College Basketball Season 2024-2025

[Xville]

I sent this to some X buddies yesterday.... essentially exactly what I was saying. 4-5 new players every year playing pivotal roles is not a recipe for success. AND we will be right back there next year with Free, Maddox, Hugely, Hunter, McKnight and likely Swain all gone. 3 starters and all guys playing significant minutes. Now, some of that is caused by the current NIL situation (losing Claude)......

Not that I’m excited about it at this point but hugley has a year left, and Maddox isn’t a loss at all. I’m guessing green is gone. He’s not a be player. Seems like a great guy, but he’s just way too one dimensional.

Regardless, we need to get back to having legit post players. Give a kid a couple million, I don’t care. There are a million guards, and I really don’t think we need to be spending much on them. We need legit guys in the post. I know traore was the plan but we need even better than him if X is to get where we want them to go.

If we can’t afford it, whatever. That’s fine. Someone just tell me so I don’t have expectations of ever getting to a final four.

I still can’t believe people are shelling out a significant amount of money to college players just to make the tournament. What’s crazy world

[bjf123]

If we can’t afford it, whatever. That’s fine. Someone just tell me so I don’t have expectations of ever getting to a final four.

I still can’t believe people are shelling out a significant amount of money to college players just to make the tournament. What’s crazy world

Just need everyone to contribute to The Final 2 Percent!


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[Xville]

Just need everyone to contribute to The Final 2 Percent!


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Speaking of, Xavier has already fallen way behind on this venture. I have been to several college stadiums where there is a tip like function for nil for anything you purchase. I haven’t seen that at X. Schools are already talking about adding the service charge for tickets. I’ve seen nothing from
X about this. Unless there is something I don’t know, our collective is already falling behind.

Frankly, I don’t care. I think paying college kids directly is silly, but if it’s the price
Of admission or an added service charge for concession/merchandise I’ll do it, because I’m going to go to the games and buy stuff anyways. I think a lot of nil is a complete waste of
Money. How much we paying our bench outside of hunter? Might as well have lit the money on fire

[drudy23]

Regardless, we need to get back to having legit post players.

Said this in another thread - this x a million

Guards are a dime a dozen - let's prioritize this for once, or twice, or 3 times.

[MHettel]

Not that I’m excited about it at this point but hugley has a year left, and Maddox isn’t a loss at all. I’m guessing green is gone. He’s not a be player. Seems like a great guy, but he’s just way too one dimensional.

Regardless, we need to get back to having legit post players. Give a kid a couple million, I don’t care. There are a million guards, and I really don’t think we need to be spending much on them. We need legit guys in the post. I know traore was the plan but we need even better than him if X is to get where we want them to go.

If we can’t afford it, whatever. That’s fine. Someone just tell me so I don’t have expectations of ever getting to a final four.

I still can’t believe people are shelling out a significant amount of money to college players just to make the tournament. What’s crazy world

I said before they left that I wouldnt mind keeping either Abou, Nzeh or Ciani in the backup big man role. not ALL of them. But one of them would have been great. I kind of prefer Abou in a limited role where he can just go in and chop wood for 16 minutes a game. Ciani is having a good season at UIC, which is probably a better "level" for him, but I did think he could grow into a bench contributor. Nzeh is raw but has that athleticism needed in the BE.

Anyway, Hugley has certainly disappointed. Hes had an up-and-down career thus far, but his commitment to transform his body does bode well in the sense that he is obviously doing everything the staff has asked of him. But hes not been effective...even against the lower level teams. Maybe he needs to be 280 and play a really limited role (in terms of minutes at our pace).

The Bench has been a disaster, frankly.

Our stating lineup is small. Free at the 5 is small. Swain is a small 4. Foster a small 3. Conwell is just about average as a 2, and same for McKnight as a PG. I wonder if we need to shake up the lineup, and squeeze the rotation. As much as I liked the deep roster, some of these guys just have played their way out of the rotation.

I'd consider STARTING Hugley and moving Free to the 4. Hear me out. Sometimes these guys play 3-4 minute spurts and can never get going. They are eager to contribute and that leads to forced shots or trying to "do too much". lets let Hugley start and relax a little out there. Let the game come to him. i know its counter intuitive based on how hes played, but the whole idea is to change the situation so he improves his play. i dont want more minutes of what hes been doing. I want the guy that posted big numbers at Pitt as a soph.

Now, swing Swain to the 3. Foster to the bench. Again, hear me out. Foster is playing 24 minutes a game as a starter. I can still find 24 minutes for him coming off the bench. he becomes the backup 2/3 spelling both Conwell and Swain. Conwell might play a little PG when McKnight comes out.

Right now, Green is getting 12 min, Hunter 19, Maddux 15. Sorry, but I'm cutting that back to 30 minutes TOTAL for those guys and if it results in one of them getting zero, then I guess thats how it goes. Frankly each of those guys have played their way out of the rotation. I would think Hunter might be the guy that stays in the rotation, just due to the size he brings. green feels like the odd man out. So these changes free up 16 minutes that can be redistributed to others.

Like I said I'd try to get Hugley up to about 22 a game (from his current 12.6). That leaves 7 additional minutes that can go to Swain and Foster (26 & 24 currently). These changes definitely give us alot more size. Instead of being small in 3 of the 5 positions, were actually either average or a little above average (at the 3 with Swain).

i really don't see what we have to lose by tinkering with the lineup. Several BE teams will look alot more like Michigan does, with size an athleticism through the roster. if we played Michigan 10 times, they would beat us 8 times.

We need to see if we can get bigger. If Hugley cant help and doesnt make a difference after a few games, then pivot to some other answer.

Despite the record, the Michigan game was a real eye opener and dampens my outlook considerably on what this team can accomplish.

[drudy23]

The problem with Hugley playing more is his inability to guard which puts him in immediate foul trouble.

I think the rotations need to shrink, or at least the minutes. At the under 16 timeout, we typically go mostly 2nd team - are these guys really tired after 4 minutes of play? Keep the starters in longer together, and use your subs when they're tired, not just for some set rotation.

I have no doubt Conwell and McKnight can both play 35+ minutes. Probably Free too, assuming he's not in foul trouble.

We typically have a noticeable change in efficiency and comfort when that second rotation comes in.

[Xville]

Would I like hugley to play the 5 to help put swain and free in the correct positions? Yes. I have said as much and said that is probably what Sean envisions as well. The problem is that right now hugley is complete garbage, and he may be the whole year. Maybe next year he gets back to what he was three years ago, but right now he’s not even useful as a sub. I hope things change drastically and the light turns on by Jan 1, but that’s hard to see right now. It would be the best thing for the team and there wouldn’t be the glaring weakness x has right now.

[paulxu]

When we think about these various rotation/minutes schemes, I'm struck by remembering that Miller has probably tried them all in practice.
Which doesn't really bode well for the remainder of the year...unless natural growth takes over in the player himself.

[MHettel]

When we think about these various rotation/minutes schemes, I'm struck by remembering that Miller has probably tried them all in practice.
Which doesn't really bode well for the remainder of the year...unless natural growth takes over in the player himself.

Yeah. But practice against who? 5 on 5 game situations? I get that those reps can be useful, but we do t have enough bigs to even DO a 5 on 5.

I don’t know if it’s an answer or not. But doing nothing is for sure not gonna make us better.

I know it’s just one loss. But it revealed some huge holes.

Can we make the dance? Yeah, maybe. Probably.

Can we make a run? Not if our opponents have access to that game tape.

[Xville]

Yeah. But practice against who? 5 on 5 game situations? I get that those reps can be useful, but we do t have enough bigs to even DO a 5 on 5.

I don’t know if it’s an answer or not. But doing nothing is for sure not gonna make us better.

I know it’s just one loss. But it revealed some huge holes.

Can we make the dance? Yeah, maybe. Probably.

Can we make a run? Not if our opponents have access to that game tape.

One thing you mentioned reminded me of something miller said either in a podcast or press conference. Paraphrasing here, but with traore going down it not only obviously effed lassina, but it effed hugley’s development. He said during summer/early fall hugley was motivated as hell because he was having to battle traore every single day and that motivated the hell out of him. I think with traore going down, it stunted his growth. I mean I love free and hunter for what they have done, but they aren’t going to make hugley better at what he does.

You hate to say this because you never want to wish for anyone to get injured but traore was literally the worst one to get hurt in terms of success and where this team could go this year. You could say Dayvion and or free but I still think traore was more important