WayneFleekHoosier

Don’t think he’ll fall in our budget. Like him though. Is he the one where we need to hire his handler or is that that Cincinnati C?

How we feeling today, ladies and gents?

Michigan gonna pull Juke Harris? Trey McKinney returns. Michigan is gonna own the big ten until Dusty takes an NBA job, I fear.

Edge and Jizz as your 2 names is really something.

That’s not how he operates though.

I goofed. C from Charlotte but George Mason C Riley Anspach or something. Idk. Not Bonke. My bad. He’s 6’11.

Can’t deny he knows some stuff. Just mentioned the Charlotte C is possibly a target. Is Rabjohns or Trilly reporting that yet? I seriously don’t know. It definitely becomes a game of dominoes but he is early. He also knows when main accounts say we are in on a recruit when we aren’t. Knows staff? Indiana ties? Knows agents? Idk.

exactly how i feel. always told to reset expectations. we've been bad so long. etc. etc. there are plenty of examples of teams down bad that have rebounded. plenty of counters to all the excuses yet we make them to feel better or have hope. I don't care about feeling better. It is what it is to me. Its the reality of things to me. I am frustrated by it, of course. I vent, of course. I've said before and i'll say again, when our results and actions match my attainable top 20 program aspirations I won't be viewed as negative by the board. until then, i probably will. imo, zero reason not to be a top 20 type program. I actually kinda like DeVries but he's so blase as a personality. I think Indiana needs some swagger and some confidence. some recruiting juice. something postive to get the ball rolling. A great season would have done it. Now we are in the same boat we were a year ago. swung and missed on a lot of top 2026 recruits. Got a few middle ranked guys with longterm upside. Now, not able to swing for the fences in the portal. or opting not to. I'm convinced our roster this year will be better on paper than last year but I don't think it'll be the level the program needs to create a spark.

It appears we target a recruit, show interest, then get a price and back out. This explains what I was trying to say about Vaaks, Harris, and maybe Harrelson last night. That’s why agents are listing us, but the reality is we are priced out. Maybe not for Harrelson yet. Bidunga, several others.

Yeah, this partially explains my crashout last night. But he isn’t the only one I was talking too. The thing is, Lettice and some of the others want to build a certain type of team. It’s not the DeVries type recruit. So, it’s not a total indictment of what we will build it’s just not the type or level of recruit these guys want. But yes, it made me grumpy last night. Lol. As always, I’m not giving up hope yet.

So you agree that Louisville should be in the championship mix? Nothing separates us from them. That’s my point. With what we can spend, setting goals of scraping into the tournament is asinine. Sure that should be minimum expectation but we should build teams with championship aspirations too if we are spending top 10-15 money.

Mindset, Goals, resources. The cignettti approach. Previous failures don’t project future results. It’s resource driven. It’s a fairly new regime. Set the standard.

I’d agree with you about this for last year. And we screwed up. Messed with any mojo we could build and set ourselves back. So now we try again because we failed in year one. Gotta aim higher and then when it doesn’t happen you are a 5 seed vs missing the whole dang thing.

I do know that. I set my hopes of top 25. I think that should be reasonable for Indiana and its resources. I don’t have to remind you though that Michigan and Louisville have similar resources. Look at their last 2 years. We realistically should be somewhere around that spread of results. But we don’t be, likely. And we’ll have excuses for why not.

I don’t disagree with this at all. Find talent that fits and that’s good enough to win at the top level and lock it down. Burton and Estrella are both ++ targets. Brumabaugh im a bit more reserved about. I want size, physicality, aggressiveness. Watching that UConn Michigan final shows the level of athleticism/size that makes the difference. Michigan was on another level all year. UConn just plays hard and tough. Weren’t physically imposing, especially at a few spots.

I’ve got a few others too. We talked last portal season at length and shared dismay of the roster build as it unfolded. Concerns creeping in again over certain positions. We will see. It’s early and Hope Springs Eternal. Or at least until the best portal targets are off the board.

And that’s the frustrating thing. Financially we are close. But in every other facet we are far.

Yes, saw that. My peeps say it won’t be Indiana. Maybe the staff will shock the world. Price is gonna be too steep.

I’ve got some DMs with a few that have connections. I and they don’t know everything. But they know more than most. Including my guy Lettice.

This is reasonable. SA kid. Burton seems like a high odds addition. After that. Let’s see who wants to spend. Teams are gonna miss target A then pivot. That could cost us guys we think we feel good about.

Burton, South Alabama guy. Feel really good about Estella. Not Fru. A scattershot approach on guards. Tons of offers. Not a directed approach. Not the big big names. Not Sherrill, Harris, Blackwell.

Ok then. I do. And I’m stating it for fact. We are gonna get some good players. 12-14 million has to spend somewhere. But not Harris or Blackwell.

Love ya Stu, but this was the mantra last year too. Didn’t work out well. We better get some size, talent, and skill on the roster to manifest wins.

Don’t project what I’ll do. Louisville is telling the world we are big fish spending. I don’t actually think they get either. But I’ll be curious what other targets this attracts for them. IU isn’t big fish spending and that is fine. Or it might be fine. We will see.

It’s ok. I view myself as a realist. I’ve talked to people I trust. We aren’t getting Juke Harris or Blackwell. We did get the South Alabama kid though if that makes ya feel better.