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Message: [QUOTE="oldhusky, post: 5191968, member: 9844"] I think it is accurate and fair to say that Geno doesn't particularly like the portal, that he only wants the right kind of kids, and that the ones that did come here have generally been successful. Having said that there were also some major misses that would have made a huge difference in this year's team, and most of those went to our main competition for a national championship. There were three exceptional bigs in the last two years that would have made a monumental difference in this and last year;s team. I am talking about Beers and Iriafen this year and Betts the year before. Relative to us, UCLA, USC and Notre Dame clearly got much stronger after the portal than before. We wound up with a good player, but lost ground to our top competitors because the top talent went to our main competition. We struck out on plan A, got a good fit and replacement for Nika, but came up empty on the biggest need when a couple of sensational options were out there. We have done well using the portal on a limited basis, but missing out on Betts, Beers and Iriafen was particularly painful , because of what a terrific addition and difference maker they could have been, and the fact that they enhanced other direct contenders. [/QUOTE]