Shooter

Yea, not sure how I'd feel about adding a Purdue guy, but he's definitely someone I'd like in the rotation. 3&D wing archetype.

Probably goes without saying, but Conwell, Dix, and Bidunga would be an A+ start to next season's roster. It seems like we have a real shot with all three. Once we fill out the rotation, would love to see us take a couple of developmental guys like Briscoe from Crispus Attucks to round out the roster.

Bidunga had great rebounding and block numbers at Kansas. Top 15 nationally in block rate. Top 100 nationally in offensive and defensive rebounding percentage. Similar size to Reneau but totally different games. Bidunga is more athletic, less skilled offensively. More comparable to Tugler from Houston.

TJD was third team All American as a sophomore. I'll take some more "raw" dudes like that!

Only 1 or 2? That will be an improvement

Agree. This is McCollum's first season ever in D1. Otherwise his entire playing, assistant, head coach career was in D2. DeVries played D1 and was a longtime assistant under Altman and McDermott. Multiple trips to NCAA tournament as a head coach. One year experience in a big conference. I think there's less risk of the non-basketball parts of the IU job being "too big" for DeVries.

McCollum is super impressive. But I'd be a little concerned about him in the IU fishbowl if we went that direction. This is his first season associated with Division I basketball in any capacity. Not as a player, assistant, nothing. Jumping from that right into the IU job would be a massive change. I have zero concerns about him from a coaching basketball standpoint. The dude can coach.

Yea, it's pretty clear that Woodson cultivated an "us vs the world" mentality in the locker room, and "the world" included IU's own fans and media. He played up things like Ballo getting death threats, or TJD getting that awful letter in the mail (both absolutely horrendous, but the work of a few isolated idiots). He used those to try and deflect legitimate criticism of his coaching from fans or media with a "see, they're all crazy" siege mentality. So glad that era is over.

Devries would be a B- hire. Young-ish coach who has done very well relative to expectations so far in his career. That said, he's entirely unproven at the level we want to be at. Has never had a single digit NCAA seed or coached a top 50 Kenpom squad. His accomplishments at Drake were also partially influenced by his son, who was a borderline top 100 recruit and the most talented player in the league. So he had a talent advantage relative to his rivals. I would be cautiously optimistic if he's the guy.

6 teams for 3 spots: SDSU, Indiana, Texas, UNC, Xavier, Boise St. If VCU loses, they get added to the bubble and it's 7 teams for 3 spots. If Memphis loses, one spot is taken and it's only two spots available. 28 of the 33 brackets updated this morning on Bracket Matrix have Indiana IN the field.

Thanks for clarifying. What a ridiculous concept this thing is in the portal era. I'm voting with my feet, I won't be watching.

At this moment, Ohio State is NET #40, Northwestern is NET #53, and IU is NET #54. But I can certainly see the TV suits demanding Indiana over Northwestern.

I doubt Cronin leaves UCLA anyway. But I think he's a good example of a very good but unsexy coach. Brownell, the more I look into him, I don't understand why he wasn't fired by Clemson at some point.

Cronin and Brownell are not on the same level. Mick Cronin made the NCAA tournament 13 consecutive seasons before missing it last year. Brownell made it only 3 of those 13 years.

Interesting resume comparison between two guys in the news today - Fran McCaffery and Brad Brownell. Both are high major coaches for 15 years, at similar level jobs. McCaffery: 8 NCAA Tourney appearances. 6 seasons finishing in Kenpom Top 25. Best season, NCAA 2 seed. Never been past Round of 32. Brownell: 5 NCAA Tourney appearances. 4 seasons in Kenpom Top 25. Best season, NCAA 4 seed (projected this year). One Elite 8, one Sweet 16. I'm taking Fran's resume, despite the lack of tourney results. Do this two years ago and it was not even close in favor of Fran. Is IU really going to hire a guy who has delivered worse results than Fran McCaffery?

Consensus from Bracket Matrix seems to be 6 teams for 4 spots, currently in this order (highest to lowest chance): San Diego St, Indiana, UNC, Texas, Xavier, Boise St. Any bid thief would take away one of the 4 available spots. UNC and Boise St have opportunities to help themselves tonight.

So he's going to love Mgbako? Seriously though, it's sounds like you are describing Matt Painter. I've often thought that Painter's best quality is that he knows exactly what he is looking for in a player, and doesn't care about stars.

Agree with your overall point. I don't know a ton about McCollum's personality, positive or negative. But that's a huge factor in making the right hire. We can sit here and look at resumes, but there was nothing obvious in the resume to tell you that Archie Miller would fail and Pat Kelsey would succeed. Have to trust Dolson et all to do the interviews, vetting and make the right choice.

Archie Miller had very little charisma, never won a thing here and still was able to sign stud recruits like Romeo and TJD. And that was before NIL. I'm not that worried about recruiting.

Agree with last part... MSU was subbing out seniors one by one, each guy slowly walks around and hugs his teammates, walks to center court to kiss logo, walks to bench and hugs coaches etc. Repeat for each senior. Whole thing took multiple minutes. It's poor sportsmanship to do that during the game and expect the opponent to just stand there and watch. They are just as much to blame as Michigan is.

With (at least) three games left to play, how are people feeling about our chances? Win 3 or more games - definitely in, and not in the First Four. Win 2 more games in any combination - we are in. Probably safe from the First Four in Dayton, unless both of those wins are in the BTT. Win 1 game - if that win is at Oregon or vs Ohio State, probably in. First Four is a possibility. If the only win is in BTT (would be quad 2 in this scenario), we're right on the edge of the bubble. Zero more wins - probably out.

I hope he does make a deep tourney run, I'll be cheering like hell. But going on a Cinderella run as a 10 seed wouldn't change how I feel about him moving forward.

Wasting your time with that poster I think. Reality is Woodson came in talking about Big Ten and National championships, and now his camp wants to pretend that bubble teams are good enough

Brad Brownell inherited a Clemson program coming off of three consecutive NCAA tourney appearances. He proceeded to make a grand total of three tourney appearances in his first THIRTEEN seasons there. I am happy for his success the last two years. But I would rather take a chance on an up and comer than hire known mediocrity.

Leal is truly tremendous on defense. Both individually and in the way he communicates with his teammates. I still think he needs to look at the basket occasionally on offense. But I'm not going to complain with these results.