I would be utterly shocked if we rolled into Fall 2024 with a front court consisting of a stretch 4, a D2 transfer and a true freshman. Unless we're really banking on Hadaway being a "front court" guy.

Guys are still jumping into the portal left and right.

Couldn't Searls play stretch 4 forward? He stats are decent on 3-point shooting.

Boals is probably cautious to not bring in a bust when the next Ali Ali is out there. I'm pretty picky about basketball players and Searls doesn't worry me.

We haven't even ended the season yet. Still way early in the portal process. Lots of guys still entering the portal each day. Including our own Ike Cornish today.

Plenty of time to scout and contact guys and figure out what needs and fits for next year.

It went the way of black and white TV, drive in movies, car hops and manners.

Last time we had a PG from Chicago it worked out pretty well.

https://www.verbalcommits.com/players/kaiden-space

Had a host of mid major offers including the MAC out of high school. Didn't see much time this year under Geno on a team that had 6 seniors.

Sometimes a school does revert back to a player's h.s. stats to decide on.

Lee Dort had pretty much no college stats. Injured mostly his 1st season and injured and then suspended the 2nd. He headed to Cal.

If some school is decimated critically by portal defections and graduation, they might take a flier on Cornish with their last remaining schollie. Yes, even a power conference team. But that is far from a guarantee with all the 4 points and 2 rebounds per game guys in the portal right now. There's like a zillion of them.

Why are you so sure this was Cornish's decision?

For some reason people look at the portal and talk about how players make the decision to enter. Coaches can basically force their hand. To your point, there are a zillion 4 point, 2 rebound guys. You think they all are in the portal because they're naive and don't know their value? Or do you think a bunch of them are in there because their coach told them their value and they're hoping to catch on somewhere in a last ditch effort?

Not saying it's the case that Boals forced him out, just saying it happens and the narrative that players end up in the portal on their own volition 100% of the time's not accurate.

No idea how Cornish ended up there, but think that it's very clear that Boals and the staff didn't have any confidence in Cornish.

Not hurting the roster, not helping it, either. Like I said before, getting a crack at replacing Cornish is basically all upside. His minutes can easily be absorbed next year by AJB, Hadaway, and James. And you'd hope that Burris/Nicol might also be there. High probability you're getting better production in those 10 minutes, and so even if you only have a 5% chance of hitting on a better replacement in the portal, it's worth the shot.

Not hurting the roster, not helping it, either. Like I said before, getting a crack at replacing Cornish is basically all upside. His minutes can easily be absorbed next year by AJB, Hadaway, and James. And you'd hope that Burris/Nicol might also be there. High probability you're getting better production in those 10 minutes, and so even if you only have a 5% chance of hitting on a better replacement in the portal, it's worth the shot.
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This to me is wait and see/be careful what you wish for. Our staff couldn't even find a warm body above 6'5 at any level last cycle for our last remaining schollie. Even if just for a year and that was an absolute need.

Ike was defensive liability and needs to add weight. However, his above the break (sweet spot) 3PT % was third on the team to only Miles and Sheldon at 42%.
From 2/10 on if he played 12 or more minutes, his average jumped up to 7ppg.

Are we really convinced that he can't help as a role player moving forward with some defensive improvement? We've been through two portal cycles so far and our best gets have been Jaylin and Shereef, even they have their flaws.

I respect how you feel in regards to Cornish, but I'm just not convinced it's going to be that easy to find a replacement (role/bench player) with more upside because...well, it just hasn't been for us.

Now that we may have three potential openings to fill, who are we seriously considering? Portal season is about half over so I doubt there will be more players jumping in the last few weeks. Is there a potential list of players that Boals is looking at?

I don't think you can honestly claim Cornish had no value due to his defensive liabilities and in the same breath say his minutes will be easily replaced by AJ Brown and Elmore James who have both been somewhere between bad and completely awful on the defensive end.

They're both better on the offensive side, sure. But Ike had potential and was showing signs of improvement there too.

I'm not following. Would you rather Cornish be on the floor than either AJB or EJ4?

In the biggest game of our season -- a game where Akron's length was killing us -- Cornish played 0 minutes. I didn't make that choice, Boals did. Both AJB and EJ4 played (injured, no less) more than Cornish throughout the season when all were available.

If you think Cornish's minutes can't be replaced by the two of them, you've got much bigger fish to fry regarding Boals' rotation choices.