Players leaving early for NBA

If Deeky can keep his head on straight he can be a huge moving part on next years team instead of a distraction.
In this world of everyone wanting to grab some of the NBA pie I doubt any of the incoming freshman redshirt. But it would be nice to have the luxury of Shead sitting out a year

Just my opinion but with six guards returning, I’m counting Tyson who sat this year, I don’t think Shead plays next year. I think Mark gets some time. Powell to me is a toss up. Depends on how fast he gets culturally acclimated, if you know what I mean.

Shead will need time but he has better point guard skills than anyone not named Jarreau.
We hopefully find out soon enough

We’ll see. Between Deeky, Shead, and Sasser likely only two of those guys are really going to play. It seems like preserving a year of eligibility could make more sense for Shead than getting garbage time minutes here and there if as expected he ends up behind those guys. Ultimately that will be his call though (and to clarify, I’m not writing him off in that competition either). With Nate, Grimes and Caleb at the wings, with Tyson as well, it’s not going to be easy for Mark to get serious minutes either honestly.

Powell seems pretty unlikely for a redshirt unless we got a transfer like Goodwin (obviously not him since he chose USC) or Roberts beefed up and grew a little and looks really ready for good, capable minutes at the 5.

It’s nuts. This may be one of our best incoming classes in decades and outside of maybe 15 minutes or so a game from Powell on paper we don’t really look like we need anything from these guys next year.

Hopefully we have a season!

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Nice problem to have but coach has a huge juggling act ahead of him to keep a lot folks happy.
Of all our freshmen Mark will see the court the most IMO.

For sure. It will be a big test for our staff.

Mark definitely looks the most ready to step in and seriously contribute, though Powell seems to have the clearest path to get minutes.

Mark’s minutes may in part depend on how much 4 Nate plays.

There just aren’t many four star athletes going to schools wanting to redshirt these days…that said, I have heard Shead is one of the most humble kids around and not about himself…
That said, I have to believe there will be some changes to our roster before next season…

Agree and the only reason we have redshirted the last few years is because they fell behind due to preseason injury that lingered into start of the season.

Shead is a borderline 4 star and a composite 3 star. There is no guarantee any freshman is ready to step in play no matter what they are ranked. 90% of the transfer portal is probably because of missplaced expectations. I have no idea what the plan is but it seems he won’t have a path to mins unless he beats out Sasser for mins next year. Heck is Cam Tyson going to get big mins at this point?

I don’t think Roberts was injured, right? However, he didn’t seem anywhere close to ready to play.

Agreed that redshirts aren’t common but there are a finite amount of minutes. It’s math. If we’re coming into the season and looks like he’s buried behind Deeky and Sasser on the depth chart then it seems reasonably likely the staff and him could decide that saving a year of eligibility would be better than just getting some garbage time minutes or being injury insurance (and with the latter he could still get his RS pulled, he’d probably just be less ready to step in). He may also want the garbage time minutes and have pride he can beat out one of the guys ahead of him during the season.

Regarding changes to the roster, at least one person has to leave or at least give up their scholarship. Since it looks like no one’s going pro Alley seems like the most likely candidate.

Beyond that, with regards to changes that would largely affect minutes for Shead or Mark, that would mean we tell one or more of Sasser, Deeky, Mills, Hinton, Grimes, or Tyson they’ve got to go. Tyson seems like the only possibility greater than pretty much zero percent and even then his strength was our biggest weakness last year and that would be pretty cold following a transfer and redshirt year. It would also probably only help with some minutes for Mark (and we’re still stacked at wing). If you think Shead will play much other than garbage time or due to injury, it only makes sense if you think he beats out Sasser or Deeky.

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I don’t know who will or won’t get minutes and no one else at this point does either. Should be an interesting season to say the least

Roberts had a hand injury in the preseason if I remember correctly.

I think that’s right on Roberts now that you mention it.

I’m with you that I’m not trying to say for certain who will or won’t get minutes. But assuming Deeky’s coming back, when folks say Shead won’t be redshirting that almost certainly means you have to be fairly certain that one of these two things happen. (1) he beats out Sasser or Deeky or (2) both him and the staff think it’s better for him to mostly only play garbage time and be ready if someone gets injured or under performs than to preserve a year of eligibility and spend it working on S&C.

I could see both as possibilities but am nowhere close to fairly certain of them myself.

  1. The reason Shead should RS is obvious. We have Jarreau and Sasser both back to go with 7 other guards ready to contribute.

  2. The reason Shead should NOT RS is that he is good enough to help this team this season. Maybe coach wants to get all he can out of him while he is here or break him in if we have some of the same struggles we did this past season. Shead could have and likely would have helped if the same scenario presents itself again.

One great thing is we will have the bodies and talent to limit minutes during garbage time. We could not do that this past season.

I like Powell but it is going to be tough for him to get min on this team especially early. We are loaded at the 4 spot and may have the option of playing a lot of small ball with Hinton and 3 other guards

Hopefully things wind down and they get to play next season.

i dont see how powell doesnt get minutes… he is the only one on roster who is taller than 6’8, and only one other “defensive” big on roster…we are going to be going up against 7’0+ players…we are going to be play elite 6’10+ guys if we get to the tourney .

no way this team can even remotely contend without powell being a contributor…4 guard lineup is cool but there are quiet a few teams itd be foolish to run that against

the fight for minutes between the guards will be tough, the tons of minutes for grabs at the 5

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Didn’t Villanova win a natty not too long ago without a guy above 6’7” playing meaningful minutes?

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Remotely contend…um ok!

Anyway, not saying he doesn’t but height doesn’t mean crap if you cannot hold your position.
He may need to develop physically. I am not making any predictions here but he will need to be ready to play D1 defense and strength, effort and knowledge will be three things he will need.

We can contend just fine without him providing us with huge minutes but if he is ready than we will be even better and deeper. I see us using a lot of different matchups and lineups depending on who we are playing. Hopefully by conference time we can matchup Powell with some of the better bigs in our league.

i justed checked, both vill titles had elite bigs the one in 2016 had a 6’11 top 50 big…the 2018 had 2 elite bigs 6’8 and 6’9 who are both in the NBA

Just one in ‘16. Ochefu. Everyone else was 6’7” or under. It’s foolish to say we’re not a contender without Powell being a meaningful contributor.

But I don’t know if we are in total disagreement. I think either Gorham has to step up. Or we need to get someone in as a grad transfer if we want to win the national championship next season.