Depth? I think that's our biggest strength compared to the non Duke/Florida teams.
You can argue "star power" is lacking with no sure fire lotto pick, but we got depth. Heck most rosters can't even name spots 8 or 9
Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread
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You can argue "star power" is lacking with no sure fire lotto pick, but we got depth. Heck most rosters can't even name spots 8 or 9
Thats about how I see it. Championship teams are heavily reliant on elite guard play. The best you can say about our starting 1 2 spots next year are unproven with potential. Fact remains we appear to be starting the season at the most important spots quite a bit weaker than we ended last season. If they can break even at those 2 spots by the end of the year we still need full steps forward from dre, Z, T, and Mirk to vault into the top few contenders for the championship. It can be done. Just more elevation than I was hoping this team would have to climb to get there.
AI stop.
one more thing: "comfortably in the top 10" and "at best I see us 8 or 9" is so ironic lol.
He just declared for the draft and is gone.
Yes.
Isaiah Evans headed to NBA draft
Sharpshooter Isaiah Evans announced that he's heading to the NBA after spending the past two seasons at Duke.
Most everyone agrees that the starting lineup will be Tomi, Mirk, Dre, QC, and Vaaks. Then have have Z, Jake, and Morillo in the rotation. I am betting on at least one surprise from the end of the bench. Not as a starter but a significant contributor. Would still like a serious big as insurance and future rotational player as losing both centers next year. Do not expect to see a ball pounding guard such as Petro recruited again. Petro wasn’t bad, he just didn’t fit. Defensive system must be adjusted to defend with bigger, slower guards. Have a summer to work on it.
btw, there were earlier mentions of the delicacy, specifically in 2022 and 2016, but the current 'thread' seems to have been a spinoff from catsup / ketchup on hot dogs in RayJ recruiting threadHow that AI missed cottage cheese as a main topic, I'll never know.
Instead probably shunted it off into the "off-topic noise" category, which is of course foolish.
Post in thread 'Illinois Hoops Recruiting Thread' https://www.illinoisloyalty.com/post/illinois-hoops-recruiting-thread.31326/post-1904316
It's been that way for close to 30 years now. In fact I'd say this coming year might not be as ridiculous as some in the past. They typically have 6-9 Burger boys, a few ranked top 5-10 coming out.
Kentucky had several years with Coach Cal when they equaled what Duke has had. Outside of that, no one comes close.
Add in ridiculously favorable officiating and it's hard to see how they haven't won it all more often.
I do think with Evans gone, the Duke fit makes more sense for Blackwell. They're lacking perimeter scoring had they not added him.
I agree with this statement in your post. If we had ended up in any other region (Connecticut/Duke, Michigan, AZ), I don't believe we would have punched our ticket to Indy.. As Brad mentioned after beating Iowa and making it to Indy how difficult it is to make it to this far...
Luck definitely plays a major factor in use getting there this year and outside of this team just "blowing up" on the performance end next season and becoming a juggernaut as a unit , we will definitely need some (more than many fans will admit) to make it there next year
This should do well on this board.
Hammer: #1 highschool recruiter
Hammer: #1 highschool recruiter
I'm sure sportsbooks are making educated guesses about how the rosters will turn out (and going to great lengths to get inside information), and might even handwave a bit based on what they expect from each coach/program.
But who knows what that is for Michigan. Maybe they assume UM will get someone good (Thiam, etc?) if either/both of Mara/Morez leave. Or maybe they're just taking lots of dumb money willing to bet UM at a bad price.
Yeah, this is how I like to think about it too, though some nuances might affect things...
Kalshi is funny. The graphs are fun for seeing trends, but include some whacky trades when volume is low. The "chance" column is even more wonky. Current prices are more stable, but still have some outliers (especially the "yes" prices), and (at this point at least with the 2027 NCAAT market) the pricing has an overround/vig built in (unrelated to Kalshi's transaction fees, which are extra). I think after trying to account for this as well, our odds are around 6.5%
At traditional books I'm seeing +1200 to +1600, with +1500 being the midpoint. After removing the ridiculous vig for futures this far out (~60% for FanDuel), our fair odds are ~4%
Just before the tournament, we were +1900 to +2000, and after removing the vig (20% at that time), our fair odds were ~4%, or 7th best. We jumped about one spot in computer rankings by the end of the tournament, so in a hypothetical re-do of the tournament based on final ratings, we probably would've been ~5-6% depending on how our bracket would've been as a likely 2-seed.
None of this is a perfect comparison, but I think it points to books viewing us as roughly similar to how we ended last season.
sacraig
- The desert
Jalen Cox to USC.
Maybe there were a few posts like that? But almost all of it was hoping there's some other player out there (star or role-player or backup) if we still had/have $$. And I think most people have moved on from discussing that regardless of their opinionI believe that almost completely, to a person, members of this board agreed that retention was job 1. Brad accomplished that. Then he brought in highly rated young guys who can probably help immediately and definitely in the future. While I understand the PTSD of the members, why are you criticizing walking from Blackwell if his signing jeopardizes the first goal? How many of you business magnets you would directly fly in the face of the company's stated priorities? None of the successful one would, I'm pretty sure. For the life of me, I can't understand the criticism.
I like his game, probably couldn't have QC and JC. Not sure that would have been a sell.
Have never seen BU sit still, always seems to find another player even when the feeling is we don't need one. I feel like we still could use another player, especially back-up 6-3 type PG guard.
Duke looks like they will have the most stacked roster since Kentucky 2014-2015. Not sure how you keep 11 top players happy.
jmwillini
- Tolono, IL
Keep the snark coming brother!
jmwillini
- Tolono, IL
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