HookEm

Lol. If Baylor got him then we 100% had a shot to get him. Oh well, if we could pull JT Toppin that would be a great alternative We could potentially get 2-3 years of Toppin and he also is 6'9 vs. Omier' 6'7.

It always amazes me when people fail to grasp the monumental difference in athleticism between elite men and women athletes. I ran track at UT in the early 90s. I was not very good, barely making the team. There wasn't a woman in the world at any level who could beat me at the time. It isn't speculation, my time was literally better than any time a woman in the entire world ran that year. And again, I wasn't very good. In high school, I was on an "ok" freshman basketball team and we would scrimmage our very good women's varsity team. It was an absolute bloodbath. My sister at the time was all-region and I (two years younger) could beat her 21-2 in a game of 21, and that was when she was fully mature and I was a skinny 15 year old. I eventually was all-district in basketball as a senior, and when I got to UT I would play pickup. The difference in skill from the "good" court at the rec center where the UT players played (Albert Burditt, Terrence Rencher, etc.) to the court next to it where I would play was staggering. Those players could have beaten me 21-2 in 21. And the difference between those players and NBA players is also huge. You could put the worst defender in the NBA on her and he would shut her down to an embarrassing degree. She would never even touch the ball. She doesn't have anywhere close to the speed needed to get separation from anyone at that level. And if she did get the ball, they would block her shot every time because they could play right up in her face (because she doesn't have close to the quickness to get by them off the dribble).

In the Vandy highlight video, I like his aggressiveness in taking the ball to the rack from the wing. He has pretty good handles and also doesn't seem to mind getting physical with bigger defenders. Get this guy in the weight room for another couple of years and he looks like he could be pretty physical.

I suppose if the men's basketball program is calling him a guard, then he is a guard. I stand corrected.

wrong thread

SDSU finished #22 in KenPom, we finished #25. The were a 5 seed and we were a 7. No sense in arguing though it as we were both about the same level. It does go to show how much easier the path to the Sweet 16 is from a 5 seed vs. a 7 seed. Regardless, I don't want Saunders. Surely we can do better than that. Dude averaged only 3 TRB and 0.2 blocks in 18 minutes a game during conference. Whoof.

I agree 100% with this BTW. I have no doubt we are going to add another big, and if we don't it will be a huge failure. We don't have to get an awesome big, but we have to have depth. Unless Onyema gets hugely better, he shouldn't be getting more than 5 minutes per game on a competitive team. Either of the guys mentioned above would change the trajectory of the team next year given the current roster. I have no doubt Toppin would start, likely at PF with Shedrick at center. Then with the first substitution we could go small. Just need some good news up in here.

This take is overly cynical. We fired Rick Barnes, who is fringe top tier and our all time coaching leader to try to get better results. Then we hired Shaka Smart who was fresh off a Final Four at VCU and at 38 years old, was by far the hottest young coach in the country. In his final year, he got as high as #4 in the AP and was a 3-seed, and we still effectively fired him after the loss to ACU. We turned around and hired Chris Beard who was also fresh off a Championship Game appearance and also a top-5 coach with a huge runway in front of him. And at the same time we upgraded our facilities and built one of the best basketball arenas in the country. Hiring RT was an unfortunate, but unavoidable decision that has been beaten to death on this board. I'm pretty confident that the administration won't stick with him for very long though if the program doesn't start competing for a title very soon. In spite of all the underachievement, Texas still ranks as the #13 program since 1997 according to KenPom, which is mildly surprising to me.

Agree completely. He was horrid last year. Maybe he will be a little better next year. My main concern is that Shedrick gets hurt and then we are playing Onyema 30 minutes a game. Holy hell that would be terrible.

I would definitely like another big, but it is possible to win at the college level without having big interior players as long as the team plays good team defense. Houston had the #2 defense in CBB last year and their starting bigs were 6'7 J'Wan Roberts and 6'8 Ja'Vier Francis. We made the Elite Eight with 6'9 Disu and 6'7 Christian Bishop. If the season started today, we would have 6'11 Shedrick getting probably 25 min, 6'8 Onyema getting 10 maybe 6'9 Nicholas Codie getting 5 min. Given the team makeup, I'm going to assume we almost never play with two "bigs" and instead play with a lead guard, 3 rangy guard/forwards and then a center. This wouldn't be a bad lineup: 6'3 Julian Larry 6'5 Tremon Mark 6'6 Tre Johnson 6'7 Jason Kent 6'11 Kaden Shedrick Or swap out 6'2 Jordan Pope for Julian Larry. We have really good size now at the guard spots and it opens up a lot of options that we have missed in recent years.

The announcement is wrong then. It only matters because everyone who sees it is like “we got ANOTHER guard?”. Well, we didn’t. This guy will never play one of the two primary ball handling spots. He is a small forward. Is Alex Anamekwe a guard? Cause that is who he is replacing.

Wouldn’t be my preference either, but he did start over half the games for a SD State team that was better than Texas last year.

It sounds like we may only have room for one more player. What bigs are realistic targets at this point. We HAVE to get another center. If Shedrick goes down (who seems prone to injury), we are starting Onyema. Ideally we would get someone good enough to send Shedrick to the 2nd unit.

Probably should change the thread title to "Transfer F Malik Presley"

He is more of a forward at 6'6, 200. Seems like some development depth freed up by Anamekwe bolting.

I have had many run-ins with Derka on the hoops boards. Somehow I missed this thread and was like... why are the basketball boards so peaceful all of a sudden... and so boring? Well, now I know why. I'm sad to see Derka go, but in my view he bullies far more than he is bullied. He loves to attack people, inflame a situation, and call names, and then in the end try to gaslight everyone into thinking HE was the one who was attacked. I have seen it over and over again. I've also seen him repeatedly derail a thread away from a positive discussion and on to whatever topic he wants. And it is very often an inflammatory topic where he is inventing an argument so that he can do what he loves... argue with huge longcat multi-posts that just wear you out. Classic example is reminding everyone over and over that he was the only one who thought we shouldn't have hired RT and everyone else is a small minded sunshine pumper. Man it was getting tiresome. But I always tried to de-escalate the situation because I know about his mental health issues. F the people who TRY to stir him up knowing about his issues. That was also ruining the board. I don't necessarily think he should have been banned, but he was given clear choices and the consequences for those choices were known to him when he made them. He knew he would be banned and just kept on digging in. It is sad to see, but not at all surprising. As time passes, I'm hopeful he will be invited back. That said, I'm sure he has already found a way to get past any bans and is already posting under a new handle.

Thanks for the clip. I like the way he moves without the ball to find open space near the rim. Hopefully we have the players with enough vision to take advantage of it. He also appears to be a good finisher (although everyone looks good in a highlight reel). I like that he goes up with the intent to dunk on someone in a lot of those plays. He looks more like a power forward to me. His game seems to be in the paint or 3s. He doesn't seem to score much off the dribble. I didn't seen him shot fake on the 3 and then attack the basket a single time. I bet he is the kind of player where at the end of the game you see that he has scored 14 points and are like, wow where did those points come from. Timmy Allen style. Unless we get some serious talent in the post, I don't see him ever playing small forward on this team based on what I have seen so far.

Is Kent more of a small forward or power forward? Any historical Texas comps?

The AF guy is not who we should be going for IMO. Between Jayson Kent, Tremon Mark and Tre Johnson, we already have enough bodies who can play small forward. If we get him, that's fine, but we have bigger needs. We really need an elite 4/5. Somebody can defend bigs and who brings a tough attitude to the team.

I swear, the thread police are out in full force. News flash: We aren't like the 300 other teams. There are no more than 10-15 other teams with our NIL bankroll, facilities, and clear need at his position. If we aren't working back channels to express our interest and resources, then we are dropping the ball.

Beard's positionless switching defense at Tech would be a perfect fit for that lineup. Basically a team full of forwards.

I would love for us to get Omier. He is an very solid rebounder and overall player. He isn't a great threat from outside, but 35% from 3 isn't bad. We could go "small" with 6'3 Julian Larry, 6'5 Tremon Mark, 6'6 Tre Johnson, 6'7 Jayson Kent and 6'8 Norchad Omier. That is a lineup that would give teams a lot of trouble. All of those guys are very good defenders. Great rebounding, great scoring. That said I have no idea if we are even a possibility.

This dude should be our #1 target right now. He would immediately change the potential of the team. He is one of the top rebounders in the country, particularly on the offensive glass. Was also the Sun Belt defensive player of the year before going to Miami. And he can score inside and outside the paint. Break the bank and do what is needed with NIL to go get him.

Never said RT has us on the brink of greatness. Had he won last year Beard would have gotten a huge amount of the credit. I prefaced all this by saying that Hurley is clearly the better coach. Maybe we would have won, maybe we wouldn’t have. We will obviously never know. And I’ll admit that saying we WOULD have won came across as more absolute than I intended. That said, had we beaten Miami, I do think Vegas would have had us favored in the game.