Game thread - @ VCU Tuesday 1/27 7pm CBS Sports Network

[Spider17]

Our administration -

10-3 OOC gives long way towards a worthwhile season. A few losses to good teams in conference won’t diminish the success we had OOC.

Quite frankly I wouldn’t be surprised if that was their motive with that pathetic excuse of a schedule. And then they try to gaslight us that we couldn’t do better with scheduling because it’s “too hard for mid majors” when nearly every other A10 team had good schedules and we made no effort to get other quality mid majors on our schedule from other conferences.

The only silver lining from getting crushed in the A10 is it highlights the reality that we all knew, which was this cupcake schedule was only to hide the deficiencies of this team that ultimately stem from poor recruiting and development of players by our staff. Can’t hide behind these A10 results. The proof is in the pudding. Now the narrative that JOC is peddling is whether we have enough NIL to compete with VCU, GMU, Saint Louis in the A10 while conveniently leaving out the fact they all have new coaches and our women’s team is doing great with the resources they’ve been given. It’s utterly ridiculous and makes me frustrated as a fan.

 

[*23*]

who knows? maybe he's right. get good HS kids that other schools aren't targeting now with the portal. maybe we have them in our last 2 classes. AA looks really good. maybe Harper and JRob. who knows about McG. the incoming class looks impressive. by the time they're good enough to move up, maybe they love Richmond like we did. maybe we can keep them. maybe ...

going the free agent route for short term fixes is expensive and clearly hasn't been working since Jordan King.

Yes but other mid majors including Liberty are already landing top 150 guys. AA is the only one that looks like a sure fire A10 starter at this point. So no the evidence does not say Mooney is doing this now.

 

[Spiderguy]

Yes but other mid majors including Liberty are already landing top 150 guys. AA is the only one that looks like a sure fire A10 starter at this point. So no the evidence does not say Mooney is doing this now.

Odds AA will be back next season? I hope so, but his stock is certainly up, and no doubt he can earn a pretty penny in the portal. Is being a hometown guy enough to keep him here?

 

[*23*]

Who the heck knows. Probably depends on how much some p5 team values him. At this point, unless just a crazy NBA type talent, its the 3rd and 4th year guys with lots of production at that level already that are most attractive. But he has put together a good bit of tape too. What is his relationship with Mooney? Super crappy schedule can't help our case. Does he see improvement from the team next season?

 

[SensibleSpider]

who knows? maybe he's right. get good HS kids that other schools aren't targeting now with the portal. maybe we have them in our last 2 classes. AA looks really good. maybe Harper and JRob. who knows about McG. the incoming class looks impressive. by the time they're good enough to move up, maybe they love Richmond like we did. maybe we can keep them. maybe ...

going the free agent route for short term fixes is expensive and clearly hasn't been working since Jordan King.

I think there's alot of maybe's in there... I agree that the portal isn't cheap but I've not seen evidence of another mid major program having success going on all on HS recruiting and foregoing the transfer portal. I will also add the caveat that I'm not a fan of the infinite transfers and lawlessness of college sports right now but that's the reality on the ground.

Here's my list a few good reasons why going all in on the high school route isn't wise:

1) Mooney has not shown the ability to identify AND land A10 level recruits on a consistent basis.

We haven't had a freshman land on the A10 All-Freshman team since Grant Golden in 17-18.
We haven't had a HS recruit land on the All A10 conference team since Burton in 22-23 when he carried that bad team.

2) The landscape has drastically changed. Most guys, with few exceptions, aren't going to stay at Richmond for 4/5 years if they are absolute studs. Teams will pay them twice as much (or more) and it will be strictly a business decision. IF, and that's a massive IF, you can get guys that love Richmond like we do and want to stay, Mooney may be right. But I wouldn't put my money on it. Thinking of most 20 year olds, if you told them they could make 3x going to play elsewhere and think the new program/coach was a good fit, they won't hesitate.

3) Getting an older starting roster via the transfer portal is a now the prevailing strategy in college sports. Gone are the days of a all freshman Kentucky team winning the National Championship. Just look at how Indiana just won the football natty, they had a bunch of 4th 5th and 6th years guys on both sides of the ball. Look at Richmond's most successful team of the last 4 years, the starting lineup was all transfers but 1 (King, Quinn, Bigelow, Hunt).


4) I'm not saying abandon high school recruiting. Without a doubt AA is a stud, Harper shows some promise. But you cannot solely rely on that anymore.

BUT I'm all for a hybrid approach, with HS recruiting and filling in roster holes through the portal. Unless you have a pretty good hit rate with HS recruiting, you can make up for missing on talent evals by getting some good dudes from the portal. You just can't be bad at high school recruiting AND say you want to go back to the old model where there were very few transfers.

 

[SensibleSpider]

Odds AA will be back next season? I hope so, but his stock is certainly up, and no doubt he can earn a pretty penny in the portal. Is being a hometown guy enough to keep him here?

I think size will be the limiting factor for him. I'd imagine he will get some looks from teams, especially if he lands on the A10 all freshman team, but P4 teams may think he is too slight to pickup. Certainly, he is at the top of the priority list for the offseason.

 

[SensibleSpider]

I also want the best HS kids we can land. just saying the transfer thing isn't working great.

Now if I saw this before my other message, I may have just agreed and saved myself 10 minutes

 

[vt4700]

who knows? maybe he's right. get good HS kids that other schools aren't targeting now with the portal. maybe we have them in our last 2 classes. AA looks really good. maybe Harper and JRob. who knows about McG. the incoming class looks impressive. by the time they're good enough to move up, maybe they love Richmond like we did. maybe we can keep them. maybe ...

going the free agent route for short term fixes is expensive and clearly hasn't been working since Jordan King.

Who knows about Mcg? Really? We are 8-20 in the A-10 since he has been here and he can't see the court. Do u really not know? Maybe Harper and JRob? Maybe what? We stink again this year and they still can't get good minutes. Do they look like key A-10 players? I don't mean to criticize our players, but if we are planning on having any of those 3 in our starting rotation the next year or two, we are mid tier A-10 at best. I am all for recruiting high school guys, and then adding a few transfers, but we need impact guys, not minor pieces.

 

[vt4700]

I also want the best HS kids we can land. just saying the transfer thing isn't working great.

Unfortunately, the high school thing is going worse.

 

[RichmondNative]

Yes but other mid majors including Liberty are already landing top 150 guys.

Watching some of Liberty vs Middle Tennessee tonight. Can see already that Liberty would never make the list of in-state opponents as the current UR regime would lose if the teams played. Flames don’t have size, but can shoot, drive and stay in front of their man on D. Players look like the types of players that UR could land, but something tells me the same player wouldn’t be as effective at Richmond. Coaching matters.

 

[*23*]

Right. Mooney has never veered from focusing on recruiting high school players. That has always been his thing. He is trying to change the narrative to make it sound like he went away from it, and now , low and behold he is going this brand new direction. LOL. Long game. The only ones falling for it are PQ, sman and Hardt. And further as 4700 points out, recruiting hs players is not going well for Mooney.

 

[*23*]

Watching some of Liberty vs Middle Tennessee tonight. Can see already that Liberty would never make the list of in-state opponents as the current UR regime would lose if the teams played. Flames don’t have size, but can shoot, drive and stay in front of their man on D. Players look like the types of players that UR could land, but something tells me the same player wouldn’t be as effective at Richmond. Coaching matters.

Exactly. They have a very good coach. And quietly over the last 4 to 5 years have become a very good mid major program.

But we know, it is SO HARD. There are so many hurdles. This NIL era is impossible for mid majors.

Mooney's messaging and presentation is so so bad. That interview with our podcasters he looks defeated.

And yes, if we played Liberty every year that would be a good game. We will probably find out mooney didn't return their calls either.

 

[MrTbone]

yeah i think thats the big killer. 7th seed followed by a sweet 16 run into a major NCAA tourney drought with capable talent to make it too. It wasnt like he had bad rosters.

He definitely had some bad rosters mixed in with decent ones. Unacceptable to not make the tournament whether he failed before the season began or during it.

 

[MrTbone]

who knows? maybe he's right. get good HS kids that other schools aren't targeting now with the portal. maybe we have them in our last 2 classes. AA looks really good. maybe Harper and JRob. who knows about McG. the incoming class looks impressive. by the time they're good enough to move up, maybe they love Richmond like we did. maybe we can keep them. maybe ...

going the free agent route for short term fixes is expensive and clearly hasn't been working since Jordan King.

I’m not convinced the incoming class is all that. Simmons pretty highly recruited, the other two notnso much. And we lost our primary big to…Wofford?

I still think some guys from the last two years will be good but there’s a lot of question marks.

 

[Eight Legger]

We better hope AA does not get A10 Rookie of the Year, or he's gone. That's something that will put him on the map for every P5 school that's looking, and I'm sure they all pay better than we will.

 

[MrTbone]

We better hope AA does not get A10 Rookie of the Year, or he's gone. That's something that will put him on the map for every P5 school that's looking, and I'm sure they all pay better than we will.

There are so many depressing things to talk about regarding UR bball, let’s leave that one alone.

 

[Eight Legger]

Someone here should be able to enlighten us about how much we are paying. Is every single player getting something or only the top guys? Are we paying anyone more than 100k a year? If so, who? And how many?

How much in total are we spending on this year's roster? $1M? 500k? Buehler?

 

[MrTbone]

Someone here should be able to enlighten us about how much we are paying. Is every single player getting something or only the top guys? Are we paying anyone more than 100k a year? If so, who? And how many?

How much in total are we spending on this year's roster? $1M? 500k? Buehler?

I don’t know any specifics but recall reading that everyone gets paid, there’s a premium for people who stick around, and that we don’t have a significant disparity between our top guy(s) and the lower tiers.

But i could also be regurgitating someone else’s theory, not facts.

 

[MrTbone]

Quite frankly I wouldn’t be surprised if that was their motive with that pathetic excuse of a schedule. And then they try to gaslight us that we couldn’t do better with scheduling because it’s “too hard for mid majors” when nearly every other A10 team had good schedules and we made no effort to get other quality mid majors on our schedule from other conferences.

The only silver lining from getting crushed in the A10 is it highlights the reality that we all knew, which was this cupcake schedule was only to hide the deficiencies of this team that ultimately stem from poor recruiting and development of players by our staff. Can’t hide behind these A10 results. The proof is in the pudding. Now the narrative that JOC is peddling is whether we have enough NIL to compete with VCU, GMU, Saint Louis in the A10 while conveniently leaving out the fact they all have new coaches and our women’s team is doing great with the resources they’ve been given. It’s utterly ridiculous and makes me frustrated as a fan.

It’s pretty undeniable that the soft as charmin ooc was intended to prop up the season results. It’s barely going to do that. Yes there are pragmatic reasons to do that like having no idea what’s on your roster and wanting to give your guys confidence. But coach can’t take a chance on having back to back losing seasons.

I don’t think it was a university-wide conspiracy, I put that on the coaching staff alone.

 

[Kneepad McKinney]

Who knows about Mcg? Really? We are 8-20 in the A-10 since he has been here and he can't see the court. Do u really not know? Maybe Harper and JRob? Maybe what? We stink again this year and they still can't get good minutes. Do they look like key A-10 players? I don't mean to criticize our players, but if we are planning on having any of those 3 in our starting rotation the next year or two, we are mid tier A-10 at best. I am all for recruiting high school guys, and then adding a few transfers, but we need impact guys, not minor pieces.

JRob is playing out of position. If he were a wing or 4 man, I think it would look better. I do worry SIGNIFICANTLY about his defense. And I worry that he never, ever looks for his own offense. He's feeding off scraps and fastbreaks. That's usually a telling sign for our freshmen. JRob feels a lot like the Dji Bailey case to me -- really just needs about 4 or 5 games in a row where he's got the freedom to go out and play without fear of The Captain Hook and I think we'd see a lot more out of him. There's no question that he's a different level of athlete than we typically have.

Harper can play. Unlike JRob, when given the floor time he's aggressive. He's looking to score. He's not just a passing relay station. And on D, he's one of our better perimeter defenders. I've been pleasantly surprised with Harper.