https://goashlandeagles.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster...

In the Portal, Toledo transfer, 6'5 shooter.

FishBates would put himself on a self-imposed exile (again) if he ends up in Athens. Cooper, who Ohio offered when he was at Olentangy Liberty, played earlier in his high school career at. . . . you guessed it - Reynoldsburg.

Pass.

I have nothing against Reynoldsburg, the part of town or the school.

What I object to is the highest paid coach in the conference signing three wing players from the same school while offering ZERO centers and/or power forwards. It's a recipe to go from mediocre to totally crappy fast. There are 87 counties in Ohio besides the one where Cbus is and 49 states besides Ohio in the U.S. but this staff can't scout and recruit players from anywhere but up the street an hour away? (and other programs seem able to get players from Serbia, Croatia, Spain, etc)

Yes, they will probably go after some lower level stiffs who already proved they can't get playing time in the MAC. That will leave lots of time for the staff to update their resumes for the upcoming pink slips next year.

We are on a list of 60 schools to reach out to Lee’s (D2) Ben Ritger. Interesting because his player page shows he wasn’t a starter but averaged 11ppg while hitting 41% from 3PT (41/99). 6’7 — cheap shooting? Illinois is even listed.

https://x.com/theportalreport/status/2034643492836716890?...
https://leeuflames.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster/ben-...

We’ve expressed interest in Huntingdon’s (NAIA) Kaden Johnson. 6’11 coming off an 17ppg and 11rpg season.

https://x.com/theportalreport/status/2034718794837631334?...
https://www.huathletics.com/sports/mbkb/2025-26/bios/john...

WMU with another anonymous donation of $3M. $2.5M as an investment in Broncos REIGN,which is strategic plan developed by the Athletic Department. I'm just trying to find a couple hundo for the Bobcat Club.

Kaden might be one to keep an eye on. When this was posted, only Casey Crawford was following. Now Boals and Lamar are.

Seems like a skilled enough big to come off the bench. DPOY in his conference.

Who is it, I wonder? Greg Jennings? Terry Crews?

Those Home Improvement residual checks must be HITTIN.

Cheeseburger Eddie for the win: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wV8oGyYq-JM

This dude not only looks but plays just like Vic Searls. And I would have traded Hadaway for Searls on Day 1 of this season. Bring back the Stache!

I think Kaden moves better and appears to be more athletic than Searls.

https://x.com/trillydonovan/status/2035132952368091509

Some financial news!

On a really long list of schools (good mid majors) to express interest in Lubbock Christian’s (D2) Antonio Pusateri. 6’7, 60% FG, while averaging 17ppg, 11rpg, 1spg, and 1bpg. Didn’t attempt a 3. Second in D2 in double-doubles and 1st team all conference and all conference defensive team.

https://x.com/theportalreport/status/2035382315132592570?...

https://lcuchaps.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster/antoni...

We already know that VCU has transfers but none are from D-2 or NAIA.

So, looking at HPU, the other double digit seed mid-major to advance.

They have eleven transfers on the roster. Here's the breakdown:

Four are from power conference schools. (includes UConn, Houston, Arizona)
Seven are from fellow mid-majors.
Zero are from D-2 or NAIA schools.

https://highpointpanthers.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster

The board has been very active this week with a lot of doomsday type of feelings, so trying to chime in with a little bit of a glass half full mentality.

The last two years have been genuinely painful to watch and nobody is going to sit here and pretend otherwise, but Jeff is the coach right now. Given where the athletic department is, they were never going to approve a $900K buyout just to turn around and pay a new coach that same salary. If this really is the last chance for a guy who is still the last MAC coach to win in the NCAA tournament (play-in's don't count), you're better off taking that buyout money and putting it directly into the roster.

Let's think about where we are in the portal process. The reason we're seeing so many D2, NAIA, and JUCO names right now is simply because those seasons end earlier. Only 14 guys from the MAC are in the portal compared to 72 last year by the time it closed. The D1 floodgates haven't opened yet. The staff doing homework on high production lower level guys this early is just how the process works. You cast a wide net while you wait for the D1 market to fill up. A staff follow is nowhere close to a scholarship offer.

Also keep in mind who actually left. Fisher and Evans couldn't crack the rotation on a bad team. Elliott has real potential that we have all seen in flashes but it never developed into anything consistent enough to justify paying to keep him.

There's been a lot of talk about these three being symptoms of a talent evaluation issue but Jordan Fisher had offers from Toledo, Akron, and Kent State, Ayden Evans had offers from five power programs, and Elliott was Dusty May's recruit at FAU. We can't praise those other MAC programs for their recruiting and then hammer Jeff when they all wanted the same guys. If you want to criticize him for not developing them once they got here, that's a completely fair and separate conversation.

If Simmons or Kelly hit the portal then sure, that's likely indicative of some real issues. Even if Kuany or Burris go portaling, is starts to be a little more worrisome. But right now we're losing our minds over guys who were already on the fringe.

Jeff basically telegraphed significant changes coming in his MAC tournament post game presser. After years of continuity that clearly ran its course, a near complete roster turnover is the quickest way to flip things around. Let's give it some time and see what the roster actually looks like before going full doom and gloom.

Solid take.

Where do you stand on the assistant coaches?

Program has gone stale.

Can't keep doing the same ole same ole.

Would like to see changes here.

Have to believe Lamar and Barlow are doing everything they can to get out before Jeff's lame duck season commences in November 2026. But if they were truly a hot commodity, they would have moved on already. We have mediocrity sitting to the right and left of Boals every game.

Solid post. We went through this last portal season before it really opened up. Diligence on lower level players before actually adding D1 talent.

There’s only one person on this board melting down across different threads over the prospect of adding a D2 or lower level player. I think most of us are pretty open to it. I’m intrigued by a few that we’ve been connected to.

The reality is this offseason we have 6/7 spots to fill. Last year we had 3. It’s unlikely all of those will be filled by D1 portal additions. We’ll probably see a blend. One thing to keep in mind, we’re going into year 5 of the portal. Some of these lower level kids with gaudy stats might have just not had D1 opportunities coming out of HS, due to most teams favoring a polished product out of the portal.

If you’re putting up +20ppg with strong shooting % numbers at the D2 level, you can probably crack a MAC rotation or better. There’s a reason some of them have flush lists of suitors.

Shooting should translate from D2 to the MAC, but the concern I have is about how they adjust to the defensive requirements and increased athleticism.

Boals and his staff have kept guys like Burris, Fisher, Reece, Connors, and Nicol on the bench an awful lot -- largely because of defensive shortcomings/athleticism concerns. Plus athletes don't often fall to D2.

A good case study is the Duncan-whats-his-name guy at Lipscomb.

IIRC, he spent a year at Texas Tech redshirting, transferred to a D-2 school and immediately made D-2 All-American, went portal and ended up at a random solid mid-major in Lipscomb and averaged 10 ppg.

At least in this case:
Couldn't see the floor at a p5 = D-2 All-American = 10 ppg at random mid-major.

YMMV (he's back in the portal btw)

Valid concerns. It's tough to find that complete package. The players we've actually reached out to (most have been posted as speculation by me); are Jaquay Randolph, Kaden Johnson, and Ben Ritger. The interest in the latter I don't fully understand other than shooting off the bench. He probably falls under the category of the players you named.

Randolph and Johnson, however, are both 6-10 and 6-11 with DOPY awards in their conferences. Those to me seem like worthy flyers in replacing Breath/Evans.

While I believe this to be theoretically true, I'm not sure it'll work in our specific case because of our lack of set plays.  Conners shot the lights out at App State from three (40.1%) and then below average at OHIO (27.5%).  While there may be more than one reason for this decline in three-point accuracy, I would attribute a lot of it to not running set plays to give him open looks. 

Here are his stats from this season at OHIO (top) and the previous year at Appalchian State (bottom).  You'll also note that he played a lot more minutes per game at App State.  I think Boals' weird substitution patterns never allowed him to get in long enough to get into the groove, or zone, if you will.  Just my non-expert, low BBIQ observations. 

Boals has followed Kyler D’Augustino from U-Indy (3rd Team All-Horizon). He entered the portal about an hour ago. From Albany, OH. Did we offer out of HS? Kid had a really strong year - 19ppg while shooting 53% and 39% from 3.

Fun fact - Kyler played at D2’s West Liberty and averaged 17ppg before U-Indy. I don’t think there needs to be a narrative around D2 kids, the right ones will figure out. Just like any 4 star can flop at our level.

https://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/player/_/id/...

I saw something about a mystery kid who played some juco ball out west who was actually kind of interesting. He's from Italy. 6-10/240 - i.e. a full grown young man. Averaged a dbl-dbl at 18/10. Not a 3-point shooter per se.

Maybe he could double as strengh coach:
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRHP...

Kyler D’Augustino had 21 vs tOSU and 31 vs Wright State. (we can dream, right?)