If there is going to be a divorce in this relationship, let Ayden Evans give up on being here, not us giving up on keeping him. I know, I know. What has he done? Not much. But if you go through the history of big men in the MAC, there's a strong tradition of post players taking two to three years to develop. I know, I know. We'd only probably get one big year out of them. But that year quite often turns out to be dominant. The standout post player is so hard to find (and now hard to keep) in the MAC. Because of this, I've always been in favor giving them time if they have talent that isn't translating to the court as of yet. Usually they need to get bigger, stronger, grow into their bodies, so to speak, and then their skill set may finally show.

There's a true story I used to tell here on Long Island (NY) about a high school game I covered between two pretty good teams. Oyster Bay had 6-6 Ken Labanowski, the county's leading scorer; Locust Valley had 6-9 Frank Brickowski, who was still trying to find his way. Labanowski ate Brick alive. I remember when I approached Brickowski in the losing team's locker room, he had tears in his eyes. He was concerned I was gonna kill him in the paper. I assured him I didn't do that to high school kids. Labanowski makes first-team all-Long Island, then goes on to play four years as a starter, not a star, at Marshall. I don't think Brickowski even made all-county, so we were surprised when Penn State gave him a scholarship. He's a bench player at Penn State his first two seasons, then the light bulb went on, it kicked in for him. Brickowski has two pretty good seasons to finish his college career, then eventually found his way into the NBA. He plays 12 seasons, mainly with San Antonio and Milwaukee, and had three seasons scoring at least 15.0 per game, finishing with a 10.0 career scoring average.

I'm not saying this will happen for Evans. What I am saying is a lot of big guys figure it out later during their college tenure and when they do, if they have skills, they're gonna make some people pay...

Boals is going into a contract year coming off of a .500 and losing record. I don’t know that he can afford to stash Evans for another year without guaranteed production which seems unlikely at this point.

I’ll be shocked if Evans is a Bobcat next fall.

What evidence do we have that Boals is capable of developing bigs?

We have to rebuild a huge portion of the production of a completely mediocre team. We need opportunities (i.e. roster spots) to improve. Evans had his opportunity with the program, and he couldn't contribute.

Has he proven adept at developing any type of player?

+1,000,000

Will be shocked if Evans isn’t in the portal this time next week after individual/coach end of season meetings.

Evans has already been passed by Kuany in terms of development, and was essentially 5th on this year's depth chart of big men at the 4/5 spots. In this day and age, your program can't afford to sit around and wait for the light bulb to turn on for a player.

Unfortunately, Evans isn't skilled. His hands are bad, his shooting's bad, and he can't rebound his position.

Perhaps that's why he's developing more off-the-court skills than basketball skills. Priorities!

Good question, Alan. I've always gotten the point of view from both the winning and losing team from high school to the pros (In hoops, I was blessed to have covered the Lakers' run with Magic, Celtics with Bird, Rockets with Olajuwon, Pistons with Isiah, Bulls with MJ; the NCAA title game in Denver when Larry Johnson-led UNLV ran Duke out of Nichols Arena by halftime). And it all started as a Postie back in 1973-75!!!

AE is a bust, plain and simple.
He hasn't shown us any upside.
Most of the time he seems lost.
He didn't even get PT when we played some cream puffs.
Cut bait and move on.




GO BOBCATS

On a smaller scale, Sam Towns.

Towns averaged 12/7 this season even though he is listed at 185 pounds by ESPN.

Maybe BGSU has a strength & conditioning coach to where even a skinny guy has some strength and conditioning working in his favor.