Cincy 360 -- Tony Pike and Austin Elmore with Rick Broering

Tony and Austin talk NKU and Xavier hoops with Rick Broering, on ESPN 1530!

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Is Penn Station East Coast Subs sincee three sixty about Cincinnati from Cincinnatis,
spuntered in part by Penn Station EastCoast Subs. Handcrafted hot grilled subs,
fresh cut fries and lemonade. It'sall about good taste. Penn Station East
Coast Subs. Order online today.This is ESPN fifteen thirty, Cincinnati Sports

(00:21):
Station. That's right, it isCincinnati Sports Station. It is our three
and we are a service of ourfriends at Penn Station East Coast Subs.
Fresh cut fries, freshly squeezed lemonade. Get the Penn Station today. What
are you waiting for? Perhaps you'rejust waiting until after this interview. A
good friend of the show covering theXavier Musketeers and the Norse of Northern Kentucky

(00:43):
University joining us right now. RickBrowing is with us. Rick, what's
going on? I'm just hanging outwith you guys. What a day,
What a time to be alive?Rick, good point, real so a
good way to be you know.I wanted to spend some time today because
we've talked a little bit. Wehad some audio from West Miller last week

(01:03):
and what Cincinnati has been building thisoffseason. By a lot of accounts,
they should be a preseason top twentyfive team competing for the NCAA Tournament.
But in every breath or every rankingthat you see Cincinnati in this offseason,
you've seen Xavier pretty much right therewith them. What Sean Miller has been
able to do this offseason, itlooks like a preseason top twenty five team.

(01:29):
Talk about some of the additions thatSean Miller has made to this Xavier
roster in the offseason. Yeah,it's you know, and when we talk
about rankings and stuff, it's sodifficult to come up with these rankings.
In my opinion, I mean,I'm surprised so many of the top twenty
five look as similar as they doright now across the different media outlets.

(01:51):
I would tend to think that's alittle bit of group think and guys not
wanting to be embarrassed as much asthey really believe all those teams our top
twenty five teams, just because like, how do we know all these teams
are bringing in four or five sixnew players and Xavier is right in that
mold. No, Obviously, Xavierfans are excited about the guys they brought
in and the first two guys thatI would point to you to is Ryan

(02:12):
Conwell to Indiana State transfer he hastwo years of eligibility left, and then
Dante Maddock, the Toledo transfer,who has one year of eligibility left.
Both of those guards shot over fortypercent from three point range last year on
really high volume. I mean,if you think about Quincy Oliveri, big
time shot maker, led the Bigeaston scoring last year, Ryan Conwell at
Indiana State made more three pointers thanQuincy Oliveri did last year and Quincy Oliveri

(02:37):
set Xavier's school record, So thatkind of tells you about the type of
shooters that Xavier has brought in thisoffseason. I think that's a big point
of emphasis for Sean Miller and hisoffensive system that they run. Last year,
I just don't think they had enoughskill and enough shooting. It was
so difficult every time down the courtcould get a decent look without being able

(02:58):
to knock down that outside shot ata high clip that they really had to
grind out possessions. And I thinkthe addition of Dante Maddox and Ryan Conwell
will really help that they also broughtin another shooter in six foot four Marcus
Foster from Furman. And then thebig question is what's going to happen in
the front court, because obviously lastyear they were built that tough flow with
Zach Fremantle and Jerome Hunter going downbefore the season even started, they lost

(03:22):
him for the entire year. Bothof those guys are back, they planned
to play this year. You know, where will they be at physically,
it's anyone's guest, But obviously ifthey're healthy, they have already proven they
can contribute at the Big East level. And then in addition to that,
they brought in a six foot ten, two hundred and seventy five pounds center
in John Hugley, who two yearsago was the leading score at Pittsburgh in

(03:43):
the ACC. He since transferred toOklahoma. He's had some injury trouble the
last few years. He really hasn'tplayed at that level since then. But
that's what Zager's hoping for, isthat they'll get him healthy and get him
back closer that twenty twenty one twentytwo form that he showed when he was
at Pittsburgh. And so that wasa big edition. Inside. They also
added another six foot ten big manfrom Long Beach State in Losina Triore and

(04:04):
those are the main guys that Ithink you'll see contributing for Xavier out of
the transfer portal this year. Rick, you mentioned Jerome Hunter. Going back
to the previous season and that stretchrun in the Big East Tournament, you
could argue Jerome Hunter was the bestplayer on the court at times for Xavier.
He's one of the best players inthe Big East at that time.

(04:25):
What would getting that Jerome Hunter backdue to the forecast for this team.
Because the pieces you just mentioned,you can start to see why a lot
of people are high on this Xavierteam. If you get Jerome Hunter at
the level he was playing before lastyear, that's a whole different level of
a team you're now talking about,no doubt. And I think the front

(04:47):
court is a really important part ofall of this. I mean, we
can talk about how exciting Dante Maddixand Ryan Conwell are, and believe me,
I like those players. I thinkthey're going to be very good for
Xavior. But at the end ofthe day, like they've had pretty good
perimeter players last year, when youthink about Quincy Alaveri and Desmond Claude,
who they lost this offseason when QuincyAliverari led the Big easton scoring. Desmond

(05:09):
Claude might have been their most talentedplayer. They lost both of those guys.
They're replacing them with players from Toledoin Indiana State. So again,
I like those guys, but Idon't necessarily know that David is going to
be significantly better on the perimeter.The key is they have to be much
better in the front court. Lastyear they were soft inside, they were
inexperienced inside. They couldn't rebound,they couldn't defend. If that Fremantle and

(05:30):
Jerome Hunter returned to the form thatwe last saw the mat, that is
such a significant upgrade right there.But that alone will make this a different
team. And then you have acouple more reclamation projects, as we just
talked about. John Hugley hasn't beenthe same guy the last two years that
he wasn't in that twenty twenty oneto twenty twenty two season at Pittsburgh.
But if he returns to that form, that's a big time low post score

(05:51):
that's already proven himself in the ACCLacina triore. I don't think he's a
big time scorer from long Beach State, but I do think he can rebound.
And then there's one one more guythat they added from Florida State late
in the transfer portal, Cameron Fletcher, who was once a Kentucky commit,
a really highly rated recruit, veryathletic player, and he's dealt with back

(06:11):
to back ACL injuries in the sameknee the last two seasons at Florida State.
So I think this year for himis going to be much more about
developing and rehabbing and getting back tobeing full strength. But it could be
midway through the season or into BigEast play that he starts to make an
impact in that front court as well, and that'll give you maybe a little
bit more insurance if Jerome Hunter doesn'tquite return to for him like you're hoping

(06:34):
for Rick. Obviously, last yearis not acceptable in the standards of Sean
Miller and what he wants to beas a head coach or where he wants
his programs to be. With thatbeing said, when you look at expectations
or you kind of look at theforecast for this season, I know it's

(06:55):
a literally to say tournament or bust, but it does feel like and Sean
Miller himself has put a lot ofpressure on this team and this program getting
back to the NCAA tournament. Thatwould, I would assume, be where
it starts from a goal standpoint forthe Xavier Musketeers or an expectation standpoint at
that, no doubt, Tony.I mean, look, they ver got
rid of a head coach recently becausehe wasn't getting the NCAA tournament. I

(07:19):
mean it's not like Xavier was performingpoorly. They were in the middle of
the Big East. I mean alot of people would say, if you
know, outsiders got people in thiscity, but people across the country would
look at what Xavier has done,you know, during Travis Steel Senior and
be like, yeah, that's that'sthe expectation for a program like Xavier.
Not here. That's not how thisworks. And they've been very clear about
that. Sean Miller, the GregChristopher, the people at Zavier have never

(07:42):
shied away from the fact that theexpectation at Xavier is the NCAA Tournament.
And so yeah, I mean thefact that they missed that last year,
you return to this year. Whoknows what the Big East will look like.
Who knows what all these teams acrossthe country will look like as they
add all these transfer portal pieces andtry to fit them together. But one
thing we do know is Xavier doesseem to have a pretty talented roster coming
back. They will have much moreexperience and Sean Miller is not going to

(08:05):
make any excuses for his team notmaking n Intilly Tournament. You know,
you mentioned at the start it's sohard to slot where these teams are going
to be because you add so manydifferent bodies. But you still got to
see how they play together and feedoff each other on the court. So
it's one thing to say, oh, they did great in the portal or
they've added some really talented freshmen whenyou try to evaluate what the Big East

(08:26):
looks like. Obviously you have atwo time defending champ now in Yukon.
I would assume it still feels likethe Big East goes through Yukon. Is
there any indication of maybe a coupleof those other top teams who to be
on the lookout for this season comingup for the Big East Conference? Yeah,
I definitely think so. And don'tget me wrong, I would rank

(08:48):
Yukon number one in the Big Eastas well. But I think there is
an argument to be made that thatranking right now and everyone having them as
the clear cut number one in theBig East has way more to do with
Danny Hurley's recent track record and whathis staff has been able to do with
their roster of the last two years, and not as much about the level
of talent they have this year,because I don't think they're clearly heads and

(09:09):
shoulders above the rest of the conferencein terms of their talent level, at
least not based on what we knowright now. Maybe we'll get a couple
weeks into the season and they'll belike, well, these guys that were
sitting out last year behind all theirstuds were really good too, and we
just didn't get to see as muchof them. But I think Creighton has
an argument to be right there atthe top of the conference with you kind
I think they're a little undervalued rightnow. Tony is a big twelve guy.

(09:31):
You watched a lot of Big twelvebasketball last year. I know,
you know, Pop Isaac. Theytransfer from Texas Tech. That's an addition
within Greg McDermott's system if he canget him to be more efficient and a
better knockdown spot up shooter, runmore actions to get him just shooting,
not off the dribble and doing allthe crazy things that he likes to do,
but just setting up and shooting andbeing a more efficient player. I

(09:52):
think the sky is the limit forthat often. So I think Creighton is
a really scary team. And thenI think after that, I'd probably splot
Xavier in around third in the conference. Maybe think John's you might argue,
is a step above them. Youcould put them at fourth. It always
gets bunched up in the Big East. Once you get past that first team
or two that feels like they're they'rea little bit higher level. Everyone else

(10:13):
is probably going to be pretty closeto that five hundred mark and you're just
fighting to get a couple of gamesahead of that. I think Xavier will
be in that mix with you know, anyone ranked two through six in the
conference this year. All right,let's stop focusing on the lower level basketball
conferences in the country and more focuson the powerhouse basketball conference in the Horizon
world. But good players are comingfrom these days, and that's where the

(10:35):
talent is. From the Horizon League, from the Horizon League. Rick knows
it, I know it. Anybodywho watches Horizon League Basketball knows it's the
best basketball conference in the country.Rick n KU trying to run it back
again. Take us through their offseason. Where did they set up as compared
to where they were a year agoor when the season ended in March.

(10:56):
Well, I think everybody who's justcasually following the program is going to look
at it and say, well,they lost daw schools all time leading scorer
and Mark west Warwick. He wentin the transfer portal for his fifth year.
He obviously already played for at NKU, set the school's all time scoring
record and all of that. Nowhe's going to play his final year of
eligibility at Missouri. He was giventhat extra year of eligibility because of the

(11:16):
COVID season being his freshman year.So he has gone. And I think
a lot of people look at itand say, oh, that's really going
to hurt NKU, And no doubt, I mean, anytime you lose a
player of his caliber, that's amega loss. But NKU didn't lose anybody
else. Through the transfer portal.They were able to bring back every other
contributor that they wanted, and thatincludes a guy like Trey Robinson who's going

(11:37):
to be a fifty year player andhad a monster finished to last season in
the semi finals if you watched theHorizon in League tournament. It also means
Sam Vinson, who lost the youknow, more than half the year last
year due to his ACL injury thathe suffered at Saint Mary's, He's going
to be back with this team andhopefully full strength. So that's where you
start with this group is they broughta lot of talent back. You also
have Keenan Tjra, the center transferfrom Marquette last year who really got up

(12:01):
to speed midway through the season andstarted playing well until he injured his ankle
late in the year. He's goingto be back, and that's going to
be the three main pieces that youlook at within this NKU team. But
also I think if you look atwhat they did in the transfer portal,
they brought in a forty six percentthree point shooter from the lower ranks in
Josh Gilling in Division two transfer,trying to maybe spark some of that Oakland

(12:24):
magic that you saw and Jack Goldkeyagainst Kentucky making all those three pointers,
just a spot up shooter from theD two level. They got one of
their own, like that and JoshDilling. They also brought in a six
foot four guard from Michigan Tech Divisiontwo school and Dan gerezger Uh. It
just got my first look at him, and he looks to be an athletic
player who's very smooth with a leftythree point shot. I think he's going

(12:45):
to be fun to watch as well. So so don't forget about some of
those other guys too that were younglast year, like Jeremiah Israel and our
guy rock Star Randy, who hassome big tip in against Right State.
So you know, they've got someguys within this program. And with all
these guys coming back being so familiarwith what coach Horn wants to do,
I think they've really got a chanceof surprising people this year. From what

(13:07):
you've seen from the rest of theHorizon League. How does that stack up
in terms of players coming and going, the additions and so on. Is
n K you expected to be rightback in the conversation for the top of
the Horizon League. You know,it's funny. They really have kind of
just become the standard in this conferenceto where I don't even think people know
what NKU does from in any givenoff season. They just say, well,

(13:28):
one KU is going to be oneof the top two or three teams
in the conference again this year,and I think that's accurate. Perdue fort
Wayne is my guest for who willbe number one, and then I would
think Milwaukee might be two or three, mixed in there with n KU and
then MKU, like I said,probably right there in the top three.
Rick, what was your immediate thoughtwith that solo home run in the first
inning against Tennessee here we go threedays days now. I do have to

(13:58):
ask you this, Rick. Ifollow you and you're one of my favorite
follows at Rick Brooring on Twitter,and you posted thirty five minutes ago why
do car companies do combo interiors withleather and cloth together. If you're a
leather person, you don't want cloth, and vice versa. Walk us through
what happened to make you say thisand share your opinions on this. Well,

(14:20):
I mean, I think it's prettyobvious. I'm looking for a car
right now, Austin. So ifyou have any of your sponsors, find
people at Kelsey Chevrolet when it hookme up. You know, we're looking
for third road seating. We gota new kit and everything. That's what
we're doing right now is we're carshopping, and I tell you what I
can't. Here's my problem with it, Austin. I'm a leather guy,
right, I don't want cloth.I hate cloth, so I only want
leather. And the problem with itis these these dealerships now, because we'll

(14:43):
do that combo thing, they'll say, oh, it's leather or leatheret on
the seats, but then you clickit and you find out's like no,
it's like just an outline of leatherwith cloth in the middle. It's like,
if you want leather, you wantleather, you don't want any cloth.
The whole point is the cloth ishard to clean, you don't want
it there, and you know viceversa. If people cloth, they don't
want the leather. So I don'tunderstand why do car companies make the combo

(15:03):
seating. It makes no sense tofollow up with that based on your your
social media as someone that has atwo and a three year old and a
child do it at any moment here? You mentioned the fifteen seconds of the
blue theme song. Is there anythingthen, Is there anything that encapsulates a
young child more than those fifteen seconds? And is there a way we can

(15:24):
bottle that up to maybe a thirtyminute stretch, maybe even an hour stretch
where the focus of the child isthat intent on those fifteen seconds. It's
incredible. I mean, you knowin that tweet I mentioned my kid has
no interest in actually watching the show, like you haven't gotten into cartoons or
anything yet. But if that themesong clicks on, he could be in
the hallway to whip around on hishands and knees, crawl in there real

(15:46):
fast, shake his arms and legsfor a few seconds, and then go
right back to whatever he was doing. Blue just puts out a banger of
a theme song. Man, Idon't know how they do it one percent.
Rick, thank you so much forjoining us as the off seat and
rolls along. What's the easiest wayfor listeners to keep up with with all
your n KU and Xavier content?Yeah, just follow me on Twitter like

(16:07):
you two guys are clearly doing.I appreciate the shout out there growing on
Twitter, And you can find theskinny podcast that I do with Richard Skinner,
who is really the brains behind thewhole operation. Here at Local told
Skinny you can find him, orat Local twelve you can find the podcast
thank you love it. Rick,thank you so much. Man. We'll
talk soon. Yep, do thebest. Thanks there he is Rick Brian,

(16:27):
Ricky Buckets. Oh boy, RichardBasketball. I got to ask you
something when we come back Austin.What well Joe Goodbarry just tweeted something out.
Uh huh he tweeted this, andI asked you this yesterday he said,
uh, yesterday, head coach ZachTaylor said Joe Burrow would be practicing
today. He said, Joe Burrowhas been given a rest day every week.

(16:48):
Today, Joe Burrow did not throwat any of the Bengals ota practice.
Your thoughts. So Joe clearly,Joe Goodberry clearly has a source because
this is closed to the public.Yep. And we were told yesterday he
was going to throw today and theBengals, you know, paraded him out
there. But that's not necessarily true. But he was asked will he be

(17:10):
good to go next week? AndZach Taylor said yes. Okay. Now,
I ask you yesterday what happens ifJoe done throw today? You said,
okay. Maybe it's a little differentnow. James Orpene pointed out when
Joe was coming out to practice today, there was no tape on the wrist,
no arm sleeve that he normally wears. So the plot second looks like
a guy who's not going to bepracticing the plot thickens. I am not

(17:33):
sworried at all since he three psixty When we come back, though,
Oh no, okay, you've hadyour time, You've had your chance to
speculate, you've had your chance togoogle the answer of who scored the first
goal for FC Cincinnati at TQL Stadiumagainst it Er Miami. All we need

(17:55):
is the answer, and you're goingto Kenny Chesney. Phone lines are now
open as I say the word open. Five one, three, seven,
four nine, fifteen thirty Kenny Chesney'sSun Goes Down Tour twenty twenty four,
Saturday, June twenty ninth at TQLStadium. Tickets available on seat geek.
If you don't win today, allwe need, quite simply is the first

(18:18):
the goal scorer of the first regularseason goal at TQL Stadium. We might
need to get the wheel out totake apart for FC Cincinnati, first FC
Cincinnati regular season goal scorer since ethree to sixty. A service of Penn
Station on the SPN fifteen thirty CincinnatiSports station. Is it possible to fill
you a great