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Houston Heartbreak vs Duke, but Still An Incredible 5th Straight Sweet 16
95 Plays1 year ago
The Cougars finish the season 32-5, after a heartbreaker in terms of how things ended. We started fast in the Sweet 16 game, Duke had a "deer in the headlights" look to them, and the refs were letting the teams play. But a devastating game-ending ankle injury to Shead at the 6:50 mark of the 1st half (when we led 16-10), proved pivotal in allowing Duke to eek out a 54-51 win to end the Cougars’ season.
So we'll begin this final in-season episode summarizing the Duke game & the impact of Shead’s injury, forecast how the team looks heading into next season & what we should look for in the Transfer Portal as the gates are already open, and then provide a brief forecast of how we believe the Final 4 will play out.
- No Conference for Old Men is available for free via Spotify / Apple Podcast / SoundCloud & the GoCoogs.com website; we're also available via the Republic of Football Podcast feed from the folks at Dave Campbell's Texas Football as their only basketball-centric offering
- Intro / Exit music: Ground Zero provided by FreeBeats.io
- Please follow us on https://gocoogs.com/old-men/
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Transcript
00:00:05
Speaker
Welcome,
Introduction to No Conference for Old Men
00:00:06
Speaker
folks, to the 24th episode of No Conference for Old Men, the podcast where three old guys are talking Houston Cougars basketball, with a bit of Big 12 coverage added in it as well, and proud members of the Goku's.com network, the undisputed number one Houston Cougars content provider.
Houston Cougars' Season Recap
00:00:23
Speaker
Our Houston Cougars, unfortunately, end their season in the Sweet 16 and end up at 32 and five for the year. A huge achievement making the Sweet 16 for the fifth straight year, but a heartbreaker in terms of how things ended.
00:00:38
Speaker
We started fast, Duke had a deer in the headlights look to them, and the roughs were letting the kids play. But a devastating game-ending ankle injury to shed at the 650 mark in the first half, when we led 16-10, proved pivotal in allowing Duke to eke out a 54-51 win to end the Cougar season.
Impact of Jamal Shed's Injury
00:01:00
Speaker
And again, all three of us are back with Tom Lydiak, former coach, Bill Walker, former player, and myself, Steve Chang, analytics guy for this episode. So we'll begin by summarizing the Duke game and the impact of Shed's injury, forecast how the team looks heading into next season, and what we should really look for in the transfer portal as the gates are already open. Then maybe a brief forecast of how we believe the Final Four will play out to end the podcast.
00:01:29
Speaker
OK, so let's get into it, guys. We're cruising along versus Duke, and then Shedd turns his ankle, making a drive to the hoop at the 650 mark of the first half, which completely flipped the game 180 degrees. What are your thoughts after having a bit of time to reflect on the loss and the impact of Shedd's injury? Tom, you want to kick us off with your coach's thoughts? Sure.
00:01:53
Speaker
Not a whole lot to say you can probably sum up the Duke game in two words and that's sheds injury. See if you just mentioned, it was like the 650 mark. I believe we were up 16 to 10 when Jamal went down with the injury. And, and it's, it's funny that when they were showing the replay, I was looking at his left ankle, that thing turned to when.
00:02:14
Speaker
You know, he went up for the shot, but before shed went out, Duke had a tough time scoring, made almost 13 minutes of game time being played and Duke had 10 points. And Jamal was, even though his, I think they said he went like one for five, whatever.
00:02:30
Speaker
You're not just losing a starter, he's consensus all-American. A lot of people, me included, think he's the best point guard, U of H history. And if you look at every squad around the country, you can't compare any squad with losing like a Jamal shed. I think Kelvin mentioned that it would be like losing to all Americans for other teams, but you just can't, you know, analytics, metrics, whatever, they can't just put a
00:02:59
Speaker
a number or whatever, it's hard to put in perspective how much Jamal means because he's also the leader and that doesn't show up, you know, like an analytics, but he gets other guys shots.
Game Analysis and Player Perspectives
00:03:09
Speaker
He gets LJ shots. He gets some annual shots. He gets the job VA shots, alley oops and dunks. When he goes out, pretty much it for us as far as trying to score.
00:03:22
Speaker
Having said all that, and then you throw in the injuries to Terrence, and then you throw into the injury to Jojo. Having said all that, we had a chance to tie the game at the end. There's no other team in the country, just like the A&M game. You know, in the A&M game, there was no other team in the country that would have won that game in overtime like we did. And also the same thing about the Duke game. You got to remember Duke starts all five of their starters or five stars coming out of high school. And you look at that team we had on the floor.
00:03:52
Speaker
and how Kelvin was able to keep it to like a one possession game is just incredible. Yeah, it was disappointing that we lost, but it may be damn proud that I'm a University of Houston basketball fan. I think everybody should probably feel the same way. There's certain things you can't control. You know, you can't control officiating, you can't control injuries, and it just sucks that our season was cut short.
00:04:22
Speaker
due to some of these injuries. But if you look back and objectively at the season, incredible season, like you said, Steve, 32 and five made the sweet 16, I think five times in a row and then came within three point shot of tying it up and sending the game versus Duke into overtime. So, uh, that's pretty much my thoughts on it. You know, woke up Saturday, very, very, very bond, but it's life and you move on and.
00:04:50
Speaker
But just damn proud of everybody in the program. Completely agree. How about you, Bill, from a player's perspective?
00:04:57
Speaker
Well, and I kind of mentioned this to you guys via text earlier. I typically bring up statistics, you know, who played well, who maybe didn't, and virtually every time why we won. Instead, having been at the game, having run into people afterwards, and of course seeing some of the posts and everything, I think this time what I'd prefer to do is just complain. Yeah.
00:05:27
Speaker
Yeah, look, we came out and we took advantage of what I said was our advantage, being more physical inside, being more aggressive inside. You know, Roberts and Francis scored eight immediate points. Shed not only got them the ball, but I mean, Shed was so good when he was in there, he dominated McCain. McCain committed
00:05:53
Speaker
Four turnovers for the game and shed was on him and he committed those four turnovers in the first 11 minutes. You talk about a deer in the headlights. McCain was completely out of the game with shed taking him apart. It was unbelievable.
00:06:11
Speaker
He was absolutely his dominant self. He was clearly the best player on the floor. And then Roberts picks up his second foul on what was absolutely a flop.
00:06:25
Speaker
by Duke, and that kind of hurt the going inside and taking advantage there. And then obviously, Shedd suffers just the devastating injury after, like you said, playing 13 plus minutes. At that point, obviously, everything changed.
00:06:45
Speaker
We lost the big 12 player of the year, the defensive player of the year, and arguably the best leader and teammate ever at U of H, possibly anywhere in the country. And everyone's roles changed at that point. And so did Duke's role. So did their approach to playing defense against us, to focusing much more on prior on jar.
00:07:11
Speaker
But after the game, myself, Rob James, who I went to the game with, who managed under Guy V and Pat Foster as a manager on the team and knows basketball really well. Brian Hiskey, who played Gulf of U of H and his son, who currently plays Gulf of U of H. We stayed at the Hyatt where the team played, but we went to the Adolphus Hotel for drinks because there are a lot of U of H players there.
00:07:40
Speaker
at the bar, Bryant was for just about two minutes, was engaged by someone and he wanted to get away from this person as quickly as he could. It was a U of H fan. So he told the guy, look, I got to go check on my son. He's like, but why don't you talk to Bill Walker? He's like, he'd be happy to talk to you. So having no clue what's going on, I walk over and
00:08:09
Speaker
The guy just starts in on me about Calvin's poor coaching. He's like, I've watched every game this year. And I'm like, well, that's great. So have I. And he said, Calvin had his poorest coaching game. He just didn't know what to do. He said that
00:08:30
Speaker
The fact that we lost this game was because Kelvin didn't have the players shooting more threes. And I'm just sitting there and I'm like, are you serious? Are you kidding me? I mean, I probably should be more mad at myself for arguing with this guy for probably close to 40 minutes, at least half an hour. But unfortunately, being the contrarian that I am,
00:08:56
Speaker
being at a bar where we maybe had a few drinks. I fell for his trap and quite honestly his idiotic arguments. I'm still just bewildered how someone who says that he watches every U of H game can be so short-sighted and quite honestly so ignorant. It blew me away.
00:09:23
Speaker
After about 40 minutes, I finally figured out that I needed to do the same thing that Brian and I and I introduced him to Rob and then I walked away. Nice. There were some people I ran across to on some posts and social media. They were in their words, they were second guessing Kelvin's quote unquote game plan in the second half and why we weren't doing more to get sharp open. You know what?
00:09:52
Speaker
Dukes, Garz, all of them are five stars. These guys are great athletes. They're quick. They're intelligent. They can jump. They switch on every screen. Yep.
00:10:03
Speaker
There's not a player in the country that could get open against that type of defense, you know, and if they do that stuff with shed out there, there's no help on sheds drives. Yeah, you know, and they can do that with shed one out there. But yeah, it was apart. And that's, yeah, that in the previous podcast, I said,
00:10:25
Speaker
He's going to penetrate. He's going to be able to kick the ball to Cryer or to Sharp. He's going to be able to lay the ball off to Juwan. He's going to be able to put the ball up for Javier to dunk. I mean, everything's changed. It's an entirely different dynamic with shut out of the game. And it's not like it was something that you prepare for it. Yeah. It happened on the spur of the moment, but I'll tell you,
00:10:52
Speaker
Hey, Bill, I finally told one guy, I said, okay, here's the deal. Go grab a piece of paper and you drop an offense that you think would score on Duke's defense. Good grief. It was, and I always come back to that quote. I think Scott Skiles said, you know, basketball's like church, many attend, but few understand. Yeah.
00:11:13
Speaker
The next thing is that I saw several posts criticizing Malik and the team for not wanting it enough. And again, the coaching. And then I ended up seeing a post from Malik's mom. She said, look, I saw that too. Yeah. You know,
00:11:35
Speaker
People are going after her son and I'm like, they're going after him. I mean, is he not the same player that was in a game where we lose the big 12 defensive player of the year yet we hold Duke to 54 points? I mean, secondly, everyone busted their collective asses trying to win and quite honestly trying to pick up the slack for Jamal.
Season Review and Injury Effects
00:12:00
Speaker
Cryard Sharp spent time running the point when Malik wasn't in.
00:12:05
Speaker
You know, that affects them. You know, we don't have either one coming off of picks, getting set up to receive passes from shut and hit open or shots because everyone's, everyone's roles changed. Oh, I just can't believe it. Yeah.
00:12:25
Speaker
I should qualify this because I've obviously encountered some of the people that are quite honestly bitching and probably feel like they have to complain about something. The overwhelming majority of the E of H fans.
00:12:40
Speaker
U of H supporters, everybody is not like this. And they understand how exceptional the team was, how well everyone played in that game, how certainly how well this team has coached. But it was just a few that, yeah, I just happened to encounter and that really got on me. And
00:13:02
Speaker
I just don't understand the Malik stuff. How dumb must you be to expect the same level of production at both ends of the court when you lose someone as great a leader, as great a teammate?
00:13:16
Speaker
and his great appoint guard as Shed is. For people to think that my league's going to come in there and perform equally or even close is just so unfair to him because Shed is so damn good.
00:13:32
Speaker
You know, if Shed doesn't get hurt, we win this game by 15 points and we're all booking our flights to Phoenix. I'm absolutely convinced of that. We lost this game for one reason. We lost as valuable a teammate and as valuable a leader as there is in the country, period.
00:13:56
Speaker
Here's one more thing I want to add that I'm done. I'm done. I saw some posters that were even saying that they hoped shed would come back in and play in the game. It's like, no, Hey, you see LA twisted ankle, you know, they had to go get an x-ray to see if it was broken. There's no way in a game where shed's whole game is quickness planting. Hey, he won't be able to plant for five weeks now.
00:14:24
Speaker
That's the last thing I'll say about that. Well, quite honestly, we didn't know either. We were sitting about 15 rows behind UH's bench and we had no idea until shed came out for the second half and then then we could see, okay, he's.
00:14:42
Speaker
clearly not playing. Sure, it would have been phenomenal. And I understand that based on NC State in 83 and some of the other one of 20 from behind the arc against Villanova a couple of years ago, you know, it just hasn't fallen our way and we haven't won a title. And this was a year where it certainly looked like we could have fulfilled our destiny. But my God,
00:15:10
Speaker
Look for scapegoats and to blame people or coaches for that happening is just, I mean, it's like, come on, be better and try to be more intelligent than that. That's it. The end.
00:15:25
Speaker
No, I think we're on the same page here. We could not have asked for a better start. Duke turnover to start. Robert's layup. Duke turnover again. Francis layup. Duke misses a three. Francis Ali dunked from a shit. Duke timeout. That's how things started.
00:15:45
Speaker
They were shell shocked. Duke came out of the timeout with yet another turnover. And we came up with almost another dunk by Francis, but still got another offensive rebound and a score by Roberts. It was going like all of us had hoped it would. You get a pretty good sense early on in our games as to whether it's going to be one of these good ones or not, based on the energy level, the crispness with how we come out. And this was one that you could just feel.
00:16:15
Speaker
we were going to be putting a hurt on Duke this day. But everything everything changed on that one severely turned ankle on our consensus first team all American point guard Jamal shed people need to remember his first team consensus all American we haven't had very many of those right just a handful in our entire history.
00:16:37
Speaker
Nothing was the same for our team after that point, accentuating the lack of depth we had this year from a point guard perspective. The team regrouped and the coaching staff adjusted the best they could at the half. And fans should be proud of how the Cougars kept this game to a one possession game to the very end against a talented Duke team, as you guys had both highlighted, with a roster
00:17:01
Speaker
that we lost Arsenault, Tuggler, and then Shedd during this game. The disappointment for the kids is that the way the game was going and how they were playing, there was no doubt in my mind either that we were winning this game. In fact, it felt like it was headed towards a blowout win for the Cougars.
00:17:19
Speaker
Now, if you look at the kids, I'm not going to spend a whole lot of time on analytics. But Roberts and Cryer did their best to keep us in the game. Roberts ended up with 13 points, eight rebounds, one block, one steal, was a player box score plus minus 14.6, while Cryer had 15 points, three rebounds, and one assist. But when you take our, whatever you want to call it, head of the snake and leader of the team, that spearheads our efforts,
00:17:45
Speaker
both running the offense and checking the opposing team's primary offensive threat, how do you play the game as it completely changes and it is impossible to recover mid-game? And as each of you highlighted as well, for all the fans that did complain and question our offensive play calling in the second half, I don't know what to say either.
00:18:08
Speaker
Duke has a strong coaching staff as well and watched the previous few games. Once Shed was out, they made the call to say, hey, it simplifies everything. We're sticking to Sharp all game long. There's no cheating, no doubling off of him.
00:18:22
Speaker
and he had no breathing room. And even two steps back from the three-point line, he had no room. It made Cryer and Roberts try to beat them. And it's easy because Houston has no one left that can break down the D handling the ball. To gut the game out and keep it within a possession,
00:18:42
Speaker
all the way till the end while continuing with our tenacious D. It's a tribute to the great coaching from Samson in the second half. The coaching on both offense and defense this season were exceptional, in my opinion, when you look at it as a whole. Finishing the season, we were 18th in adjusted offensive efficiency and number two in adjusted defensive efficiency. From a roster construction perspective, I loved how this team was made up.
00:19:09
Speaker
with Roberts, Francis, Tugler, Arsenal, Walker at the Biggs and Shedcrier, Sharp, Wilson, Dunn at the Wings. The only thing I did question towards the end of the season at all, actually, I was one of the ones that asked, had we overtaxed the kids with a workload and practices, not leaving enough time for recovery and not causing the injury, but potentially leading to the injury bug yet again? It's probably three or four years in a row we've had this.
00:19:37
Speaker
But as Brad Townes, one of our colleagues that had more insight on this shared on gocos.com, practices and workload schedules and load were actually indeed adjusted coming into our first season with the Big 12 and lightened up in anticipation of the tougher games and the Saturday, Monday game schedules at times in the Big 12 with us being featured on Big Mondays. So just unfortunate injuries, the team did their best throughout the season
00:20:07
Speaker
and we move on to 24, 25. Now from an advanced analytics perspective, the one thing I did want to highlight for fans just to illustrate how big a difference it was once Shed went out. For the game, Duke shot a dismal 46.9 effective field goal percentage and 35.5% from three, turned the ball over on 15% of their possessions, all well below their season averages. Their stats before Shed went out
00:20:37
Speaker
My God, they were shooting at 23.5 effective field goal percentage, 0% from three after taking eight of them at that point, turned the ball over on 33% of their possessions. They were being bullied all over the court.
00:20:54
Speaker
On the flip side, even without shed, we found a way to maintain a similar level of scoring. Our effective field goal percentage was 42.1% before the injury. And we somehow figured a way to maintain 42.9 for the whole game.
00:21:09
Speaker
on turnover, so we went from 15% to 17% on our possessions, but still within striking distance, what we lost was the ability to go on runs of eight to 10 points in spurts after steals without a true ball handler and distributor, which is a big part of our point production.
Roster Expectations and Transfer Strategy
00:21:27
Speaker
So now as we look to next season for our Cougars, what do you guys think in terms of the roster makeup? And I know there's still a lot to be determined. We don't know who's staying for sure and who's leaving. But what are you guys expecting or maybe looking for from a portal perspective? Bill, maybe you can kick this one off. What are your thoughts? Yeah, well,
00:21:51
Speaker
I'm hoping that everyone that is able to come back for the most part does. I think sheds gone. Yeah, I agree. And maybe equally as devastating Ryan Alvin's gone. Uh, that was a joke. I'm not sure how said my leak and done come back.
00:22:19
Speaker
maybe one, but I mean, I'm looking at the team for next year. And if nobody gets poached and that's always a possibility, just like with Tremont and I guarantee you there's an IL money that schools are probably going to be dangling in front of, especially sharp and job year. But let's assume we get everyone back. I'd say we have a manual.
00:22:48
Speaker
We have J1, we have Javier, we have LJ coming back. We have Terrence, Tuggler, Ramon. That's seven. Then we have our two.
00:23:03
Speaker
red shirts from this year, Jacob McFarland, big guy, and Cordelius Jefferson, you know, so we're up to nine. Then we have our two freshmen that are coming in, Mercy Miller, the scoring machine from California, Masterpiece Sun, and Chase McCarty, the 6'5 forward. So now we're at 11. So now it becomes, you know, who do you get? And
00:23:31
Speaker
I was looking at players in the portal and I think the focus probably is and has to be on point guard. Agreed. And looking at some of the point guards that are available, you have Yuuzhan from Oklahoma who just declared
00:23:52
Speaker
bigger point guard, 6-4. Is he a U of H player? Could be. There are some others. Malik Mack is a small point guard from Harvard, 6-1, 170, although he was kind of a scoring machine. There's another player, Zeke Mayo, South Dakota State. He's 6-4. He's also a good scorer. And
00:24:19
Speaker
When you read some of these reports, you don't know how well they're able to play defense. I'll tell you one guy, his name's Ace Baldwin. He was a point guard at Penn State. He's got one more year. He was the big 10 defensive player of the year. And he's 6'1". You know, he's not as big as Jamal, but
00:24:41
Speaker
He rebounds the ball, he moves the ball, he's a great defender. So at least he's got the numbers that would end the game that would fit right into Kelvin's system. There are a couple others, Doug McDaniel at Michigan.
00:24:59
Speaker
He moves the ball well. He's ultra quick, but he's 511, 175 and not a great defender and certainly not a rebounder. So you would think no to him. Yeah. I mean, those are the guys I'm looking at, I guess, in the portal right now. Those, you know, kind of those half dozen Oozan would be interesting. Yeah, I agree. Baldwin, I think of all these guys, he's, he's probably the most like shed. Okay. How about you, Tom?
00:25:29
Speaker
You know, like Bill said, it depends a lot on who stays, who goes, like whether we get poached with the player, like Bill said, trim on that one came out. To me, that one came out of the blue. You know, I'm not privy to any inside information, but definitely point guard is at the top of our list. I think Jamal is, is gone. So you're looking at point guard.
00:25:58
Speaker
I don't see a point guard on the roster. I know LJ came here supposedly because he was going to have a chance to run the point a little bit. But for you old heads who are familiar, I compare LJ to Calvin Murphy. Calvin Murphy was a 5'10 guard, but Calvin was not a point guard. He was a 5'10 shooting guard. Matter of fact, when he played for the Rockets,
00:26:21
Speaker
John Lucas played the point at about, you know, I think Lucas was listed at six three. I don't know if he was that tall, but Calvin Murphy, you know, played the shooting guard at five foot 10. And that's kind of the situation we had this year, you know, with LJ playing the two and he's only six one. We haven't seen a lot of LJ play point.
00:26:40
Speaker
but I just don't think for a program is the lead is ours that he's the answer at point guard. So definitely I think we're going to be on the portal looking for point guard. And I'm not sure about Cordell, whether they're going to room him for a point, whether he's a shooting guard, whether he's a combo. So who knows? Yeah. If Malik doesn't stay, maybe you're looking at two point guards. Yeah.
00:27:06
Speaker
in the portal. We also got to consider whatever player we pick up in the portal that we might have a player leave. We do that from Kellen's interview that JVA was going to leave if we went in the portal and grabbed another big. So you never know how those dominoes are going to fall. And with Joanne and LJ
00:27:31
Speaker
You just never know, you know, we're not mind readers. We can't jump inside their head and, you know, and see what they're thinking. And we also don't know what Kelvin is thinking also, you know, Kelvin might've had idea a long time ago about who he wants to stay and who he's going to kind of nudge out the door, but definitely point guard. We're at the point where we don't rebuild. We just reload.
00:28:00
Speaker
And I just can't see handing the keys off to a freshman to drive your dad's Lamborghini and then run it off a cliff, so to speak. So Kelvin's looking at assembling a roster that's going to win a national championship. We had the roster this year to do it. Entries took care of that. We got a lot of good pieces coming back. And we'll just have to wait and see probably the next couple of weeks
00:28:29
Speaker
If you're a major league baseball fan, they have what's called the hot stove league. Once the world series is over with, you know, before spring training, you know, you got all the talk about trades and, you know, free agent signings and this and that. And, you know, with the portal now and then out all money, this is kind of like the hot stove. It's kind of exciting. Yeah. Yeah. Cause you can get really good, really better.
00:28:55
Speaker
in a hurry, but the portal can also be a cautionary tale. Be careful of who you bring in. You know, Eric Musselman in Arkansas. There's exhibit A, Bill Self. He admitted it. He said, I just screwed up on the roster. And Kelvin's a Hall of Famer. He's a really smart guy. So he knows what he's doing. He's, he's not going to screw things up.
00:29:20
Speaker
Well, keep in mind, U of H has had a lot of players indicate that they wanted to come here and they've been told, no, it's just not the right culture fit. So it's not a matter of taking someone who may have some good numbers and
00:29:40
Speaker
You know, whatever. I mean, it's if someone is a good defensive player, a good rebounder, they're probably a good team player. The guys that do the things that Calvin's looking for, I don't see an Arkansas situation here just because they're just not going to come here.
00:30:02
Speaker
Gonna be told, you know, thank you, but no, thanks. The other thing is Jefferson it wouldn't be Yes, he hasn't played in a big 12 game. He hasn't played in a game but he also practiced against shed for an entire year and the others I don't know that I would equate it to handing the Lamborghini over to a child and
00:30:28
Speaker
He's going to be in better shape. I agree. You want experience and Kelvin at one point when he was asked about point guard next year, he kind of half smiled and said, don't worry. I've got it covered. Yeah, he did. I would have to.
00:30:45
Speaker
Bet that one of the good point guards is coming in, one of the experienced point guards, but I wouldn't necessarily sleep on Jefferson either. We'll see. We'll see. I've heard leader with Cordell.
00:31:00
Speaker
Yeah, I think I'm more with Tom. I'm not discounting Jefferson. I think he'll be part of the equation. I don't think he becomes your primary point guard next year, especially. Yeah, I don't think that he's, I think he could take over as playing my league's role. Yeah, absolutely. And fill that role very well.
00:31:24
Speaker
Maybe even better. Yeah, I would agree with that. Our roster looks strong yet again. I actually think we're going to end up with another title chasing roster, even if shed leaves.
00:31:39
Speaker
I looked at the roster as well. And obviously, again, we don't know who's going to elect to leave and things like that. But if you look at it, Sharp, KJ Jefferson, Walker returning on the perimeter, Francis Tuggler, Arsenault, Lott, McFarland at the four or five spots, maybe Arsenault becomes part of the wing. We've got two freshman perimeter guys, like you said, Mercy Miller and Chase McCarty.
00:32:05
Speaker
makes it 10 known ones that you expect to have back. The TBDs are shed, which I agree with you guys. I believe he's leaving. We even saw a tweet today from Shark where he stated he was bummed out that shed wouldn't be back next year. Roberts, I'm hoping he's back, but if I'm being truthful, I think he also leaves. Cryer, well,
00:32:31
Speaker
You've been here for what four or five years five years. I think right with him with a red shirt year He's physically been here five years. It's a lot to go through so I'd love to have him back. I just Sometimes it's just too much. You just reach a point. You're 21 and it's just time to move on right and
00:32:50
Speaker
If the NIL money is okay and the one thing about Joe on is that he's had the knee issue the entire year and maybe further but definitely the entire year he's getting it drained constantly and.
00:33:06
Speaker
Is somebody, and when I say somebody, I'm referring to overseas, going to offer him a decent longer term contract. I don't know. With the NIL money, coming back to U of H may be the most optimal situation for him. I think it is. Yeah, I would hope so. I hope the money is going to be enough to entice him to come back.
00:33:36
Speaker
It's tough to go through a full year. We've heard about the prep and yet another year through it, and it can be tough on these guys. And so we'll see. I'm hoping he's back as he'd be a perfect fit. LJ Cryer, I'm hoping he's back again. There were some posts suggesting that he may be looking at a more offensively oriented opportunity. Malik Wilson, we all know he wants to be back. Dunn, I don't believe he'll be back, but we'll see.
00:34:06
Speaker
You know, we've got three open spots to get to 13. As Pezman had stated, and you just mentioned, during his interview, our three key seniors have eligibility to come back and we were working on NIL dollars. So we'll see where that lands. I believe a lot of folks have stepped up on that front. But ultimately, it's going to be the kids' decision as to whether it's what they want to do or not. I agree with both of you guys. Point guard is the glaring gap that we
00:34:34
Speaker
have where I believe, again, Shed has gone. We can't wait in the portal, to be honest, so we need to make calls pretty quick. Unfortunately, we did not have the luxury of a freshman or sophomore point guard learning the ropes behind Shed. So I think this is a position that we got to have. It's the greatest need.
00:34:55
Speaker
I do like the kid from South Dakota state, Zeke Mayo, that supposedly had been contacted by us. He's a Lawrence Kansas kid though. He is. Yeah. And I think he named his finalists and our names off of it. So I don't think that's going to happen. Good point guards don't grow on trees, especially ones that would fit our culture. But I think two very recent portal entries.
00:35:20
Speaker
Oozan, as you had mentioned as well, Bill from OU, two years left. I actually love this kid's game. And if we've got any contact and if the coaching staff feels like he's a good fit, boy, he'd be fantastic. There's PJ Haggerty from Tulsa. He's also got two years left. We actually recruited him coming out of high school. So I don't know if we still feel like he's a good fit or not.
00:35:42
Speaker
Next would be a dead-eye shooter from the three spot with some length. I mean, Terrence Arsenal may become that, but it might be good to get another kid with that skill set for some competition. If we need some scoring low, just in case Roberts decides to call it a career, there's a kid that just entered the portal today, Ezra Osar from East Carolina.
00:36:08
Speaker
would be a nice kid. I don't know if you guys remember him, but boy, if we recruited him, it would follow our staff's trend of going after kids they've seen up close. And he ate us up last season. He was a freshman last season, first game against ECU. The kid had 15 points, eight rebounds. Well, we had some time to prep for him for game two in the mirror game. And you know what happened? He came back with 18 points, 19 rebounds.
00:36:37
Speaker
I mean, that is just crazy. So he's still got two years left. And so we'll see if there's any interest from the staff. And then an interesting tidbit just before we went live on the podcast on the freshman recruiting front. Liam McNeely, the five-star who decommitted from IU, just listed us in his top five teams recruiting him after he reopened his recruitment, along with KU.
00:37:05
Speaker
Yukon Kentucky in Michigan Steve there's your three men right there that can shoot. Yeah If he's interested, so we'll see so I think you know We're gonna try to keep tabs on it. None of us have any inside info on any of this stuff. So we'll be Combing Twitter and Trillie Donovan and whatnot to see what's going on in this guy You know
00:37:34
Speaker
How does he get his information supposedly?
Closing Remarks and Future Episodes
00:37:37
Speaker
I don't know, but he's been. He's the one who said, he's the one who said Terrence Arsenault was thinking about leaving. Yeah, he said him in Cryer, right? So we'll see. But it's also, it was also stated that it was dated information. It was a posting that happened a few months ago. And then
00:37:54
Speaker
A follow-on posting suggested that Kendrick Perkins had recommended to Arsenal to stick it out at U of H, subsequent to that. So we'll see. We'll see. Again, it's all speculation. Weird stuff leaking out left and right these days. OK, guys. So finally, I know we don't have much interest in the tourney after Akuka's lost and no other Big 12 teams.
00:38:20
Speaker
are left. But let's just project out our Final Four projections. Who'd you guys have left from your last predictions and who do you think will win it out now that our Cougars are out? Tom, you want to go first? My Final Four was Chalka had U of H going up against I can't remember who's the one seed on the other one Purdue. Yeah, then I had Yukon going up against who was the other
00:38:47
Speaker
One seed was at UNC. Yeah, UNC. Yeah. And then I had Yukon, U of H playing a final game and U of H winning at all. Now with it revised, I would have, well, let's see, NC state plays Purdue. You know, I kind of wanted NC state to win, but I think Purdue is going to end up winning Yukon versus who are they playing? Alabama. I think Yukon is going to win that game and I think it's going to be a Yukon.
00:39:16
Speaker
Purdue final and I think hard to say his name. I can't get it out of my mouth. Danny Hurley is going to win another one. Yeah, I know how you feel. How about you, Bill? Well, I think this is going to end up being very redundant, probably for all three of us, but I had I had Yukon. I had Arizona. I had Creighton and I had us and then I had us beating Yukon.
00:39:45
Speaker
This was like, I do really well in brackets about one out of every seven years at best. I overthink it. I make terrible picks. And this year was no different in my office pool. I think I pretty well sealed dead last. So, you know, take everything I say for what it's worth. And I'm going to say the same thing. Yeah.
00:40:12
Speaker
I think Purdue beats NC State. You know, I think Alabama could keep the game reasonably close against UConn because they've got so many offensive weapons. But unfortunately, Alabama plays next to no defense. And I don't think UConn is going to go on a 30 to nothing run against Alabama like they did against Illinois. I think it's going to be UConn over Purdue. Yeah.
00:40:41
Speaker
I mean, from my March Madness brackets, I didn't hit a single Final Four team. I had ISU, North Carolina, Houston, and Creighton. So I'm 0 for 4, man. And I'll tell you in brackets, I usually do reasonably well. I'll probably win money every other year, but this is one of those years that I did not even come close. And I'm with you guys. I think it's going to be UConn, Purdue, Final.
00:41:11
Speaker
And I think UConn is going to pull it out because this may be a generational UConn team. They're good. No doubt about it. They've been upping their game in the tournament as well. So as much as I hate Hurley, their team is pretty freaking amazing.
00:41:28
Speaker
They're good, but I don't think they're as good as everyone thinks. And I would have loved to have seen us play them. Oh, me too. I would have loved it. You know, they want to blow out in their 116 game. They beat Northwestern, who's not athletic. They beat San Diego State by 17. San Diego State wasn't as good as they were last year when UConn beat them by 17. And then, I mean, the Illinois game was tied at 23 before the 30 to nothing run.
00:41:59
Speaker
Yes, you're absolutely right. And they won big. But Illinois just, A, they offensively, they fell off the map and B, UConn was just scoring at will. I think a good team that plays well on both ends of the floor can compete with UConn at
00:42:18
Speaker
beat you, Connor. Unfortunately, like I said, we're not there. Yeah, I think all of us would have we would have liked a shot at them. But next year, next year is going to be the year I'm convinced. So that's it for this episode 24 of the no conference for open podcast. Hope you all enjoyed it. And again, we'd really appreciate it if folks would follow subscribe or collect our podcast, depending on your podcast platform of choice.
00:42:44
Speaker
We're also available via the Republican football podcast fee from the folks at Dave Campbell's, Texas football as the only basketball centric podcast. We're at the go cooks.com website for those that prefer to digest the content that way. We appreciate the continued support from all also, please give us a follow on our Twitter account. No conference for old men. Thank you all again for listening. And again, now that it's officially the off season for our hoops program,
00:43:09
Speaker
will begin our monthly cadence with some ad hoc episodes should there be any breaking news from the program or transfer portal perspective. So please be on the lookout to download and listen as the episodes drop. Take care everyone.