Watching a replay of our victory over Duke. I like Kriisa’s game.

I'm taking Florida over Auburn. (I have to as I picked Florida to win in February.)

Unfortunately Duke over Houston, though I pray I'm wrong.

Bol Bowen to Alabama. Gillespie to Tennessee.

That's what NCAA basketball is right now.

No draft either.

I think this is an aspect of Pope and the Portal that isn’t being discussed. Kids want to see that a coach can get a player to the NBA. I feel like this is something that left me wanting from last year’s game coverage…someone from UK needed to get in the ears of the media producers and anchors and get them talking about the possibility of so and so being drafted.

Examples: having Jay Bilas say on air something like, “The Lakers are looking for a locked in shooter in this year’s draft and might roll the dice on Brea late in the second round.” Or Dykes saying, “It’s expected that Oweh will put his name into the draft, if for no other reason than to get feedback from NBA executives.” Even if it doesn’t happen, having things like that said on during coverage will carry weight. I might have heard mention of the NBA two or three times during UK games all year. Unacceptable.

Pope’s staff needs to be working within NBA circles to get fringe player drafted that might have otherwise gone overlooked. Having Williams go 58th, even if he doesn’t survive in the league past a year, would be huge. Cal was so good at getting kids drafted that wouldn’t have been if they had played for most anybody else. Some of those kids carved out nice niche careers.

Lastly, Pope will need his Mashburn. He’ll need that first kid that gets a green room invite.

The money made at the college level now is life changing for sure. The money made in the NBA is kingly and kids want to envision that possibility.

NM

Assuming all 5 return, we have 10 players now.

We still need 2 frontcourt players, and hopefully one more sg/sf (if we recruit a starter sf, oweh will play sg. if we recruit a starter sg, oweh will play starter sf. It is also likely we just bring a development piece at wing)

Deleted the last thread - you can continue on this one but it needs to be a civil discussion. I understand a lot of you are frustrated on how recruitment is shaping up but we can do better and not use foul language to get our points across.

I'd expect in meeting with the kids he tells them what his plans are, what style of offense he runs, etc. In my opinion, a lot of guards may not like the idea of the offense running through a big out on top. Just a thought.

Take 10 minutes and enjoy I reckon

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Just out of curiosity, I watched a video summary of Jaland Lowe in a game where his not very good team beat a somewhat better (hey, they made the tournament) UNC-Cheats team.

He was fairly dominant in that game against pretty good UNC guards (that team's problem was in the front court.). He looked quicker than the Cheater's guards. He was able to get to the rim and finished pretty well.

He scored 18 points, and had six rebounds -- and seven assists with few turnovers. He pretty much willed his team to a win that seemed important at the time.

There is a reason this guy was ALL-ACC, third team. He had the ability to take over a game. Yeah, the ACC was down but its not like its the Horizon league.

Login to view embedded media Goo get this guy to fill the brea role

He doesn’t have great quickness on defense, so not sure if he would struggle a bit there, but Tthis guy would fit great in Pope’s offense…similar to Ivisic for ILL.

Portal highlights

A bunch of UK insiders are acting as if it's a DONE DEAL!!!

So what gives????

Why hasn't he made it official???

If we already have 9 scholarship players for next year (last year at this time we had 0). And typically, along with last year, we had 12 scholarship players, and you only need 3 maybe 4 more scholarship players. Wouldn’t you want to be very selective with the few more we need to completely fill the team?

We aren’t ever “missing out” on guys, when a ton of great players haven’t even hit the portal yet. You get 3 top 50 portal players and we’re set. And because we’d have 5 returners (last year we had 0). Not to mention our best players probably coming back. A solid transfer already. And 3 freshman who are much better than the freshman we had last year (granted I’m glad they’re coming back, since they will be improved and know the system). Then what are we worried about? We should be a border line top 10 team when it’s all said and done. And with the quality of coaching that Pope gives us, that’s a legit shot to contend for much more next year

Quote regarding Mark Pope: “We’re in good hands.”

1 - Lewis/Chandler
2 - Johnson/Perry
3 - Oweh/Noah
4 - Williams
5 - Garrison/Moreno

Clearly, we want Lewis to be a really solid FR backup PG off the bench. With the NIL involved, I'm not sure that they will push Johnson to a backup role by default.

Moreno will NOT be third string Center on the depth chart being MCD AA and highly ranked. $ He's coming to play and can. We might get someone who can bounce between the 4 and 5 to allow Garrison to play the 4 some and provide depth.

We obviously want a stud PG and stud PF to allow solid depth behind them. Noah and Perry will hopefully be solid pieces #10 and #11 and not higher. Williams will be a solid backup 3.

I think some people think Pope is bringing in more pieces than he is, therefore, he is being very selective to make the right picks. I'm sure Oweh will require around 2 million himself to stick around. A lot of these "contacts" are just Pope and staff checking in on fit and pricing. We will be fine. Relax.

Bucky McMillan expected to be the hire at Texas A&M. Samford was fun last year and nearly upset Kansas round 1. Didn't quite get to the tournament this season. I think it's a good hire and should keep the SEC atop college basketball.

I NEED him in a UK jersey.. may be a hot take, but he is phenomenal in my eyes. May be looking for more playing time, but he sure does bring toughness to any team. Goes 110% all the time.