On this episode, Alex Bozich is joined by Rick Bozich of WDRB.com to discuss his recent column on Houston and Florida shredding the NCAA tournament field and the transfer portal and recruiting rankings.
Read Rick's column here: https://www.wdrb.com/sports/bozich-houston-florida-shredding-ncaa-field-basketball-recruiting-rankings/article_0bbeef1e-e423-432b-914e-1964be858d25.html
This week's episode of Podcast on the Brink is brought to you by Visit Bloomington: https://www.visitbloomington.com/
Support Inside the Hall and Podcast on the Brink with a donation: https://www.insidethehall.com/recommends/donate-to-inside-the-hall/
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Read Rick's column here: https://www.wdrb.com/sports/bozich-houston-florida-shredding-ncaa-field-basketball-recruiting-rankings/article_0bbeef1e-e423-432b-914e-1964be858d25.html
This week's episode of Podcast on the Brink is brought to you by Visit Bloomington: https://www.visitbloomington.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:16):
Welcome back to a new episode of Podcasts on the Brink.
It is Thursday, April tenth college basketball season officially over.
What a great Final four and National Championship game? We
had just a great tournament in general. Before we get
to this week's episode with my Dadrick Bosage of WDRB
ANDWDRB dot com, wanted to take a moment to remind
(00:36):
you that Podcast on the Brink as always brought to
you by our friends at Visit Bloomington, who is also
a proud partner of Indiana University Athletics. Spring has arrived
and it's a great time to enjoy award winning wings
at Buffaloi's go paddleboarding on Lake Lemon, or experience one
of the many great festivals in Bloomington, like the Cosmic
Songwriter Festival and Grand Falloon. Order your free visitor guide
(00:58):
and play in your spring get away at visit Bloomington
dot com. How'd your bracket do in the tournament this year?
I had Houston winning, so I came up just short.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
You know, we always have to post one like immediately
after the draw comes out, and I'm never really very
happy with it because it's so quick. I didn't answer,
I didn't enter any pools I should have I had.
I think my final four was Auburn beating Saint John's. Well,
Saint John's didn't make it, and it was Alabama beating Houston.
(01:37):
So I had two of the four teams, but I
didn't have their teams in the championship game.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
I was also on a survivor pool that Jay Horry,
who graduated from New Albany. His mom was actually my
math teacher at New Albany, but he runs the survivor
pool every year in the tournament and I'm always usually
out like the first weekend, but this year was so
so few upsets that actually me and my brother in
law both made it to final four weekend. The only
(02:07):
teams both of us had left were it who was
on the who was on the side with Florida? Was
it Auburn? Okay, we had Auburn and Duke left, so
both of us picked Auburn and so they were out.
But I think it was the most people that had
ever split that pool. But it kind of just speaks
to the the number of how few upsets there where
(02:28):
it was a It was a great tournament overall, just
with the quality of play. I thought later in the
in the second round and going into Final four weekend,
what did you think just in general of the of
the tournament and how it all worked out.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Yeah, it was a really good final four. There weren't
as many off the wall upsets in the early rounds.
I mean, I don't know if that's going to be
a continuing trend or not. You know, we didn't see
some of the crazy stuff we've seen in the past.
Didn't seem to be that many super dramatic games or
like breakout players. Coaches kind of ruled the whole thing.
(03:06):
But it was a good tournament. There's always a letdown
after the season's over because there may be multi November.
But it was a good tournament. And the other thing
that makes it hard for me to judge is there's
so much other stuff going on in college basketball when
the tournament's going on that sometimes it's hard to actually
focus on the tournament. There's all these coaching changes, there's
portal activity. I think sometimes that distracts from the tournament.
(03:30):
It's it's hard to follow it all.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
Yeah, I was I've been thinking about this a little bit.
I mean, I don't I don't know that there's a
way that they would be able to move the tournament
up because I know that CBS likes to have the
Final Four and then the Masters back to back weekends.
It's like a big thing for them. But I just
think the mechanics of the whole thing has become a
bit chaotic from the standpoint of I know they moved
(03:55):
back to portal a week this year, but it was
it's still opened, you know, with with teams left in
the tournament a ton of teams, and Izzo made some
pretty you know, Izzo's always outspoken, but made some comments
about well if I get if I lose some ground
in the portal, I'm not gonna worry about it. I've
got to focus on my season. And I mean, I
(04:15):
guess in one way, it's an advantage for the teams
that are out to get the head start on the portal,
but the teams that are still in disadvantage. Can you
just thinking out loud here, Can you think of any
way they could change the system to make it more
equitable for everybody? Is it moving back to the portal
a little bit more and lowering the number of days
(04:37):
to enter. I mean last year it was forty five
days I believe to enter. This year it's thirty. It
still seems like that's a pretty long period for guys
to be able to enter. I mean, I think you
maybe could even cut it down by another week and
at least maybe have it open a week later. But
the chaos of it all, I agree with you from
standpoint of you know, fan bases around the country, once
(05:00):
their team loses, they're not so focused on the tournament anymore.
They're just focused on the portal and who their teams
are going. I know in Indiana that's kind of been
the focus now since the end of the season. It's
all transfer portal, guys entering, and who's Indiana going to
get from the portal.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Yeah, I mean, the problem is that it's such a
contrast to professional sports and professional sports. You know, the
NFL Super Bowl ds in February, free agency starts in March.
In the NBA, the season ends in June. Free agency
starts early July. Baseball the World Series ends in late
October early November, and then there's most free agents will
(05:39):
start signing somewhere to December. I understand why collegists can't
do it that way because of academic years and all
that kind of stuff. But it's a distraction to the
rest of the tournament, I think, and I you know,
moving it back another week would probably be helpful. So
the only teams that aren't involved are the final four teams.
But even if they do that, people are still going
(06:03):
to be making deals and talking to people behind the scenes.
I'm sure that, I mean, that goes on during the season,
so right, I don't know that's I'm sure a lot
of fans don't care about it. To me, it was
just sort of I think it just it takes away
from the tournament because it's always team loses and the
next day, five guys go into portal. You know, it's
(06:23):
it's such a whirlwind activity. There's no cohesiveness or continuity
to it all.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
And that's one reason I wonder why it needs to
be thirty days Because the season ends and guys are
going in the portal the next day. They most of
these guys already know what they're going to do, So
why does it need to be a thirty day window.
Maybe make it the Monday after the National Championship game
and let it go till the end of April or
something like that. I understand, like you said, for the
(06:49):
for the even though it's hard to sometimes look at
this from a an academic perspective because a lot of
a lot of this it's it's changed into professional sports
with the deals that are being made and everything. But
obviously the timing of it is such that guys have
to figure out where they're going to go by summer
(07:12):
and you know, enroll in a new school, So that
that's kind of why the timing of it all is
what it is. One reason I wanted to have you
on this week was just to talk about your column
that you did earlier in the week on Monday over
at WDRB dot com. I'm going to put a link
to that in the show notes for anyone who hasn't
had a chance to read it. But you did some
research on the two teams that made the National Championship game,
Gonzaga and Florida in terms of the transfer portal rankings
(07:36):
and also the recruiting rankings, the traditional recruiting rankings. What
what what stood? What did you find? I guess first
for for those that haven't read the column, actually just
going to read it, but what did you what were
your takeaways from that and what did the data tell
you about how maybe this tournament was different and maybe
how it relates to what we can expect in the
(07:57):
future in college basketball.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
I guess my primary takeaway is that if you have
the right coach, and he's a good coach, he's got
a good eye for talent and the talent that fits
in his system, and he can develop players, you can win.
You don't have to have four and five stars. I
think I tweeted out there were more zero star high
school replayers in the championship game than there were four
star players. There were two zero star recruits guys who
(08:21):
weren't ranked at all, and one four star recruit. And
among recruiting classes, neither Houston nor Florida had a top
twenty high school class the previous three seasons, and only
Florida had a top twenty. I think it was portal class, correct.
I think it was twenty twenty two. Maybe you mentioned
(08:42):
it was, yeah, And that was just one player I
think left from that class, Will Richard, who was like
the first recruit that Todd Golden got at Florida. So
it's really a hat tip to Calvin Sampson that he
gets guys he doesn't care where they're ranked. He gets
guys that want to play the way he plays and
are good at it and coaches them into being, you know,
(09:03):
productive players. And I think I also had a take
away from it that there were a lot of older
players that you know, there were a lot of seniors
and juniors that played the freshman got beat and looked
like freshmen in the last ten and a half minutes
of the game for Duke against Houston. But the main
takeaway is, you know, it used to be, especially when
(09:24):
Cala Perry had it rolled in Kentucky and then coach
k that the five star, number one recruiting class guys
were really good. Kentucky had that team in twenty fifteen.
They didn't win it all, but they had Towns and
Booker and Trey Lyles and the Harrison twins and Willie
Carley Stein and all those dudes. Duke had OAKA four
(09:46):
and just Justice Winslow and Grayson Allen and Tyas Jones,
and you can look, you know, through the years, you
had to have four and five star players to win
it all. It's not that way anymore. You can and
get guys who were not or overlooked and then what
(10:06):
Florida especially did was they went and got guys who
proved themselves at other schools. I mean, Walter Clayton was
a guy that wasn't ranked at all. He was ranked
higher as a football player than he was as a
basketball player. He didn't want to play football, so he
signed with Rick Patino and played at Iona for two
years and was really good. When Patina went to Saint John's,
he didn't go with him. He wanted to go back
(10:27):
home and play for Florida. Will Richards started out at Belmont.
You know that Condon was a decently ranked and he
might have been top one hundred player from Australia right
to the huff guy is a huff for hawk. I
don't know how you pronounce it. Sure he was ranked
(10:48):
to twenty something from Pennsylvania and Florida was he liked
Florida because he was a Florida football fan, or he
liked at school Colors or whatever in Florida was smart
enough to take him, and he's a really good player.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
So Elijah Martin's another one right zero.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Star recruit who started at Florida Atlantic and they you
know so, and it reinforces the narrative that the teams
that are not in the Power five conference have in
some way become like the you know, the Triple A
or Double A farm teams of the top college basketball programs.
And we're going to see that again this year with
(11:28):
a lot of guys moving up from those schools into
Power five schools because of the nil opportunities that are there.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
So do you think we're past the era of like
the one and done teams being you know, I don't
want to say dominant in college basketball? We did. We
did just see Duke make it to the Final four
and have a chance to win. Have they not collapsed
in the late last ten minutes? But a confuson But
(11:56):
do you think that era now with the portal being
what it is. I mean, there's high school kids I
know of right now that are you know, top one hundred,
top two hundred recruits in the country right now that
haven't committed anywhere. And I think a big reason of
that is because right now everyone's so focused on the portal,
and these guys may get you know, left until late April,
(12:20):
early May, and even some of the higher ranked high
school kids you just don't hear as much about them
as you do now the top portal guys. I mean,
this is this kid that's gonna reportedly visit Indiana, Kentucky,
Auburn and Old Miss Lamar Wilkers and one of the
top three point shooters in the country. He's getting more
buzz right now on social media and the message boards
(12:44):
and some of the remaining high school kids on the board.
So it kind of speaks to how people have prioritize
the portal. I'm just curious, do you think this is
a product of the COVID year and guys just being
older the last couple of years, or do you think
this is a trend that's here to stay where maybe
fresh and are maybe not as prominent in the sport
moving forward.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
I guess what I think is that for most schools,
there are only a couple of schools that have shown
they can really do the one and done thing, and
that was Kentucky with Calipari and Duke and Shire has
done it, you know, beyond the way that coach k
did it. And you're right, if they would have won
that game, then none of this would have we would
have been talking about any of this. But becau it's
(13:25):
a very small number of coaches or programs that can
try and play the one and done game, and somebody
might pull it off. Again. I'm not going to say
they won't, but I think it's a bigger it's a
much wider path to go the other way that you
can find guys, and and there's a lot more guys
in the portal than there are guys who are good
(13:47):
enough to really be dominant players as high school freshmen,
and schools are going to back away. I think some
coaches are going to back away from recruiting guys that
aren't they aren't convinced they're going to help them from
the very beginning because they're going to coach them for
a year and they're going to disgruddled by not playing,
and they're going to go somewhere else, and then the
next program is going to take advantage of the work
that they put in. So I'd say Duke will keep
(14:10):
doing it, cal Perry will keep doing it in Arkansas,
I don't know. At Hurley's got a good class coming
in next year, so he might be He's he's a
good enough coach and has enough of an ego that
he might think that he can do it and I'm
sure there's going to be some somebody else that will
develop him as a coach and have the belief that
he can find an efficiency. People are always looking for
(14:32):
what can I do that somebody else can do? Uh,
And he'll think that, well, everybody's getting away from the freshman.
I'm going to focus on the freshman. But I think
generally the smartest path is to do it the way
that Florida and Houston did it. But you got to
you got to be good at identifying players and you've
got to be good at developed developing players. That's where
(14:53):
a lot of coaches fall short. And since this is
an EU podcast, you can say what was there? What
was their protoclass ranked last year?
Speaker 1 (15:03):
It had to be top five?
Speaker 2 (15:04):
Yeah, yeah, and it didn't translate into victories because why
I mean, Ballot pretty much had the season that you
thought he would have, but Miles Rice did not, Carlisle
did not, Goody probably did, and langdon Hattan you know,
was inconsequential. So you know it worked for Louisville. I mean,
(15:28):
Javon Hadley outperformed I think what you thought he would.
Chuckie Hepburn absolutely did, Terrence Edwards did so. I think
that's the path. I mean, I think that's that's the
safest path, is the really have it. You've got to
have a good staff that says who's going to be available,
how much are they going to cost, how are they
(15:49):
going to fit together? And the hardest part of it
all to me is to evaluate is what are they
like as people, uh in a locker room and how
coachable are they accepting their roles? Because I look at
Louisville this year and Terrence Edwards came here from being
the he was the most outstanding player in the league
(16:10):
at James Madison except the Sun Belt, I think it was,
and he accepted not being a guy that got a
million shots a game. And you've got to have guys
that are willing guys who leave. Some percent of them
are disgruntled guys, but when they get to their new place,
they got to quit being disgruntled and accept here's what
(16:32):
my role is and this is what I'm here to
do to play for the team and do that. So
you've got to have a good feel for the actual
what motivates a kid and what his intentions are.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
The one thing that just popped into my mind, like
kind of the flip side to what we've seen with
the programs that have had complete overhauls is what Purdue
has been able to do over the last several years,
although this spring we've kind of seen that tested for
the first time. They've had some guys leave. I know,
Cam Heidi went to Texas, Miles Colvin went to Wake Forest.
Those are guys that you looked at and said, maybe
(17:06):
if they stay off four years at Perdue, by the
time they're junior senior, they could be a you know,
an All League player, but maybe a little less patient
because of what Braden Smith and Lawyer and Kaufman Wren.
Those are the guys that kind of run the team.
But there's also the model of what Matt Painter's done,
which to credit to him, I haven't seen any other
school be able to retain it, recruit guys, get them
(17:29):
to buy into the long term development plan. Even I
mean Kaufman Wren, he was a guy that picked between
Indiana and Purdue. I believe it. In the end, he
red shirted his first year and now he's stuck it
out there at Purdue and he's become an All Big
Ten type player. So that's kind of the other side.
That to me is also a model that can work.
But you have to speaking to what you said, you
(17:51):
have to be able to have a system that has
proven over time that you can develop guys and make
them better and show them that when they get to
a certain point in their career, they're going to have
the role that they want. Otherwise, you know, a guy
comes in for one year, doesn't play very much, and
he's got ten schools calling him and said, well, you
only played, you know, eight minutes per game. We can
(18:12):
get you twenty five minutes per game and a little
bit more nil, and then all of a sudden they're
in the portal and gone. So to me, that's also
been pretty impressive just being able to watch what Painter's
been able to do it perue in terms of retaining
players and also developing within the system.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
Yeah, I mean, he's another guy that's like, he's got
a belief system, and he's going to recruit to the
belief system and he's gonna not a waiver from it.
He's done transfers strategically. I mean several of his team
usually has one or two guys out of the portal
who fill a specific need. You're right, He's gotten a
lot of guys to buy in on the development plan
(18:46):
and this year is the first variation from that. With Heidi,
he looked like he was I mean, he played quite
a bit in the NCAA tournament and I would think
he would have a pretty big role next year. But
I guess he didn't want to be the.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
Third, fourth best player, fifth bath player.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
Or he wasn't getting enough nil. Uh he went to Texas, right,
so he's probably getting il and Colvid. I'm sure thought
I don't want to be a backup another year to
Braden Smith and Fletcher Lawyer. Uh So he decided he's
going to go to Wake Forest and Steve Forbes is
you know he had Hunter Sallas the last couple of years.
He had that kid from Oklahoma one year before that
(19:23):
who really did well there. So he's big on portal
guards and handing them the ball, let him do their thing.
But Painter, again, that's he's got his niche and that's
what he stays too. But I don't think everybody can do.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
That in terms of going back to Houston and Florida.
When you looked at the guys that they got, was
there any because it's It's easy to sit here and say, well,
they did a great job of getting under the radar
guys and develop developing them. Was there any theme amongst
the players that they got in terms of what they
looked for, how they how they put that together, just
(19:57):
kind of when you watch them play, because it's one
thing to just collect talent and then think it's all
going to fit together. But I think the piece that
a lot of coaches probably miss is figuring out in
such a short period of time how all the pieces
are going to fit together. And I think that's where
you have to give Golden and Samson a ton of
credit because they obviously got talented players maybe that were
(20:20):
a little bit under the radar, but they also figured
out a way that they're all going to fit together,
and that's that's I think maybe the toughest thing to do.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
For Houston. I think it's physical strength. I mean, he
looks he wants guys who are older, mature, and they
have strong bodies and are willing to really commit to
playing defense. I think he filled a need as a
shooter when he got Crier away from Baylor. He became
more of his offensive guy. But the rest of them
(20:49):
are more defensive oriented players for Florida. I think Todd
Golden likes lengths. I mean, he had four big men
that he played and rotated, and they were all pretty long,
and they were all very athletic. They weren't weren't the
Umar Ballo, Race Thompson kind of kind of big man.
They were guys who could really run the court. A
(21:09):
couple of them kind of reminded me of Cody Zeller
the way they ran the care when Zeller was at
Indiana and beat the defense down court, and the first
option on the offense was to get the ball down
to the big man for a dunk. So I think
that that was that's there, that's their point, that's what
they're looking for. So everybody has their own thing, but
(21:30):
it's not two bigs in the middle of the lane
trying to post up and back their man down and score.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
In terms of Indiana, obviously they've had a couple of
transfer portal pickups so far. I think there's some dis
judging from the messages I get on the inside the
hall community, the messages on social media, Facebook comments, et cetera, emails,
I think there's some people who are a little bit
(21:58):
impatient right now, just in terms of how things are developing.
What have you thought just so far of how the
rosters developed so far? Getting Reed Bailey, obviously Devreze's son,
Tucker's coming along Connor and right Trent Sisley and then
potentially Luke Goodie. That's what maybe five players so far
(22:19):
potentially that could be maybe the core of the team.
What just early impressions on how they've worked the portal
in how I guess the speed of how things are developing.
I mean, I looked at some data last year. A
lot of the guys that committed Indiana wasn't until later
in April and early May. I think people were maybe
(22:41):
panicking a little bit too soon. There's there's still a
lot of time here.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
Yeah, I mean, I think it takes time. I think
the thing I'd say is some of the guys that
you're trying to get have other options, and so they
want to probably look around a little bit and not
just commit to the first place that offers someone. I
think we're seeing some of that playouts. You're going to
have to win some recruiting. Bass are gonna have to
have some plan b's and some planned c's. You know,
I think they're probably doing a lot of work that
(23:07):
we don't know about. I don't think there's been a
lot of immediate leaks in terms of who they're after,
and that's as immediate person. I guess. I don't like that.
I'm sure fans don't like that, but as a coaching staff,
it's to their credit because I don't. I think you
try and keep it as secretive as you can who
you're trying to get, because if you're after him, then
other people are going to say, Hey, Illinois after that guy,
why aren't we after him? Or you know, Kentucky's after
(23:29):
that guy, can we get him. The one thing that's
kind of surprised me is that usually I canna say usually,
but often when coaches change jobs, they bring one or
two players from their previous program with them, And to
my knowledge, no West Virginia guys have Davreez his son,
(23:50):
his son. But no, that's a you know, that's an
easy recruitment. But none of the other guys, none of
the none of the younger players, none of the commit
it's the height. They had three high school commits. None
of them are also coming. That's that seems a little interesting.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
To me, just from the standpoint of.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Interesting from well, I guess I always compared to what
I'm most familiar with. And when uh Kelsey came to Louisville,
he brought Rain Smith and James Scott, two of his starters,
and another guy who red shirted. UH Pope brought Jackson
Robinson from b YU and who was one of his recruits.
(24:34):
I mean, I think you see that fairly off. I mean,
hasn't one or two of the Maryland guys followed Kevin
Willard to Villanova?
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Yeah? Yeah. The one thing I would say is a
couple of the players that obviously played a ton last year.
I think we're heavily tied to Chester Frasier, who obviously
wasn't going to come to Indiana because of his ties
to Illinois. And the high school recruits I think to
the same, you know, based on what I can see,
(25:03):
maybe had some ties to assistant coach that didn't come.
So we'll see what happens. I don't think any to
my knowledge is none of those three I've committed elsewhere,
So we'll see. I think sometimes with the high school
kids it may take a little bit longer to develop.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
I'm not sure.
Speaker 1 (25:17):
I'm not saying that any of them are going to
come to any and I agree with you. It's been
a little interesting. They also didn't have the deepest or
most talented team last year. It was Virginia. I mean,
I think they did a little bit more with lest
I know, they had one guy that was a freshman
last year that I think transferred down to a lower
major school that they maybe took late. So you know,
I don't have I don't have as much of a problem.
(25:39):
I don't have any problem with it, as long as
you know they're able to fill the roster out and
they're able to get guys that fit. I mean, I
don't think you just bring somewhere along just because they're
with you at the previous stop. But clearly they got
the best player available that was still had eligibility from
West Virginia bringing in Tucker Devrees. Last thing I wanted
to ask you about, just in general with college basketball,
(26:05):
do you think the portal overall has been good for
the sport or do you think it's been a negative.
Kind of a loaded question, but we'll leave on that.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
I mean, I think overall it's been good. I don't
like it, but I'll admit it's because of my age,
and I came up in an era when it wasn't
like that, and I liked it. And I hear from
more fans who are of my age of one of
the things they enjoyed about college basketball was watching a
player come in playing as a freshman, getting a little
(26:36):
bit better, and then playing as a sophomore and getting
even better, and then playing as a junior and being
really good. And now it's like they you don't see
that very much anymore, and every year is a different
roster and it's a different face. And you know, in
the previous eras guys would play at a school for
(26:57):
three or four years and be associated with the pro
and then maybe come back and be around the program
or be a part of the program or whatever. And
now it's like they're there for seven months and they're
gone on to the next one. There's so many guys
that are playing at four schools. And I know that,
I know the arguments, and I don't disagree with them
(27:18):
about coaches can change jobs and regular college students can
change jobs, and they deserve to get paid because all
the money that's in there. But having lived through the
previous I mean I'm old enough to remember when Kreem
Abdul jabbaris Luel Sender couldn't play as a freshman at
UCLA and his life turned out okay, same for Bill Walton.
(27:39):
You know, it just seems it's so frenetic now that
it's really harder to follow the game. You try, and
I laugh, like people post those stories the day after
the National Championship game of a really early top twenty
five for next year. I mean, you don't even know
twenty percent of the players who are going to be
(28:00):
on the team. I mean, how can you possibly project
who's going to be good and who's not going to
be good. It's foolish. Where in the old days, I mean,
I can remember in twenty twelve, when I was at
the Final four that somebody told me that USA Today
was going to have the story the next day that
IU was going to be preseason number one for twenty thirteen.
And that makes sense because Zella and Olodipot and Hall's
(28:20):
and Watford and all those guys are going to be back.
Now doesn't make any sense. So I'm not the guy
says the rules shouldn't have changed. This is wrong. I
get it. It's the way it is, I accept it,
but I do have a longing for the way that
it used to be because it just was more I
don't know, it just seemed like you could follow, you know.
(28:43):
I'm Purvis Elson was the MVP of the nineteen eighty
six Final four as a freshman. He stayed at Woiver
for four years, and as a media person, you've covered
him and you got to know him at IU. You know,
Quinn Buckner was the was a freshman starting point guard
on a team before in stages last year, and was
the captain of an undefeated team at Kentucky. I can
(29:06):
think of guys that Sambouie, that Kenny Walker, the guys
that I would get to know and you watched them
go from good to really good to great, and you
don't see that anymore now. It's so transactional. I don't know.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Yes, it's I mean, I mean even a recent example
of an Indiana player, I mean Trace Jackson Davis. Think
about we might have seen a player like we won't
We won't see another player like that, and that was
just he's just what two years out of college.
Speaker 2 (29:33):
Any records that he set will never be touched, like
all the career scoring records. I mean, no one's gonna
break Cheney's record and it's not gonna happen, right, So,
just a different world. And is it better in some ways?
It's better? In some ways, I don't think it's better.
And you know, the interest in the tournament this year
from the TV ratings seemed to say that people like
(29:54):
the tournament still. I guess crowds will probably be up
next year at IU. They were definitely up at Louisville
this year because they were winning. Uh So winning is
what matters in the end. But I think there's you know,
there's some fans who've been around for a long time
who probably long for the days that it used to
(30:17):
be somebody would come to a place and stay for
four years, and that's not going to be that way
yet accept it.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
Yeah, I mean you could see some more guys like
an Anthony Lele or a gal Away. I think situations
like that, homegrown players from Indiana or any you know,
for any other program.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Right, you do it, and Coffin Rens do it, but
they're the exception.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
Right No, And I mean, and those are the guys
that are going to be appreciated long term, right, in
those programs because they're going to be remembered for they
were in this era of player movement and they stayed
and they won. And you know, that's another key I
think to all of this is if you win enough,
you have a chance probably to keep guys right for
if they're not an NBA player, you have a chance
(30:57):
to keep guys for the long term if you're not winning,
and then you're gonna see movement and the other thing
I think just for general interest in the sport, I
think it's you know, with the NBA in July right
when when free agency starts, I mean it's it's the
lead on everything. It's the big story NFL free agency.
(31:18):
I think it has given a bit of a boost
to the to the year round coverage of college basketball
that the portal. Right now, if there's a big portal commit,
it's gonna be one of the top headlines in ESPA
dot com. That that wasn't gonna you know, in the past,
if a guy had to transfer and sit out and
we weren't going to see him play for a couple
(31:39):
of years at a new place, that it wasn't a
big deal. So I think from that standpoint, it's kind
of helped. I just agree with you from the chaos perspective.
I hope that at some point they're able to arrive
in a system where there's a little bit more stability
and in terms of player movement, I don't have problem
with guys transferring. Maybe it can be a one time
(32:00):
transfer with no with no exceptions. But with this idea,
I mean, isn't Trey White that started at USC. Isn't
he going to be at his fourth school in four years?
And I think these there's been one coaching change in
that so it's not like it's been coaching. He started
at USC, went to Louisville, Illinois, and ol Kansas.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
Right, He's not the only one. There's plenty of this guy.
That was the point guarded. He was at Arizona, then
he went to West Virginia and Kentucky. Nwas going to Cincinnati.
Kerr Crisa, Yeah, Yeah, he's another four school guy. So
there's there's gonna be a bunch of them. It's gonna
it's gonna happen. You know, it's going to continue to happen.
(32:40):
And people talk about I mean, coaches don't jump four
top three, you know, No, they jumped once. They might
jump twice, but once more likely Underwood did jump.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
But Buzz Williams every six years.
Speaker 2 (32:51):
Right Underwood did it. I mean he went from Steven F.
Austin or whatever to Illinois. I me to Oklahoma State
to Illinois. But they don't jump every year. So but
it's not good. It's not gonna change. I mean, players
are going to be able to do that. The NCAA
is going to be afraid to try to enforce any
rules because they know they'll get sued if they try
(33:13):
and stop them.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
I mean, I think the only thing they could do
is maybe introduce IF they, if they, if they IF
contracts come into the sport, you know, signing players to
multi year deals. I think that's the only way you
stop it. I mean, you say you sign a freshman,
say this is an IL deal for our revenue shared
deal for two years. You have to commit to the
two years or the three years, and then it would
(33:37):
be up to the players to decide if they want
to sign it. Right, you get the stability, But then
do you want to bet on yourself and say after
one year, I'm I'm going to be able to maybe
go get somewhere else or do you want to take
the guarantee of the of the deal of what I
can get up front. So I think that'll be the
next frontier and all of this, but it's an ever
changing landscape. I really enjoyed your column at WDRB. I
(33:57):
thought it was really well done, and I know a
lot of au fans read it and gave it, you know,
a lot of thought because of last season and what
happened with the portal, and I think people are excited
about a little bit maybe more analytic driven, more savvy
approach to the portal this season. Might not see Indiana
ranked at the same level in terms of the portal rankings,
(34:18):
but who knows a team.
Speaker 2 (34:20):
That's better, That's what That's what was missing at Indiana.
These guys were highly Vallo and Rice and Carlisle were
highly ranked in the portal, but there wasn't any forethought
into a how are they going to fit together? How
are they going to play together, and how are they
going to be developed. I mean, Ballow, like I said,
I think, played about how you thought he would be good.
(34:41):
He played the way about how I thought he would
be But Miles Rice probably thought this isn't how I
was used to playing at Washington State. I was he's
a better player than he played for IU last year.
For sure in Carlisle, he was vastly overrated and maybe
maybe he just had an off year. But I didn't
really see he wasn't a very good shooter, who wasn't
(35:04):
a great ball handler. He's a decent defender. But if
he was ranked in the top was he the top
twenty of the portal guy?
Speaker 1 (35:12):
He was pretty high. The other thing that really I
don't see it. Another thing that really torpedo the season
was that it took forever for Woodson to figure out that,
you know, he had a guy on the bench, and
Anthony leal that if you would have just played him
more from the start, I think the record would have
been a lot different in the end. But he was
too married to this idea of playing the two big
(35:35):
lineup and playing.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
The guy the most money. Too. I mean there's some
of that implicit in this. If you go in the
portal and get some of the top players, you're paying
them a decent amount of money, and A you're probably
thinking that I'm paying them, I need to play him
and be the agency are probably saying, hey, wait, a minute.
I come, my guy as playing more, right, if you
send more players to you in the future, you tell
(35:57):
me he's gonna play, And now he's sitting in the bench.
I'm not sure I'm gonna send more guys your way.
Speaker 1 (36:00):
We don't mean it was no coincidence that he played
Bryce and Tucker all the way up to the UCLA
game and then didn't play him at all after that,
and then that's when they obviously, you know, started winning
some more games. But at that point he was desperate
to try to make the tournament, so he and he
knew he was gone. So he basically said, I'm just
(36:24):
just gonna play the guys that give me the best
chance to win, which I think that's how you have
to coach from the start of the season. And now
I want to make this about Woodson, but I'm just saying,
in this whole new era of portal acquisitions, that needs
to be a conversation that happens on the front end
with the player and say we're gonna pay you this
amount of money. We're happy to do that. We want
(36:46):
you to be a part of our program, but we're
not promising you that you're going to play thirty five
minutes a game. You're gonna have to earn your minutes,
and that that's how it has to be. Because I
think that's, you know, among the many things or managed
last season, I think that was even the Louke Goodie thing.
I mean, there was times where he was playing Imbacco
more more than and then Goody, and it was clear
(37:08):
certain situations that that shouldn't have been the case. And
the two bits, you know, all those guys it was
it was basically playing the highest value that all guys
as much earlier in the season, and then once they
figured out later on in the season that uh, he
was going to be gone, he just played the guys
that helped him win the most. I think that's how
you have to do it from the get go. Whether
it's the guy that's getting one point five million or
(37:29):
a guy that's getting three hundred thousand, play the guy out,
play the guy that's going to help you win the game.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
My hope is that one day some bright young student
at the i U. Kelly School will do ah his
thesis on how Mike Woodson mismanaged the Indiana basketball program.
It would be a best seller.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Yeah, we could probably do a five hour podcast and
still have plenty of things to talk about, but we
will leave it at that. We were hopeful for better
days ahead for Indiana basketball. Is Darren Devrees and the
coaching staff kind of work the portal in a stealth
(38:10):
like manner, which not a lot of leaks I think
is a good thing. Like like you said, could maybe
drive up the pot price for certain guys if all
of a sudden word gets out that you're working on
a certain guy. So hopefully things continue to operate in
this way and we'll see some moving here in the
next couple weeks with the roster. Thank you again for
(38:30):
coming on this episode of Podcasts on Brink. If if
you haven't read the column again, I'm gonna put it
down the show notes. It's at WDRB dot com. Just
click on sports I think bozicch and Crawford and scroll
down a little bit and it should be down there.
Pretty good analysis there of what happened with Gonzaga and Florida.
For those who enjoy the show, podcast on the Brink,
please leave us a rating and review over on Apple Podcasts,
(38:53):
leave us a five star rating over on Spotify, and
we'll be back soon with another episode of podcast on
the Brink,
Welcome back to a new episode of Podcasts on the Brink.
It is Thursday, April tenth college basketball season officially over.
What a great Final four and National Championship game? We
had just a great tournament in general. Before we get
to this week's episode with my Dadrick Bosage of WDRB
ANDWDRB dot com, wanted to take a moment to remind
(00:36):
you that Podcast on the Brink as always brought to
you by our friends at Visit Bloomington, who is also
a proud partner of Indiana University Athletics. Spring has arrived
and it's a great time to enjoy award winning wings
at Buffaloi's go paddleboarding on Lake Lemon, or experience one
of the many great festivals in Bloomington, like the Cosmic
Songwriter Festival and Grand Falloon. Order your free visitor guide
(00:58):
and play in your spring get away at visit Bloomington
dot com. How'd your bracket do in the tournament this year?
I had Houston winning, so I came up just short.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
You know, we always have to post one like immediately
after the draw comes out, and I'm never really very
happy with it because it's so quick. I didn't answer,
I didn't enter any pools I should have I had.
I think my final four was Auburn beating Saint John's. Well,
Saint John's didn't make it, and it was Alabama beating Houston.
(01:37):
So I had two of the four teams, but I
didn't have their teams in the championship game.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
I was also on a survivor pool that Jay Horry,
who graduated from New Albany. His mom was actually my
math teacher at New Albany, but he runs the survivor
pool every year in the tournament and I'm always usually
out like the first weekend, but this year was so
so few upsets that actually me and my brother in
law both made it to final four weekend. The only
(02:07):
teams both of us had left were it who was
on the who was on the side with Florida? Was
it Auburn? Okay, we had Auburn and Duke left, so
both of us picked Auburn and so they were out.
But I think it was the most people that had
ever split that pool. But it kind of just speaks
to the the number of how few upsets there where
(02:28):
it was a It was a great tournament overall, just
with the quality of play. I thought later in the
in the second round and going into Final four weekend,
what did you think just in general of the of
the tournament and how it all worked out.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Yeah, it was a really good final four. There weren't
as many off the wall upsets in the early rounds.
I mean, I don't know if that's going to be
a continuing trend or not. You know, we didn't see
some of the crazy stuff we've seen in the past.
Didn't seem to be that many super dramatic games or
like breakout players. Coaches kind of ruled the whole thing.
(03:06):
But it was a good tournament. There's always a letdown
after the season's over because there may be multi November.
But it was a good tournament. And the other thing
that makes it hard for me to judge is there's
so much other stuff going on in college basketball when
the tournament's going on that sometimes it's hard to actually
focus on the tournament. There's all these coaching changes, there's
portal activity. I think sometimes that distracts from the tournament.
(03:30):
It's it's hard to follow it all.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
Yeah, I was I've been thinking about this a little bit.
I mean, I don't I don't know that there's a
way that they would be able to move the tournament
up because I know that CBS likes to have the
Final Four and then the Masters back to back weekends.
It's like a big thing for them. But I just
think the mechanics of the whole thing has become a
bit chaotic from the standpoint of I know they moved
(03:55):
back to portal a week this year, but it was
it's still opened, you know, with with teams left in
the tournament a ton of teams, and Izzo made some
pretty you know, Izzo's always outspoken, but made some comments
about well if I get if I lose some ground
in the portal, I'm not gonna worry about it. I've
got to focus on my season. And I mean, I
(04:15):
guess in one way, it's an advantage for the teams
that are out to get the head start on the portal,
but the teams that are still in disadvantage. Can you
just thinking out loud here, Can you think of any
way they could change the system to make it more
equitable for everybody? Is it moving back to the portal
a little bit more and lowering the number of days
(04:37):
to enter. I mean last year it was forty five
days I believe to enter. This year it's thirty. It
still seems like that's a pretty long period for guys
to be able to enter. I mean, I think you
maybe could even cut it down by another week and
at least maybe have it open a week later. But
the chaos of it all, I agree with you from
standpoint of you know, fan bases around the country, once
(05:00):
their team loses, they're not so focused on the tournament anymore.
They're just focused on the portal and who their teams
are going. I know in Indiana that's kind of been
the focus now since the end of the season. It's
all transfer portal, guys entering, and who's Indiana going to
get from the portal.
Speaker 2 (05:16):
Yeah, I mean, the problem is that it's such a
contrast to professional sports and professional sports. You know, the
NFL Super Bowl ds in February, free agency starts in March.
In the NBA, the season ends in June. Free agency
starts early July. Baseball the World Series ends in late
October early November, and then there's most free agents will
(05:39):
start signing somewhere to December. I understand why collegists can't
do it that way because of academic years and all
that kind of stuff. But it's a distraction to the
rest of the tournament, I think, and I you know,
moving it back another week would probably be helpful. So
the only teams that aren't involved are the final four teams.
But even if they do that, people are still going
(06:03):
to be making deals and talking to people behind the scenes.
I'm sure that, I mean, that goes on during the season,
so right, I don't know that's I'm sure a lot
of fans don't care about it. To me, it was
just sort of I think it just it takes away
from the tournament because it's always team loses and the
next day, five guys go into portal. You know, it's
(06:23):
it's such a whirlwind activity. There's no cohesiveness or continuity
to it all.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
And that's one reason I wonder why it needs to
be thirty days Because the season ends and guys are
going in the portal the next day. They most of
these guys already know what they're going to do, So
why does it need to be a thirty day window.
Maybe make it the Monday after the National Championship game
and let it go till the end of April or
something like that. I understand, like you said, for the
(06:49):
for the even though it's hard to sometimes look at
this from a an academic perspective because a lot of
a lot of this it's it's changed into professional sports
with the deals that are being made and everything. But
obviously the timing of it is such that guys have
to figure out where they're going to go by summer
(07:12):
and you know, enroll in a new school, So that
that's kind of why the timing of it all is
what it is. One reason I wanted to have you
on this week was just to talk about your column
that you did earlier in the week on Monday over
at WDRB dot com. I'm going to put a link
to that in the show notes for anyone who hasn't
had a chance to read it. But you did some
research on the two teams that made the National Championship game,
Gonzaga and Florida in terms of the transfer portal rankings
(07:36):
and also the recruiting rankings, the traditional recruiting rankings. What
what what stood? What did you find? I guess first
for for those that haven't read the column, actually just
going to read it, but what did you what were
your takeaways from that and what did the data tell
you about how maybe this tournament was different and maybe
how it relates to what we can expect in the
(07:57):
future in college basketball.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
I guess my primary takeaway is that if you have
the right coach, and he's a good coach, he's got
a good eye for talent and the talent that fits
in his system, and he can develop players, you can win.
You don't have to have four and five stars. I
think I tweeted out there were more zero star high
school replayers in the championship game than there were four
star players. There were two zero star recruits guys who
(08:21):
weren't ranked at all, and one four star recruit. And
among recruiting classes, neither Houston nor Florida had a top
twenty high school class the previous three seasons, and only
Florida had a top twenty. I think it was portal class, correct.
I think it was twenty twenty two. Maybe you mentioned
(08:42):
it was, yeah, And that was just one player I
think left from that class, Will Richard, who was like
the first recruit that Todd Golden got at Florida. So
it's really a hat tip to Calvin Sampson that he
gets guys he doesn't care where they're ranked. He gets
guys that want to play the way he plays and
are good at it and coaches them into being, you know,
(09:03):
productive players. And I think I also had a take
away from it that there were a lot of older
players that you know, there were a lot of seniors
and juniors that played the freshman got beat and looked
like freshmen in the last ten and a half minutes
of the game for Duke against Houston. But the main
takeaway is, you know, it used to be, especially when
(09:24):
Cala Perry had it rolled in Kentucky and then coach
k that the five star, number one recruiting class guys
were really good. Kentucky had that team in twenty fifteen.
They didn't win it all, but they had Towns and
Booker and Trey Lyles and the Harrison twins and Willie
Carley Stein and all those dudes. Duke had OAKA four
(09:46):
and just Justice Winslow and Grayson Allen and Tyas Jones,
and you can look, you know, through the years, you
had to have four and five star players to win
it all. It's not that way anymore. You can and
get guys who were not or overlooked and then what
(10:06):
Florida especially did was they went and got guys who
proved themselves at other schools. I mean, Walter Clayton was
a guy that wasn't ranked at all. He was ranked
higher as a football player than he was as a
basketball player. He didn't want to play football, so he
signed with Rick Patino and played at Iona for two
years and was really good. When Patina went to Saint John's,
he didn't go with him. He wanted to go back
(10:27):
home and play for Florida. Will Richards started out at Belmont.
You know that Condon was a decently ranked and he
might have been top one hundred player from Australia right
to the huff guy is a huff for hawk. I
don't know how you pronounce it. Sure he was ranked
(10:48):
to twenty something from Pennsylvania and Florida was he liked
Florida because he was a Florida football fan, or he
liked at school Colors or whatever in Florida was smart
enough to take him, and he's a really good player.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
So Elijah Martin's another one right zero.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Star recruit who started at Florida Atlantic and they you
know so, and it reinforces the narrative that the teams
that are not in the Power five conference have in
some way become like the you know, the Triple A
or Double A farm teams of the top college basketball programs.
And we're going to see that again this year with
(11:28):
a lot of guys moving up from those schools into
Power five schools because of the nil opportunities that are there.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
So do you think we're past the era of like
the one and done teams being you know, I don't
want to say dominant in college basketball? We did. We
did just see Duke make it to the Final four
and have a chance to win. Have they not collapsed
in the late last ten minutes? But a confuson But
(11:56):
do you think that era now with the portal being
what it is. I mean, there's high school kids I
know of right now that are you know, top one hundred,
top two hundred recruits in the country right now that
haven't committed anywhere. And I think a big reason of
that is because right now everyone's so focused on the portal,
and these guys may get you know, left until late April,
(12:20):
early May, and even some of the higher ranked high
school kids you just don't hear as much about them
as you do now the top portal guys. I mean,
this is this kid that's gonna reportedly visit Indiana, Kentucky,
Auburn and Old Miss Lamar Wilkers and one of the
top three point shooters in the country. He's getting more
buzz right now on social media and the message boards
(12:44):
and some of the remaining high school kids on the board.
So it kind of speaks to how people have prioritize
the portal. I'm just curious, do you think this is
a product of the COVID year and guys just being
older the last couple of years, or do you think
this is a trend that's here to stay where maybe
fresh and are maybe not as prominent in the sport
moving forward.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
I guess what I think is that for most schools,
there are only a couple of schools that have shown
they can really do the one and done thing, and
that was Kentucky with Calipari and Duke and Shire has
done it, you know, beyond the way that coach k
did it. And you're right, if they would have won
that game, then none of this would have we would
have been talking about any of this. But becau it's
(13:25):
a very small number of coaches or programs that can
try and play the one and done game, and somebody
might pull it off. Again. I'm not going to say
they won't, but I think it's a bigger it's a
much wider path to go the other way that you
can find guys, and and there's a lot more guys
in the portal than there are guys who are good
(13:47):
enough to really be dominant players as high school freshmen,
and schools are going to back away. I think some
coaches are going to back away from recruiting guys that
aren't they aren't convinced they're going to help them from
the very beginning because they're going to coach them for
a year and they're going to disgruddled by not playing,
and they're going to go somewhere else, and then the
next program is going to take advantage of the work
that they put in. So I'd say Duke will keep
(14:10):
doing it, cal Perry will keep doing it in Arkansas,
I don't know. At Hurley's got a good class coming
in next year, so he might be He's he's a
good enough coach and has enough of an ego that
he might think that he can do it and I'm
sure there's going to be some somebody else that will
develop him as a coach and have the belief that
he can find an efficiency. People are always looking for
(14:32):
what can I do that somebody else can do? Uh,
And he'll think that, well, everybody's getting away from the freshman.
I'm going to focus on the freshman. But I think
generally the smartest path is to do it the way
that Florida and Houston did it. But you got to
you got to be good at identifying players and you've
got to be good at developed developing players. That's where
(14:53):
a lot of coaches fall short. And since this is
an EU podcast, you can say what was there? What
was their protoclass ranked last year?
Speaker 1 (15:03):
It had to be top five?
Speaker 2 (15:04):
Yeah, yeah, and it didn't translate into victories because why
I mean, Ballot pretty much had the season that you
thought he would have, but Miles Rice did not, Carlisle
did not, Goody probably did, and langdon Hattan you know,
was inconsequential. So you know it worked for Louisville. I mean,
(15:28):
Javon Hadley outperformed I think what you thought he would.
Chuckie Hepburn absolutely did, Terrence Edwards did so. I think
that's the path. I mean, I think that's that's the
safest path, is the really have it. You've got to
have a good staff that says who's going to be available,
how much are they going to cost, how are they
(15:49):
going to fit together? And the hardest part of it
all to me is to evaluate is what are they
like as people, uh in a locker room and how
coachable are they accepting their roles? Because I look at
Louisville this year and Terrence Edwards came here from being
the he was the most outstanding player in the league
(16:10):
at James Madison except the Sun Belt, I think it was,
and he accepted not being a guy that got a
million shots a game. And you've got to have guys
that are willing guys who leave. Some percent of them
are disgruntled guys, but when they get to their new place,
they got to quit being disgruntled and accept here's what
(16:32):
my role is and this is what I'm here to
do to play for the team and do that. So
you've got to have a good feel for the actual
what motivates a kid and what his intentions are.
Speaker 1 (16:44):
The one thing that just popped into my mind, like
kind of the flip side to what we've seen with
the programs that have had complete overhauls is what Purdue
has been able to do over the last several years,
although this spring we've kind of seen that tested for
the first time. They've had some guys leave. I know,
Cam Heidi went to Texas, Miles Colvin went to Wake Forest.
Those are guys that you looked at and said, maybe
(17:06):
if they stay off four years at Perdue, by the
time they're junior senior, they could be a you know,
an All League player, but maybe a little less patient
because of what Braden Smith and Lawyer and Kaufman Wren.
Those are the guys that kind of run the team.
But there's also the model of what Matt Painter's done,
which to credit to him, I haven't seen any other
school be able to retain it, recruit guys, get them
(17:29):
to buy into the long term development plan. Even I
mean Kaufman Wren, he was a guy that picked between
Indiana and Purdue. I believe it. In the end, he
red shirted his first year and now he's stuck it
out there at Purdue and he's become an All Big
Ten type player. So that's kind of the other side.
That to me is also a model that can work.
But you have to speaking to what you said, you
(17:51):
have to be able to have a system that has
proven over time that you can develop guys and make
them better and show them that when they get to
a certain point in their career, they're going to have
the role that they want. Otherwise, you know, a guy
comes in for one year, doesn't play very much, and
he's got ten schools calling him and said, well, you
only played, you know, eight minutes per game. We can
(18:12):
get you twenty five minutes per game and a little
bit more nil, and then all of a sudden they're
in the portal and gone. So to me, that's also
been pretty impressive just being able to watch what Painter's
been able to do it perue in terms of retaining
players and also developing within the system.
Speaker 2 (18:25):
Yeah, I mean, he's another guy that's like, he's got
a belief system, and he's going to recruit to the
belief system and he's gonna not a waiver from it.
He's done transfers strategically. I mean several of his team
usually has one or two guys out of the portal
who fill a specific need. You're right, He's gotten a
lot of guys to buy in on the development plan
(18:46):
and this year is the first variation from that. With Heidi,
he looked like he was I mean, he played quite
a bit in the NCAA tournament and I would think
he would have a pretty big role next year. But
I guess he didn't want to be the.
Speaker 1 (18:59):
Third, fourth best player, fifth bath player.
Speaker 2 (19:01):
Or he wasn't getting enough nil. Uh he went to Texas, right,
so he's probably getting il and Colvid. I'm sure thought
I don't want to be a backup another year to
Braden Smith and Fletcher Lawyer. Uh So he decided he's
going to go to Wake Forest and Steve Forbes is
you know he had Hunter Sallas the last couple of years.
He had that kid from Oklahoma one year before that
(19:23):
who really did well there. So he's big on portal
guards and handing them the ball, let him do their thing.
But Painter, again, that's he's got his niche and that's
what he stays too. But I don't think everybody can do.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
That in terms of going back to Houston and Florida.
When you looked at the guys that they got, was
there any because it's It's easy to sit here and say, well,
they did a great job of getting under the radar
guys and develop developing them. Was there any theme amongst
the players that they got in terms of what they
looked for, how they how they put that together, just
(19:57):
kind of when you watch them play, because it's one
thing to just collect talent and then think it's all
going to fit together. But I think the piece that
a lot of coaches probably miss is figuring out in
such a short period of time how all the pieces
are going to fit together. And I think that's where
you have to give Golden and Samson a ton of
credit because they obviously got talented players maybe that were
(20:20):
a little bit under the radar, but they also figured
out a way that they're all going to fit together,
and that's that's I think maybe the toughest thing to do.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
For Houston. I think it's physical strength. I mean, he
looks he wants guys who are older, mature, and they
have strong bodies and are willing to really commit to
playing defense. I think he filled a need as a
shooter when he got Crier away from Baylor. He became
more of his offensive guy. But the rest of them
(20:49):
are more defensive oriented players for Florida. I think Todd
Golden likes lengths. I mean, he had four big men
that he played and rotated, and they were all pretty long,
and they were all very athletic. They weren't weren't the
Umar Ballo, Race Thompson kind of kind of big man.
They were guys who could really run the court. A
(21:09):
couple of them kind of reminded me of Cody Zeller
the way they ran the care when Zeller was at
Indiana and beat the defense down court, and the first
option on the offense was to get the ball down
to the big man for a dunk. So I think
that that was that's there, that's their point, that's what
they're looking for. So everybody has their own thing, but
(21:30):
it's not two bigs in the middle of the lane
trying to post up and back their man down and score.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
In terms of Indiana, obviously they've had a couple of
transfer portal pickups so far. I think there's some dis
judging from the messages I get on the inside the
hall community, the messages on social media, Facebook comments, et cetera, emails,
I think there's some people who are a little bit
(21:58):
impatient right now, just in terms of how things are developing.
What have you thought just so far of how the
rosters developed so far? Getting Reed Bailey, obviously Devreze's son,
Tucker's coming along Connor and right Trent Sisley and then
potentially Luke Goodie. That's what maybe five players so far
(22:19):
potentially that could be maybe the core of the team.
What just early impressions on how they've worked the portal
in how I guess the speed of how things are developing.
I mean, I looked at some data last year. A
lot of the guys that committed Indiana wasn't until later
in April and early May. I think people were maybe
(22:41):
panicking a little bit too soon. There's there's still a
lot of time here.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
Yeah, I mean, I think it takes time. I think
the thing I'd say is some of the guys that
you're trying to get have other options, and so they
want to probably look around a little bit and not
just commit to the first place that offers someone. I
think we're seeing some of that playouts. You're going to
have to win some recruiting. Bass are gonna have to
have some plan b's and some planned c's. You know,
I think they're probably doing a lot of work that
(23:07):
we don't know about. I don't think there's been a
lot of immediate leaks in terms of who they're after,
and that's as immediate person. I guess. I don't like that.
I'm sure fans don't like that, but as a coaching staff,
it's to their credit because I don't. I think you
try and keep it as secretive as you can who
you're trying to get, because if you're after him, then
other people are going to say, Hey, Illinois after that guy,
why aren't we after him? Or you know, Kentucky's after
(23:29):
that guy, can we get him. The one thing that's
kind of surprised me is that usually I canna say usually,
but often when coaches change jobs, they bring one or
two players from their previous program with them, And to
my knowledge, no West Virginia guys have Davreez his son,
(23:50):
his son. But no, that's a you know, that's an
easy recruitment. But none of the other guys, none of
the none of the younger players, none of the commit
it's the height. They had three high school commits. None
of them are also coming. That's that seems a little interesting.
Speaker 1 (24:06):
To me, just from the standpoint of.
Speaker 2 (24:12):
Interesting from well, I guess I always compared to what
I'm most familiar with. And when uh Kelsey came to Louisville,
he brought Rain Smith and James Scott, two of his starters,
and another guy who red shirted. UH Pope brought Jackson
Robinson from b YU and who was one of his recruits.
(24:34):
I mean, I think you see that fairly off. I mean,
hasn't one or two of the Maryland guys followed Kevin
Willard to Villanova?
Speaker 1 (24:41):
Yeah? Yeah. The one thing I would say is a
couple of the players that obviously played a ton last year.
I think we're heavily tied to Chester Frasier, who obviously
wasn't going to come to Indiana because of his ties
to Illinois. And the high school recruits I think to
the same, you know, based on what I can see,
(25:03):
maybe had some ties to assistant coach that didn't come.
So we'll see what happens. I don't think any to
my knowledge is none of those three I've committed elsewhere,
So we'll see. I think sometimes with the high school
kids it may take a little bit longer to develop.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
I'm not sure.
Speaker 1 (25:17):
I'm not saying that any of them are going to
come to any and I agree with you. It's been
a little interesting. They also didn't have the deepest or
most talented team last year. It was Virginia. I mean,
I think they did a little bit more with lest
I know, they had one guy that was a freshman
last year that I think transferred down to a lower
major school that they maybe took late. So you know,
I don't have I don't have as much of a problem.
(25:39):
I don't have any problem with it, as long as
you know they're able to fill the roster out and
they're able to get guys that fit. I mean, I
don't think you just bring somewhere along just because they're
with you at the previous stop. But clearly they got
the best player available that was still had eligibility from
West Virginia bringing in Tucker Devrees. Last thing I wanted
to ask you about, just in general with college basketball,
(26:05):
do you think the portal overall has been good for
the sport or do you think it's been a negative.
Kind of a loaded question, but we'll leave on that.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
I mean, I think overall it's been good. I don't
like it, but I'll admit it's because of my age,
and I came up in an era when it wasn't
like that, and I liked it. And I hear from
more fans who are of my age of one of
the things they enjoyed about college basketball was watching a
player come in playing as a freshman, getting a little
(26:36):
bit better, and then playing as a sophomore and getting
even better, and then playing as a junior and being
really good. And now it's like they you don't see
that very much anymore, and every year is a different
roster and it's a different face. And you know, in
the previous eras guys would play at a school for
(26:57):
three or four years and be associated with the pro
and then maybe come back and be around the program
or be a part of the program or whatever. And
now it's like they're there for seven months and they're
gone on to the next one. There's so many guys
that are playing at four schools. And I know that,
I know the arguments, and I don't disagree with them
(27:18):
about coaches can change jobs and regular college students can
change jobs, and they deserve to get paid because all
the money that's in there. But having lived through the
previous I mean I'm old enough to remember when Kreem
Abdul jabbaris Luel Sender couldn't play as a freshman at
UCLA and his life turned out okay, same for Bill Walton.
(27:39):
You know, it just seems it's so frenetic now that
it's really harder to follow the game. You try, and
I laugh, like people post those stories the day after
the National Championship game of a really early top twenty
five for next year. I mean, you don't even know
twenty percent of the players who are going to be
(28:00):
on the team. I mean, how can you possibly project
who's going to be good and who's not going to
be good. It's foolish. Where in the old days, I mean,
I can remember in twenty twelve, when I was at
the Final four that somebody told me that USA Today
was going to have the story the next day that
IU was going to be preseason number one for twenty thirteen.
And that makes sense because Zella and Olodipot and Hall's
(28:20):
and Watford and all those guys are going to be back.
Now doesn't make any sense. So I'm not the guy
says the rules shouldn't have changed. This is wrong. I
get it. It's the way it is, I accept it,
but I do have a longing for the way that
it used to be because it just was more I
don't know, it just seemed like you could follow, you know.
(28:43):
I'm Purvis Elson was the MVP of the nineteen eighty
six Final four as a freshman. He stayed at Woiver
for four years, and as a media person, you've covered
him and you got to know him at IU. You know,
Quinn Buckner was the was a freshman starting point guard
on a team before in stages last year, and was
the captain of an undefeated team at Kentucky. I can
(29:06):
think of guys that Sambouie, that Kenny Walker, the guys
that I would get to know and you watched them
go from good to really good to great, and you
don't see that anymore now. It's so transactional. I don't know.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Yes, it's I mean, I mean even a recent example
of an Indiana player, I mean Trace Jackson Davis. Think
about we might have seen a player like we won't
We won't see another player like that, and that was
just he's just what two years out of college.
Speaker 2 (29:33):
Any records that he set will never be touched, like
all the career scoring records. I mean, no one's gonna
break Cheney's record and it's not gonna happen, right, So,
just a different world. And is it better in some ways?
It's better? In some ways, I don't think it's better.
And you know, the interest in the tournament this year
from the TV ratings seemed to say that people like
(29:54):
the tournament still. I guess crowds will probably be up
next year at IU. They were definitely up at Louisville
this year because they were winning. Uh So winning is
what matters in the end. But I think there's you know,
there's some fans who've been around for a long time
who probably long for the days that it used to
(30:17):
be somebody would come to a place and stay for
four years, and that's not going to be that way
yet accept it.
Speaker 1 (30:23):
Yeah, I mean you could see some more guys like
an Anthony Lele or a gal Away. I think situations
like that, homegrown players from Indiana or any you know,
for any other program.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Right, you do it, and Coffin Rens do it, but
they're the exception.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
Right No, And I mean, and those are the guys
that are going to be appreciated long term, right, in
those programs because they're going to be remembered for they
were in this era of player movement and they stayed
and they won. And you know, that's another key I
think to all of this is if you win enough,
you have a chance probably to keep guys right for
if they're not an NBA player, you have a chance
(30:57):
to keep guys for the long term if you're not winning,
and then you're gonna see movement and the other thing
I think just for general interest in the sport, I
think it's you know, with the NBA in July right
when when free agency starts, I mean it's it's the
lead on everything. It's the big story NFL free agency.
(31:18):
I think it has given a bit of a boost
to the to the year round coverage of college basketball
that the portal. Right now, if there's a big portal commit,
it's gonna be one of the top headlines in ESPA
dot com. That that wasn't gonna you know, in the past,
if a guy had to transfer and sit out and
we weren't going to see him play for a couple
(31:39):
of years at a new place, that it wasn't a
big deal. So I think from that standpoint, it's kind
of helped. I just agree with you from the chaos perspective.
I hope that at some point they're able to arrive
in a system where there's a little bit more stability
and in terms of player movement, I don't have problem
with guys transferring. Maybe it can be a one time
(32:00):
transfer with no with no exceptions. But with this idea,
I mean, isn't Trey White that started at USC. Isn't
he going to be at his fourth school in four years?
And I think these there's been one coaching change in
that so it's not like it's been coaching. He started
at USC, went to Louisville, Illinois, and ol Kansas.
Speaker 2 (32:18):
Right, He's not the only one. There's plenty of this guy.
That was the point guarded. He was at Arizona, then
he went to West Virginia and Kentucky. Nwas going to Cincinnati.
Kerr Crisa, Yeah, Yeah, he's another four school guy. So
there's there's gonna be a bunch of them. It's gonna
it's gonna happen. You know, it's going to continue to happen.
(32:40):
And people talk about I mean, coaches don't jump four
top three, you know, No, they jumped once. They might
jump twice, but once more likely Underwood did jump.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
But Buzz Williams every six years.
Speaker 2 (32:51):
Right Underwood did it. I mean he went from Steven F.
Austin or whatever to Illinois. I me to Oklahoma State
to Illinois. But they don't jump every year. So but
it's not good. It's not gonna change. I mean, players
are going to be able to do that. The NCAA
is going to be afraid to try to enforce any
rules because they know they'll get sued if they try
(33:13):
and stop them.
Speaker 1 (33:15):
I mean, I think the only thing they could do
is maybe introduce IF they, if they, if they IF
contracts come into the sport, you know, signing players to
multi year deals. I think that's the only way you
stop it. I mean, you say you sign a freshman,
say this is an IL deal for our revenue shared
deal for two years. You have to commit to the
two years or the three years, and then it would
(33:37):
be up to the players to decide if they want
to sign it. Right, you get the stability, But then
do you want to bet on yourself and say after
one year, I'm I'm going to be able to maybe
go get somewhere else or do you want to take
the guarantee of the of the deal of what I
can get up front. So I think that'll be the
next frontier and all of this, but it's an ever
changing landscape. I really enjoyed your column at WDRB. I
(33:57):
thought it was really well done, and I know a
lot of au fans read it and gave it, you know,
a lot of thought because of last season and what
happened with the portal, and I think people are excited
about a little bit maybe more analytic driven, more savvy
approach to the portal this season. Might not see Indiana
ranked at the same level in terms of the portal rankings,
(34:18):
but who knows a team.
Speaker 2 (34:20):
That's better, That's what That's what was missing at Indiana.
These guys were highly Vallo and Rice and Carlisle were
highly ranked in the portal, but there wasn't any forethought
into a how are they going to fit together? How
are they going to play together, and how are they
going to be developed. I mean, Ballow, like I said,
I think, played about how you thought he would be good.
(34:41):
He played the way about how I thought he would
be But Miles Rice probably thought this isn't how I
was used to playing at Washington State. I was he's
a better player than he played for IU last year.
For sure in Carlisle, he was vastly overrated and maybe
maybe he just had an off year. But I didn't
really see he wasn't a very good shooter, who wasn't
(35:04):
a great ball handler. He's a decent defender. But if
he was ranked in the top was he the top
twenty of the portal guy?
Speaker 1 (35:12):
He was pretty high. The other thing that really I
don't see it. Another thing that really torpedo the season
was that it took forever for Woodson to figure out that,
you know, he had a guy on the bench, and
Anthony leal that if you would have just played him
more from the start, I think the record would have
been a lot different in the end. But he was
too married to this idea of playing the two big
(35:35):
lineup and playing.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
The guy the most money. Too. I mean there's some
of that implicit in this. If you go in the
portal and get some of the top players, you're paying
them a decent amount of money, and A you're probably
thinking that I'm paying them, I need to play him
and be the agency are probably saying, hey, wait, a minute.
I come, my guy as playing more, right, if you
send more players to you in the future, you tell
(35:57):
me he's gonna play, And now he's sitting in the bench.
I'm not sure I'm gonna send more guys your way.
Speaker 1 (36:00):
We don't mean it was no coincidence that he played
Bryce and Tucker all the way up to the UCLA
game and then didn't play him at all after that,
and then that's when they obviously, you know, started winning
some more games. But at that point he was desperate
to try to make the tournament, so he and he
knew he was gone. So he basically said, I'm just
(36:24):
just gonna play the guys that give me the best
chance to win, which I think that's how you have
to coach from the start of the season. And now
I want to make this about Woodson, but I'm just saying,
in this whole new era of portal acquisitions, that needs
to be a conversation that happens on the front end
with the player and say we're gonna pay you this
amount of money. We're happy to do that. We want
(36:46):
you to be a part of our program, but we're
not promising you that you're going to play thirty five
minutes a game. You're gonna have to earn your minutes,
and that that's how it has to be. Because I
think that's, you know, among the many things or managed
last season, I think that was even the Louke Goodie thing.
I mean, there was times where he was playing Imbacco
more more than and then Goody, and it was clear
(37:08):
certain situations that that shouldn't have been the case. And
the two bits, you know, all those guys it was
it was basically playing the highest value that all guys
as much earlier in the season, and then once they
figured out later on in the season that uh, he
was going to be gone, he just played the guys
that helped him win the most. I think that's how
you have to do it from the get go. Whether
it's the guy that's getting one point five million or
(37:29):
a guy that's getting three hundred thousand, play the guy out,
play the guy that's going to help you win the game.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
My hope is that one day some bright young student
at the i U. Kelly School will do ah his
thesis on how Mike Woodson mismanaged the Indiana basketball program.
It would be a best seller.
Speaker 1 (37:49):
Yeah, we could probably do a five hour podcast and
still have plenty of things to talk about, but we
will leave it at that. We were hopeful for better
days ahead for Indiana basketball. Is Darren Devrees and the
coaching staff kind of work the portal in a stealth
(38:10):
like manner, which not a lot of leaks I think
is a good thing. Like like you said, could maybe
drive up the pot price for certain guys if all
of a sudden word gets out that you're working on
a certain guy. So hopefully things continue to operate in
this way and we'll see some moving here in the
next couple weeks with the roster. Thank you again for
(38:30):
coming on this episode of Podcasts on Brink. If if
you haven't read the column again, I'm gonna put it
down the show notes. It's at WDRB dot com. Just
click on sports I think bozicch and Crawford and scroll
down a little bit and it should be down there.
Pretty good analysis there of what happened with Gonzaga and Florida.
For those who enjoy the show, podcast on the Brink,
please leave us a rating and review over on Apple Podcasts,
(38:53):
leave us a five star rating over on Spotify, and
we'll be back soon with another episode of podcast on
the Brink,
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