I actually think the IL should join D3. All these transfers suggest these players dont value the educational experience on these campuses compared with thier basketball ambitions. I thought when Dingle left Penn it was a bad look for them but a one-off situation. The truth is the IL is no different than the Big 12 to most of the players and I think its time to bow out of big time BB just as when these schools left big time football in the middle of the 20th century. Players decomitted from Harvard like its Iona. Nearly the entire Columbia team has entered the portal. Its disgraceful. The girls game is actually refreshing as they all seem to stay to graduation. Lets have the girls in D1 and the boys in D3.
“All these transfers”? Very few kids transfer out of the league.
if the IL can still recruit then we can stay d1.
I was a huge bear on the NIL in terms of it’s implications on the league.
So far recruiting is fine to better than my expectations.
I do see slippage from the golden age however because we are chopping the heads of our elite talent and getting youngee.
Winning an ncaa game + not likely anymore imo whereas it was almost an expectation in the recent golden age
1 Like
I read that nearly the entire Columbia team entered the portal. 3/4 decommits from Harvard.
Entering the portal doesn’t necessarily mean they transfer. It allows a kid to weigh his options, especially after a coaching change. Look at the kid at Brown last year who entered the portal on a whim and got a scholarship and NIL from Stanford. There are almost 2000 names in the portal. I bet at least 4-5 of the 6 Columbia kids return.
1 Like
Defeatist approach. Maybe suggest some ways for the ivy to maintain standards and compete at D1 rather than say we quit, we’re off to D3, never to be heard from again.
2 Likes
Simple answer.
Do what James jones is doing. And hope the portal and nil doesn’t get you either before they enroll or hit your non nba prospects. It will take the elite unless the offers down ratchet
They keep going up pre rev share
If you recruit diaper dandy’s you are toast (amaker) because you are icarus
But more kids are being pushed down to you in high school recruiting so far.
Get the good ones develop them live with some high end attrition and try to stay mid major competitive.
You likely can no longer compete with the power 4 but you aren’t d3
That’s where we are. It could get worse. I predicted d 3 initially but there is a path or blueprint if narrow
3 Likes
Yup- 3 years of x lee is better than one yr.
Gleanings from X re X:
Great enthusiasm about him from Kentucky fans when it was leaked that the Cats were “involved with” Lee until they picked up Jaland Lowe from Pitt, then crickets.
Leak that X. has talked to UNC has kicked off noise from Tar Heel fans. Most are positive but some folks posting that he is over-rated.
One post suggesting that his price tag is $2.7M (which I have trouble believing).
Some comparisons being made to Walter Clayton, Jr. after that kid went off last night against Auburn. Clayton, Jr. played two years for Iona before jumping to Florida for his last two years (an example of what our friend james from yale has been preaching as an Ivy survival strategy).
Wow, 2.7M: take it!
Did not watch Auburn, but watched much of Duke/Houston. I had a hard time imagining Xaivian doing much against either team.
1 Like
A question about how this will play out.
Does Lee need to decide about the NBA
draft before any school will commit to him
through the portal. If that is so, will he not decide
until after the NBA tryout camps? It seems
possible that this could take some time.
Absolutely. It may get harder for the league to have top 100 teams, but that doesn’t mean you have to be D3. Lots of space to still be competitive and play good basketball.
The blueprint feeds off of success. Poulakidas and Mbeng stick around in part because they keep winning and going to the NCAAs. There is still room for that. You have to recruit a combination, I suspect — some kids who won’t get NIL offers who will stick around and be experienced players as upperclassmen, and some higher level high school recruits who can star for a couple of years and then transfer. The one thing I don’t know how to solve for is the Icarus problem. Hard to know who is too close to the sun. But recruiting has always involved figuring out who is likely to stick around, who has other priorities, etc. I remember a couple of kids over the years who ended up at other Ivies where the Penn staff said they backed off due to concerns about whether they were committed to basketball. So I guess you keep trying to figure out who might decommit, etc., and do the best you can to get the best talent you can and keep them around as long as you can.
2 Likes
The suggestion (FWIW) was that $2.7M is X’s price, not that anyone was offering that. The poster was questioning whether X was worth his price tag.
Good question, LocalTiger. I’m sure X isn’t the first player to announce for both the portal and the draft, but it does pose a dilema. What school is going to commit to a kid who is serious about the NBA draft? And what NBA team would commit to a kid that is headed back to college? (We’re not talking about Larry Bird who was worthy of using a high draft pick on knowing he was headed back for another year at Indiana State).
I assume there are “binding” contracts involved one way or the other.
1 Like
I imagine Lee would only stay in the draft if he got a 1st round promise, which seems extremely unlikely.
He’ll go through pre-draft workouts like last year, maybe even get a Combine invite. But I can’t imagine him opting for a mid-late second round pick (non-guaranteed contract) over a chance to boost his draft stock and make a seven-figure paycheck in the process.
1 Like
Which kid from Brown was that?
Okpara
Okpara was harvard
1 Like
I agree he probably withdraws from draft
if the advice is he will not go in the first
round. The question is when he will get that
input, and whether any school would commit to him
before that option is off the table.
This year’s NBA Combine is May 11-18 and withdrawal deadline is June 15. So maybe he stays “on the market” for a while. But he could also withdraw from the draft early if he gets a big offer from a big program.
He could use the draft as leverage, holding out for a guaranteed starting role with a 2M+ NIL check (which would prove their commitment to him).