Marquette, Shaka article

[Rico444]

Court Report: How Marquette became one of college basketball's best teams despite shunning transfer portal

Marquette had everyone fooled after refusing to promise NIL money to transfers. "Hell no, we ain't doing that," Shaka Smart said

www.cbssports.com

A big night in Milwaukee awaits Wednesday. The 11th-ranked Golden Eagles of Marquette host No. 16 Xavier at 7 p.m. ET on CBS Sports Network with sole possession of first place in the Big East on the line.
Not bad for a team that was picked ninth in its league by media and coaches alike. Here's how Shaka Smart's worked his way to almost certainly winning Big East Coach of the Year.
There are just a handful of high-major programs that did not add a Division I transfer last offseason. Most of them (UCLA, Indiana, Michigan State, Iowa) were given benefit of the doubt in the preseason and projected to be NCAA Tournament teams. Not Marquette. After making a surprise run to the NCAA Tournament as a No. 9 seed in Year 1 under Smart, the program lost four of its top six scorers. Marquette was young, but Smart and his staff went into last spring like almost every other coaching staff in college basketball: prepared to scour the portal and court a couple of players.
Then, the news of Nijel Pack's $800,000 NIL deal to go to Miami dropped, and it changed everything.

"When the news came out about [Pack] going from Kansas State to Miami, that was a watershed moment in transfer recruiting in our sport," Smart told CBS Sports. "It completely altered what other transfers wanted."
Marquette was at different stages of recruiting four transfers. And practically overnight, the tone and expectations of those recruitments changed, Smart told me. He didn't like what he was hearing and quietly abandoned those recruitments — and stopped recruiting D-I transfers altogether last spring.
"We made the decision: Hell no, we ain't doing that," Smart told CBS Sports. "First of all, it's illegal, but we're not prioritizing some guy that hasn't worn a uniform over Tyler Kolek and Oso Ighodaro."


One of the guys Marquette was talking to wound up in the Pac-12. Two more found spots elsewhere in the Big East and another is now in Conference USA.

Recruiting experts, any idea who those recruits might be, specifically the ones in the Big East?

 

[auror]

Post April 23rd (date Nijel Pack's NIL deal went viral) transfers into the Big East who who were already in the portal then (thus talking to Shaka already) and may have been able to ask for a decent NIL:

Bryce Hopkins - April 25th
Manny Bates - May 4th
David Jones - May 1st
Al-Amir Dawes - May 5th

Possible but less likely (not as high profile/valuable):
Souley Boum - May 2nd
Hassan Diarra - May 11th
Femi Odukale - May 8th
Primo Spears - April 29th
Qudus Wahab - May 24th

 

[HuskyWarrior611]

Pretty impressive he was able to lose that many guys, not hit the portal, and then still be as good as they are this year.

Didn’t know that was possible anymore.

 

[Chin Diesel]

It also helps to not have to go in to transfer portal to get recruits if you don't lose part of your current roster to the portal.

 

[Tenspro2002]

It also helps to not have to go in to transfer portal to get recruits if you don't lose part of your current roster to the portal.

Corey Floyd put up a 5 trillion last night. We weren't losing anything.

Providence 94-86 Creighton (Feb 14, 2023) Box Score - ESPN

Box score for the Providence Friars vs. Creighton Bluejays NCAAM game from February 14, 2023 on ESPN. Includes all points, rebounds and steals stats.

www.espn.com

 

[McLovin]

Shaka is such an underrated coach. He could have had a stellar career at Texas if they weren’t impatient (a lesson worth learning for UConn fans).

 

[Chin Diesel]

Corey Floyd put up a 5 trillion last night. We weren't losing anything.

Providence 94-86 Creighton (Feb 14, 2023) Box Score - ESPN

Box score for the Providence Friars vs. Creighton Bluejays NCAAM game from February 14, 2023 on ESPN. Includes all points, rebounds and steals stats.

www.espn.com

I was suggesting had Smart lost 3-4 players in to the portal he would have needed to backfill using the portal.

 

[Billy Jack]

In my own preseason rating of the Big East, I had Marquette as a bottom feeder this year because they had lost so much from last year and because they didn’t have any impact players coming in. Boy, was I wrong! Shaka is BE Coach of the Year in my book - and I’m not wrong on this one.

 

[gsmooth]

In my own preseason rating of the Big East, I had Marquette as a bottom feeder this year because they had lost so much from last year and because they didn’t have any impact players coming in. Boy, was I wrong! Shaka is BE Coach of the Year in my book - and I’m not wrong on this one.

Shaka Smart is a brilliant game strategist. He should get BE Coach of the Year. Think about this, too, Marquette has swept the season series 2 years in a row against Nova which of course includes Nova's Final Four team last year.

 

[freescooter]

When I said we should have hired Shaka when Calhoun retired and again when Ollie was fired I was told he he was lucky, untalented, couldn’t recruit at a Big Time level. Guess he Isn’t that bad, huh?

I think Texas was just a bad fit. It happens. But a good coach

 

[Fishy]

Shaka is such an underrated coach. He could have had a stellar career at Texas if they weren’t impatient (a lesson worth learning for UConn fans).

Shaka would have been here instead of Kevin Ollie if Calhoun hadn’t engineered that transition.

 

[Matt1010]

Shaka would have been here instead of Kevin Ollie if Calhoun hadn’t engineered that transition.

And if Shaka had taken over at UConn post Calhoun and had the same first six year results as he did at Texas he would have been fired.

 

[Hi-Low]

Shaka would have been here instead of Kevin Ollie if Calhoun hadn’t engineered that transition.

One of JC's few errors in 25 years....we got the 2014 title with KO so it worked short term but otherwise a hot mess. Will never know what the past 10 years would have been with Shaka if true, but I'm good with DH and where things are now. Excited for the rest of this season and next year's class but time will tell.

 

[huskyfever]

I really like Shaka and think he is doing a great job at Marquette, but coaches are pretty hypocritical when they speak about “grabbing a bag.” Shaka had a good thing going at VCU and “grabbed a bag” to go to Texas. I don’t blame him, but I always think it is disingenuous when coaches talk about the horrors of players getting paid now when they are paid absurd amounts and often jump to the bigger paying jobs.

 

[Fishy]

And if Shaka had taken over at UConn post Calhoun and had the same first six year results as he did at Texas he would have been fired.

He’d have been fine here.

One of JC's few errors in 25 years....we got the 2014 title with KO so it worked short term but otherwise a hot mess. Will never know what the past 10 years would have been with Shaka if true, but I'm good with DH and where things are now. Excited for the rest of this season and next year's class but time will tell.

Just don’t like the way he did it. I’m sure he had no idea that it would turn into the absolute dumpster fire it did, but he has to own that.

 

[MTBingNinja]

Corey Floyd put up a 5 trillion last night. We weren't losing anything.

Providence 94-86 Creighton (Feb 14, 2023) Box Score - ESPN

Box score for the Providence Friars vs. Creighton Bluejays NCAAM game from February 14, 2023 on ESPN. Includes all points, rebounds and steals stats.

www.espn.com

“
Jud Buechler
He is also notable for being the all-time NBA leader in "trillions" (logging playing time in a game but not getting anything for the stat sheet, resulting in a number followed by 12 zeroes), with 55.”

 

[HuskyWarrior611]

Shaka would have been here instead of Kevin Ollie if Calhoun hadn’t engineered that transition.

Still of the opinion that Ollie just got a really raw deal being banished to the AAC. His career will be a what if as far as being given a proper situation goes. Hard to believe a NC was luck. Especially when we see how hard winning just one tournament game is.

 

[August_West]

Still of the opinion that Ollie just got a really raw deal being banished to the AAC. His career will be a what if as far as being given a proper situation goes. Hard to believe a NC was luck. Especially when we see how hard winning just one tournament game is.

Meh. I mean I thought Kevin could coach his ass off, and he did, but he let outside forces dull his edge ( and none of those forces were the AAC) . That’s the most diplomatic way I can say that.

 

[FfldCntyFan]

Still of the opinion that Ollie just got a really raw deal being banished to the AAC. His career will be a what if as far as being given a proper situation goes. Hard to believe a NC was luck. Especially when we see how hard winning just one tournament game is.

I think the raw deal he received was entirely self inflicted. After the 2014 title (and what appeared to be a tremendous recruiting effort that somehow evaporated) we had sufficient national recognition and goodwill within our following that we could have been fine if he kept the program at a high level.

We could have scheduled enough name non-conference opponents to keep people happy and the lesser competition could have allowed a top program (which we were in position to continue being) to do what Gonzaga has been doing in the WCC.

The AAC became a contributing factor but it wasn't the cause of the demise under KO.

 

[Matt1010]

Shaka also hasn't won a single NCAA tournament game since 2013. The most recent loss being by 33 points in a 8/9 game.

 

[Huskyforlife]

Shaka also hasn't won a single NCAA tournament game since 2013. The most recent loss being by 33 points in a 8/9 game.

People don’t realize how few great coaches are actually out there. Shaka is good, Hurley is good, Texas is one of the rare schools that has enough money to pay the next big thing (Beard/Shaka) whenever they’re done with the prior guy. UConn is not one of those schools.

 

[Fishy]

Still of the opinion that Ollie just got a really raw deal being banished to the AAC. His career will be a what if as far as being given a proper situation goes. Hard to believe a NC was luck. Especially when we see how hard winning just one tournament game is.

Absolutely ridiculous.

The clown stopped working. I mean, he simply stopped doing his job.

 

[caw]

I'm going to disagree. IMO, Ollie wasn't actually a bad hire, maybe not the best but he wasn't bad, and it wasn't actually a bad call by Calhoun at the time. The man averaged almost 25 wins a year his first four years, which isn't bad. He had flaws as a coach but he wasn't bad those first four years (3.5).

Then he stopped caring about pretty much any aspect of coaching from recruiting, to planning, to maintaining order with players, or following rules. Those were unforeseeable when he was hired. Considering his previous work ethic that got him and kept him in the NBA, it was probably one of the things UConn worried the least about.

 

[HuskyWarrior611]

Meh. I mean I thought Kevin could coach his ass off, and he did, but he let outside forces dull his edge ( and none of those forces were the AAC) . That’s the most diplomatic way I can say that.


The real way to say it is he let p ewe double ess y Make him forget about everything else

I definitely agree that was a BIG part of it too.

Having women problems and then seeing your main rivals go from Syracuse, Pitt, and Georgetown to SMU, Cincy, and Houston can make it hard to get out of bed in the morning lol.

 

[HuskyWarrior611]

Absolutely ridiculous.

The clown stopped working. I mean, he simply stopped doing his job.

I don’t disagree. I just wonder if he would’ve did that if we were successful in going to the ACC, Big Ten, or even got back to the Big East. Not saying he would’ve. Just a thought.