*****2026-27 Transfer Portal News*****
- Thread starter QChawks
- Start date
I just think that is going to be an open competition, and it depends on the players joining the team. As much as I personally love Stremlow I don't think it's a guarantee, and I don't think they can do that bringing in the numbers they need. Somehow they need to sell opportunity on a roster that needs at least five additions. It just remains to be seen at this point if Jensen wants to upgrade or run it back in a similar fashion. We find out soon, I guess.
I think Taylor Stremlow will be starting next season and will get plenty minutes. She's a good shooter and 3 pt shooter and passer and has moxie or whatever a person wishes to call it, but she makes many great hustle plays. I'd like a couple more of her on my team.
KF and Addie provided very little down the stretch so adding another offensive threat from the portal already makes this a much better group of guards. Another year of experience is also going to make CCW and Stremlow better players. People also seem to be forgetting that Journey was a true freshman and Ava is going to be a monster next year. Add in McKenna and they should be an excellent group down low as well.
As of thirty minutes ago, 1,279 women have entered the NCAA WBB portal, with an expected 400 more to join according to Talia Goodman. Talia Goodman shares that 27% of them have been in the portal previously. She also stated that approximately 55 of the women in the portal were former 4 and 5 star athletes. Tennessee, Pittsburgh, Iowa State, Oklahoma State, Penn State, Purdue, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Charleston and Evansville are among the programs that have lost eight or more players. There are a plethora of strong athletes available. I have suggested the Barbot twins from Charleston might be a great fit and not overly expensive. The valid question is can JJ and staff close on one or two of these top 55. Can she persuade Jordan Speiser to come to Iowa or will she lose again in the Jordan battle. Can JJ persuade a Lauren Hurst or a Lara Somfai to come to Iowa? JJ has to get one or two of the top 100 women in the portal, or it will be a failure. Cory Close will no doubt grab 4 or 5 of these young women. Recruiting is tough business but JJ and staff have to succeed this year. Four women graduated and five hit the portal.We need women who are starter material not bench material. Go Hawks.
No, I'm not blaming Jan for the current portal nonsense. Several posters seem to think that we can replace player 9-13 on the bench with players better than someone like Callie Levin. I just don't think that happens. Now if Bunsens thought that bench players are going to get 100k -200K then I think we might have been able to keep her. I still think in the next year or so she could be a rotational player who gets 10-12 minutes per game. Maybe she wants to start somewhere but I highly doubt she'll get that kind of payday at a lower level school, and she's got two solid years in the system here. I could have seen a role for her at Iowa going forward. Is what it is.
Thats actually not true. CCW and Stremlow were fine until the titie game. The last 3 games nobody except Ava played the way they're capable of.
I think what most of us believe is that players 9-13 are pretty much irrelevant to how the season will play out.
The difference with Clark was that she was making 3-4 million $ in endorsements a year. I'm not even sure she took any money from the school. Most of these players are not getting top line national commercial deals.
Ahh.. I think of it as the last month of the season leading into and during the Big10 tournament. That UCLA game or whatever happened in the locker room between that game and the NCAAT game took something out of this team because they were a shadow of what they were before that.
Ol' Doodle definitely sees a little Kate Martin/McKenna Warnock in her.....which is certainly a good thing. Here's hoping she stays and continues to improve.
Maybe, until you have an injury or two, and these young women are infamous for ACL and knee injuries. Where would we have been this season if we had another flamethrower who could have stepped in when Mccabe went down.
The toughest thing about the portal era is having a bench that is actually very good. It's a big trick, maybe the hardest trick for current coaches.
Addie was supposed to be that as she was part of the 8 player rotation. Unfortunately she wasn't so Stremlow stepped up and put up superior numbers. Injuries always make or break seasons. If you're having to go deeper than 8 or 9 on your bench you're generally going to have a pretty steep drop-off.
Yeah Stremlow stepped up for sure but she also brought along some bewildering dumb turnovers. I have a hard time forgetting those it seems. To me she'd be a great 6th man.
She did have some dumb turnovers. There's no disputing that, but she also had nearly a 2-1 ATO which isn't bad.
In the last 3 games in the NCAA tournament, the UCLA starting 5 scored 168 out of their 200 combined points. I'm not saying that is a blueprint that SHOULD be followed. I also don't know if "very good" here is relative or absolute. I do know that relying on the bench for certain aspects of production is an assumption that is not universally true.
My opinion, which is far from novel, is that the bench players should be role players whose specific contributions and production is prioritized as filling vacuums/holes AND/OR maximizing synergy in their respective lineups when they go in the game. To that end, expectations that all bench players we bring in to have certain statistical profiles is missing the forest through the trees. There's so many different ways for a player to fit that role that may not seem very impressive by just looking at their box score type of stats. Not saying you're doing that Marv, I'm just generalizing.
I agree with that. I think what I'm getting at, is how high school recruiting has always been about offering players a chance to come in and start (at some point), so there is always the hope there for the player that they can come in and earn that role. At minimum, that gives a team a bench player that (at least projected) has talent to be very good, so traditionally depth was a little organic. Players bought-in and worked against each other, and for each other.
Coming at it from the portal era, those players that would have talent, but not starting talent on one team, will perhaps just go in search of that on another team. The organic talent leaves (as we are finding out), so somehow you (Iowa) have to sell a talented player into a projected bench role. That is what I mean by tricky. A team still needs talent, a work ethic, drive, and a fight for playing time if anyone is going to reach their ceiling. You want very good players, somehow. Maybe money can buy that, but not an easy task. I just don't think you can entice a quality player to join a team knowing there isn't a path outside of injury.
UCLA found their way to it, because even though the bench players didn't get all the glory, those players were recruited, and are very good. Iowa still needs to recruit that kind of core player on the bench, but the depth makes it tough. (UCLA found the sweet spot at least for a year). Whatever the HS recruiting hopes are for the '27 class has to be balanced (to some degree) by what they do in the portal.
I would be shocked if Jan picked up a power 5 talent. Jan is not good at working the portal and neither are her assistants. We will be getting some developmental mid-major players…nothing wrong with that as long as they actually develop them.
IMO, we need one wing/guard starter and 2 strong guard backups. That's your top 9 players right there with the 6 already in place. The rest are filler.
So neither Lucy Olson or Chit Chat are /were not Power 5 talent? Go have a drink.
Another guy that everyone should simply place on ignore.
They found the sweet spot because ALL the players came back to win a championship, and then they added Kneepkins who was an AA at Utah.
In all fairness Lisa was still the coach when Lucy committed, (and they clearly sold her on coming right in and taking Clarks open spot). Lucy was the third leading scorer in the NCAA Clarks senior year, so it wasn't a stretch that she could fit in well, and hiring Barrett went a long way in making CCW comfortable coming to Iowa.
And you would be correct with your time frame. We just had different time frames is all
And completely ignores that they have gotten Chit Chat and Lucy.^^^^
This opinion will go over like a lead balloon.
now have heard from someone in the know that Dani and Thompson have scheduled a visit to iowa. anything new on your end?
What gives you any reason to think Boogie is bad at working the portal? She was hired after the portal was opened last year. Super bizarre to assume she is bad at this with no evidence
Also, Chit Chat turned out great
And Lucy was one of the best portal gets that season.