Rothstein - Early Big East Breakdown - St. John's and UConn are on a collision course + Power Rankings

[UCONNFAN179]

In the last couple of days Seton Hall picks up 6'10 250lb center in 2026 class top 50 to reclass to play this year, & Oregon picks up 6'11 260lb athlete from Nigeria playing in a Turkish league to be a depth piece. In other words, there have still been guys out there.

Exactly my point. You would think we'd have gotten someone by now

 

[CardiacAndre7]

Graded relative to their position and depth placement (ie an A- 7th man means they are extremely qualified for the role, but doesn't mean they'd be an A as a starter).

	UConn	Grade	Edge	St. John's	Grade
PG	Silas Demary	A-	UConn	Dylan Darling	B+
SG	Solo Ball	A-	UConn	Ian Jackson	B+
Wing	Braylon Mullins	B+	UConn	Oziyah Sellers	B
PF	Alex Karaban	A	UConn	Bryce Hopkins	A-
C	Tarris Reed	A-	St. John's	Zuby Ejiofor	A
6th Man	Jaylin Stewart	B+	St. John's	Dillon Mitchell	A
7th Man	Malachi Smith	A-	Tie	Joson Sanon	A-
8th Man	Eric Reibe	B	UConn	Kelvin Odih	B-
9th Man	Jacob Furphy	B	UConn	Ruben Pray	B-

Ruben Pray is an insane name lmao

 

[auror]

Ruben Pray is an insane name lmao

It's actually Prey, typo me. I don't know if that's more or less insane lol.

 

[CardiacAndre7]

It's actually Prey, typo me. I don't know if that's more or less insane lol.

Almost more. Gotta love some College Ball names

 

[BFieldHusky]

To me, the St. Johns point guard issue is bigger than if T Reed can stay on the floor. Its nice that people think Jackson can play PG, but that is a true mystery.

 

[bjc42]

Ruben Pray is an insane name lmao

for real bro

 

[CTFAN4LIFE]

To me, the St. Johns point guard issue is bigger than if T Reed can stay on the floor. Its nice that people think Jackson can play PG, but that is a true mystery.

Agreed - Jackson is a very nice player but Solo is a step ahead.

 

[Hurleyman216]

Hate to say it before the season even starts, but we will be as good a Reibe is at backup center. If he can give us a solid 15 mins/game and not give up too much on the defensive end then we are going to just steamroll even very solid teams. If he isn’t ready for that role yet then we could be in some trouble.

 

[superjohn]

Hate to say it before the season even starts, but we will be as good a Reibe is at backup center. If he can give us a solid 15 mins/game and not give up too much on the defensive end then we are going to just steamroll even very solid teams. If he isn’t ready for that role yet then we could be in some trouble.

There's a reason Hurley didn't bring in a third center, he's confident in Reibe.

 

[dennismenace]

Graded relative to their position and depth placement (ie an A- 7th man means they are extremely qualified for the role, but doesn't mean they'd be an A as a starter).

	UConn	Grade	Edge	St. John's	Grade
PG	Silas Demary	A-	UConn	Dylan Darling	B+
SG	Solo Ball	A-	UConn	Ian Jackson	B+
Wing	Braylon Mullins	B+	UConn	Oziyah Sellers	B
PF	Alex Karaban	A	UConn	Bryce Hopkins	A-
C	Tarris Reed	A-	St. John's	Zuby Ejiofor	A
6th Man	Jaylin Stewart	B+	St. John's	Dillon Mitchell	A
7th Man	Malachi Smith	A-	Tie	Joson Sanon	A-
8th Man	Eric Reibe	B	UConn	Kelvin Odih	B-
9th Man	Jacob Furphy	B	UConn	Ruben Pray	B-

Pretty close in comparison. The only question (which could well be decisive) is if Hopkins is close to pre-injury status. He was unstoppable against us taking it to the basket, rebounding and long distance shooting. If he's healthy he's a load. I'm not looking forward to a Pitino team with a healthy Hopkins. He reminds me of Dixon of "Nova" except maybe a better defender if he's healthy.

 

[jibsey]

Graded relative to their position and depth placement (ie an A- 7th man means they are extremely qualified for the role, but doesn't mean they'd be an A as a starter).

	UConn	Grade	Edge	St. John's	Grade
PG	Silas Demary	A-	UConn	Dylan Darling	B+
SG	Solo Ball	A-	UConn	Ian Jackson	B+
Wing	Braylon Mullins	B+	UConn	Oziyah Sellers	B
PF	Alex Karaban	A	UConn	Bryce Hopkins	A-
C	Tarris Reed	A-	St. John's	Zuby Ejiofor	A
6th Man	Jaylin Stewart	B+	St. John's	Dillon Mitchell	A
7th Man	Malachi Smith	A-	Tie	Joson Sanon	A-
8th Man	Eric Reibe	B	UConn	Kelvin Odih	B-
9th Man	Jacob Furphy	B	UConn	Ruben Pray	B-

Thanks. Interesting that Jayden Ross isn’t even on the page, must be #10 as well as 2 other new experienced transfers. Both teams loaded up.

 

[UCONNFAN179]

Hate to say it before the season even starts, but we will be as good a Reibe is at backup center. If he can give us a solid 15 mins/game and not give up too much on the defensive end then we are going to just steamroll even very solid teams. If he isn’t ready for that role yet then we could be in some trouble.

100%. which makes the fact that we haven't brought in a beefy back up center for defense and/or rebounding in emergency situations all the more perplexing.

 

[UCONNFAN179]

There's a reason Hurley didn't bring in a third center, he's confident in Reibe.

Watching Reibe, he's currently incapable of handling rebounding duties and rim protection vs stronger teams. That's not a knock on him as a prospect, it's just he's not big enough yet to handle upperclassmen down low.

 

[RuffRuff]

Watching Reibe, he's currently incapable of handling rebounding duties and rim protection vs stronger teams. That's not a knock on him as a prospect, it's just he's not big enough yet to handle upperclassmen down low.

7 foot, 230 so he is a bit light for his height but I wouldn't call him a total light weight. We just have to see what he is once the staff gets ahold of him. I'm holding out judgement on what he's capable of until he has a few months in the system as I don't sense he's gotten the kind of coaching necessary to prioritize needs at his position at the college level. Bigs just take time and coaching.

 

[Lafayette]

Watching Reibe, he's currently incapable of handling rebounding duties and rim protection vs stronger teams. That's not a knock on him as a prospect, it's just he's not big enough yet to handle upperclassmen down low.

Imma gonna wait until we see them both in a few preseason and 2-3 Big East games.

They are going from U19 where they were the best on their respective teams (Furphy and Reibe) and coming to UConn, two realities hit: one: your teammates are better all around (neither had a Demary Jr at point or Solo as a shooting guard, etc) and two: you are not even as good as the starter for your position.

But with UConn conditioning and practices they will find their way and they should both carve out some playing time since Reibe is literally the only other 'big' if Tarris has foul, rest, or injury issues and Furphy is a scorer and scorers get minutes.

One thing with Hurley is he gets enamored with guys who play well against us: Mahaney, Koroma, and I have to think he saw both Reibe and Furphy play USA's U19 team in the same way considering we will see some of them it's nice to know Furphy can guard Dybantsa, etc.

 

[Waquoit]

Imma gonna wait until we see them both in a few preseason and 2-3 Big East games.

And it's not like he has to go up against Reed. On the other team, I mean.

 

[UCONNFAN179]

7 foot, 230 so he is a bit light for his height but I wouldn't call him a total light weight. We just have to see what he is once the staff gets ahold of him. I'm holding out judgement on what he's capable of until he has a few months in the system as I don't sense he's gotten the kind of coaching necessary to prioritize needs at his position at the college level. Bigs just take time and coaching.

I didn't call Reibe a total light weight. I said (as an 18 year old freshman) he is not currently capable of handling rim protection and rebounding duties vs a big/mature, beefy front line. I don't think that's a hot take. Look at his light rebounding numbers and foul issues in many of the recent games..., and that was only vs other 18 year-olds! It's just not his strong point yet.

Even if Reibe was ready for those matchups, I still find it strange that we didn't grab another bigger body 5 capable of rim protection and rebounding vs bigger, more muscular players in case of emergency. There were plenty available. We're already small at the 4. If Reed misses any time due to injury or foul trouble, which was a regular occurrence last season, we don't really have anyone else to match up with and rebound vs any real muscle down low.

Given our aspirations this year, I'm just saying I am very surprised we didn't add another beefy big. It looks to be an obvious hole that could/should have been addressed relatively easily... I'm talking about a player similar to an Okwandu, Wane, etc. We seem to have adequate depth everywhere else. Hopefully this will be addressed.

 

[REB1094]

It’ll be the marquee matchup in the BE. The “away” game at MSG and hopefully the BET game will be absolutely electric

Dylan Darling was great last season, but I’ll take Silas Demary over him because Silas already did it at the P5 level (the strongest conference in the country too) and of course we always value size in our PGs

Ian Jackson is a wildcard. He was a top recruit and top transfer for a reason. I’d say Solo has a higher floor, Ian has a higher ceiling. I’m giving it to Solo. If he comes back with a respectable dribble-drive game and keeps his defensive improvement going, he’ll be competitive for All BE 1st team

I don’t know who Oziyah Sellers is. Braylon clears

Karaban and Hopkins will be a great matchup. It’s a battle of hypotheticals - how good will Karaban be back in his natural role vs. how will Hopkins return from injury in a new system? I’m really excited to see this one. I’m leaning Karaban since there’s less unknowns

Same with Tarris vs Zuby. Zuby is one of my favorite non-UConn BE players and I was high on Tarris all last year. This frontcourt battle is going to be amazing. I’m split 50/50 here but if I had to pick, I’m going Zuby

Our bench is deeper but theirs is more front loaded with Mitchell and Sanon (I may be underrating Malachi Smith here). St John’s wins the bench matchup unless Stewart or Furphy overperform

 

[Hurleyman216]

I don't personally agree with Rothstein in picking St. John's over us. St. John's is almost starting from scratch with a whole new team again this year and while they have some offensive fire power, their defense and chemistry are a huge question mark. We have 4 studs in Demary, Ball, Karaban and Reed. We will be an elite shooting team. Defense and backup center are question marks for us, but we were dramatically improved on defense at the end of the season, so I expect we will be a top 15-20 defense and probably a top 5 offense.

 

[uconn_jack]

In the last couple of days Seton Hall picks up 6'10 250lb center in 2026 class top 50 to reclass to play this year, & Oregon picks up 6'11 260lb athlete from Nigeria playing in a Turkish league to be a depth piece. In other words, there have still been guys out there.

Nobody good enough to play is going to come to be a break glass in case of emergency 5, and any big body willing to come in and be that probably won't be good enough to play center in front of Koroma or Karaban anyway despite their size limitations. Singare was what we needed for that role, and was decent enough to play if needed, but he left not wanting to be that person and nobody else at that level will either. I thought we might bring in a big body just a practice player, but not somebody who would ever actually play unless both Reed and Reibe went down. If that happens, we're screwed with or without this hypothetical player.

 

[Lafayette]

Nobody good enough to play is going to come to be a break glass in case of emergency 5, and any big body willing to come in and be that probably won't be good enough to play center in front of Koroma or Karaban anyway despite their size limitations. Singare was what we needed for that role, and was decent enough to play if needed, but he left not wanting to be that person and nobody else at that level will either. I thought we might bring in a big body just a practice player, but not somebody who would ever actually play unless both Reed and Reibe went down. If that happens, we're screwed with or without this hypothetical player.

Singare was willing to be that behind Samson and Reed, Jr. But seeing we got Reibe, he didn't want to continue in that role another year, especially if he would get minutes elsewhere.

This is going to be a hold your breath year at Center, kind of like point guard last year.

 

[HooperScooper]

#1? Pffft.

St. John's basketball roster, starting lineup prediction: Rick Pitino brings in No. 1 transfer class

The Red Storm's Zuby Ejiofor will be surrounded by new teammates this season

www.cbssports.com

 

[RuffRuff]

#1? Pffft.

St. John's basketball roster, starting lineup prediction: Rick Pitino brings in No. 1 transfer class

The Red Storm's Zuby Ejiofor will be surrounded by new teammates this season

www.cbssports.com

Parrish indexing hard on Pitino. He and Fanta had a podcast on StJ this week. A couple new pods have come out the last couple days, F68 had a Peach Jam follow up, along with their thoughts on early season rankings. General consensus has us in that 4-5 range, F68 feeling Purdue/Houston/Florida are a slight cut above the rest of the field. They also think there is a drop off after team 12 in terms of potential to win it all, with Arkansas on the backend.

 

[Husky68]

Parrish indexing hard on Pitino. He and Fanta had a podcast on StJ this week. A couple new pods have come out the last couple days, F68 had a Peach Jam follow up, along with their thoughts on early season rankings. General consensus has us in that 4-5 range, F68 feeling Purdue/Houston/Florida are a slight cut above the rest of the field. They also think there is a drop off after team 12 in terms of potential to win it all, with Arkansas on the backend.

Over the last 25 years you would have made a lot of money betting a Big18 team wouldn't be the winner. No team right now should be any kind of cut above UConn, on paper UConn has it as good as anyone else.

 

[RuffRuff]

Over the last 25 years you would have made a lot of money betting a Big18 team wouldn't be the winner. No team right now should be any kind of cut above UConn, on paper UConn has it as good as anyone else.

I tend to agree. Only caveat would be Purdue if this Israeli is as good as they’re saying. Look no further than last year as Florida came in well outside the top ten.