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Two lazy passes cost us 4 points in the fist 5 mins of the game.

Miami vs Ohio is as good as it gets right now.

Dayton VCU is really fun early. VCU kid hits a 3 to tie it and then gestures at the Dayton bench gets a boneheaded T.

Just way too soon to make any read on next season IMO. Entirely depends on who we bring in and we don't know who they are yet, or even who is available. In the article, the range of players who could feasibly get 4M is between 10-25 players. There are way more than 10-25 impact players in the portal. In the article, an all conference caliber player would be between 2-2.5M. We have plenty budget for the high end of the market, just not the ultra high end like Duke and BYU and UK, who can afford to spend 4M on a single player without blowing out their entire payroll. I believe Carr was saying it would take time to get the roster where they want it from a balance perspective between HS recruiting and portal because we've been so overly reliant on the portal the past two years. I don't think he was saying it would take time to get things where they want them in terms of winning. There's no reason to lower expectations at this point.

Like you said, we were definitely talking past each other, legit misunderstanding. All good in my book.

You're not hearing me lol. I'm not saying 9 better players. I'm saying the top 9 could've been better if 2 of them (Bailey and Conerway) were different. Do you believe the current roster is the absolute, unquestionable best that could've been done? What evidence do we have to support that claim, other than it's the reality we got? I don't think even the staff themselves would say this roster is the best that could've possibly been had. Of course it's easier said than done... but it's his job to get it done. People were fussed because they were correctly concerned by the slow start in the portal, which was due to not being fully staffed, which you could easily argue is another mistake DDV made. I'm not crucifying the guy for it, but it's silly to act like he's done everything perfectly since he's gotten here too. Archie Miller has absolutely zero to do with the roster DDV built, lol.

Yeah, it was probably never going to happen with either of them. Kind of makes me wonder why the staff prioritized them enough to get them on campus before any other visitors.

Completely agree! Clark is regarded as our best assistant, he joined too late to make a difference in the portal IMO. So keeping an eye out for players with existing connections to him especially.

Totally agree. Last year, it seemed like we could get "top" guys like Conwell and Dix on campus but stuck to our guns when it came time to make best and final offers. Hopefully the guys we prioritize early this time, we are willing to pay top dollar for and then Carr / staff can find 2 or 3 underrated players that are good value and have multiple years of eligibility. Portal will make for another interesting offseason.

Very much agree in principle that the ability to scout should be one of the staff's best skills. Not sure that it is (don't think they're terrible at it either though, necessarily) and that's where Carr should be helpful IMO. Woody seemed to rely on rankings, we definitely didn't with this bunch. The data suggests DDV didn't really do more or less with the talent he had - just basically shot par. With Woody, we were doing less with more. Filling 5 spots is easier than filling 13 so whether the money is the same or the difference is marginal, I think it will be allocated better this time around.

If Ristic couldn't crack the rotation on this team as a 21 year old with three years of pro experience, I have a tough time picturing him ever being much of a contributor here. I think Drake is unlikely to be much more than a "break the glass in case of emergency" type of ball handler. Seems like the plan with Andrej was always to redshirt. I'm most curious about him. Harris, another wildcard... he would be a RS sophomore next year and has been injured his entire time here so no idea if he can do anything at this level. Sometimes it just doesn't work out, though maybe the staff believes he can contribute? I'd think for roster balance purposes, you'd want to send one guard and one big out so you can add 5 portal players. Flip side, the guards are much less interesting to me and keeping both bigs means one of them is probably getting at least some minutes next year. So you'd have to count on them somewhat. We probably need two starter quality big guys IMO. A true C and a guy who can play the 4 or the 5. We need a starting backcourt, with PAM off the bench. Probably need another ball handler?

Regardless of whether the rumor about an additional 2.5M is true, there's more than enough money to add 5 quality players. More money should make it easier to get the guys the staff wants. Hopefully they want the right guys.

CAM's firing is so far removed it makes no sense to mention him IMO. The only thing relevant is having nothing to inherit from Woodson. The point isn't even that we needed 9 better players. You think out of all those schools, there's not a single big man who could contribute better than Bailey or a guard who fit better than Conerway? I'm personally not so fussed, but the roster could have been better with the money we had. DDV was just doing it at way less than 100% staffed which is a big deal. He's much better positioned for this portal, so time to see what they can cook up for us in year 2.

He's definitely not questioning the money paid to Wilkerson. See a bit of hyperbole in this post but I agree with your general sentiment... I don't think anyone believes he should've been able to get 9 "top players" in the portal this past go round, but that he could've assembled a much better top 9 players with the budget we have. Obviously easier said than done, but CAM's train wreck certainly had nothing to do with it. I think an easy critique of DDV would be, why didn't we press harder to keep Reneau? Maybe that's not fair but he was a JR already on campus, we probably could've enticed him to stay. But that wasn't part of the vision. So we should've gotten someone better than Reneau for the system, but we didn't. We overpaid for Bailey. Referring back to the graphic I shared earlier, look at all the teams with a lower talent rating than ours who are overachieving. And all our peers in the "meeting expectations" area... we probably could've constructed a better roster with some of those players, and they were not "top players" in the portal or commanding more money than we could spend. Of course, you're right DDV was not fully staffed for the portal, which was a huge impediment. He made a choice to build the roster from scratch. He hasn't really done himself many favors with this first year, but I don't think he's been atrocious and want to see what he does differently heading into year 2.

Baylor beating Houston early in H2

I think Jasai Miles is going to surprise a lot of people next year. I really like him as a player.

Jasai Miles is really good at defense.

Could be trouble with Wilkerson and Sam checking out with a 15 point lead and 12:30 to go

Seems likely to break this one and Alford's 3 pointer record. What a year from Wilkerson. Would've loved to see him with a better supporting cast.

Good first half performance from a team still fighting to make the tournament

For sure. To get 5 spots, we need two transfers. The likeliest candidates (Ristic, Andrej, Harris, Drake) probably aren't making much, so sending them packing won't free up much more money. If the seniors are making ~7M, that should be plenty to add 5 quality players IMO. Very eager to see how we move in the portal.

I doubt the market value for potential returners is any better than their current deal at IU, but maybe. Big offseason ahead.

The past can't be changed and we are where we are. The question for me right now is, can DDV take constructive feedback on board and grow as a coach because of what he has learned from year 1 here? We have ample resources and didn't spend well this season. We also have a relatively clean slate going into year 2 to build something better.