Any news on the transfers that left RU?
- Thread starter RUBigFrank
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It looks like Grant is going to Charlotte: https://www.on3.com/college/charlotte-49ers/basketball/2026/transfers/
They signed another power forward who’s ranked higher than Grant, so I wonder if he’ll even start.
They signed another power forward who’s ranked higher than Grant, so I wonder if he’ll even start.
Charlotte has a surprisingly strong payroll stash — something like $5 million, which is pretty great for an American Conference program.
Media rev. was just under that number for 2026 per online search. But they have to share with football which is up n coming for them.
The problem right now in my opinion, is while we’ve upgraded the talent, we’ve not only not added length but actually, reduced our size (which is concerning considering how undersized we were to begin with).
In the frontcourt we’ve replaced Ogbole with a center who weights a good 30 pounds less and then some. Nwuli and Grant are both measurably taller than Smith and Sydnor. Fall and Denis were not impactful but nobody on our current roster has their length. And even in the guard room, we traded our tallest listed guard in Zrno for Duarte who is listed at 2 inches shorter.
For this reason, along with several other reasons, I cannot fathom why we are in the market to use our remaining resources to land a 6-3 PG. It seems ridiculous to stock up on so much backcourt depth but have a grand total of 3 player over 6-5 who can play the 3 or the 4. Powers or Duarte at the 3 is a really bad plan alongside 2 small guards.
In the frontcourt we’ve replaced Ogbole with a center who weights a good 30 pounds less and then some. Nwuli and Grant are both measurably taller than Smith and Sydnor. Fall and Denis were not impactful but nobody on our current roster has their length. And even in the guard room, we traded our tallest listed guard in Zrno for Duarte who is listed at 2 inches shorter.
For this reason, along with several other reasons, I cannot fathom why we are in the market to use our remaining resources to land a 6-3 PG. It seems ridiculous to stock up on so much backcourt depth but have a grand total of 3 player over 6-5 who can play the 3 or the 4. Powers or Duarte at the 3 is a really bad plan alongside 2 small guards.
We upgraded the center spot with a guy who is 6-10, 250 or 260 who has offensive skill around the basket. Who cares if Ogbole was a chiseled 275 if he couldn’t catch a basketball?
Nwuli and Grant were both 6-7, and we replaced them with guys who are 6-7 and 6-8, so I’m not sure where you’re getting that we replaced them with less length. Sydnor in particular looks like he will be a big upgrade over Grant (who had zero motor).
And Fall and Badalau barely played — they are literally irrelevant to our portal hauls. Irrelevant.
Finally, although Zrno was 6-7, he really didn’t do much with his length. His defense improved over the year but he was never a defensive stopper. He will be missed mostly for his 34% shooting from 3-pt range, but I think we’ve replaced that with Smith (who is a high level shooter and scorer).
I really think you’re reaching here.
Not sure this is right. Center is EO'S size. Smith amd Syndor are listed at 6'8 and 6'9, while Grant and Nwuli were 6'7. I think a 4/5 should be priority #1, ideally.
We exaggerate height listings so maybe that’s all it is. but Buchanan is not close to 6-7 in reality. Syndor is a bit smaller than Grant - a clear upgrade, but whatever Smith is everyone else on the entire team is 6-5 or under and we’re still targeting guards. I just don’t understand that. Forwards and centers struggle more with foul trouble than guards do. We currently have a grand total of 5 guys (one is Ware who didn’t see the court last season) to cover three positions - 3-5. Everyone else on the team - is 6-5 and under - should only be playing the 1 or 2. Tariq, Lino, J Mike, Powers, and Duarte. 5 guys to rotate 2 positions plus Smith has handling skills and could easily play the 2 also. Powers and Duarte should NOT be sliding to the 3 with two small guards. That’s ridiculous. We need another wing/forward. Preferrably one who defends. Need to upgrade Denis is basically the deal.
Edit - forgot Wooten - 6 guys to rotate 2 positions and we are targeting a 7th…. Why?
Smith is listed at 6-7. Grant 6-8 on ESPN. Nwuli also. Denis and Fall bigger and I know they stunk but I still think it’s not great to have only like 2 players over 6-7 on the entire team - and Buchanan is not really 6-7.
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I really don’t understand the notion that Powers/Duarte/Wooten can’t guard 3s. Pike likes guys that can guard on the perimeter. Hard to find a ton of them in the portal for cheap. Plenty of teams run 3 skill guys on the perimeter. Just cause basketball got a bit bigger doesn’t mean we automatically need to be supersized 1-5. Maybe some extra ball pressure can provide a zag to the way many teams are zigging.
It’s fine to play 2 guys who are 6-4ish at the 2 and 3. Sure. But in my opinion, it seems like a pretty poor plan to go into the season with a plan of major stretches of time where you have two guards under 6-2 at the 1 and 2 paired with a guard who is under 6-5 at the 3 together. That’s really undersized, and yes, there may be circumstances where you can use a line up like that to press, but in terms of your regular rotation, planning on having Powers slide over for major stretches to be undersized defender at the 3 where he’s not a good defensive player to begin with doesn’t sound great. Wooten is a frosh. And we don’t even know if Duarte will be good enough to see the court. Also - we’re one injury away from only having one single traditional 3 and 4 on the entire roster. We have Buchanan, Smith and Sydnor. I just don’t understand why we would be adding an 8th guard whose natural position is 1-2 when we only have 3 players whose natural positions are 3-4. It makes no sense at all.
No reason to be targeting a guard as the next addition.
But I don’t see why we’d need to even play anyone but Smith, Sydnor or Buchanan when we are healthy. Just rotate them to play all those minutes. Or at worst give 8 minutes to Powers at the 3. I think we simply need players. I think we upgraded from 2 to maybe 4-5 already, and that’s ignoring potential Mark/Powers improvements. And the chance to get a good guard is much more likely than getting a good wing. For as much as we want to be bigger, across the country there’s not tons of amazing wings/forwards.
Yes there is. For a million you can get an actual player that will get legit minutes and play well. On the other hand you might get a Grant type or even worse. We need as many guys that we can count on to give us good minutes every time on the court. Much more value for money at guard than forward. Also eases the need for Lino or Powers to become actually useful players for us.
We don't know if Duarte or Wooten can guard anyone at this level and we've seen thus far Powers can't. Doesn’t mean they can't, but we aren't going to assume they can. You don't need to be supersized, but you do need proper depth. We got crushed last having only Dortch at a skinny 6'8 and 6'4 Darren backing up bigs one we learned Fall and Badalau were unplayable and Zrno was more a 3.
Smith, and DB aren't fours no matter how much we want to force it there. Smith is Grant defensively, so terrible. He and DB should take all minutes at the 3/wing. Sounds like Pike wants DB at the four, so we'll see, but thats when he suffered being able to rebound. Already a slight downgrade in rebounding at the center spot unless Gurdack takes a big leap (possible).
We upgraded all of those spots with players practically the same size and they are not done adding players. RU didn’t have $20m to work with so I’m pretty happy with the roster so far given the rumored NIL amount. Let’s see who they can get to fill out the roster. I expect another 5 or 4 for sure and then probably best available at PG or Wing.
I’m excited to have a center on the court that understands the game. EO was a giant but he allowed much smaller players to easily score while never understanding how to defend a pick n roll. Just having a center in the right spots should improve the defense, even if he isn’t a high level shot blocker.
For cryin’ out loud, yes they are under 6’2” because they are under 5’11. All three.
Their heights are as exaggerated as Schiano’s 113 home game sellout streak.
Good for him. Honestly, i think he is a solid forward reserve 9th man playing 12-15 min a game. He plays D, rebounds, is long, and can switch on D. Just very limited offensively
Not sure we are going to find a better 4/5 reserve
Not sure we are going to find a better 4/5 reserve
would love a true power forward who’s 6’9 and can bang inside. Ideally, Ware developed into that but that’s a huge wish.
OR a 6’10 stretch 4 forward that all these big ten teams have. A big that can defend in the paint, but also make 3s.
thats where the remaining portal focus should be.
OR a 6’10 stretch 4 forward that all these big ten teams have. A big that can defend in the paint, but also make 3s.
thats where the remaining portal focus should be.
First of all - as Sean said, Smith is a poor defensive player. It’s not possible to be a downgrade there because Grant and Zrno did nothing positive on D - but there still may be match ups where we prefer to play him less. Buchanan has his WTF days where he’s just off. Everyone has these - but when he’s off he tends to be really off. Maybe that will change next year but to start the season with only 2 players other than Ware over 6-7 (and again Buchanan is closer to 6-4 than 6-7) just doesn’t seem like a great idea. I also think adding another smallish guard could (and probably would) create chemistry issues. Too many guards will not be a good thing for us in my opinion.
I’m happy with what we’ve done so far too. I just don’t understand why we are targeting a PG. Pike has never been great at managing chemistry issues. If we bring in a starting PG, someone is going to be very disappointed. Tariq is going to be playing 25 mpg at least. And Lino wasn’t sticking around if the plan was for him to play less than half a game. So that leaves 35 minutes (max) of playing time in the backcourt. Do you think J Mike and Powers are playing less than 10 mpg each? Wooten and Duarte not playing at all? Where are the minutes for another new guard coming from?
At this point, I think we’d be better off targeting a couple defensive players to fill out the roster. Could be any position I suppose, but I don’t know that bringing in someone to take over running the offense is a good idea.
Better question why did they waste money retaining the smallest back court in the country who can’t shoot?
Money will be the answer!
Why target a PG? If I was coaching for my career there is no way in hell JMike or a young not ready Lino would be leading the team!
Whether 5’11” or 6’1” they are clearly undersized and IF we are in fact targeting another PG addition then I agree with you. Whatever we paid J Mike and the others in that scenerio would be too much. Besides which, the million dollar range is not getting a a PG to come compete in our crowded backcourt who materially better than Lino and TF in the open market. It’s a ridiculous plan.
Big physical defenders to balance the ticket. Bryce Dortch “style” players. No problem with making a change there. I can see how he would want a fresh start. But we need to add at least one defense first kid now. That’s where we should be targeting most talented available.
That’s a different question and the likely answer is with what we were willing to spend we probably couldn’t get a guaranteed better PG than Lino. Lino has a bad game against Creighton, but his issues are developable and he scored in double digits in 8 of the last 11 games (six 14+ point games). Folks don’t seem to understand $1M isn’t buying RU an established high major starter and everyone else is as much a question as Lino.
Regardless - Lino, Tariq, J Mike and Smith (who plays point forward) are signed. Even if you got someone “slightly” better than every one of them at running the point the economics of using the money that way now vs buying more defensive weapons do not make sense.
A bigger concern - even if we are “better” on D on paper than last year, we still project right now to be worse at D than the Dylan / Ace team without more upgrades. Maybe the backcourt D a slight improvement but Smith ranked in the bottom 5% on D (PJ level bad).
I don’t think Sydnor will be an upgrade over Ace who did some frosh things but was a good shot blocker. Gordak is okay on D, but on his own not an impactful upgrade from a rotation of Ogbole / Martini / Lathan / Dortch. Where exactly are we significantly upgrading the D that failed us? We’re not going to be outgunning anyone on offense. That blueprint never works for Pike. A lock down defender on the roster would go a long way. We should be on the hunt for one in the bargain rack with ugly efficiency numbers keeping the price down.