Why not do some “power rankings” for the Summit League? It’s a top 10 conference right now, and it probably still will not get enough respect from the tournament committee to get two teams into the big dance. If you’re really impressed by Joe Lunardi’s fake bracket in July, then you might actually love something like this…but please, don’t even talk to me. Power rankings are kind of like a movie that has a pretty good story going up until the end and you find out it was all really just a dream and you realize the story sucked all along and Blake Lively has a really short range even if she was great in “The Town”…but here we go.
1. South Dakota State
A 9 point win and a 4 point win over who many think to be the two worst teams in the Summit was not the best way to start off conference play for numero uno, but they still came out 2-0.
The Jackrabbits look different without Jake Bittle. He may not be their flashiest player, but he is by far their smartest player that runs their offense and makes a low amount of decisions. His injury was only listed as 2-3 weeks, but they may not be favored in a road game against IUPUI without Bittle.
The big question mark for the Jacks was: who were they going to play at the center position? Redshirt frosh, and Nebraska native, Mike Daum has been the answer for SDSU and has been averaging 12 points and 5 rebounds per game in 17 minutes a contest. Sophomore Ian Theisen has been putting up nearly 7 points and 4 rebounds per game, and both players can knock down threes.
2. North Dakota State
The Bison put up a 10-4 record in non-conference play even while battling with injuries to two of their top players: Chris Kading and Kory Brown.
NDSU recently moved Carlin Dupree to the bench and he scored 16 in 28 minutes.
Head Coach David Richman acknowledges that they are a young team, but they still have a target on their backs and everyone in the conference is going to give them their best. Don’t worry about Globo Gym, they’ll be fine.
Curious who was going to make up the scoring for the loss of Lawrence Alexander? Did you think it would be sophomore Paul Miller? Miller is scoring 16.6 points per game and he is making 2.7 threes per game at 43%.
3. Omaha
Clearly it looks like I have issues putting them here, but you shouldn’t be surprised. The Mavericks have won 4 games in a row and that is the longest streak they have had over division one teams.
In the year of the foul, they get to the line more than anyone else in the Summit League. The Mavericks have shot 52 more free throws than South Dakota State, who has the second most free throw attempts on the season. If you’re not a deep team, especially at the wing, you could really run into foul trouble on the Mavs. They are also second in free throw percentage in the Summit League behind Denver.
Tra-Deon Hollins is still leading the country in steals. Back courts have had issues getting the by Hollins and Devin Patterson.
4. IPFW
They are 12-4, but I challenge you to find a meaningful win. Oral Roberts is their best win.
Head Coach Jon Coffman wanted to play more small ball this season and shoot more threes to match the rest of the Summit League, and they currently have the second highest three point shooting percentage in the league behind Western Illinois. They are even second in scoring behind Omaha.
Mo Evans could be the most difficult player in the Summit League to defend, after Obi Emegano, Evans is tied for second in the conference in scoring (17.3) and he is third in assists (5.1).
The Dons were really excited about redshirt freshman John Konchar, who Coffman said would have been worth 5 wins last season. Konchar is averaging 11.2 points and a league leading 7.7 rebounds per game. He’s also 5th in field goal percentage in the Summit League. He has been playing mostly the 4 position, so he will soon have to go up against AJ Jacobson, Tre’Shawn Thurman, and Tre Burnette.
Max Landis has made more threes than any other player in the League with 3.3 threes per game.
5. South Dakota
The Coyotes lost at home to IUPUI, but then beat Oral Roberts on the road. They had similar situations like this last year. Losing at home to Omaha, beating Omaha on the road. Losing to Oral Roberts at home, beating Oral Roberts on the road. Losing to Denver at home, beating Denver on the road. They are a hard team to predict for. This season they have beat Minnesota, lost to CSU Bakersfield, seriously, a hard team to figure out.
Last year, their defense forced teams to take the more threes than any other team in the Summit League and they have done the same thing so far this season. So teams have to be able to knock down threes against the Coyotes. **Looks at UNO’s three point field goal percentage…hits head on table**
6. Oral Roberts
Oral Roberts had a very difficult non-conference schedule, but they now have lost 6 games in a row…5 of those 6 games were on the road.
The Golden Eagles have the best player in the league with Obi Emegano, but after that they are an incredibly young and inexperienced team. They are going to have a few “Seriously!” losses.
ORU lost to South Dakota at home without Obi Emegano, who was out with concussion symptoms.
7. IUPUI
Another team with an incredibly difficult non-conference schedule, the Jaguars are currently 5-12, but they did manage to beat South Dakota on the road. They are a gritty team and head the Coyotes to 2 of 15 on threes in that game.
The Jaguars are playing with a large portion of their team as newcomers, so they could have some “Seriously” wins.
8. Western Illinois
They gave up a 16 point lead to Omaha and only lost by 4 to (a Jake Bittle-less) South Dakota State.
The Leathernecks are a deep team in the sense that they have a ton of players on the roster, but there is a significant talent drop off after their top 4 players. They were an injury filled team last season, and there have been a few little injuries so far this season…but they have had the same starting lineup in every game.
They are an inconsistent team, in the sense that everyone on their team is incredibly inconsistent.
The Leathernecks do have the best three point field goal percentage in the league, but they played an incredibly weak non-conference schedule. Yes, yes, we all know they beat Wisconsin…cool.
9. Denver
Starting the conference season against North Dakota State and South Dakota State was not fun for them…and now they have Oral Roberts coming to Denver. Denver has been a good home team the last 3 seasons, but can Oral Roberts really drop 7 in a row? Yes, it is possible.
The Pioneers also played a weak non-conference schedule facing no power conference teams, but they may have done this to get their basically new roster some much needed experience.
Seriously, Blake Lively was only really given 15 minutes of actual screen time in the “The Town.”
The coaches were not kidding when they said that The Summit League is a conference on the rise. Every team has an identity, and every team thinks they have a legitimate chance at winning The Summit League. Western Illinois with a win over Wisconsin and being 5-1 at the moment has definitely been the biggest surprise so far. The season is still young, but we are done with the first calendar month.
I was going to come up with something looking at who the 1st and 2nd All Summit League teams were up to the end of November, but then I realized there is still a ton of basketball to be played out, so what is the point? Instead, why not look at who and what have been some of the biggest surprises so far around the Summit?
Western Illinois with a win over Wisconsin is clearly what sticks out the most. J.C. Fuller’s scoring going up is not that big of a surprise as he was getting better and better as the season went on for the Leathernecks last season, but shooting 72% from threes so far is big surprise. He is not going to finish the year at 72% but he should continue to give the Leathernecks a second option after Garret Covington.
Obi Emegano being a scoring machine is not a surprise, but he has already made 21 threes on the year after making 29 all of last season.
We knew North Dakota State had to find someone to make up for the loss of scoring from Lawrence Alexander, but Paul Miller averaging 19.6 points per game, after scoring 6.7 per game last season, has been quite the jump through 5 games.
Jake White being healthy for the Mavericks has been like getting an entirely new player. He is 5th in the Summit League in scoring right now at 16.3 points per game through 6 games, while only averaging 21.5 minutes per game.
Marcellus Barksdale did not get a double digit scoring performance until his 7th game. He does not have a history of being a prolific scorer, but you would think the senior leader would be scoring a little more.
Tre’Shawn Thurman and Reed Tellinghuisen have caught up to AJ Jacobson. It is not a huge surprise really. Thurman was expected to get an increased role for the Mavericks as they lost Mike Rostampour, was Jacobson supposed to get more shots from the departure of Lawrence Alexander and the addition of a couple more post players? Tellinghuisen is still not expected to be the main option for the Jackrabbits, but he is an efficient scorer that has added on some muscle. The class of 2018 is a big time class for the Summit League, and there are still some junior college players and transfers that could be huge additions to the class.
John Konchar is what IPFW had been advertising. Jon Coffman stated that Konchar would have been worth 5 more wins for the ‘Dons had he not redshirted last season. He is averaging 11.6 points and 8.1 points per game so far. Watch an IPFW game too, he looks like the most mature player the team has. Coffman was also pretty big on the improvement of Brent Calhoun, but he is only averaging 1.8 points per game and shooting 31% from the field.
Nate Engesser is not starting for Denver. He is leading the Pioneers in scoring with 16.2 points per game, but he has yet to start a game, and he is only playing 22.5 minutes per game. Also Denver, who was thought to be the worst team in the league by many is 5-1 so far. Many had it between Denver and Western Illinois as the two worst teams in the league, and they are both 5-1.
There are 4 freshmen averaging more than 10 points per game so far: Konchar (IPFW), Mike Daum (South Dakota State), Dan Jech (South Dakota), and Joe Rosga (Denver).
Tra-Deon Hollins currently leads all Summit League players in assists and steals. He leads the nation in steals as of right now. He reminds of what it was like to play with Eddie Jones in NBA Live 99…on rookie mode.
I was pretty down on AJ Owens of Oral Roberts before the start of the season, but he is proving me wrong with 12.1 points and 5.4 rebounds per game, and he even leads the conference in blocks so far. My bad.
If you look up the scores on ESPN before any games are played, and you see South Dakota, ESPN lists Eric Robertson has their must see player. Every time.
Sometimes I find preseason predictions pointless, other than starting a conversation about the upcoming season or letting people know what could potentially be the biggest games of the year, there is not really much of a point to it.
I mainly find them useless because of the methodology in ranking teams. Many seem to just copy and past the standings of last year, and then make a small edit if a team had a high amount of turnover from last season’s roster. But I came up with a plan to do this for the Summit League. I was reading some preseason predictions for the Big 10 football season which was done by a bunch of ESPN writers. Some made good points but they all had to come up with a record for each team, and the math did not always make sense. One clown had Ohio State going 12-0 with a 8-0 Big Ten record and Michigan State going 11-1, and also with a 8-0 Big Ten record. Seriously, how drunk and lazy and/or bad at math was that guy? Or some guys would have two teams going 8-0 in conference, a couple going 0-8, and everyone else going 5-3. The math didn’t add up and they were telling you that these teams would win these amount of games because they are Skeletor and they said so.
So I came up with a plan. I would go through the Summit League conference schedule and assign wins and losses over the course of a number of weeks. At first it was just: South Dakota State is a better team than Denver, so win goes to the Jackrabbits. Then later, I would look at the difficulty of each team’s conference schedule. Obviously, everyone plays each other twice, but there are some things that stick out; like how Denver is the only team with the highway to the danger zone in playing at North Dakota State and South Dakota State in back to back games. Or how South Dakota and Oral Roberts are the only two Summit League teams without three straight games on the road in conference play. Then things like Omaha playing on the road against someone on a Thursday, as road games on Thursdays appear to be difficult for most teams. Actually road games are pretty difficult for anyone. Then I would go through the schedule again and consider some teams’ strengths versus their opponents weaknesses. Like how teams better be good at three point shooting against South Dakota as they forced teams to take the most threes with their defense…and other things.
But I assigned wins and losses to each game, and did it several times considering different factors. Then I plain and simple would add up each team’s wins and losses to see who had the most after going through it about 15 times. Is it perfect? No. Is it better than just saying South Dakota State will go 15-1 in conference because of Jesus? Probably.
Really, after going through all of this; I really do not see much separation between many of the teams. South Dakota State seems like a clear cut favorite. Then North Dakota State seems like they are 2nd best, but they really should not be as comfortable as one would think. Then Oral Roberts-Omaha-IPFW-IUPUI-South Dakota appear to be in a fight for spots 3 to 7 with Denver and Western Illinois sitting at 8 and 9; but Denver is a difficult place to play; and Western Illinois, while not great last year, they do return basically everything.
So much of the 3 to 9 in the Summit League appears to come down to:
Who can stay healthy?
Who can win on the road?
Who can pick up a win against South Dakota State and North Dakota State?
South Dakota State
Range of wins: 13 to 15
This team’s back court is extremely good, and the Jackrabbits could score 30 points a game on just three pointers alone. The obvious question mark for the team is who is going to rebound and play center? Scott Nagy has admitted to not knowing what to do there. I think one of the most underrated part of Cody Larson’s game was his passing ability. A big man that can pass is so huge for your team. He could draw in the double team and kick it out to the open man, or pass it to a driving player, and it was just a huge weapon for the Jackrabbits.
Their three game road stretch of at North Dakota State, Oral Roberts, and South Dakota is an extremely tough road stretch for them, but they will be fine in the end. They start their conference schedule at home with Denver and Western Illinois… must be rough.
North Dakota State
Range of wins: 10 to 13
At first I just thought to myself: oh they have everyone back, and they have enough players to make up for the loss of Lawrence Alexander, so they should just own this conference. Then I thought: replacing Lawrence Alexander might be one of the most difficult things to ever overcome. So much of their offense was based on what Alexander could do, and he only had two games last season where he did not score in double figures. No player in Bison history won more games at North Dakota State than Lawrence Alexander. Teams generally have a significant drop off when they lose one of their best players in program history, but somehow I still really like them to finish 2nd in the conference.
Dave Richman has this team completely confident though and they are buying into his system, and their team motto is: just get better and better every day…which they do a good job of doing. One thing that is scary to think about in addition to losing one of the program’s best players in history: is the fact that they went 12-4 in the Summit League last season, but they did not exactly blow anyone out. Only three of their wins were by more than 10 points, and one of those was a revenge game against South Dakota where Alexander had 31 points on 11-14 shooting. So who is for sure going to score the ball down the stretch when they find themselves in close games this season? I am not saying that they cannot find anyone, but it is something to definitely consider.
The Bison probably have the best post game cores in the league with AJ Jacobson, Dexter Werner, and Chris Kading; but Kading is coming off some summer surgeries. They can go small, they can go big with those three; the three of them each bring something different to their front court to give them several different options. The Bison also appear to be extremely excited about freshman Deng Geu, but they have also stated that they may redshirt him.
They lucked out with the greatest 3 game road stretch ever. They are at IPFW on a Thursday and then at Western Illinois on a Saturday, they then have a 8 day break before playing on the road at IUPUI.
I realize I look like a total homer placing them this high.
Oral Roberts
Range of wins: 7 to 10
At first, I thought no way on this team. They have lost too many players in the last few seasons, the newcomers do not look all that great, and they might even be one of the least deep teams in the Summit League, which is almost an accomplishment. Then I remembered that is the exact same thing that I thought about North Dakota State last season. Obi Emegano is going to have to have to be the same type of player that Lawrence Alexander was for North Dakota State last season, which is something that he appears to be capable of.
No one seems to be taking the losses of Korey Billbury, Denell Henderson, and Bobby Word very seriously though. Billbury was potentially a 1st Summit Team player, and he is being replaced by unproven guys. The whole team is completely changed. Their two top returning guys (Emegano and Brandon Conley) had shoulder surgery over the summer as well, and did not play in their summer trip. There is a lot to point at and say that this why they wont be a top 3 team in the conference, but for some reason, I always consider them a top 4 team in this conference. I just think Scott Sutton is that good of a coach and that Obi Emegano is that good of a player. Sutton has finished in the top 3 in the Summit League in every season that they were in the Summit League since 2003-2004.
I would not be shocked if this team finished 2nd in the conference, and I would not be totally surprised if they finished 8th in the conference. There is just no telling what is going to happen. Jalen Bradley appears to be in the perfect situation playing alongside Emegano. Freshman Javan White, while he looks like you could snap his arm like a twig, seems like he can really help the Golden Eagles in the low post in a league with not much depth in post players this season.
The start of the conference season does not look like a big help to them. Three teams they can beat, but on the road against IPFW, then back home for South Dakota, then back on the road against Denver, then back home for North Dakota State. They make up for it late in the season when they have three straight home games against IUPUI, Western Illinois, and Denver.
IUPUI
Range of wins: 6 to 10
This team was picked last in the preseason rankings before the start of last season. Everyone thought it was one of the worst rosters they had ever seen, but they were able to pick up 6 wins with that roster. What were they bad at last year? 3 point shooting…fine add Darell Combs, a transfer that made 32 threes in his sophomore year at Eastern Michigan. Rebounding…fine add two 6’8″ transfers from Loyola. Too many turnovers…fine, everyone that turned the ball over the most left the team, except for Marcellus Barksdale who handled the ball the most for the team. Guard dominated league? Fine, put Marcellus Barksdale on Obi Emegano or Garret Covington on any given night. Hell, they don’t even see him as their best perimeter defender.
The roster has improved, the coaches have a year of being together under their belt, and the program is improving more and more every day. They did hold an open scrimmage this week, but had 3 newcomers sitting out with some nagging injuries. One of the players that sat out was Jordan Pickett who transferred from Loyola where he had a history of injury problems, and it sounds like the Jaguars were expecting him to be one of the team’s primary ball handlers. That could become an issue.
They might be one the most boring team to ever watch, but you cannot ignore their improvement and upside. They also had Marcellus Barksdale playing four different positions last season in just about every single game, and he will not have to take on as much of a load this season with the additions to this team.
South Dakota
Range of wins: 5 to 8
I admit that I really like Craig Smith, and I think the loss of him as an assistant coach was a big factor as to why the Huskers had a drop off last season. Some of these preseason rankings appear to just rating the Coyotes around 5th primarily on the fact that Craig Smith is their coach…and I am totally cool with that. This team lost the most scoring in the Summit League, their team has been plagued with injuries in the preseason, oh and the staff currently has no idea who is going to score the ball for them. Spots 3-9 in the Summit League could be incredibly close, injuries could ruin any team, as well as pretty much starting 3 weeks later than everyone else as far as full team practices go.
Another thing that is kind of weird is that Trey Norris is probably their starting point guard, who started is sophomore year, but Smith thought it was a much better decision to send him to the bench in his junior year. So does Smith even believe in his point guard? Also Tyler Flack is returning from a back injury. You back isn’t important in basketball, is it? I was on the Craig Smith can coach this team to 3rd or 4th bandwagon, but there seems to be something new every week that continues to point to the fact that this is going to be a long year for the Coyotes.
This team though is going to force teams to take 3s on them. They forced their opponents to take the most amount of threes last season, and held them to the lowest three point field goal percentage in the Summit League…so you kind of need to be able to hit the three against them.
IPFW
Range of wins: 5 to 7
I have seen this team ranked any from 4th to 6th in preseason rankings. The Summit League ranked them as the 4th best team. I don’t see it. They return the 2nd least amount of scoring the Summit League, and they return the least amount of division one starts on their team. The losses of Steve Forbes, Joe Edwards, and Isaiah McCray seem too big. It seems like they are asking their newcomers to do too much and are placing too high of expectations on them. They think Brent Calhoun is going to have a breakout year because he lost a bunch of weight and is really healthy, but let’s wait a few games to see how much of an asset that can be. They are putting a lot of emphasis on redshirt freshman John Konchar to be an undersized 4 man and play small ball this season.
I am just not sold on this team yet. This team was the worst free throw shooting team in the Summit League, but I think they really are going to improve there, which could help them with some of the rule changes, but teams should be adjusted to the rule changes come conference play. I do think this team does have probably the best order of games in the conference as well. Oral Roberts at home on a Wednesday, South Dakota at home on a Wednesday, North Dakota State at home on a Thursday, South Dakota State at home on a Thursday; and on top of that they never have three games in a row in which they should not be completely unfavored. Have to give credit to the fact that they have one of the top back courts in the league with Mo Evans and Max Landis, but who knows how valuable that can be in a back court dominated league…says the guy that bases part of Omaha’s potential success on the Mavericks having one of the top back courts in the league.
The team did underachieve last season, but Joe Reed admitted that last year’s team was just completely focused on the Summit League tournament, and did not look at their season on a game-by-game basis. He said they are more focused on taking it one game at a time this season. I will be surprised if this team ends up in the top half of the Summit League, but they could do it with lucky breaks with injuries to other teams and whatnot. It is a young team, and a team of mostly newcomers. I will say if they can keep this roster together, add their two transfers sitting out this season, and a 6’10” freshman that recently committed, that the Mastodons will be a very good team against the Summit League in 2016-2017.
Denver
Range of wins: 2 to 7
There are many question marks for this team. I am really curious how a 30 second shot clock affects a team in the Princeton offense, probably not a ton, but it has to affect it in some way shape or form. Denver does have 3 seniors to run that offense, but they do have 13 underclassmen on their team that have to learn that offense and be prepared to hit shots with the shot clock winding down. Denver can pick up a few wins at home with their elevation advantage, style of play, and Joe Scott’s coaching abilities, but do you really feel fully confident in 9 freshman and 4 sophomores on the road in conference play? They also have 3 seasons in a row of declining in wins, so it is not like there is a bunch of momentum heading into this season. Not to mention, they were picked 2nd in preseason polls last season. I have seen them ranked as low as 9th in the Summit and as high as 6th.
This team should have a pretty decent non-conference season though with no power teams on their schedule, and Wyoming is the hardest team on their non-conference schedule, who lost everyone. The start to the conference schedule is not very kind to the Pioneers. They start off with with two weekend games on the road against North Dakota State and South Dakota State, and then they have Oral Roberts at home…so they are starting off with the three teams that are known for being the toughest in the Summit League. After the Golden Eagles, they have IPFW at home who swept them last season by 16 point margins in each game; and then they are back on the road for games against Western Illinois and IUPUI. It is possible that they start the conference season at 0-6. Talk about momentum!
Western Illinois
Range of wins: 2 to 5
No one is taking Western Illinois very seriously, and it completely makes sense. They ended 2014-2015 on a nine game losing streak and they were 0-8 in Summit League road games. Western Illinois is not an easy place for other teams to pick up wins though. They were 3-5 at home, and they lost both of their home games to North Dakota State and South Dakota State by 2.
It also seems like everyone on this team was injured at some point, and they return the most scoring in the Summit League at 89% of their offense. They are also very excited about their two freshmen 6’11” Brandon Gilbeck and 5’11” DeAngelo Brewster. Gilbeck and Brewster do not need to carry the load for this team with Garret Covington, JC Fuller, and Jabari Sandifer still on this team, but they need to just be role players; so it is not like they have any pressure on them. It is completely easy to write off the Leathernecks and pencil them in as the worst team in the Summit League, but they could seriously surprise a couple teams this year and pick up a shocking win or two. The toughest part of the season for them is going to be when they 6 out of 8 games on the road in the conference.
But the serious questions were all no for the Leathernecks last year. Can they stay healthy? No. Can they win on the road? No. Can they beat South Dakota State or North Dakota State? No.
Sometimes I find preseason predictions pointless, other than starting a conversation about the upcoming season or letting people know what could potentially be the biggest games of the year, there is not really much of a point to it.
I mainly find them useless because of the methodology in ranking teams. Many seem to just copy and past the standings of last year, and then make a small edit if a team had a high amount of turnover from last season’s roster. But I came up with a plan to do this for the Summit League. I was reading some preseason predictions for the Big 10 football season which was done by a bunch of ESPN writers. Some made good points but they all had to come up with a record for each team, and the math did not always make sense. One clown had Ohio State going 12-0 with a 8-0 Big Ten record and Michigan State going 11-1, and also with a 8-0 Big Ten record. Seriously, how drunk and lazy and/or bad at math was that guy? Or some guys would have two teams going 8-0 in conference, a couple going 0-8, and everyone else going 5-3. The math didn’t add up and they were telling you that these teams would win these amount of games because they are Skeletor and they said so.
So I came up with a plan. I would go through the Summit League conference schedule and assign wins and losses over the course of a number of weeks. At first it was just: South Dakota State is a better team than Denver, so win goes to the Jackrabbits. Then later, I would look at the difficulty of each team’s conference schedule. Obviously, everyone plays each other twice, but there are some things that stick out; like how Denver is the only team with the highway to the danger zone in playing at North Dakota State and South Dakota State in back to back games. Or how South Dakota and Oral Roberts are the only two Summit League teams without three straight games on the road in conference play. Then things like Omaha playing on the road against someone on a Thursday, as road games on Thursdays appear to be difficult for most teams. Actually road games are pretty difficult for anyone. Then I would go through the schedule again and consider some teams’ strengths versus their opponents weaknesses. Like how teams better be good at three point shooting against South Dakota as they forced teams to take the most threes with their defense…and other things.
But I assigned wins and losses to each game, and did it several times considering different factors. Then I plain and simple would add up each team’s wins and losses to see who had the most after going through it about 15 times. Is it perfect? No. Is it better than just saying South Dakota State will go 15-1 in conference because of Jesus? Probably.
Really, after going through all of this; I really do not see much separation between many of the teams. South Dakota State seems like a clear cut favorite. Then North Dakota State seems like they are 2nd best, but they really should not be as comfortable as one would think. Then Oral Roberts-Omaha-IPFW-IUPUI-South Dakota appear to be in a fight for spots 3 to 7 with Denver and Western Illinois sitting at 8 and 9; but Denver is a difficult place to play; and Western Illinois, while not great last year, they do return basically everything.
So much of the 3 to 9 in the Summit League appears to come down to:
Who can stay healthy?
Who can win on the road?
Who can pick up a win against South Dakota State and North Dakota State?
But for the sake of length, I am going to just post about Omaha to get started and why they should win more games than their 5-11 record last season. Then I will come out with the rest of the Summit League later.
Omaha
Range of wins: 7 to 11 wins
Boldest Predictions: Will pick up win against North Dakota State at home, will sweep South Dakota
Clearly, I am biased in how well I think the Mavs could do this season. The Mavericks finished 5-11, but they had 4 conference losses decided by one or two possessions. I know it does not work this way, but the Mavericks could have finished 8-8 or 9-7 in the Summit League had just a couple more things gone their way. There is also more to play for with the Mavericks this season, and they should have a slightly stronger home court advantage with their new arena being right on campus. The attendance for the Mavericks has risen each season since transition, and people in town are starting to take them more serious. 2012-2013 was probably the most fun season to watch, but Omahans did not seem to even notice. UNO Men’s Basketball was that new television show that had some good looking commercials that got you interested; but it was pitted in the same time slot as Breaking Bad in it’s prime and Sunday Night Football. Justin Simmons had some of the most exciting dunks you could possibly witness; but Doug McDermott was in the middle of one of the greatest careers in Creighton and NCAA history; and Tim Miles was bringing a personality to the Huskers. Omahans were in the mode of thinking they’d like to go to a Mavs game, but never fully pulled the trigger. A few years later: Creighton is down and Nebraska is too young for locals to know what is happening. UNO has a brand new arena, in a fun part of town, some local guys on the roster that can make some noise, and six seniors to help start the new era of the program.
The Mavericks also have a pretty good way to start conference play with Western Illinois and IUPUI at home. 2013-2014 started @ Western Illinois, @ North Dakota State, @ South Dakota State; and 2012-2013 was @ North Dakota State, @ South Dakota State, and then a month conference break before they had South Dakota and Kansas City at home before going back on the road against very good IPFW and Oakland teams. Last year the Mavs started on the road @ South Dakota and Western Illinois, and then came back home for North Dakota State and South Dakota State, before going back on the road against Oral Roberts. The Mavs are finally not being welcomed to the Summit League with the middle finger jammed in front of their face, so hopefully they can start league play with some momentum. The most difficult part of the conference schedule is going to be three straight road games at Denver, and the Mavericks yet to have a good game in the state of Colorado; then at Oral Roberts which is one of the toughest places to play in the Summit League; and then at South Dakota State who is the preseason favorite in the league and swept the Mavs last season by margins of 19 and 22 points.
As far as what is returning to the Mavericks: they lost Mike Rostampour and CJ Carter, but they are returning 61% of their scoring; which is the 4th highest in the league. Marcus Tyus and Devin Patterson as a returning back court is arguably one of the top 3 back courts in the league. Jake White is hopefully healthy enough to give significant minutes when the conference season turns around, he is tied with his fellow teammate Tre’Shawn Thurman as the 2nd leading returning rebounder in the league. Randy Reed and Tim Smallwood should hopefully finally have roles edged out to really help this team improve. Lack of depth was an issue for this team last season, but newcomers Zach Pirog, JT Gibson, and Tra-Deon Hollins sound as if they can really help the Mavericks improve on some of the weaknesses the Mavs had in 2014-2015, and add some needed depth to this team. This team can go big, it can go small, it has adaptable lineups that can go up against anyone in the Summit.
From what I could tell, the preseason predictions biggest concerns with the Mavericks are that they cannot make up for the loss of Mike Rostampour and CJ Carter. Okay, everyone loses someone in college athletics, but should we really be concerned about losing two guys that were not recruited to ever play in a Summit League conference tournament? So really, why are people so hard on them for losing Rostampour and Carter, but no one is hard on IPFW for losing Steve Forbes and Joe Edwards; or South Dakota for losing Tyler Larson and Brandon Bos; or Oral Roberts for losing half of their team? Please don’t take this as a Rostampour and Carter Were Not Unimportant thought… The Mavs would not be the same without them. The point is, it does not seem like the Mavericks are asking as much out of their newcomers and returning players as much as other teams. They are asking Jake White to be healthy enough to score 2-4 more points and grab a couple more rebounds, which I realize is easier said than done; Tre’Shawn Thurman to continue to improve; Tyus and Patterson to be more consistent; and Reed and Smallwood work more on their roles that they established toward the end of last season. Other than North Dakota State and South Dakota State, everyone else appears to be asking guys to come in and be stars or huge impacts right away. One thing that does scare me about Omaha finishing in the top half of the conference is the injury to Marcus Tyus. He’s coming off ACL surgery that he injured in February. Being ready in full form throughout November, December, and January just seems like a lot to look for at this point.
The Summit League preseason team came out last week, and it was pretty fair. It is actually really difficult to come up with a 1st and 2nd Team list of picks, especially in a guard heavy league and you are a fan that wants to see the first team be a traditional line up with 2 post players, a wing player, and 2 guards.
I was listening to the recordings from the Summit League Media Day yesterday and was happy that Scott Nagy basically called preseason teams pointless. Last year no one predicted that his players Deondre Parks and George Marshall would be all league picks, and it is basically because no one knows how the newcomers are going to do at this point. Or if someone like Tyler Larson is going to see a huge improvement in play.
IUPUI’s transfers Nick Osborne and Darell Combs could be better than AJ Jacobson and Garett Covington for all we know. Or IPFWs redshirt freshman John Konchar could be a better player than Jake Bittle. We have to wait and find out. Preseason picks are basically made to make us even more excited for the college basketball season.
So I wanted to do something (that I thought) that would be fun and create a Summit League Super Team… This was nothing more than merely fun and to verify my lunacy…maybe to show how much time I have on my hands with my wife busy studying and working toward her PhD.
Imagine there is a tournament with the best players from each conference each year at the end of every season. There can be a power conference tournament and a mid-major tournament if you are really scared about this, but it is make believe, so get over it. So, each conference has to put together a 12 man roster of their best players from the conference, and you can have three players that can be reserves in case any of the 12 get injured. They can be in any year of eligibility, but they must have been eligible in the 2015-2016 season in this case. One wrinkle in the roster is that you have to have at least one player from each team on the 15 man roster.
So let’s pick someone from each team.
Denver – Nate Engesser – 6’3″ Sr
2nd best field goal percentage (51.4%), free throw percentage (82.9%) of any player returning to the Summit
4th highest amount of 3 point field goal percentage (42.9%) of any player returning
IPFW – Mo Evans – 6’0″ Jr
Ranks 3rd in Assists Per Game (3.3) of returning players
IUPUI – Marcellus Barksdale – 6’5″ Sr
Tied for 2nd highest steals per game average (1.7) of any player returning to the Summit League
Played 4 different positions for the Jaguars in 2014-2015
Ranks 4th in free throws attempted per game for any returning player
NDSU – AJ Jacobson – 6’6″ So
4th highest free throw percentage (82%) for any player returning
18 games of scoring in double figures
Omaha – Devin Patterson – 5’11” Sr
One magazine voted him as preseason defensive player of the year
Summit League leader in steals per game for last 2 years
2nd highest Assists Per Game (3.9) of any returning player
Ranks 3rd in free throws attempted per game for any returning player
ORU – Obi Emegano – 6’3″ Sr
Voted Preseason Player of the Year
Most points per game (18.3) of any returning player to the Summit League
Tied for 2nd highest steals per game average (1.7) of any player returning to the Summit League
Scored in double figures in 28 games in 2014-2015
USD – Tre Burnette – 6’5″ Sr
Leading rebounder (5.9/game) for returning Summit League players
Had 4 double doubles in 2014-2015
Averaged 12.3 points per game in the month of February
SDSU – Deondre Parks – 6’1″ Sr
3rd highest points per game average (14.1) for any returning Summit League player
2nd most 3 point field goals made (69) of any returning player to the Summit League
Scored in double figures in 27 games in 2014-2015
WIU – Garret Govington – 6’5″ Jr
2nd highest points per game average (15.5) for any returning player
4th highest amount of three point field goals made (63) for any returning player to the Summit League
3rd highest free throw percentage (82.8%) for any returning player
2nd most free throws attempted per game for any returning player
Okay…okay…the first thing I think when I look at this finished roster is that the team is small. We are going to need some height on this roster to compete against the other conferences. We cannot reasonably take this team to a tournament like this with Barksdale, Burnette, and Jacobson as our post game. How about we throw in candidates to fill out the roster.
Denver – Marcus Byrd
IPFW – Joe Reed, DeAngelo Stewart
IUPUI – Mason Archie, Darell Combs, Nick Osborne
NDSU – Kory Brown, Carlin Dupree, Chris Kading, Dexter Werner
Omaha – Tre’Shawn Thurman, Marcus Tyus, Jake White
USD – Casey Kasperbauer, Trey Norris
SDSU – Jake Bittle, George Marshall, Reed Tellinghuisen
WIU – JC Fuller, Jabari Sandifer
So we have to pick six out of these twenty guys, which is not easy. How about we address the post player void first and pick three post players from the list. Am I too bias to throw in Jake White and Tre’Shawn Thurman right off the bat? Are Byrd or Kading better players than either of them? The jury is out on Byrd since he plays in such a slow paced offense. Kading apparently had 3 surgeries since the basketball season ended. Osborne has yet to play a game in the Summit, and we are just going off of the He Played Alright in a Slightly Bigger Conference So He Has to be Pretty Good With a Year Off and Now Into a Smaller Conference card.
I like Reed though, he’s going to go from being the ‘Dons 5th option to being their 2nd or 3rd option. He can step back and hit the three, even though he is not going to do it a lot. He also played very well when Steve Forbes was hurt for a few games. Okay, we are adding Reed and Thurman for sure. So White or Kading…I know Kading did not score a bunch of points in 2014-2015, but he did not need to. He led the Summit League in blocks per game season, and this team needs rim protection. With Thurman and Burnette on the team, the team will have to the two leading returning rebounders in the Summit League, so we are somewhat covered there. I think I got to take Kading on this one. But crap, what about Dexter Werner? He was probably actually the most important member of the Bison last season not named Alexander or Jacobson. You look at Werner and you think he is just going to get rebounds and put backs, but that is not true. He gets the ball at the top of the lane and drives it to the basket when he wants. He also has some pretty spectacular spin moves that put a number of Summit League guards to shame. I know he is undersized, but I think we have to go Werner, especially considering the injuries to Kading and White.
So we have Werner, Thurman, and Reed on the roster. We are up to twelve.
G Marcellus Barksdale – 6’5″ Sr
G Tre Burnette – 6’5″ Sr
G Garrett Covington – 6’5″ Jr
G Obi Emegano – 6’3″ Sr
G Nate Engesser – 6’3″ Sr
G Mo Evans – 6’0″ Jr
F AJ Jacobson – 6’6″ So
G Devin Patterson – 5’11” Sr
G Deondre Parks – 6’1″ Sr
F Joe Reed – 6’8″ Sr
F Tre’Shawn Thurman – 6’7″ So
F Dexter Werner – 6’6″ Jr
This team has two very good point guards in Devin Patterson and Mo Evans, but they both can be a little fast. We might need a guy to say “SLOW DOWN!!!” The guy for that is Jake Bittle. It is not like Bittle is slow, but if you ever watch a Jackrabbits game, Bittle is the man to run the half court offense. He holds the ball at the top of the key and then Parks and Marshall work to get open. He is the quarterback and they are the wide receivers.
I feel like we are one post player away. I know I had Kading and White as the leading candidates before, but I want to go with IUPUI’s Nick Osborne on this one. He is a transfer, sure, but there are high expectations around him for the Jags. Maybe not as much as Cody Larson had when he transferred to South Dakota State from Florida, but there are high expectations for him. I am not sure if he is going to be a great player in the Summit League, or better than White or Kading, but damn it I want to take the gamble here.
So this team has some rebounding and rim protection, ball handling and passing, three point shooting, and perimeter defense. I think we might have to go with George Marshall here. He is probably not the most important player on his team, but he is highly needed on what should be the best team in the Summit League in 2015-2016.
I don’t know how this team would do in a tournament like this, because I already wasted enough time make this, so it is not like I’m going to go waste even more by making an Super WAC Team. It is probably not even the top 15 guys in the conference, but it would be an extremely competitive team.
Here is a change of pace and the All Summit Get Ready for Terrible Puns and Poor Jokes Team
Joe Scott knows his team is young and the Pioneers are a work in progress, but he is preaching maturity to his team.
Jon Coffman is pretty damn excited about college basketball and his team.
Redshirt Freshman John Konchar has apparently put on a ton of muscle, and the ‘Dons are really excited about him and are more prepared to go small ball this year in the Summit
Brent Calhoun is expected to make a big jump for the ‘Dons, he has lost a bunch of weight and is in the best shape of his life.
I have realized that after an entire season that I have been spelling “Mastodons” incorrectly.
Jason Gardner is excited about this program, and thinks his staff will be more comfortable working together this year. He has gained a large amount of respect for the Summit League.
In his opinion, Mason Archie is his team’s best defender and wants to defend the other team’s best player.
Marcellus Barksdale had to play four different positions in just about every single game for the Jaguars, he will not have to do that this year and expects Barksdale to benefit from not having to playing too many different roles.
Barksdale and Archie have both graduated already, and set a great example for the team.
His 4 transfers are really going to help this team.
The new arena has really helped the Jaguars in recruiting.
Dave Richman acknowledges that his team has 11 of his 15 guys as freshman and sophomores, but they are a deeper and more talented team than last year.
Chris Kading had 3 surgeries in the off season, will probably miss the first couple games of the regular season.
Lawrence Alexander carried the Bison on his back, he was the winningst most player in Bison history, it is not going to be easy to replace him. They will have to replace him by committee.
The Bison ended up 12-4 in the league, but many of their games were won by just a possession.
Derrin Hansen (and Brittany Lange) is excited about the new arena, it has been a huge asset to the program, and they know it will help them catch up to the rest of the league in the next few years. Not to mention it is extremely huge for the community.
Hansen is expecting more productivity from Tim Smallwood, Hansen is unclear if Smallwood will start or come off the bench yet. Smallwood has a much better feel for the game right now. He was a huge help when Marcus Tyus missed the last 6 games of the season.
Devin Patterson has become better in his leadership role.
Marcus Tyus is coming off his knee injury very well.
Jake White was only healthy for 2 or 3 games last year, he can have a big year if he is healthy.
Randy Reed is going to have a big role this year.
The players UNO has brought in bring in a winning culture, with all of them playing in their state championship games. Zach Jackson’s team won the state championship.
Hansen thinks his new guys can be immediate impacts for his program, but it sounds like minutes may be an issue at this point.
Scott Sutton says he is excited and optimistic, but he also sounds like he wants to skip the morning and get straight to lunch. He likes his new players, he knows there will be growing pains, but it is a tough group of guys that should be ready by the conference schedule. Their non-conference schedule should really help prepare the Golden Eagles for the Summit League.
Obi Emegano and Brandon Conley have both been injured throughout the summer and had shoulder surgeries, but are doing very well at this point. The staff is doing the best that they can to protect them.
Sutton thinks the rule changes in college basketball are going to benefit a guy like Emegano the most. He already led the league last year in free throws attempted per game and he should get even more attempts at the line this season. Sutton also likes how his team plays with a 30 second shot clock.
Sutton really really likes Jalen Bradley, and will have a hard time keeping him out of the lineup. Bradley got to play a lot on the team’s summer trip, where the team got to play with a 24 second shot clock.
Sutton could have a year where he is starting a couple freshmen. AJ Owens is their post player, but not as consistent as they would like him to be. Owens could have the biggest jump this year in the league.
Craig Smith sounds like he came to party. He thinks it is going to be a heck of a year for the Summit League, and his team will be a work in progress. He is glad that his team set a foundation and a culture last year. They lost a lot of scoring, so they have to figure out a way to score the ball.
Smith really does not know who is going to help take on the scoring yet, but Tre Burnette really caught on toward the end of the season. Casey Kasperbauer is one of the best three point shooters he has ever coached.
The Coyotes have had a lot of injuries. They have 17 players on the roster, but ended a practice with only 10 players recently. It has been hard to get going and figure out lineups and who plays well together.
Dan Jech can score in a lot of different ways and is a great rebounder. Smith sounds really excited about Jech.
Tyler Hagedorn has a great feel for the game and can do a lot of different things.
Tyler Borchers has been a great surprise for the Coyotes, he doesn’t look pretty with everything that he does, but he does great things.
Scott Nagy says his team has taken their time getting ready because of the great experience that they have at the guard position. He thinks the Jackrabbits have a lot of depth, which is going to be needed in college basketball with the rule changes.
He points out that preseason awards mean nothing. No one expected Deondre Parks and George Marshall to be all league picks last year. Some transfers from IUPUI or on other teams could be big time players, and no one knows anything about them yet.
Jake Bittle and George Marshall both have nagging injuries, nothing that would keep them out, but they will be hurting after games.
Nagy thinks his team is smaller than he would like it to be. They could even go very small with no true post player in some games.
Adam Dykman works extremely hard, and down the road will be a tremendous 4 man in the future.
The biggest question mark for the Jackrabbits is: how will they replace Cody Larson? They are looking at 3 guys to replace him…Connor Devine, Ian Theisen, and Mike Daum. He has no idea who will be their starting center at this point.
Nagy just seems displeased by rule changes, doesn’t see the need for them, but they have to play with them. He doesn’t think the rule changes will affect how they play though.
Billy Wright feels his program is headed in the right direction. His team has set a philosophy in how they want to recruit and compete.
Western Illinois returns 85% of their scoring.
His freshman are working hard to compete for starting spots and playing time.
Garret Covington has really worked hard to improve his rebounding
JC Fuller is one of the most underrated players in the league.
De’Angelo Brewster and Brandon Gilbeck will have big breakout years as freshmen.
The Summit League is close in talent, you are an injury or two away from going from the top to the bottom, or a recruit away from going from the bottom to the middle of the pack.
So the Summit League is stacked with guards and wing players this season. College Sports Madness recently came out with a All Summit League 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th team and 16 of the 20 players were guards, 17 if you count South Dakota State’s Reed Tellinghuisen as a guard. The Summit League came out with their preseason 1st and 2nd teams yesterday, and 8 or the 10 players were guards. The teams they selected are fair for the most part, though I do not agree with leaving Tre’Shawn Thurman off the list, but I get that I am biased.
Anyway, there are so many guards on this list, and that is because the Summit League is going to be a very guard heavy league this year. So could one come up with a conclusion that who ever has the best post game is going to set themselves apart from the rest of the conference? So who has the best post players in the conference?
For the sake of argument, I am going to reduce each team’s list to their top 4 post players, because realistically teams hardly ever use more than 4 post players in the Summit League. Hell some players do not use more than two post players.
North Dakota State
Chris Kading, Dexter Werner, AJ Jacobson, and one of the other 3 players that will mix in.
I have kind of had North Dakota State as my team to win the conference this year, but I am growing more and more uncomfortable with that recently the more I am looking things up. Not that I think they are in trouble or anything. Anyway, it is pretty hard to argue that they do not have the best core of post players in the Summit League. I know someone might look at Chris Kading and say he’s only a 5 points and 4 rebounds guy, but he takes smart shots, he led the Summit League in blocks per game, and he would routinely hold the other team’s best post player to a bad game.
Dexter Werner was the Sixth Man of the Year in the Summit League last year, and he completely deserved it. He was a big time force that brought immediate energy to the Bison post game off of the bench, and he shot 51% from the field. He was playing undersized most of the time, but he was still able to get 1 block per game, which is tied with the 2nd most for returning players to the league.
Dexter Werner was selected to the 2nd Team for the All Summit Preseason Predictions.
Then the Bison have AJ Jacobson, and while there is no official Summit League Freshman of the Year Award, I am pretty sure it would have been him last season. He appears to be a popular choice for 1st Team All Summit this upcoming year, after coming off averaging 11.6 points per game and 4.2 rebounds, and many people think he is going to take a large load of the shots that Lawrence Alexander was taking. He is probably more of a traditional 3, but he did quite well for the Bison at the 4 position, and the Bison can bring in Werner off the bench and slide Jacobson over to the 3, making for a big lineup.
It is kind of unclear who the 4th post player will be at this point for the Bison. They had Nebraska-native, Spencer Eliason redshirting last season, and they are bringing in two 6’8″ freshmen that they appear to be pretty excited about. With Kading and Werner, you kind of expect one of the two true freshman to redshirt though, right?
South Dakota
Eric Robertson, Tyler Flack, Tyler Hagedorn, Dan Jech
I admit that is pretty difficult to go on from here, so how about South Dakota? The Coyotes might actually have the most talented post players, but there are some questions to it. Can Tyler Flack bounce back from sitting out all of 2014-2015 with an injury, and does Craig Smith even like him? Flack was averaging 8.5 ppg, 4.7 rpg, 1.5 bpg, and shooting 55% from the field as a sophomore in 21 minutes on a pretty bad South Dakota team.
Flack is back.
Can Eric Robertson survive as a starter if Smith doesn’t feel comfortable with starting a true freshman? Then there is two freshman, Tyler Hagedorn and Dan Jech. Jech gives the Coyotes a post player and Hagedorn gives the team a stretch four. The Coyotes were able to survive last season with 6’3″ Tyler Larson and 6’5″ Tre Burnette as their primary options in the post last season, so what is going to happen when Smith adds some height to their post game. Oh yeah, and there is also Tre Burnette, who had the highest rebounding average of any player returning to the Summit League.
Omaha
Jake White, Tre’Shawn Thurman, Daniel Meyer, Zach Pirog (or Randy Reed)
It is kind of a bold move picking the Mavericks that high here. Consider this though, no player 6’7″ or taller that is returning to the league averaged more points per game than Tre’Shawn Thurman last season. Jake White is healthy apparently, while I cannot 100% verify this, but I am pretty sure he had limited minutes in his junior season due to injuries. Even with as many injuries that he had in his junior season, he was probably the fastest post player in the league. So you have to assume he will go from 20 minutes per game to 25-30, his field goal percentage should rise above 40% while he’s healthy, he can probably be a 10 and 8 guy. 10 and 8 should get you Honorable Mention in the Summit.
Could Jake White be the most underrated post player in the league?
Daniel Meyer should be getting a minutes increase as well. Statistically, he had about the same statistics that Dexter Werner had in his freshman season at North Dakota State, and he should receive an increased role (maybe even a Werner like role) with Mike Rostampour and Rylan Murry no longer on the team. One game last year, I was sitting near Matt Hagerbaumer, you seriously need to take the opportunity to sit next to Hagerbaumer if you ever get that chance. He’s constantly yelling support to younger players, and he was so excited about Thurman and Meyer as freshman. He at one point said that they needed Meyer to be a banger down low and be the dirty work guy. Basically, the Mavs need him to be Matt Hagerbaumer 2.0, and he is capable of being that. Meyer apparently played very well on the team’s trip to Italy as well.
I am still unsure if Zach Pirog will redshirt. Hansen kind of has a history of redshirting big players, and the team already has White, Thurman, and Meyer; but maybe Pirog is even better than advertised? He should add immediate rim protection to the team, which would be extremely helpful, but how many minutes would be able to get this season? Not to mention, there will probably be a lot teams playing 6’5″ guys at the 4 position for a decent chunk of minutes this season, so wouldn’t you want to play Randy Reed more at the 4 position this season; leaving a lot of the minutes at the 5 to White, Meyer, and even Thurman. Just seems like minutes wise it would be a good idea to redshirt Pirog, but he is someone that can immediately help this team.
South Dakota State
Connor Devine, Ian Theisen, Michael Daum, Adam Dykman
There is a big gaping hole to make up in the loss of Cody Larson for the Jackrabbits, and it is unclear who will fill that role. The Jackrabbits also grew comfortable playing Reed Tellinguisen at the 4 last season, as the team’s 5th best offensive player, they really couldn’t keep him off the floor, even if he was playing undersized at times.
You look at Devine and Theisen and you think two guys that don’t even combine for 5 points per game, but really they were playing behind Cody Larson and sharing that role of backup post player. Then you realize that they both shot over 50 percent from the field, and they both had stretches over the season where they were making big plays. It’s also not like Scott Nagy cannot develop guys at all. Devine as a 40% free throw shooter might get left off the court down the stretch of the few close conference games the Jackrabbits will have.
The Jackrabbits also had Nebraska-native Michael Daum redshirting last season, who seemed like a pretty attractive recruit coming out of high school, so who knows how much he developed under the Jackrabbits staff. The basketball fan in me says “oh wow this guy averaged 25 and 13 as a senior in high school,” but the Nebraskan in me says “I have never even heard of Kimball, how could anyone be good at basketball from there.” The Mavericks offered him a scholarship though, he also held offers from South Dakota, Wyoming, North Dakota, and others, so non-Nebraskans see something in him.
Then there is even another Nebraska-native on the team, 6’7″ Adam Dykman. I am pretty nervous about Dykman, I constantly saw his name in the paper for big games, and I know a few guys hugely into Nebraska high school basketball that were upset that UNO or Nebraska did not give an offer to this kid. I am afraid he’s psycho angry about that.
With such a strong group of starting guards, I don’t think it’s going to come down to the post players for the Jackrabbits. The show Scrubs had a great core of cast with JD, Turk, Kelso, Elliot, and Dr. Cox, would the show have been successful if they threw in a bunch of episodes centered around Ted and made a three episode story arch about Ted? Many people would have turned away. I actually would have watched the crap out of that. So how many times are you going to hear a ESPN3 commentator say: The Jackrabbits are having a great night with Marshall, Bittle, Parks, and Tellinghuisen knocking down all these outside shots and beating their defenders to the rim; but I really think they need to get the ball into Devine to work his magic on Dexter Werner? Probably never.
IUPUI
Nick Osborne, Matt O’Leary, Evan Hall, and Noah Thomas
Nick Osborne and Matt O’Leary were decent players at Loyola and will now have increased roles with the Jaguars. Evan Hall and Noah Thomas are both true freshman, so the hard part for the Jags is throwing in an entirely new core of post players into their lineup. Hall is a 6’7″ freshman that was rated as a 3 star recruit and had offers from Eastern Kentucky, Western Kentucky, and Lipscomb out of high school. Hall is a 6’9 and 235 post from the state of Indiana that averaged a double-double in his senior season. The Jaguars also survived last year on having guards playing as post players, so it’s not like they cannot win without a post game at all. Essentially, the team decided that they didn’t like the cast of the last season of the Power Rangers and went with entirely new ranger squad, and they feel pretty comfortable about how the new cast will go. How many other places are you going to find a Power Rangers reference talking about sports? Actually, I don’t think this my first time on here.
IPFW
Joe Reed, Brent Calhoun, Andrew Poulter, Racine Talla
You’ve got to feel confident in a 6’8″ guy like Joe Reed that has shot about 55% for his career. Like Jake White and Tre’Shawn Thurman getting more shots because of departures, you’ve got to think that Reed’s shot attempts will go up with the loss of Steve Forbes. Reed is another guy with potential to be a 10 and 8 guy. His other three front court teammates are kind of question marks.
I’ve seen people bragging up Andrew Poulter, and I do not get it. He was a 7 and 5 guy as a sophomore at a junior college, and he also shot 47% from the field. I watched a video of him in high school working on some 1 on 1 moves, he was looking like an All American but he’s 6’11” and 275 going up 1 on 1 against some 6’5″ 175 pound guy. Granted, it is high school and I doubt there were too many guys near his size to work out with, but still, I don’t see how his 1 on 1 skills will ever come into play from the Summit. Then there is sophomore Racine Talla who is 6’9″ but hasn’t played a game of basketball in 3 years. It just seems like a gamble to take them seriously at this point. Maybe Jon Coffman realizes how to use them appropriately though, we will clearly have to wait and see. And many people have them picked as the 4th best team in the conference, so maybe I am just a moron. 95% chance that I am a moron.
Oral Roberts
Brandon Conley, Tre Vance, AJ Owens, and Darian Harris
Did you know this team led the Summit League in blocks per game last season? They essentially did not need production offensively from their post players as they had Obi Emegano, Kory Billbury, and Bobby Word to take on a bulk of the scoring, so they really just needed their post players to play defense and make great outlet passes. I don’t think people are realizing how important Denell Henderson was to this team. None of these players are huge scoring threats, and a lot of people are high on Owens even though he basically only got minutes when the Golden Eagles were getting killed last season. He shot 40% from the field, and he was basically playing against other teams’ 3rd string most of the time. Darian Harris also seems like he should be a shooting guard, but the ORU had to use him at the 4 position several times last season due to lack of a post.
I am nervous for Scott Sutton this season, but not in a way that I think he’s going to get fired or anything. I really do not think he has a great roster this season, but it is Sutton and Obi Emegano. I love hearing rumors every off season about schools looking at Sutton as a head coaching hire, but we may not get that this April and May. If Sutton can come in top three of the league this season, I really think he deserves coach of the year, but I don’t think he’ll get it.
Denver
Marcus Byrd, Daniel Amigo, Christian Mackey, and 1 of 2 freshman.
I am scared for Denver this season. A few have selected them to finish in last this season, CBS Sports rated them as the 3rd best team in the Summit League but it was pointless. It is really hard to look at Denver and say they have the best players in anything, not because of a lack of talent, but because of the offense that Joe Scott runs. Marcus Byrd averaged 8.5 points per game as a junior, 8.5 at Denver is like averaging 13 any place else. Byrd can also step out and take the three, he actually has the highest three point field goal percentage of any player returning to the Summit League this season, and he makes nearly 2 threes a game.
Daniel Amigo was also giving the Pioneers pretty good minutes as a freshman, but his season ended early due to injury. The Pioneers also have a 6’7″ freshman named Abiola Akintola from Australia, who was not widely recruited, but he averaged 17.8 ppg and 6 rebounds per game in the U18 Australian Junior Championships, whatever the heck that is. I know there are a lot of question marks for international players, and it could be difficult to figure out if he is even the right fit for Denver, but it could be something amazing watching him develop.
Western Illinois
Tate Stensgaard, Jalen Chapman, Mike Miklusak, and the mystery man
All are average guys that on any other team in the Summit League would be role players, and really they are just role players for Western Illinois, but they give a lot of minutes to the Leathernecks when they are available. They many lost the last 13 of 14 games of the season because they had no Stensgaard or Chapman for that time, but still, could they have made the difference. The team has 4 freshman post players that will mix in. I wonder how they will work out.
Basketball, meh, mainly the NBA has entered into an era of looking at teams by asking the question: Who has the best Big 3? Having a Big 3 certainly is key, but really I think it’s just as important to follow up with who has better role players to back up Big 3? Could the 2008 Boston Celtics have won an NBA championship without their young starters Kendrick Perkins, Rajon Rondo, and older bench players of PJ Brown, Sam Cassell, and James Posey? But while we are on the subject, that I brought up, let’s take a look at who could have the best Big 3 in the Summit League in the 2015-2016 season.
SDSU:
Jake Bittle, George Marshall, Deondre Parks
There is little doubt that the Jackrabbits will have the best guard trio in the league. Each averaged double figures in scoring, and all three can defend the perimeter. Each averaged double figure scoring, and Bittle has the highest field goal percentage of any returning player to the Summit league at 53.4 %. The Jackrabbits also have 3 of the top 5 returning players in 3 point field goals made, Marshall made 64 threes in 2014-2015 and he did not even play the entire season. The big question mark is; with Cody Larson graduating, who is going to rebound and defend in the post for them?
The Jackrabbits are returning 74% of their scoring from 2014-2015.
Role Players:
Reed Tellinghuisen, 6-6 SO: If you look at the Jackrabbits fan forum, someone posted pictures of Tellinghuisen lifting weights, which is not weird at all. He does appear as if he has added some weight onto his frame, which is great as he will be used more at the 4 position in his second year as a Jackrabbit. The Summit League has Tellinghuisen, AJ Jacobson, and Tre’Shawn Thurman all in the same class at the forward position. How excited are you for 2017-2018?
Connor Devine/Ian Theisen: These two split time and basically taking turns of who was backing up All Conference player Cody Larson. These two combined for for almost 5 points and 4 rebounds per game. With a young front court, these two will be counted on more in the 2015-2016 season to step up.
Skyler Flatten, 6-6 SO: Flatten was actually getting a decent amount of minutes, but then something happened. George Marshall happened.
Keaton Moffitt, 6-5 SR: Keaton Moffitt also happened. The transfer, from Division 2 Sioux Falls, made quite the impact on his team with his leadership and hustle, routinely making big plays when it was needed most.
Omaha:
Devin Patterson, Tre’Shawn Thurman, Marcus Tyus, (Jake White)
The Mavericks could have a Big 4 if Jake White is healthy, with as many injuries as he had in his junior season, it is going to be like getting an entirely new player in the line up. It seemed as if the entire team faced injuries issues last season, so if the Mavs can stay healthy, they can be a very dangerous team in the Summit League with their senior back court of Patterson and Tyus to go along with their rising sophomore star Tre’Shawn Thurman.
Random stat: The Mavericks have the most experienced roster with the average eligible player being 2/3 of the way through their sophomore season, but they have the smallest roster with an average height of 6’4″. If Zach Jackson, Ben Kositizke, and Zach Pirog all redshirt, the roster gets even smaller, but more experienced. It is still up for debate if this is one of the meaningless things I have ever posted here.
The Mavericks are looking to make a big jump with a new arena and new era.
Role Players:
Tra-Deon Hollins, 6-2 JR: Averaged 17 ppg, 6.2 rpg, and 5.3 apg his freshman season of junior college, he appears to be a little bit of everything, and can really help the Mavericks improve their perimeter defense.
Daniel Meyer, 6-9 SO: Only averaged four and a half minutes a game in 2014-2015, but he is likely to see an increased role with the graduation of Mike Rostampour and the departure of fellow redshirt freshman Rylan Murry. Meyer appeared to play with a lot of activity on the team’s trip to Italy.
Randy Reed, 6-6 SR: I’d like to see Reed’s shot chart, I cannot think of many jump shots Reed made, or took. He really can slash and get to the basket though. When Marcus Tyus missed the last 6 games of the season, Reed really did a decent job of bringing energy off the bench. There were many instances in the Mavericks’ home game against Oral Roberts that he made a play to keep Omaha in the game. I would think with not a ton of post players around the Summit League that Reed will be used as a backup 4.
NDSU:
Kory Brown, Carlin Dupree, AJ Jacobson
After losing the Summit League player of the year, Lawrence Alexander, the Bison will look to replace that offense in their back court. AJ Jacobson said in a Q&A that the Bison are all about a team effort, and know that there is a next one up to take Alexander’s place. It will probably actually be two up with Kory Brown and Carlin Dupree to take the load on offense over. Seriously, this team is starting to become the HYDRA of the Summit League.
While this team is still relatively young, they seem to have completely bought into Dave Richman’s schemes. A Big 3 probably does not really matter to the Bison, they appear to be ready for anything. Looking at their roster, they probably have the most complete roster in the Summit League. It is also probably worth nothing; that while the Bison are a young team, their roster has the most division one starts on the active roster for 2015-2016 with 197 starts. Kory Brown is after all a 4 year starter…assuming he is going to start this season.
The Bison will continue to work as a team after the loss of Lawrence Alexander.
Role Players:
Chris Kading, 6-8 SR: Kading averaged 5.3 points per game and 3.9 rebounds per game in 2014-2015. He is not much of a threat on offense, but he does rarely make mistakes. Actually the Bison rarely make mistakes as a team. Kading led the Summit League in blocks per game.
Paul Miller, 6’4 SO: Miller averaged 6.7 points per game and 3.8 rebounds per game, while making 37 threes in his freshman campaign, which is all impressive considering he was sharing the back court with the likes of Lawrence Alexander, Kory Brown, and Carlin Dupree. He also had 10 games in which he scored in double figures.
Dexter Werner, 6-6 JR: Had a massive jump from his sophomore to his junior season going from 2.8 points per game to 8.4 points per game. He also only averaged under 20 minutes per game in 2014-2015. With Werner coming off the bench, he and Jacobson allow the Bison to be extremely tough at the 4 position for 40 minutes. It also allows Jacobson to move over to the 3 and play more outside, which is not a bad thing for them. Werner was second on the team in blocks per game, and is tied with Omaha’s Tre’Shawn Thurman as the 2nd leading shot blocker returning to the league.
IUPUI:
Marcellus Barksdale, Darrell Combs, Nick Osborne
A bunch of new faces for IUPUI, which is not a terrible thing. Marcellus Barksdale is the team’s returning leading scorer, but he can easily fall to the team’s 2nd or 3rd best scorer on the team. Eastern Michigan transfer Darrell Combs is ready to go and has shown he can get buckets. I cannot wait for the “combing the court” puns from terrible ESPN3 commentators. Loyola-Illinois transfer Nick Osborne is expected to make a big impact on this team as well, and will more than likely serve as the team’s primary post presence, as he and other Loyola-Illinois transfer Matt O’Leary are the only upperclassmen post players on the team. Osborne was known for getting into lots of foul trouble when he was a post player for Loyola. The Jaguars are going to look entirely different this season.
The Jaguars exceeded expectations in 2014-2015, what can they do with a group of new and improved players?
Role Players:
Seriously, how many 6’5″ guards do the Jaguars need?
Aaron Brennan, 6-6 SO: Averaged 6.4 points per game in 2014-15 and started in 24 games, but could be moved to the bench with the additions of Osborne and O’Leary. Not a bad thing for your team to have a guy on your bench with 24 career starts as a freshman.
DJ McCall, 6-5 SO: Averaged a shade under 5 points per game and had 15 starts on the year. Could also see an increase of minutes with the graduations of Elijah Ray and Khufu Najee.
The further I get into this, I realize that the entire team is a group of role players.
South Dakota
Tre Burnette, Tyler Flack, Casey Kasperbauer
I admit that throwing Flack’s name into the mix is a risk. Due to an injury, he has yet to play under Craig Smith, but Craig is probably going to like using a 6’7″ guy who shot 45% on threes in his sophomore season. Combine that with Casey Kasperbauer ranking 95th in the nation last season in threes made, and South Dakota will rely on the three ball a lot this season, again. The trio can really make up for the losses of Tyler Larson and Brandon Bos from last season.
Tre Burnette is the Summit League’s leading returning rebounder from 2014-2015, and Kasperbauer has the most three point field goals made of any returning player to the League, he also has the 3rd highest three point field goal percentage of any returning player.
South Dakota lost 56% of their scoring, that is the most in the Summit League.
Role Players:
Trey Norris, 6-0 Sr: Came off the bench in his junior year after being a starter in his sophomore season, but will compete for the starting point guard position with incoming JuCo player, Shy McClelland. Norris had a drop off in production from his sophomore season under coach Smith, but he can still be a capable part of the offense for the Coyotes.
Eric Robertson, 6-8 Sr: He made the game winning shot over the Mavericks in Omaha, right? I just remember the beard, and being incredibly angry. I do not completely blame him for the Mavericks’ loss, it is just the final image I have in my mind of that game. Perhaps an increased role in his senior season with the departure of James Hunter, but Craig Smith did a decent job recruiting two 6’9″ freshman (Tyler Hagedorn and Dan Jech) that he may be intrigued to get to the top of the rotation immediately.
IPFW
Mo Evans, Max Landis, Joe Reed
I continuously forget about the existence of Max Landis, but he is on the team, I swear it, and he was 4th on the team in scoring last season. The ‘Dons lost a lot of their post game, and they do not appear to have much replacing what they lost, so the team could rely a lot on Mo Evans to be a star. Landis will be there to shoot the three, and Joe Reed will need to be counted on even more to be a stretch 4 than he has before. Seriously, this is the first time we have seen the ‘Dons without a serious threat of a stretch 4. Yep, first time in 5 years? Reed did shoot 36% from behind the line last year, but did not take many as he only made ten on the year. The team will be counting on two junior college transfers to fill the void of what they lost from last season, and will need them to adjust and contribute quickly.
Side note: The ‘Dons will have transfers from Louisiana Tech, Purdue, and Bradley all eligible to play in 2016-2017.
The ‘Dons have the fewest number of Division 1 starts by players on their roster.
Role Players:
Andrew Poulter, 6-11 JR: Played in seven games his redshirt freshman year at Arkansas-Little Rock before transferring to Western Texas for his sophomore season, where he averaged 7 points and 5 rebounds per game.
DeAngelo Stewart, 6-6 JR: Played his freshman season at Alabama State before transferring to Northwest Tech in Kansas for his sophomore season. Averaged 16 ppg, 6 rpg, and shot 47% from the field in his sophomore season. A few people have already tabbed Stewart as the Newcomer of the Year in the Summit League.
Western Illinois:
Garret Covington, JC Fuller, and Jabari Sandifer
It is hard to determine who the Leathernecks’ third best player is behind Covington and Fuller. Sandifer was the third leading scorer on the team with 7.4 points per game, and he also led the Summit League in assists with 4.3 per game. He even had a great opening weekend in the Summit with 22 points and 4 assists against IPFW and 20 points and 6 assists against Omaha, but then he was basically never heard from again only scoring in double figures one more time through the season.
Western Illinois actually has a lot of experience on their team, but how much faith can you put in a team that has gone 1-27 on the road in the last two seasons. The last time they won a road game was January 30th, 2014 against IPFW.
The Leathernecks return 89% of their scoring, can they see improvement if they stay healthy?
Role Players:
Mike Miklusak, 6-6 JR: Played in 15 games because of a season ending injury He had 21 points and 7 rebounds against Omaha. I am putting my head down right now.
Jamie Batish, 6-4, SR: A bit of an inconsistent guard, but gives the Leathernecks an option on offense after averaging 6.4 points per game in his first season with the team. He had 15 points in a win against Omaha. Seriously, I am going to punch myself in the face right now.
Tate Stensgaard, 6-8 SR: Played in 20 games before facing a season ending injury. Has shot over 56% on his career as a Leatherneck.
Denver:
Marcus Byrd, Nate Engesser, Bryant Rucker
Honestly it is pretty difficult to analyze a team’s Big 3 when they run the Princeton offense. Excuse me, I have to take a break, I just had a random memory of Barry Collier being a terrible basketball coach.
Okay, I am back… With their offense you need guys that take high percentage shots. These three seniors-to-be had a combined shooting percentage of nearly 50% from the field and 42% on threes. Marcus Byrd has the highest three point field goal percentage for any player returning to the Summit League. The Summit League has been more difficult for Joe Scott and the Pioneers than it was for them against the Sun Belt and WAC, which hopefully is not all that surprising. The Pioneers have gotten worse each of the last three seasons going from 22 wins to 16 wins to 12 wins, can they go for 10 this year? With their high shooting percentage, the Pioneers can always be in a game, but with the Summit League having so many good shooters, teams have been able to take over games down the stretch. It is pretty difficult to beat at home as they are 32-13 at home over the last 3 years, and last year they lost 7 games at home by a combined total of 39 points…one of those games was a 16 point loss to IPFW as an outlier.
Denver does not care about a Big 3.
Role Players:
Daniel Amigo, 6-10 SO: 5.7 ppg, 46 FG%
Jake Pemberton, 6-3 SO: Likely to see an increased role with the graduation of Brett Olson and Cam Griffin.
Oral Roberts:
Obi Emegano, Brandon Conley, Scott Sutton
With Korey Billbury and Bobby Word departing from the team, I really cannot come up with who is going to make up a Big 3 for the Golden Eagles. On paper, it looks kind of rough for Oral Roberts and coach Sutton, but Sutton is probably one of the top coaches in the Summit League and entering his 17th season as the head coach of the Golden Eagles, so they cannot really be counted out, especially if they arguably the best player in the conference. You want to talk about new faces? Oral Roberts is going to be like trying to figure out who is joining the cast of another Expendables film.
Obi Emegano is a popular choice of Preseason Player of the Year.
Role Players:
Seriously have no idea what will be happening with this team. Perhaps this is what happens to a team when they change conferences so often…naw what I mean Denver? Brandon Conley is probably the only for sure thing on the team, everyone else seems to be the mystery man with his trigger on the finger. The Golden Eagles can probably get above .500 in the conference with Emegano and Sutton though.
With players coming and going, roles need to be filled on teams, and some players just respond quicker than others. North Dakota State’s AJ Jacobson clearly had a big year as a redshirt freshman, which was a huge help to the Bison as they lost three key seniors from their 2014 championship team. IUPUI’s Marcellus Barksdale went from averaging 0.3 points per game as a freshman in 2012-13 to averaging 8.6 points per game in his sophomore season, and now is considered an All Conference candidate by many. South Dakota State’s Keaton Moffitt transferred from a division 2 program to be a top guy off the bench for the Jackrabbits. Omaha’s Mike Rostampour made an immediate impact with Omaha in his junior season after transferring from division 2.
With the Bison and Jackrabbits as the two favorites to repeat as the two top teams in the Summit League, the league seems to look like it will be in a pretty tight battle for who is 3rd to 8th (or 9th) in the conference standings at the end of the year. So who are some of the potential wild cards in the Summit League that can set their team apart in 2015-2016?
Denver
EVERYONE ON THE ROSTER NOT NAMED MARCUS BYRD, NATE ENGESSER, OR BRYANT RUCKER
Here is a statistic that may jump out at you. Denver returns the second fewest amount of division one starts on their roster in the Summit League, behind IPFW. They are a young team, though so was North Dakota State last season, with 6 freshman and 4 sophomores on the roster, so I am incredibly curious who can make up for the losses of Cam Griffin, Brett Olson, and Jalen Love.
The team virtually has no post game, but it is not really something that is incredibly needed in the Princeton offense. Barry Collier ran the Princeton offense really well without a competent big man at Nebraska. That was a really bad joke. Could sophomore Daniel Amigo make a big jump if he is healthy? He started in all 15 of the games he played in during his freshman year averaging 5.7 points per game, and had three double digit scoring performance, but they were all in blow outs.
Daniel Amigo is super serial.
IPFW
JOHN KONCHAR – 6’4″, rFR
Could Konchar be a big time player as a freshman. He redshirted in his first season with the ‘Dons, I assume because of the 4 upperclassmen guards that were on the roster last season. Konchar averaged 29 points, 14 rebounds, 4 assists, 3 steals, and 2.5 blocks per game in his senior season in high school in Chicago. Holy crap! He did see action in IPFW’s preseason game last season, but he only had 3 points in 15 minutes, but hey it was a preseason game.
RACHINE TALLA – 6’9″, SO
Talla is seriously the biggest question mark for IPFW. He redshirted at USC Upstate his freshman season, and then only played in 2 games in junior college because Mississippi is the worst place on earth. So how much of an impact can a guy be who has basically not played a competitive game of basketball in 3 years.
IUPUI
JORDAN PICKETT – 6’0″, SO
Pickett transferred to IUPUI after only playing in five games at Loyola before suffering a season ending injury in 2013-2014. The Jaguars do not have much of a back court, they have a lot of 6’5″ guards, but can the bigger players deal with all of the smaller shooting guards the Summit League has to offer. Pickett is likely to have a big role for the Jaguars in 2015-2016. In the Jaguars’ red-white scrimmage last season, which was basically IUPUI vs their players who were forced to redshirt due to transferring, Pickett was able to score 11 points against…the Jaguars.
NICK OSBORNE- 6’8″, JR
One of three transfers from Loyola on the roster. Osborne is expected to make an immediate impact with the Jaguars, as they have not had much talent in the post in a few years. Osborne averaged 5.4 ppg and 4 rpg, and shot 50% from the field in his sophomore season at Loyola. He did average 3 fouls per game, so curious to see how much time he will spend on the bench due to foul trouble in the Summit League.
How much of a difference can Nick Osborne make with the Jaguars.
NORTH DAKOTA STATE
They lost Taylor Braun, Marshall Bjorklund, and TrayVonn Wright a year ago, and they ended up repeating as Summit League Champions with a 1st year coach. I think they will be fine…
One could ask; who is going to be make up for the 19 points per game that they lost in Lawrence Alexander? Can Kory Brown, Carlin Dupree, Paul Miller, and junior college transfer sophomore Malik Clements make up that 19 points a game in the back court? Yes, they probably can.
OMAHA
JAKE WHITE- 6’8″, SR
Can Jake White be the best post player in the Summit League? Can he?
Last year we were teased with White. With 10 rebounds in his first half as a Maverick, we were thinking our front court would be unstoppable with him and Mike Rostampour. Then a few minutes into the second half, White hurt his knee, and then for almost a month we kept being told: not this game, but next game probably… If you look around the post players at the Summit League, White is capable of being the best post player in the League, but he has to stay healthy. When White transferred, Derrin Hansen stated that White would be the best post player in the Summit.
DANIEL MEYER – 6’9″, SO
Meyer only played 4.5 minutes per game in his freshman season with the Mavericks, but with Mike Rostampour and Rylan Murry (i cried a tear) no longer on the roster, Meyer should expect more playing time in his sophomore season, I mean, right? It sounded as if he did really well in Italy, but it did not sound like the teams the Mavs played against had many players taller than 6’5″…but I did not look at official rosters, just shady looking websites that did not look fully updated. When Meyer did play last season, I was never terrified that he was going to ruin everything. He seemed to move pretty well without the ball, set good screens, and had a nice touch. He even looked like he could be as good as a passer out of the post as John Karhoff, but we will have to wait and see.
ORAL ROBERTS
ALBERT OWENS- 6’9″ SO
With the graduation of Denell Henderson, Owens will competing for the starting center position with junior college transfer Tre Vance. Owens did average 3.8 ppg and 2.4 rpg, but he never really received any significant playing time in any of the Golden Eagles’ big games. Yet, if you look around at some of the conference predictions, Owens is expected to be a big key factor to ORU’s success. You know, assuming they have some success this season.
Owens has great size listed at 6’9″ and 260lbs.
JALEN BRADLEY- 6’0″ JR
Bradley is familiar with the Summit League, as he originally played for the Mavericks, but he only played in a total of 26 minutes against the Summit League due to injuries in 2013-2014. Bradley went on to junior college for his sophomore season, where he averaged 17 points per game. Everyone knew Bradley could shoot at Omaha, I remember watching him shoot from half court in warm ups and making it regularly, but we did question if he could defend or play the point guard position. While he was at Omaha, they were deep with guards with: CJ Carter, Marcus Tyus, Alex Phillips, Caleb Steffensmeier, Devin Patterson, and Justin Simmons. The Mavericks could have used him in his sophomore season as that energy guy off the bench, and that would likely still be his role, but ORU fans are expecting him (and 6’3″ Div 2/Fresno State transfer Aaron Anderson) to fill a void left in Korey Billbury and Bobby Word. That is a lot to ask.
SOUTH DAKOTA
TREY NORRIS – 6’0″ SR
Norris started in all 28 games he played in for the Coyotes in his sophomore season, but then was sent to the bench in his junior season as Craig Smith took over at South Dakota. Can he be counted on to be the starter again and help lead the Coyotes to another winning record?
TYLER FLACK – 6’7″ JR
Sat out 2014-2015 with an injury. He started 19 out of 29 games his freshman season and 27 out of 30 games in his sophomore season. As a sophomore, he averaged 8.5 ppg and 4.7 rpg, he also shot 55% from the floor. Is he going to be the same after a serious injury, and will Smith have big plans for Flack?
Can Tyler Flack be Tyler Flack again?
Here is a glaring stat for South Dakota. I was looking at the South Dakota State fan forum, wishing I had it in me to do some trolling, and the Jackrabbits are pretty stoked that they return so much of their scoring. The Jackrabbits return 74% of their scoring, which is second in the conference behind Western Illinois who returns 89% of their scoring, but that is Western Illinois… Anyway, South Dakota lost the most scoring in the Summit losing 54% of their scoring. So they are going to need Flack and Norris to return to 2013-2014 form.
SOUTH DAKOTA STATE
CONNOR DEVINE/IAN THEISEN
Did I mention that South Dakota State is returning 74% of their scoring? I think I just did that. Most of that is the loss of Cody Larson. The Jackrabbits arguably have the best guard trio in the Summit League with George Marshall, Deondre Parks, and Jake Bittle, but they are left with little in the post after the loss of Larson, and they are young in the post. Devine and Theisen shared the time behind Cody Larson in the post last season, can they and freshman Nebraska natives Michael Daum and Adam Dykman make up for that loss in Larson?
WESTERN ILLINOIS
When you only when 8 games, you lose 13 of your last 14 games, one of your wins is a 2 point win at home against Devin Patterson-less Omaha team, and 15 of your 20 losses are by 10 points or more, there is not much confidence riding in your team going into the next season. So basically everyone on your roster not named Garrett Covington is a wild card.
The Leathernecks did have some injury issues in 2014-2015, and they have the 2nd most returning division one starts on their roster in the Summit League behind North Dakota State, and as previously mentioned, they do return 89% of their scoring.
With no hopes of making the Summit League conference tournament, there were never really any great expectations of the Mavs over the last 4 seasons, other than just hoping for improvement. As fans of a transitioning team, I felt most of us would look at it as Okay, We Are Not Great, But We Are Not IUPUI. I have to say, the more and more I research about the Jaguars, the more and more I am growing fearful of their potential.
You have to consider why we have fans have been going with a little bit of this IUPUI Sucks logic…
They only had 6 wins in each of the 2012-2013 and 2013-2014 seasons. They have not had a winning season since 2010-2011. What Ron Hunter had built up from a NAIA to Division 1 program had been lost by Todd Howard. Basically to be summed up, ever since the Dakota schools gained some recognition, the Jaguars dropped off the map, so how could adding another school just south of the Dakotas help with that? IUPUI dumped Howard and got an attractive hire in Jason Gardner, former 2nd Team All American guard at Arizona.
As fans we like to jump on the Oh, He Played Point Guard in College, So He Will Be A Great Coach theory pretty easily. Maybe we are jumping the gun here on Gardner in thinking he will be a great coach at IUPUI and turn the program around. When I say “we”, I mean the people that tune into IUPUI games on ESPN3, it is all the commentators talk about. Before Gardner took over the job at IUPUI, he was an assistant with Josh Pastor at Memphis for a season, and an assistant at Loyola Chicago for two seasons. By the way, am I the only one that feels Pastor is incredibly overrated?
Anyway, in Gardner’s first year at IUPUI he is able almost double the team’s win totals and get them up to 10 wins…yay! Which is actually a supreme feat considering there were some people that did not think the Jaguars would win one game all year. With no real big time scorer, (Marcellus Barksdale led the team this season with 9.5 points per game) the team had an odd style of play, did not shoot particularly that well (42.6 FG% – 7th in Summit, 29.6 3pt% – 9th in Summit), hell they were even last in the Summit League in turnovers with 15.5 per game. Yes, someone averaged more turnovers than the Mavs! The Jaguars were able to pick up some wins over IPFW, who was the preseason favorite in the Summit, Denver (twice) who was also a favorite in the Summit before the season started, and also picked up wins against South Dakota, Western Illinois, and Omaha when CJ Carter had a career high 45 points. Their non conference schedule had some games you expected them to lose; Xavier, Evansville, Purdue, Drake, and Indiana State, but they were able to pick up some close wins against Milwaukee, Ball State, and South Alabama. Also you know what they did not do during the non-conference? They did not play any division 2 or NAIA teams for some easy slap stick comedy wins.
The men’s basketball program is growing as the university is growing as well. Like UNO, as a commuter campus, the university did not have much for on campus living for students. A few years ago, the university acquired the University Palace Hotel, a one time 4 diamond hotel, whatever the hell that means, and they renovated it into a dorms for students in 2013. The men’s basketball team has also moved into a renovated Fairgrounds arena, which can seat up to 8,200. So with a new coach, new facilities, IUPUI is starting to gain some attention, and they are clearly trying to make an effort to get their program to where it once was under Ron Hunter.
As far as what is coming for IUPUI basketball, Gardner has been working toward recruiting some decent talent for the men’s team…although it is not like he has much to improve from. The Jaguars had 5 players that transferred out from from the 2014-2015 season, but it is not like they are losing 5 guys that anyone is screaming “oh no, we might not get to 10 wins again!” When Gardner was hired at IUPUI, 3 players from Loyola decided to transfer to the Jaguars program who will be available for 2015-2016.
Nick Osborne is 6’8″ and 220, he played in 28 games and made 17 starts in his sophomore year at Loyola while averaging 5.4 points per game and 4 rebounds per game, and he shot 50% from the field. He is also a post player that can hit 80% of his free throws, that is never a terrible thing. Maybe he is not a guy that is going to come in and save the program by any means, but taking a year off to practice, he can definitely come into the Jaguars program and be an instant help to the team. Most likely a starter for the team, especially considering that the Jaguars do not have much of a front court.
Matt O’Leary is 6’8″ and 225, he played in 31 games his sophomore season at Loyola and made 5 starts himself. I do not care what anyone says, O’Leary is always a bad ass last name. O’Leary averaged 4.2 points per game and 3 rebounds per game his sophomore year at Loyola. He is also not a terrible passer for a big man, averaging 2 assists per game his sophomore and had a career high of 6 assists at Tennessee Tech. Osborne and O’Leary can each step out and hit a three, but it is not like it is a big part of their game, does it seriously sound like IUPUI has two John Karhoffs coming into the program?
Jordan Pickett is a 6’0″ sophomore guard who also sat out after transferring from Loyola, he only played in 5 games at Loyola before a season ending injury. Seriously a wild card.
Darrell Combs is a another player who sat out the 2014-2015 season after transferring from Eastern Michigan. Combs is a 6’2″ guard who can score the ball. He played in 36 games, and started 7 his sophomore season for an Eastern Michigan team that went 22-15 and made it to the second round of the CIT. He averaged 7.5 points per game his sophomore year, but he only shot 32% from the field, so hopefully for the Jaguars he has been working on that in the year that he redshirted. But hopefully for the Mavs, he has not… He did also score in double figures 12 times his sophomore season. Osborne, O’Leary, and Pickett are all candidates that could jump into the starting lineup at IUPUI with Barksdale for the 2015-2016 and completely change the look of their team.
Incoming as freshman, the Jaguars have T.J. Henderson, a 5’11” guard from Indianapolis. Henderson averaged nearly 30 points per game, 5 assists, and 5 steals per game as a junior in high school. He also held offers from IPFW, Kennesaw State, and Buffalo. I cannot find out how his senior season went, he transferred high schools, but 30 points per game, 5 assists, 5 steals…ehhhhhhhhh. We will (obviously) have to wait and see what that will translate into as a college player. Five steals a game just sounds like Devin Patterson to me, that is a good thing. I saw a blip in an article mentioning Henderson returning from an injury and scoring 20 points in a game in “limited minutes.” The team will also be adding Henderson’s teammate, forward Gary Bonds, at 6’8″ he was in and out with injuries over his senior season. So, another wild card, he did also receive scholarship offers from Wright state and New Orleans. IUPUI will also be gaining a 6’9″ forward from Indianapolis, who played with Henderson and Bonds in AAU, and averaged 14 points and 13 rebounds as a senior. He is described as being a guy who does the dirty work of setting screens, diving after the ball, posting for rebounds, which is never a terrible thing to have on your roster.
The Jaguars also have Evan Hall, a 6’7″ forward from Hindman, Kentucky who picked IUPUI over Eastern Kentucky, Morehead State, and Northern Kentucky, some recruiting sites listed him as a 3 star player as well. Hall averaged 15 points and 8 rebounds as a senior and shot 65% as a senior, he also had 14 points and 8 rebounds as a junior while shooting 72% from the field. Sounds like is pretty solid, or like he played against a bunch of 5’10” post players in a small Kentucky region. I have never been to Kentucky, no one has ever invited me, and I doubt anyone ever will. He was on the AAU National Championship team though.
The team will be adding Grant Sinn, who is a transfer from North Park University in Chicago, which is a real thing, but I am unclear if he ever actually played before transferring to IUPUI in the Spring semester. He shot 45% from three point range in high school. If you ever talk to a non-hipster from Chicago, they do not know what or where North Park is. Sinn gained interest from some D-1 programs before settling on North Park, Gardner has said that Sinn will be an immediate asset to their basketball program.
As for more for the future, Gardner and IUPUI picked up a transfer from Syracuse, 6’3″ guard Ron Patterson. Patterson was never the ultimate player at Syracuse, so he does not sound like a big time factor for the success of IUPUI, or like he is going to be an All First Team player for the Summit League. His best game at Syracuse was a 13 point and 4 assist performance in a blowout win over Colgate. He averaged 2.6 points per game and 1.7 assists while shooting 31 percent from the floor in his sophomore year at Syracuse.
None of these incoming players, or new facilities are guarantees for success for the Jaguars, but they certainly are some positive momentum that the Jaguars have not had in a few years. They ended their season on a 2 point loss to Oral Roberts in the Summit League tournament, ending the season on a 2 point loss in a tournament makes players think Crap, If Only We Would Have Hit One More Three Earlier In The Game! That sticks in their mind and makes them work harder in the off season, well hopefully. The Jaguars are not a joke anymore, they are not what they were from 2012-2014. Gardner is pulling them into the right direction, they might not get to the North Dakota State and South Dakota State level this upcoming season, but they have the tools to get their eventually.
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