You're listening to the back home network, presented by home
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Cask, ale, and klaviyo. Here.
It is the 22nd of March of 2022, and we got a special guest
joining. Ting us.
Today, it returned to the podcast a person that we haven't
had on for almost a decade. We're going to get to that in
just a second. First of all, just wanted to
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where to Go for all that. We got a person.
I never thought we'd quite have back on the podcast before but
we're hoping is going to be more regular thing.
Now as Father, James Pierce joining us.
Once again, how you doing? It's good to see you.
Good to talk to you, what's happening?
I'm thrilled to be back on. It's been a bit.
Like you said, we were trying to reverse engineer it and it's
like, it would have been. Yeah, like, 2013, but I I feel
very desired to hear it because I put it in that way.
It's like, we never thought we'd have a backlog.
I'm glad to be back. It's good to have You've missed
the entire Archie Miller era. It's almost it's like a Rip Van
Winkle situation where it's like someone falls asleep.
You know, after I you in 2013 is number one all season and then
they wake back up and they're like, hey, you know, what did I
miss? And it's like, well, you missed
quite a bit. But, but now, we know in all
seriousness. It's good to have you back.
And, you know, we've had a lot of conversations over the years
about IU basketball and I'm looking forward to starting
those up again, as we talked about to start with this, I You
team that just wrapped up this season and some of the things to
think about in terms of what we just witnessed over the course
of the last four months or so. I can give you one kind of maybe
like a hopeful Harbinger story. I you've not heard this one.
This is from Dustin, is this is an energy exchange between me
and Dustin Dopey Rack in. Now, back here on the Hoosier
beat, which is great. But this is, when like I use
number one, they're having their big season, and I was kind of in
the middle of like, figuring out, what was going to come next
for me. And I figured I was Trio on the,
on the beat, and everything was great covering and I basically
figure, it's like, I've really got, I've got to take the
broadcasting thing seriously, and so, like I said, The way
from the Hoosier beat the middle of the season and traveled with
the IE softball team to do broadcasting and Dustin.
I told them I was doing that. He's like, that's insane.
Why would you do this? But this is, you know, this is
like a one set of, you know, generation type thing.
And basically from the moment that I write my last day was
number one versus number two, Indiana, Michigan.
At Assembly Hall, beat down the Wolverines and really Galen
things. Don't seem like they've been the
same sensor. So maybe I'm hoping that, you
know, being back on the podcast in this way.
We're right back like we never left.
It's going to be coming hot. I think that's the hope.
That's the Hope here. Absolutely as yeah.
It if you stop time that day that I you beat Michigan in Ann
Arbor, you know, you'd be in a very different place than what's
actually transpired over the last eight years.
A lot of more Downs than UPS. I would say in that time period
for IU, basketball in particular, but Yeah, it said
it's going to be fascinating to talk through all of this and you
know that the end of the 2013 season, if you stopped time
there it would be a very different time than what we have
now and to some degree. It kind of feels like I use been
stuck in neutral since that point the Archie Miller era,
definitely felt like a lot of neutral time.
Being spent. If not slightly regressing from
what the program had seen prior to that.
We have the first year of the Mike Woodson era.
Yeah, that took place this past year.
And yeah, I've been talking about it throughout the course
of the season. I've almost gotten to a point
where I don't trust my own observations, having talked
about it, so specifically. And so, detail-oriented over the
course of the last few months. So I am curious to start things
off with from your perspective. What did you see?
As I guess the sum total of this season?
What stood out to you both good and maybe not so good.
Like the coolest. So to me like the Highlight
moment. Maybe this is like a weird like
kind of out of school thing. But there's that question which
some people thought was strange like after the tournament
victory over Wyoming where it's John.
Rothstein who's like if you could say something to Bob
Knight and there's some people like, why are we still talking
about Bob Knight? But what to me Mike Woodson has
been really neat in terms of how intentional he's been about like
saying he wants this to be about Indiana, the Indiana that he got
brought to by bye. Bob Knight back in the day.
And so I kind of seeing that as like an intentional thing and
then him being a guy who wants to be like kind of a mentor
figure for these young men, at least the way that's how he
talks about it. And there's a way that like a
lot of coaches talk about it, but he just exudes a kind of
authenticity about that. And so like, even like the at
the end of the state, Mary's game gives Jordan Geronimo an
extra pad on the back at the end of the thing.
Like, that's that's pretty cool. So like seeing that I mean, Like
handing out participation trophies, but I don't think
that's what that is. I think the guys appreciate that
from a guy who's been an NBA coach.
He's coach Carmelo, Anthony. He's been, he's done this and
it's like, this is the guy who wants to be back here.
Who cares about us wants to go further us.
And I think that has been seen in places like, Tres Jackson,
Davis, you know, I think, in terms of bright spot, get him to
come back. He does.
And then if you look at like, this was a thing, you know, if
you look at a lot of his even Advanced numbers between last
year and this year, but even his freshman year, you're getting
the getting the ball in places where he can like his effective
field goal. Percentage up all the way.
He's not taking the jumpers out, but he's shooting shoots better
than he did as a freshman, when his usage was so much lower.
You know, he's used really well as a shot blocker.
He was able to do a lot of stuff as motor gets higher.
And it seems like, you know, Mike Woodson was happy with the
progression that he made. He thought he was one of the
best guys in the country all year.
Even if it's numbers, didn't always necessarily show that.
And so I think that's something encouraging, where you get your
guy to come back and he has such a season, and he seems to have a
high esteem for the coach, brought him back.
So, that's the kind of thing. So, I don't want to spend so
much time on that. But just if you're asking or
some promising things, that's those are a couple of positive
things that caught my eye. Now, I think those are good
observations. I mean, one of the things about
the Archie Miller era, that was I guess trouble summon and
surprising to me, was it just felt like Like there were a lot
of instances where the team just didn't have the level of
coherence that it needed in order to push through and win
games in clutch situations down the stretch, particularly in, in
January and February. And they rarely got the chance
to really do much of those things in March.
And I think the thing about this season and Woodson that I find.
So particularly interesting is that this team exhibited, some
of those similar characteristics that previous IU teams had where
they did struggle. They had that big losing streak
in February, it looked like the season.
Had gone off the rails. There was something about the
way that this team was set up though by Woodson and the
coaching staff that brought them back together.
Got them in line just in time for the Big Ten tournament and
that ended up propelling to the NCAA tournament, which is we
know, they haven't been to and five years.
So, I do think there's some positives to look at there.
And look, I think not just Trace Jackson Davis, but also, you
know, bring it in Xavier Johnson and the way.
That he was able to integrate and kind of find himself, and
establish himself as a leader. The way that race Thompson,
like, not just continued his play from last year, but really
improved it in. A lot of ways there, do seem to
be some real positive aspects. Culturally coming out of this
eye. You program that that are a bit
of a difference from what we've seen in the past couple of
years. Yeah, it's true.
There's one thing. It was so you're just talking
about Trace Jackson Davis. Obviously.
Yeah, Xavier Johnson played really?
Well that last part of the Year, especially or like I think like
Woodson was Unapologetic where he was like, it's going to be
hard to play for me. But like by the end of the year,
you're seeing him come out and like Xavier Johnson.
Specifically put up 18 points a game regularly and he's at seven
assists just in terms of raw numbers counting stats.
Like, that's pretty good. The the Side piece that you
mentioning terms of like losing some games that they could have
one, maybe should have one throughout the season.
There's something in that we're not to get too much on this, but
this is kind of a meta point at the start of the year.
I was maybe maybe irrationally high on the team but I think
Mike Woodson was talking about is like I think you'll the goal
would be to win the Big Ten in terms of like generally what he
wants to do and I was sitting here like, yeah, these guys
could win the Big Ten in the Of it was kind of some of what we
saw. It's like Purdue was really
good, but they have trouble on defense and they've had a lot of
trouble Garden people. Wisconsin won the big tenants.
You're not going against Wisconsin, but a lot of things
that they had go right for them could have gone another way like
Indiana. Frankly, does I think the in the
coaches and players and say this, you go Indiana had two
games against Wisconsin, they could have one.
I don't know, who'd win the Big Ten, if not for that, but it
wouldn't have been them. Illinois is right there, you
know, and so, Are there a lot of things where he like, it may be
added up? It's like, you could have beaten
Ohio state that second time. You could have get those two
against Wisconsin, maybe things go different.
Iowa City, maybe not, but then there's that Purdue game.
You start, adding it up, the Northwestern thing, everything
that happened there, all that, that Syracuse game.
Where all those crazy things happen.
That's it. Don't forget trade Galloway,
getting knocked out by that dirty, play at the beginning of
the season. So there's a bunch of stuff.
We're like, frankly, this This is I think good news for IU
fans. Generally, is that I you fans
still for whatever reason, think we should win the Big Ten and I
think that's fair. It's that's the expectation.
That's the program. Like what's has not run away
from it. I think there's something maybe
encouraging that this year. A lot of things went bad that
shouldn't have gone that way, but if that team was able to I
think that's something that the players can look at and say, if
we had found a way to stick in there in the right times and
places we could have actually We won the Big Ten in the regular
season. We were good enough to do that.
It's not something for regret. It's something for the young
guys to come back and say we were right there.
We didn't kind of know what it looks like to be there.
We know there's some things to clean up but I think that to me
would be very promising. I think it's an interesting
point and you know, though it is interesting because you look at
the breadth of the Big Ten season for IU and most of the
games that they won. They won pretty decisively the
one exception I guess would be the Purdue game.
At home, which was certainly a close one.
But you know, you guys are the rest of those games that they
won. And, you know, they want, I
think every other game by at least five points and and it was
a series of games that to some degree.
Felt like I you kind of could have won but just they didn't
have the intangible elements or in some cases the tangible
elements of shot-making or playing consistently, good
defense. That kept them from that and I
do agree with you. I think there are some building
blocks to go off of. Of their, I guess the question
ends up being our the building. Like is it?
Okay, I you is closed and I just got to fix a few things or are
there hard caps and deficiencies with the way that the roster was
constructed. One of the things we talked
about a lot on the podcast this year was just how mismatched a
lot of the pieces seem to be particularly in moments where
you needed a shot to get hit or you needed a, you know, a good
defensive play to happen at a particular Moment In Time.
And certainly I think more, you know, you can only think of a
season where you're 21 and 14 and half of those plays got made
that you at least got to the NCAA tournament.
So there is that but it will be interesting as roster.
Turnover happens, whether this core ends up being able to
assimilate those new pieces and then also change the way that
they've been doing business so that they're able to elevate
their game even further than they were able to this year.
Yeah, in this is where so site. I've traditionally Galen in our
relationship. I've been more like on the
optimistic side, you might remember the text exchange, we
had where I tried to make the argument that Tom crean really
was setting up for like a Jim Calhoun style of like run at
Indiana. Obviously that did not happen.
So I I still remember our end-of-season podcast from 2011
where you argued quite convincingly in retrospect.
I think that IU was just unlucky that year as opposed to bad.
And I was not nearly as convinced you were certainly.
Right on that front. But yeah, I think of the overall
scheme of things, decree narrative necessarily turn out
the way that we hope but your are you arguing I guess at this
point the perhaps you're not as optimistic as you would be
otherwise realize how I put that out was more that was more
ambiguous. But this is this is just to say
that I've kind of nuanced and I think maybe come over I can now
come across in a way that's less.
Unambiguously optimistic. There are things that you over
the course of the year, I think. Have gone differently than I'm.
I don't know why they didn't go differently.
One thing that I had to kind of circled at the beginning of the
year was it'll be really interesting to see how it
tomorrow Bates does, from the beginning of the year, to the
end of the year. And I didn't know kind of what
the plan was going to be there. Now.
There are three, you know, he was going to be kind of in that
group of guys. Like, if it's a side thing,
there are a lot of thoughts here, but besides Parker, Stuart
Miller cop and Xavier Johnson, I think everybody hit.
Like worse than 30 percent from three, who took a like a pretty
good volume of them into our baits is one of the guys
shooting threes and I thought at the end of the year, maybe he'll
be somebody. You can count on to get the ball
to outside. Who can score from the
three-point line, who can score kind of in that.
Mid-range you can go to the basket and we didn't see that
and I'm not sure if that's whether it because a lot of the
time coach woods and wanted to say we're going to play the,
we're going to play the senior guys in a lot of ways that made
sense because they were the guys who are hitting the shots and
especially at the end. Of the year, you know, you have
to maybe hope that the older guys are going to be more ready
than the Freshman but I for whatever reason we just didn't
see him go to where I was hoping that he'd go like it.
We even saw it like that. The the second Big Ten
Championship that Tom crean one at the end of the year.
You're seeing like Joann Morgan, canning threes and OG and Adobe
doing stuff and I was hoping that we'd see that and maybe we
saw some glimpses of it late, but I just I don't I didn't see
as much of it as I thought we would.
And so I think there's a big kind of question.
It's like is tomorrow Bates going to come back and how good
is he going to be next year? I think that's a good question
and that will be a big kind of I think indicator for how next
year ago still be one of those guys who has a lot to say about
that. There's a few players like that.
I think the Bates is a good example and it's hard to tell.
I feed a to some degree and I've talked about this with IU
basketball a lot. It's been such Patchwork roster
wise every year really since the the last time we talk regularly
about this that people to some degree have gotten impatient
with players developing and for every race Thompson who started
off very slow and then has developed into a really big
contributor. You've had a player like say a
Stanford Robinson who was there for a couple of years.
Never really got into the swing of things ended up transferring
and then it's like well, we're starting this whole process over
again, you know, it did feel like Tamar Bates in Tournaments.
This year was starting to get a little bit better.
Feel. He actually ended up shooting at
29.8% from three for the season. So he's right at that kind of
Mendoza Line that you mentioned. He wasn't very good on offense
this year. He, you know, but he also I
think was starting to get it a little bit at the very end of
the year. And that that is a cause for
some optimism because I think, you know, that's the type of
player who's got both the inherent talent and the athletic
skill. That IU is going to need to
compete with these teams that we are seeing do well in March
Madness, you know, you look at the the Iowa State's and the
Miami's and the North Carolina's and they know these are not
teams that are winning their conference championships, but
they have this mix of athleticism and defense and a
little bit of shot-making, that's allowed them to have
success. And that might be what Indiana
has to do until they get their talent level ratcheted up to the
degree where they can compete consistently with the Michigan
State's. Or the Wisconsin's or the teams
at that level and other conferences.
Yeah, I mean this is where and so I think I am.
I'm bullish on the style of play and I'm optimistic about how
they're going to be able to fit everything together.
I don't think it's too early to say what happens next year.
In terms of just like as a selfish way, is a basketball
fan. I was really thrilled to see how
Xavier Johnson and Trace Jackson Davis played together at the end
of the year. And I there's a piece of me that
hopes like I don't know what the funny thing is.
I don't know in terms of how bent Trace Jackson, Davis is
ongoing professional. It would be a lot of fun to see
him. Come back and score two thousand
points past Mike Woodson up, you can get the get the
trash-talking if the season goes, well next year.
He could pass him on the scoring list, but also like the fact
that he and Xavier Johnson playing together the way they
did. And, you know, whether maybe
raise Thompson stays maybe he goes somewhere, maybe Jordan
Geronimo. UPS in with that for place,
that's to me, that's really interesting because if you see
that happen, I think that this was all started by saying it's
like, oh can they compete with people at the top of the
conference? Like they did this year?
And I mean, frankly, I think there are cases that, you know,
they do a couple things different and like, if they you
have this team, you have everybody go back and play again
with this roster. I think, you know, you play
another season. I think they could win the Big
Ten with this group with the other groups, come back and the
Big Ten is going to A little thin next year.
Yeah, in terms of like, we're not the Indiana's up, the only
group that's losing a lot of people.
It's pretty thin in terms of people outside Purdue.
And so I think there's something to me, maybe if you lose, you
know, if you lose. Trace Jackson, Davis.
It. That's a lot of shots.
It's a lot of like am. He's a really good player both
on offense and defense. I don't know how you replace
that. But at the same time they're
going to guard the crap out of the ball.
They're going to stop you from putting that, you know,
everybody who's coming. Is pretty good on defense, he's
going to play right? And they were one of the best
defenses in the country this year and I think they're only
going to get better with more time with Woodson and then five
and the staff. It's really interesting.
I mean, I've said all season, how pleased?
I am that Indiana has managed to build an identity around
defense. Now, the defense did, I mean,
the end of season Fall Off from a statistical perspective, the
Iowa game in the st. Mary's game, really?
Kind of took them out of the top 20 and Ken Palm defense, but
still they were a top 20, Ken Palm defense.
They were one of the best defenses in the country.
I do have some questions about the offense and and I do wonder
you know as much as we talk this year coming in about hey, if
Indiana could just improve by 10 or 15 spots on offense and get
the same level of defensive contribution, there going to be
a team that like you said could challenge for a Big Ten title or
at least a double by in the Big Ten Tournament.
They almost went Opposite direction.
The shooting wasn't quite there. They never really looked that
settled on offense. So many things to you know,
travel directly through Trace Jackson Davis and when that
didn't work, when team started doubling or tripling him in the
post, Indiana really struggled to find Alternatives and tell
Xavier Johnson started, just driving to the bucket every
single time, but I don't know how sustainable that is, as your
B option on offense, if you're a option isn't working.
So I do believe that there's a good Good chance.
This Indiana team is going to be able to put together a lot more
wrinkles on offense and diversify a bit more.
I wonder if that's going to be possible with Trace Jackson
Davis coming back. If he does come back and like
you said, it's we're still kind of up in the air to see what
happens with that. Unless Trace, Jackson Davis,
diversifies his own offensive game.
And I guess maybe that's the one thing I was the most
disappointed about in that it felt like the rhetoric coming in
from the offseason last year. Was it Trace was going to be
shooting a lot more mid-range. Shots.
He was going to be stepping out a bit more, trying to stretch
the defense and really the whole season was basically just him
sitting in the paint putting up shots.
I am curious to see if that game part of his game can be worked
on if he does come back and if not what the offense turns into,
if he doesn't, if he's not out there.
I'm curious on this. I'll take this, I'll toss it
right back to you. The thing that I heard Mike
Woodson say, in one of the conference's at the end of the
year was he's like we wanted to. I like, I like how he's, I like
how he talks. He's a guy.
He's from, he's what to school at Broad Ripple, which is not
too far from where I grew up. So I Love Brought Broad River,
High School's not open anymore. But Mike Woodson went there.
And so so representing, it's great.
But he's talking at the end of the years.
Like I wanted Xavier Johnson to be doing this all year, but he
just wasn't there yet, but he's come a long.
And, so, in terms of what the point guard positions capable of
doing where they're running a lot more pick-and-roll, and
they're putting him in space more, both him entries Jackson,
Davis, that to me, it looked like it changed the way, they
were running the offense and A lot of that looks different from
the stuff. We saw a year.
And so, you know, not not putting blame on anybody.
It's like Xavier Johnson's. Trying to learn how to play
point guard for Mike. Woodson.
Mike Woodson. Keep saying I'm not the easiest
guy to do that for but when you get it you get it and it starts
to look good. And then yeah, so that's the one
thing that if it is the case where he's going to be back to
the basket, A lot of the time, like he was, I don't think
you're going to see so much, but the offense that I saw at the
end of the year for the most part, look different.
There's one other thing that I think is relevant here.
I wonder if so, like we'll see what happens with Parker Stewart
and Miller cop. Parker Stewart went through it.
Right? The senior night stuff.
Correct? I don't know a cop did but I
think I think that everybody involved would have hoped that
Miller cops year had looked better than it did different
than it did because he played hard he did what they wanted
them to do on the floor. He was more of an authentic
threat. This was one thing, like people
were like, why don't we see more of this, or that, or the other
person? It's like, we literally just
like that. We just said there were three
guys who thought the shot better than thirty percent on the year,
and you need to space the floor. And so it made sense to me why
Miller copies out there, but I don't think he shot as well as
he wanted to, and especially not inside the three-point.
He didn't do anything else besides the three inside the
three-point line. And so, I think that's something
where, like, if he is coming back, that's something where he
can work on a lot of that. And you'd have to see him look
more. Like he did his second to last
year at Northwestern where he shot probably closer to 40%.
And from both 3M to. If you do that, if Miller cop
this year, I think average is like nine, nine or ten points a
game shoots you hits, you know five more of those threes.
I think you're looking at some of the different discussion
better from three and a lot better from to.
I think that's that sort of stuff.
At least. They do you think that would,
would that fit the bill more, pick-and-roll?
More dependable, three-point threat, and you have a little
more flexibility in a guy like say, after Animo.
I was back in race Thompson does not, I don't know what that
looks like. I it's possible.
I mean, look losing Trace, Jackson Davis offensively.
That's a lot of points that's off the table, but it doesn't
mean. It doesn't mean you're not
going, it's not going to be, does me not going to score.
It just means that you have to find other ways to score and I
am curious. There's two scenarios there.
If Trace Jackson Davis does come back, or if race Thompson comes
back and fills the trace Jackson Davis role as a Artur, you still
need perimeter shooters that can pull the defense off of the
post. And I think with Jordan Geronimo
showed a pretty Deft Touch from outside in the tail portion of
this season, which surprised me, I mean, Jordan Geronimo finished
31 percent from three, only shot at 29 times, but you know, you
figure over the course of the last five games that Indiana
played, he was responsible for three 3-pointers.
All of which were really critical in those individual
games and you don't want a guy like that or a guy like race
Thompson necessarily having to live out there because they're
going to be a lot more effective from about 10 feet in.
That's where you have to have people that can shoot and open
up the floor. And so, regardless of who's in
the post, I think for a IU to run a modern offense, which I
think Mike Woodson ultimately wants to run.
He coached in the NBA, he's used to dealing with higher level
athletes who can make decisions on the court and more
importantly, hit the shots that they They have when they're
open, there's got to be more efficient.
Efficient and effective scoring from distance.
It can't all just be the point guard, you know trying to get
into into two man games with whoever's playing in the post at
the time and I don't know what the answer is on that.
I mean, it'll be interesting with some of the recruits
Indiana's got coming in and certainly they can go back to
the transfer portal again, but that has to be a priority
because overall, on the season, this Indiana team finished up
shooting. Thirty-three point three percent
from three which granted that was a big improvement over what
they've shot from three, the last five years.
I mean, you have to go back to 2017 to find a season where they
were above 32 percent from three, but it still wasn't
particularly good. And I think you also have to
look at the free throw shooting percentages as well for a team.
That was so focused on post play to only shoot, you know, what
were they? Sent on the year that was 235th
in the country, you know, so to me those things, really go
hand-in-hand. You either have to shoot better
from outside or you got to hit your free throws and ideally
you're doing both. So what Indiana?
What Mike Woodson decide to do to try to address.
That is going to be interesting because I just don't know at
this point. If they've got the Personnel on
the roster who will be able to improve their shooting to the
degree that they would need to to have the kind of outcomes
that were hoping to see. Offensive end.
Yeah, that's hard to say and the neat thing, the thing that I've
come to love more and more about college basketball.
The longer I've been out of school is it is a neat thing and
this is on board with what coach would someone say when he came
in and said, I want to help these young men become the guys
who were trying to set him up, to be to a tournament to men.
And there's something neat about that.
Where I think like the the most edifying example, I can think of
is the transformation that so my college classmate, who Victor
Oladipo, what did he do? Is freshman year.
What are you do? Is sophomore year.
What did he do? His junior year, his junior year
Galen, he came back and he was hitting, Mike, 45 percent free.
Yeah. It's over.
Victor Oladipo is crossing over and dunking on you and then he's
hitting four out of every ten. Threes.
He shoots then, that's really good.
I mean, I think you're under, I think you're underselling this
Victor, Oladipo. His freshman year was 84 26.3,
which was 30.8% his sophomore year.
He was 10 for 14. E8, which was 20.8%, and then
his last year at IU. He was 3468 44 percent and that
was on top of shooting, 64% from to.
So now, Victor Oladipo also is a singular talent, but that was a
lot of hard work. That was a lot of practice and
that was a lot of unlocking of skill sets.
So I certainly understand where you're coming from with that.
Yes, ultra, try to disambiguate my point which is to say that
singularly talented. He was not a singular.
Really talented. Three-point shooter.
And that like literally like 10 games in, he's still taking and
draining these threes. I'm like if he's going to be
shooting these, we're going to be really good.
So like all these guys and that's where it's like the young
guys who are on this team. And that's where like, Trey
Galloway and Anthony Lee. Looks like they haven't shot as
well, as they thought they would maybe is, people maybe thought
they would? It's like Victor Oladipo came
back. I don't know.
I don't know how they did that. I'm not.
So you maybe talk to Tony and Ron and figure out how do we get
in? Anthony Leo and Trey Galloway
the shots to get them at 45% from three, but I'll tell you
what Yogi, if they shoot you if they make the kind of
improvement percentage-wise the Victor Oladipo made from his
sophomore, junior year just in terms of shooting the three,
which he was not particularly good at it.
First. We're going to be in really good
shape and that's something we're college guys who want to play
really good basketball, which I know they all want to do.
That's a good place to look and figure out how to do that.
I think instead of asking Tony add Rania myself.
I think the plan is To have you and him on the same podcast next
time. So yeah, Tony.
And I, we still send each other Christmas cards.
That's a fun thing. There we go.
I'm going to, I'm going to make this happen.
That'll be our next, Our Deck stacked.
Look. I will say this.
I think a lot of the points you're making here.
We're good. I think there is a lot of room
for optimism for this iut, moving forward.
And particularly. If you are of the opinion that
this season was a net success, which it feels like most people
are of that opinion. I know.
I I certainly am, you know, certainly there's things you can
look at and say could have gone better here.
Could have gone better there but overall 21 and 14.
Making the NCAA tournament from where this program has been is a
pretty good accomplishment. So we will just have to see how
things go. And I think the big question
right now and this is something I think we'll save for the next
podcast is just what exactly happens with this roster.
Because as you mentioned, we're not sure about Trace Jackson,
Davis, we're not really sure about race Thompson.
There's there seems to be transfers every year.
That we don't expect and then you've also got the potential of
new players coming in that are transferring from other schools.
Including as we saw today, the notification that Jalen Hurd
chiffino's teammate at Mount Verde Academy has decommitted
from Florida, which means he's going to land somewhere.
So, there's a lot of different possibilities.
We'll keep an eye on that as we go along, but we will evaluate
these things as we move forward. And I think we'll continue to
talk about them because this is what Essentially March and April
and early may have become with college basketball.
It's almost like a roulette wheel is spinning and we got to
analyze what spot the ball is going to fall on at this stage
because we just don't have a lot of ideas at this point.
We're not going to know until we actually see the tweets.
See the announcements about who's going to be her and who's
not that's the fun thing. We're not going to really.
So in terms of like being able to step away used to be like you
could jump right in and like start analyzing it and I've
yourself crazy for like 2 months.
It's like good news for, at least, folks, like, kind of, in
my position. It's like, yeah, I really enjoy
following the season but you really it's like Easter's
coming. I have to spend more time on
that. And, you know, I don't really
have to worry about missing very much because some of its just
figuring out who's gonna, who's still going to be here.
How are they going to make those decisions?
So, I'm really looking forward to guys.
Got, you get the College semester finished figure out
what guys want to do and then come summer, sir.
Only will have much more of a concrete idea of what's coming,
next. We will continue the
conversations and it is an honor and a pleasure to have you back
on the podcast. We're looking forward to
chatting with you about this stuff as we move forward, honor
and a pleasure to be back. You know, thanks for having me
Father, James Pierce joining us here on Crimson cast.
Thanks to all you folks for listening in.
We will be back with more podcasting in the near future.
So be sure to keep it tuned in. Subscribe, iTunes, Spotify,
whatever. Follow us on Twitter?
Would love to Have you in the fold for Father, James Pierce?
I'm Gail and klaviyo. Thanks for joining us.
Folks will catch you on the flip side.
Bring back the Bison. So long, everybody.