re: Tide Hoops | Recruiting

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If he can where he can shoot good enough that you have to guard him when he is at the three point line and not leave him wide open daring him to shoot then that would be huge. He's probably not there yet, but his shot looks good enough to think he can get there.

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yea, his stroke does looks very solid. i could see that improvement for sure.

You average his two games together, he is averaging 3 rebounds, 3 blocked shots, and 5 points in 12 minutes. That's good. He isn't as bad as he looked yesterday or as good as he looked today. A lot of Bama fans overreacted to his performance yesterday, even some of the Crimson Crossover guys, you're not the only one. Truth is even the best basketball players have terrible games, especially bigs when they get in foul trouble early.

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So, are we waking up at 4:00 am on Tuesday to watch Bediako square off against Senegal?

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Please don’t tempt me

Interesting. I just bought a bunch of spores from spore works

Yeah I just don't have any serious concerns about Bediako. Skills development is a question mark with all but a select few prep bigs, but he appears to have good hands and feet, good mobility, and a shot that is worth working on. So the building blocks are there to be more than a guy who is just on the floor to grab rebounds, block shots, and score on put backs. Which is why all this doom and gloom over one bad game is such nonsense. He has barely received any college coaching and he's pretty raw. Give him a year or two to see what he's made of. It's not 2013 anymore. We have the luxury of not desperately needing any top 50 recruit we can get to come in and be a force from day 1.

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Yea I couldn’t agree more. I’m not concerned but I also didn’t expect him to be a star right out of the gate. I don’t really expect that from anyone honestly.

I’m just interested to see how we come together as a team.

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100% agree

There are a lot of solid bench options out there that can supplement the roster and quite a few that seem to fit our system. Plus the possibility of a high school re-class.

I'm curious to see which way we go. I trust Nate and Company in this situation pretty fully.

From perusing the Torvik Transfer Database here are the guys that I'm most curious and intrigued by that I'd really never heard of. Who knows if any of their names pop up soon (Gurley was one of the "intriguing" guys when we did this back in the spring based on these stats).

Keith Williams - Cincinnati (G, 6-5, 215 lbs) (SR)
+3.2 Box Plus Minus Overall
+2.8 Offensive Box Plus Minus
+0.4 Defensive Box Plus Minus
96.2 Offensive Rating
48.3% True Shooting
31.3% 3PT
65.3% FT

Williams looks to be a solid backup PG option who plays good defense, takes care of the ball and is an average offensive scorer. Comes from a big league so you know what you are getting.


Cedric Russell - Louisiana Lafayette (G, 6-2, 190 lbs) (SR)
-0.2 Box Plus Minus Overall
+2.3 Offensive Box Plus Minus
-2.4 Defensive Box Plus Minus
104.4 Offensive Rating
56.3% True Shooting
40.3% 3PT
76.2% FT

Russell is an offensive scorer who shoots it well - but he doesn't play much defense and he has abysmal assist/turnover figures. So he'd be the opposite of Williams, basically. Plus comes from a smaller level.


Tyrece Radford - Virginia Tech (G, 6-2, 200 lbs) (SO)
+6.7 Box Plus Minus Overall
+5.1 Offensive Box Plus Minus
+1.6 Defensive Box Plus Minus
125.1 Offensive Rating
61.3% True Shooting
29.2% 3PT
76.6% FT

Radford would be a perfect fit - good offensive player, good defensive player, comes from a good league, good ball handler, etc. The problem is - he has baggage, and it may be the reason he left Virginia Tech. DUI, concealed weapon, etc.




And then there is the newest wildcard - Kevin Obanor, the darling of the NCAA Tournament from ODU who just put his name in the portal. He's a stretch 4 who shoots the lights out and clearly would seamlessly transition into our system and fill an Alex Reese like role.

Kevin Obanor - Old Dominion (F, 6-8, 225 lbs) (JR)
+3.1 Box Plus Minus Overall
+4.6 Offensive Box Plus Minus
-1.6 Defensive Box Plus Minus
116.4 Offensive Rating
62.6% True Shooting
45.3% 3PT
87.3% FT

We're already pretty set at F and I'd guess we really want to grab a combo guard who can help run point as well, but the way we play and the roster we have I could definitely see us making room for a guy like this that fits our system like a glove.