Mick Cronin has put 1 guard into the nba as a first round pick at ucla. And dent got worse.
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Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread
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That team just had some very questionable shot selection. Just watching the games - the announcers would be surprised at some of the threes. They weren’t just threes, but very low percentage looks.
However, everybody was involved in that. Singling out Mayer is something that’s just become prominent amongst the fanbase. It’s somewhat reasonable - as he was many times the forefront of it - but also somewhat unfair.
The weird reoccurring theme with that squad - most notably - was how we’d get down huge in the first half, just storm back in the 2H, and hopefully find a way to win.
Some of the notable games that year:
Alabama A&M - team in the Kenpom 300s; we were coming off the PSU loss where Brad went irate in the postgame. We really didn’t play well but obviously won; the interviews were quite weird though. This was the first time it truly left like the locker room might not be together.
Missouri - I believe we played them after Alabama A&M? If not, after one or two more cakewalk games. Either way, it was our first true opponent since Penn State. We looked so bad. It was never a game. Straight up blasted. I remain that this is the single worst performance of the Underwood era. Everyone had major questions at this point.
@Northwestern - we looked terrible offensively and lost. There was a bad technical which flipped the game (believe it was Harris).
After Northwestern Skyy quite. However, we did right the ship, and seemed to be playing well. But then… had a really underwhelming showing against Indiana. Just dog walked on our home floor, TJD went for 42. We NEVER doubled the post and he got layup after layup. Was a super questionable game from a BU coaching standpoint, IMO.
We basically got blown out 3 times by Penn State. I guess the BTT game was closer, but the first two were horror shows.
Northwestern at home - we looked absolutely god-awful in the 1H, got down 19, but came back and won. Sencire Harris on Boo Buie (who had 35)… Shannon comes back from a concussion and goes nuclear in 2H. That was a pretty good NW team (7seed).
Michigan at home - we blew a big lead, went to OT and got down 7 with around 1:30 left… and Shannon completely saves the day. Had we lost, we may have been on the bubble. That was a bad Michigan team that missed the tournament.
Perhaps the most frustrating game for me was @OSU. That was an ABYSMAL team. They had lost like 20 in a row… just to snap the losing streak against us.
@Purdue in the regular season finale was literally the most insane game. Looked HORRID in the 1H… felt like it’d be a 40 ball… down 24 at halftime IIRC… and probably should’ve won it at the end. ASIDE FROM WINNING, that might have been the best second half performance I’ve seen from an Illinois team. To even have a chance in that one was insane.
Mayer had 2 FTs in the final minute to take the lead, went 1/2, and then we had 2 or 3 blunder offensive possessions which were a complete lack of chemistry and execution… which was pretty embarrassing.
Arkansas in the tournament - got down huge again, Mayer was straight up benched after looking putrid and never returned. Got it down to 5 with 2 or 3 minutes… and there was a brutal Coleman turnover with Shannon right next to him on the fast break.
Bottom line, it’s just not a good recipe to get down in that manner, and keep coming back. Over and over, rinse and repeat. When we were down 20; something clicked, but it didn’t to start games.
Was that team a head case? Probably, probably not. However, if there is a BU team that’s a candidate for that, it’s that team. I recall both Goode and Ty later said that team wasn’t great in the locker room (Ty I remember for sure).
It was an offseason where, outside of Shannon and Hawkins, I really didn’t feel bad about losing a few guys. Epps got progressively worse, LaTulip has mentioned him not being involved in the huddles. RJ was so bad all year. And obviously Skyy quit mid season. Sometimes it’s a case of addition by subtraction.
The draft day deadline was very fascinating. We got back both CH and TSJ - which was MASSIVE - but missed on RayJ Dennis literally the next day and people were very upset. We legitimately did not have a point guard.
What people did not realize was how much of a STUD Domask was.
UCLA is around #25 in odds right now. I don't think he's enough to jump them 20+ spots, plus those odds probably already assume some chance of him going there.
Edit:
I see from your other post you're looking at Kalshi, but they're a huge outlier right now, and it's based on just a couple transactions today that bumped them from 0.6% to 4.9%. Also, the current price for them is 4.6% to win but 99.3% not to win, which adds up to much more than the other teams, so something looks off. Maybe it's insider traders who know something about Blackwell, but if so, UCLA is #8 after getting him, not before.
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I think Petro also really was behind the 8 ball showing up so late. Could’ve really benefited from a full summer with the team and Fletch
My grandpa put sugar on his. I like blueberries and honey on mine.
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You might need to get in on that, there is some value there
From my understanding, according to insiders and others, that is not how NIL works. Just because a donor says I will give 6 million for Blackwell, doesn't mean they would give 6 million for someone else. I believe you start back at square one and try to sell another player and see how much monies would be available if any. I know people can just put money into a "general" fund, but when it comes to the big buck donors, they tend to only have a huge commitment for certain players. Add that on to how good the coaching staff is feeling about the team as a whole. My guess is Brad knows who his big donors are and how important the donors trust in him is. He knows he wants to be able to go to them again next year and they will trust him again. Some donors are probably hard to please but easily upset when an "investment" fails. I really don't know a lot about the whole process and certainly no expert but from the word here, it makes perfect sense. Also I think some of the insiders have said if the staff feels they need an off the bench guy they may still do so.
I don’t know if we will get there but I can’t like this enough. On paper we have an extremely talented and experienced squad and right now, on paper is all anyone has! This team has the opportunity to be special again this year. I like our chances. ILL…
I think this is more important than the national championship thing. Blackwell wants to play at the next level and Mick doesn't have a good track record. Brad's record is impeccable in terms wings/guards.
How much money is in that market… probably doesn’t take much to move it would be my first thought.
It wasn’t just Mayer’s in game performances and attitude. I’m sure most remember, but the guy literally missed games because he drank too many Monster energy drinks and got himself sick. Just moronic behavior. I can only imagine how un serious he was about winning and leading by example off the court.
I don’t want to risk this teams chemistry being ruined by someone who isn’t bought in.
Well because nobody else on the team was capable of creating their own shot in the half court that year. He was actually hitting them at a good clip until he had a cold stretch to end the year.
TJ was a monster in transition but he improved a ton the next year.
The biggest thing you can say about Mayer is that he wasn't Marcus Domask but I don't think people realize how incredibly special it was for Marcus to turn into a point guard mid season and just continually get better at it(that is just an incredibly rare thing to do).
He took a lot of step back shots because he wasn't a great ball handler and should have never been a primary ball handler in a half court setting.
All of this is assuming it's true this is mainly about Blackwell's camp being concerned about usage.
Illinois just has a much better system for you to thrive in. If you get more usage in a worse system? Cool. @aveseaboy is right, if this is your stance stay at wisconsin. They're offense was 10th compared to UCLA down in the high 20's (and btw, UCLA was a pretty big disappointment this year, they were predicted ahead of Illinois). Gard actually does have a track record with guards going pro too.
DUMB. Now if Duke? I get it a lot more.
Longest post in loyalty history
Definitely. After looking at it more, the graph shows historical transactions, and large ones can move the price a lot in these currently thin markets. Duke and Florida pretty much went back to where they were a little while after I posted that.
The current price being offered looks more stable. (For example, we dropped from 9.1% to 6.4% on the last transaction, but the currently offered price is 9.1%, so that last transaction obviously was too large for the liquidity)
Blackwell sets visits to Duke and Louisville. Already visited UCLA.
Does not look like Illinois is involved.
Does not look like Illinois is involved.
No. He had a decent stretch in, at most, the third quarter of the season. Otherwise, the large majority of his shots were ill-advised and appeared selfish.
You are right, Mayer wasn't a good ball handler, which is a not a good reason to take bad shots. If he was looking to make the team better, he would have moved the ball and then moved without the ball into good positions for shots far better than low percentage step back 3s. He was actually pretty athletic, but nullified his athleticism most of the time by settling for terrible long range shots.
goat move is chili oil (“lao gan ma” in particular) on cottage cheese. The kick, crunchy bits, umami from the chili oil go extremely well with the creaminess of cottage cheese.
skyIdub
"I can't tell you. Secret."
From my understanding (mainly reading the insiders comments) — is that the Blackwell buzz was very strong UNTIL the Andrej announcement.
He announced his return, and either we backed off on Blackwell or his camp backed off on us (I guess it’s been said his camp backed off on us).
He announced his return, and either we backed off on Blackwell or his camp backed off on us (I guess it’s been said his camp backed off on us).
Team is probably set in regards to rotation then.
If he backed off on us then why didn’t he back off on Louisville and Duke? Those are just as, if not even more talented teams. If he doesn’t see the fit on our team - then he wouldn’t be considering those schools either.
I think the staff probably thought we don’t need to spend 4-5mil on a transfer (which… kinda sucks).
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Honestly, if he can’t see his (solid) fit in this roster, then he wouldn’t see the vision of the staff and system. His chemistry would be off, and money obviously could become a bigger influencer on his mind the whole time. Therefore he’d hold us back; so all power to him elsewhere. This year won’t be about any one player, it’ll be about the team as a whole. The talents will shine brighter that way.
Bye.
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