ECisGod

6 hours ago, DGNU said:

They've gotten Eric Dailey, Tyler Bilodeau & Kobe Johnson in this cycle so... that would be a mistake. That's gotta be all NIL...

Unless something has drastically changed UCLA's NIL sucks.  Mick Cronin complained about their NIL situation last season.

Mick Cronin says he's committed to UCLA despite frustration - Los Angeles Times (latimes.com)

17 minutes ago, Red Five said:

Kyle was at UCLA yesterday.  I think we're just hoping he doesn't commit to there or Wake before his planned visit here this weekend.

UCLA doesn't have any NIL money to overwhelm him with, so I doubt he commits there without at least visiting Wake & NU.

On 4/17/2024 at 12:49 AM, whateveritis1224 said:

What's the starting lineup look like right now?

 

Rollie

Brice

Juwan

Rienk

Andrew

 

6th Man Griffin

 

Or do you have a smaller lineup with Gary as the 4 and have Griffin as the 2/3 along with Brice? Guess it depends on if Hoiberg can pull Kyle and/or the Charlotte big man. Gets one or both? We're probably set with the 3 man rotation with Brice, Juwan, and Griffin at the 2/3 spots and then a 4 man rotation with Rienk, Kyle, Andrew, and Charlotte Big Man at the 4/5. Rollie and Uhlis rotating at the 1.

I don't think Gary is consistent enough of a 3 point shooter to play the 3.  Not saying that he couldn't become more consistent, he clearly got better last season, but I still see him as an undersized 4.

Reed from Michigan is going to UConn.

Ex-Michigan center Tarris Reed Jr. transferring to UConn - ESPN

6 minutes ago, SouthLincoln Husker said:

He also needs bench players with extra years of eligibility.  As of right now, we are Sr heavy.  You need some core players past next yr. Gavin fits that mold.

Right now we have three players that will be around after next season, so I agree that we need to get a couple of players with at least two years of eligibility left.

ESPN has the Huskers as a 7 seed in Denver vs South Carolina.  Nine B1G teams in their very early projection.

NCAA Bracketology: 2025 March Madness men's field predictions (espn.com)

18 hours ago, Husker03 said:

I would bet NIL will change that as well. If there is one thing Clark, Reese, Beukers, etc showed this year is that women are marketable in that arena as well. One NIL dollars become more significant across the board, the women will be jumping ship to the highest bidders as well and parity will ensue.

There might end up being more parity between the power conference teams, but teams from smaller conferences will end up losing players just like on the men's side.

30 minutes ago, Husker03 said:

Also, if we are being fair, the men's game was pretty clunky back in the 70's and 80's as well.

That's one of the reasons I compared current college women's basketball to the men's game in the late 70's/early 80's.

There is more depth of talent in the women's game than a decade ago, but there isn't enough to get many upsets in the big dance.

2 hours ago, Husker03 said:

What were the numbers for the Saturday prime time final 4 games, again?

 

Again, the argument is immediately moot anyways. Fact is, give women the network and time and hype, the numbers are there.

In doing some basic research, it looks like games with Clark drew huge ratings.  All the other games, not so much - though South Carolina vs NC state drew slightly more than the two men's final four games (7.2 vs 6.7 & 5.3) and I wonder how much of that was SC being undefeated, wondering who Iowa (Clark) might play or real interest in the game.

If they get better TV ratings than the men next year, then they might have something.  I would guess that won't be the case.  Clark was a huge draw, but the NBA is seeing that if you promote a few players as stars instead of the entire league you don't get much for ratings if the "stars" (LeBron, Steph, Giannis) are not playing.

I would say that women's college basketball is in the same place the men's game was in the late 70's/early 80's.  They have just come off a decade of one team being dominant (UConn women vs UCLA men) & if you aren't one of the teams ranked in the top 10-15 before the tournament you have virtually no chance to make the final 4.

There was exactly 8 games where the lower seed won in the women's NCAA tournament in 63 games & only one of those was in the first round (there was ten in the first round of the men's tournament).  One was a 5 seed beating a 4, 3 were a 3 seed beating a 2.  Weirdly the elite 8 was all four 1 seeds vs all four 3 seeds.  The only two games that most people would call real upsets were Middle Tennessee beating Louisville (11 over 6) and Duke beating Ohio State (7 over 2).  The other two were the 3 seeds beating 1 seeds to get to the final 4.

The only sport where women consistently get better ratings than men is tennis.  Even the US men's national soccer team outdraws the women's team despite the fact that the women are the best team in the world and the men are in the 15-20 range.

I know this is a long and kind of rambling post, but I'm just trying to point out that a one year blip doesn't mean much.  If it's the start of a trend, good for the women who play college basketball but if it will be forgotten in a couple of years.

14 hours ago, Husker03 said:

Dudes title game drew under 15 million viewers.  I’m sure we can try to come up with 100 reasons to explain it away, but there is no denying there is a market for women’s sports when they are as hyped up as men’s.  And honestly, it makes complete sense. 

You can try to come up with 100 reasons, but only two matter - network & time.  ABC vs TBS & Sunday afternoon vs Monday night (9:20 tip on the east coast).

The only other one that might matter is people wanting to see Clark win (Iowa) or lose (most of the rest of the country).

 I didn't watch a single second of the women's game (or the entire tournament for that matter) & watched all but the last minute of the men's game (and took of the 21st & 22nd to watch as much of the first round as I could).

1 hour ago, Huskerfollower4life said:

Was he playing in pain all season bc of his knee??? I didn't even know he had a knee problem.

He had what they called a "minor" knee surgery around Christmas & was out for a couple of games.  It definitely affected his ability to practice full time - it was mentioned by Hoiberg several times in press conferences.  If it was as minor as they say, a few weeks off should let it fully heal - or he could need to have another "clean up" done and then a few weeks off to let it fully heal.  I'm sure we'll hear his status fairly soon.

13 minutes ago, Huskerfollower4life said:

Has it been confirmed that Mast is coming back??? I know that Williams and Gary have been confirmed but haven't heard anything about Mast.

He was there to support Tominaga in the 3 point contest & a couple of comments he made sounded like he's planning to be back.   Don't remember exactly what he said, but I'm pretty sure he'll be back. 

1 hour ago, Moiraine said:

I’ve been annoyed by both sides of the discussion of her greatness, but mostly by the side that blows smoke up her a$$. I was watching a men’s BB game, I think in the Elite 8. So one of the best men’s teams in the country. A guy makes a long 3. Announcer says (paraphrasing) he’s looking like Steph Curry out there. Another announcer says “or Caitlin Clark.” And it made me want to barf. You can talk about her being good without being so moronic it becomes a joke. And it’s not that the guy was saying she could do well in the NBA. It’s obnoxious because she hasn’t played a single second against the equivalent female competition. If she had been in the WNBA 10 years and put up Curry like numbers, the comment wouldn’t bother me. 

 

Anyhow, there is no way she joins the 3 on 3 league. She doesn’t seem to do well (or I should say as well) against physical, athletic female defenders. She won’t be able to shoot over or get open against men who are 6-18” taller than her typical defenders. Not to mention she’d be a huge liability on defense unless the team composition required 1 female per team. 

 

Not only are they taller, but they are much quicker, stronger & jump higher.  She's 6' tall, but most of her 3's are shot from her chest so anyone who guards her tightly will be able to block her shot easily.

9 hours ago, OmahaPlaya said:

So glad Iowa lost, now they can stop with trying to make Clark the goat when she ain't won s#!t.

I hope she takes the $5M from the Big3.  It will be fun to watch her get her a$$ handed to her.

36 minutes ago, Madcows said:

Technically, 4 of their starting 5 can come back. Ashworth, Kalkbrenner both have Covid year left, Alexander could go back as well. None of these three should go pro, none will make an NBA roster, unless they want to go international or G-League they aren't pro level players. With NLI, they probably make more at Creighton than they will in the G-League. They also have Miller/Jasen Green as their other starter. They do lose Farabello and Sheierman, with the latter being a huge loss for them and the few who entered the portal but never played because they only went 6/7 deep.

I'd be shocked if Alexander comes back.  He wanted to leave after last year & almost no one comes back for two years after they wanted to go pro.  I'd guess he will get a 2-way contract as a free agent/late 2nd round pick & spend most of his time in the G-League only going up to the NBA if there are injured players at his position.

Kalkbrenner isn't going to be any better after another year at Creighton, so he might as well go pro.  His game will play well in Europe & he'll make more there than in NIL.  The question becomes is he willing to move to Europe this summer or next.  I think that from an NBA/G-League standpoint he has regressed in scout's eyes & I don't see it getting any better unless he can get 25% stronger.  It might be fun to see him get posterized on a regular basis in the NBA.

No clue on Ashworth.  He was supposed to be their point guard, but never had the ball in his hands because Alexander was their lead guard.  He's not going to play pro ball in the US unless he plays on someone's summer league team before he goes off to Europe/New Zealand/Australia.

26 minutes ago, Mavric said:

Roughly 8 ppg, 5.5 rpg and 1.3 bpg in two years at Fresno.

 

 

Not sure he'd come back to Nebraska.

30 minutes ago, BigRedBuster said:

Why?  The 64 best teams are in the NCAA.  What? the next 32 are in the NIT.

 

The next teams, the team is not going to care enough to be able to put a full team on the court before they hit the transfer portal....and nobody will be watching.

Probably because Fox felt left out of the postseason basketball world.

68 teams in the NCAA

32 in the NIT

16 in The College Basketball Crown

16 in the CBI

8 in the CIT

It also sound like they might expand the NCAA to 72 or 76 in the next couple of years.  80 would make more sense so there would be 16 first round games to get to 64.  When the tournament first went to 64 in 1985 there were 282 teams (64/282=22.7%) and now there are 362 (362 * .227 = 82+), so there would be approximately the same percentage of teams that make the NCAA tournament as there was when it first went to 64 if it expanded to 80.

There will be a new postseason tournament next year.  Two teams from the B1G, Big 12 & Big East are guaranteed + 10 other teams.

Fox, AEG to launch new postseason basketball tournament - ESPN

44 minutes ago, BigRedBuster said:

Somewhere I saw a Tweet showing who is still on the team.  I can't find it.  But, it's getting pretty thin.

On scholarship are: Gary, Mast, Ulis & Williams (all seniors)

Walk-ons: Burt & Jacobson are Sophomores, Grace & Hoiberg are Juniors.

Two incoming freshmen:  Frager & Janowski.

That leaves 7 open scholarships.  If they'd had a really bad season or Hoiberg had left, I'd understand why so many are leaving, but after having a really good season & no coaching change, I'm confused.

They can't even play 5 on 5 pickup games until the freshmen show up in May/June unless they bring in some student managers.

1 hour ago, Mavric said:

 

And Clark's response is "Scoreboard".

20 minutes ago, brontosaurus said:

IDK if all these spots have already been filled, but it would be cool to get invited to one of the early season tournaments like Fort Myers or Charleston (or even like a Battle 4 Atlantis). Even if it would mean an early season loss to a good team, at least we'd get some semblance of how good the team actually is playing against legit major competition or even some quality mid-majors and it would eliminate the "But they haven't played anybody!" criticism that we get in December.

The Cornhusker Classic is kind of nice, but usually the opponents are some real stinkers (Duquesne this year being a big exception)

I agree that it would be nice to be in a better exempt tournament, but most of those tournaments are owned by ESPN (like bowl games) so sometimes it's hard to get into their rotation once you've gotten out.  You kind of have to kiss ESPN's butt. 

Playing Creighton a little earlier than usual in 2024.

1 hour ago, SouthLincoln Husker said:

I see him as a 6 man.  We need a pt guard & I don't see him replacing Williams or Gary in the starting lineup.  He is 1 yr guy, so probably won't come to Nebraska.

Might be a good replacement for Wilcher.

Here is ESPN's top 50 in the portal.

NCAA men's basketball transfer rankings for the 2024-25 season - ESPN

Cliff Omoruyi from Rutgers would be a great defense/rebounding guy that would allow Mast to move to the 4 and replace Allick's hustle.

1 minute ago, whateveritis1224 said:

With him and Fidler, probably also gotta watch them going to Creighton. Can't think of the last high profile Bellevue West player that chose Nebraska over Creighton going back to Dotzler the elder.

Creighton's going to need a lot of players out of the portal.  McDermott doesn't seem to have much confidence in their bench so 4 of their 5 starters play 35+ minutes/game and all 4 of them will be gone after this season.  Three are out of eligibility & Alexander will go pro + their 6th man (Farabello) is a senior too.