'sstart with that. Let's start with what

(01:04):
happened today. Yeah, Roddy Anderson, a point guard from Boise State,
actually started his career at UC SanDiego as a freshman two seasons ago,
then played at Boise State last yearas a sophomore. Has now transferred to
Zavier. He just committed today.Watched a lot of his film over the
last few days as I was gearingup for his visit to Xavier, which

(01:26):
took place on Wednesday. And he'sspeedy, I mean really quick, very
athletic. He finished well at therim each of the last two seasons,
and it was interesting looking at whatthey did at Boise State last year.
It was really a very deliberate system. They played at the three hundred and
twenty third fastest pace in the country, which means they were essentially one of

(01:47):
the slowest teams in the country.And he's a guy that's very quick.
So I'm kind of thinking Sean Milleris looking at this and saying, Hey,
a guy that maybe wasn't in theright fit. He didn't shoot the
ball well, his efficiency were lowthe last two seasons, but he wanted
to make the jump up to thehigh major level, and I think Veager's
taking him with the future in mind, he's played a lot of basketball already,

(02:08):
still has two years of eligibility left, and like I said, you
can learn in Sean Miller's system fora year, a system that maybe fits
him a little bit better, andthen really be a big factor for Savior
in the twenty twenty five to twentysixth season. I think what stands out
about the players that they have broughtin for this coming season is, you
know, we've seen the Missoulet Boom, Quincy Oliveri types and others who have

(02:31):
come from come up a level andplayed in the Big East. This offseason,
we're seeing Fletcher who's played at twohigh major schools. Obviously he's at
his injury issues, but still,and then John Hugley who's played at Oklahoma.
So take that into consideration, justsort of encapsulate the class of guys
who are coming in via the portal. Yeah, I think it's really about

(02:53):
finding a balance and in terms ofwhether you want to find the mid major
guy or the high guy, Idon't know that they have a huge preference
there. I think what they paya lot of attention to is they subscribe
to these analytics services and you know, you played the game Madden back in
the day, and all those playerswere ranked eighty four overall or eighty one

(03:14):
overall. Well, these analytics serviceswill rank every player in the transfer portal
like you know, this guy isan eighty three, let's say, and
then they'll have all of the statisticalprofile broken down. They get very granular
with that as well, but justthey give them an overall grade. And
these teams know, you know,like Fager's done their research. They know
a guy graded at whatever level tendsto do well in the Big East and

(03:38):
it's the type of guy they've hadsuccess with in the past. So I
think those are the things that theyreally pay most attention to when they're looking
for the different guys in the transferportal. But one thing that Sean Miller
just mentioned this past week on hisown podcast with Adam Bound was that they
really want to have a blend ofone year transfers, multiple year transfers,

(03:58):
and then maybe occasionally some freshmen aswell that are either coming in to contribute
immediately because of that talented or guysthat understand I'm going to sit out for
a year develop and then try tomake an impact a year later with what
they bring back Daveon McKnight, ZachFremantle, God Willing, Jerome Hunter can
contribute this season, Trey Green,Dalen Swain. That group. With this

(04:23):
group, what could be the strengthof this upcoming season's team. Well,
I think one thing that's really interestingis we went into the offseason and we
had heard Sean Miller talk a lotabout getting bigger, stronger, tougher,
not having a team that couldn't reboundon the defensive end again, not having
a team that couldn't defend the postagain, and yet we got into the

(04:43):
transfer portal on the way it playedout. I'm looking at this team going
into next year and I'm thinking thestrength of this team appears to be their
guards. They look like they're goingto be a team that needs to play
fast, which he wants to doon the offensive end, He's made that
very clear over the last two years, but also a team that can shoot
the ball from the outside. DanteMaddox the transfer from Toledo and Ryan Conwell

(05:04):
the transfer from Indiana State, thetwo guards they added that I think are
really kind of the crown jewels ofthis transfer portal class. Both of them
were forty percent plus three point shooterslast season, and so when I see
that, I see a team thatis going to get up and down the
floor and really shoot the ball wellfrom the outside. Are there? And

(05:24):
this might be a stupid question,and if so, you could tell me,
But are there? Maybe I don'tknow. Lessons learned from the way
last year's team was constructed that couldit be applied to how they've chosen to
put together next year's club, withoutquestion, and I think it was one
hundred percent a result of what happenedlast year. They were looking at it

(05:45):
from the standpoint of okay, andgranted there's a huge caveat there on.
There was all they could really dowith the hand they were dealt having Jerome
Hunter and Zach Fremantle both go downfor the year in the summer, after
the transfer portal had closed. Theydidn't have the option of bringing in experienced
transfers at that point, so theyhad to go the inexperienced route, go
the international route. They tried toget a guy that was older and Gidis

(06:09):
Tamisha. He was actually a transferHe had spent three years in a university
in Lithuania. But the other guys, you know, Theazar Djokovic and Sasha
Shani bringing in those young guys thathad some talent. It was just very
clear, especially once you got intoBig East play, that a young guy
who's still finding his way doesn't havemuch value in the current transfer portal climate

(06:30):
when guys are twenty three, twentyfour to twenty five years old still playing
college basketball at this high major level. The transfer portal, especially with the
COVID year, the extra year ofeligibility playing out for a lot of these
guys over the last few seasons,it has really changed how it works in
terms of constructing your roster, andI think Sean Miller and his staff were

(06:51):
very cognizant of that as they wentinto this offseason. I'm a big fan
of this era that we're in.I'm glad the COVID year is going away.
Do you agree? Yeah? Iknow. I was happy to hear
you say as you're bringing me inthere that you have enjoyed and you think
the transfer portal makes college basketballs offseason fun, because I agree. I'm

(07:11):
sure the coaches hate it having togo directly into a very stressful time of
rebuilding their roster as soon as theirseason finishes. But from a fans standpoint,
I mean it really keeps college basketballconversation in the forefront. Right after
the tournament ends. This becomes sortof like your professional free agency period here
for a month and a half,and there's a lot of interesting things that

(07:32):
are going on. So I thinkit's fun, but it definitely makes it
difficult to figure out what your rosteris going to look like from year to
year. And I would agree withyou that it'll be nice once the extra
years of eligibility where you have theseguys who have like red shirted ones,
they also have the COVID year andnow they're on their seventh year of college

(07:53):
basketball. Once you get rid ofthose guys, it'll be a lot easier
to sort some of the stuff out. Is there a way that makes sense
that could give you and I whatwe like, which is we get an
off season where there's stuff happening intransactions and where we're talking about college basketball
during times where we typically aren't.But that also makes life a little bit
easier for coaches in the immediate aftermathof the season. You know, I'm

(08:18):
sure they're looking at ways in whichthey can do that, and I'd like
for that to be the case,it seems reasonable that we would find a
way to give them a little bitof a breathe there. But the other
problem is, if you talk tothese coaches, they're going to want to
start their off these in programs herein like two weeks in June or whatever.
So I mean, you know,it's like how far can you move

(08:39):
it back when you're gonna when thesekids need to find where their next school
is, they have to move acrossthe country. In some cases they have
to finish up where they're at.I mean, there's just a lot going
on, a lot involved in Imean, the coaches, as much as
they hate this, they're also sometimesa victim of their own jail, you
know. I mean, like they'rethe ones who kind of put these things
in place because they put so muchpressure on and they want to keep pushing

(09:01):
the envelope as far as what they'reallowed to do. What's the off season
been like so far for Darren Horn'sprogram. Well, I think it's really
good, you know. I Meanyou look at it and you say they
lost their all time leading scorer inMark west Work, who transferred to Missouri,
and it's like, well, howcould that be good? It's like,
well, in today's transfer portal era, if you only lose one player,

(09:22):
And quite frankly, they knew theywere losing Mark west Work. He'd
already played there for four years.He was either going to try to go
to the professional route or move onto a higher level where he would get
paid and make some money play inanother year of college basketball. So they
knew that was coming. They wereable to keep everybody else that they wanted
to keep. They have eight playerscoming back. They've been able to add
a couple of nice additions to thetransfer portal. One guy that I'm really

(09:43):
excited about is a six to fourpoint guard with some athleticism that came up
from the Division two ranks. They'vebeen able to do that each of the
last two seasons where they've found theirstarting point guard from the D two level.
And this guy appears to be themost talented of them all. He
has more stize, more athleticism,Andy can shoot from the outside a little
bit. So his name is DanCarezger, coming from Michigan Tech. And

(10:05):
you know, I think they arepoised, assuming Sam Vincent can respond from
his injury and get back to wherehe was playing a year ago when he
got hurt. As long as he'sback and fully function, I think he
and Trey Robinson will really lead thisteam to one of their most successful seasons.
Is Mark we was good enough toplay in the SEC? A great

(10:26):
question. He's been doubted every level, every step of the way, everywhere
he's been, and he's always risento the occasion. So I would never
doubt the kid. But I wouldsay looking at the times that NKU has
played higher level opponents the last fewseasons, he has definitely had a more
difficult time against the bigger, moreathletic defenders. PJ bomba guy at Villanova

(10:48):
this past year, was at WashingtonState the season before that. When NK
you played them, really comes tomind as like a six four to six
' five athletic. Not a greatHigh major player, but the type of
player that every single team in theSEC is going to have playing on the
wing. That would concern me alittle bit for him. So he's walking
into a tough situation with a teamthat didn't win hardly at all last year,

(11:09):
and you know he's making a bigjump up and level. So I
think a lot of fans are goingto be intrigued to see how he does
at Missouri. You and Richard recordedthe podcast today. Did you answer my
question? We did, and youwon't believe what he did to our guy,
Harley Smile of it. Just reallyunbelievable amount of disrespect. Is the
podcast posted? It is, It'sup right now, the skinny podcast Local

(11:31):
twelve. You can find on anypodcast feed that you listen to, so
check it out. Most definitely you'rethe best man. Thank you so much,
Thank you for