Who knows...but I think they must have a bucket of it somewhere given all of these 4 and 5 star FBS transfers that Marion has brought in.

I really like the recruiting class that Les has brought in so far and I'm excited to see these new Ags in action this fall. It feels like we are building towards being ready for the move to the MWC in 2026. I wonder if we have any more scholarships available for this year or if we're done now?

Article from the Sac Bee yesterday by Joe Davidson:

Mike Bibby and Campus Leaders Abuzz on Tour of Sac State’s New Basketball Venue

They were handing out hard hats and bright green vests on Friday morning, required garb for any construction site, including a quick tour of a work in progress at Sacramento State.

The renovation project for a long-needed, bigger basketball venue on campus is no longer rumor and speculation. It’s happening, and it serves as the backdrop of the rolling momentum for the men’s basketball team that has been buzzing with former Sacramento Kings star guard Mike Bibby taking over as head coach and Hall of Fame great Shaquille O’Neal accepting the program’s general manager post in an unpaid, voluntary position.

Bibby and O’Neal have been friends for years, never mind their fierce rivalry days in the NBA in the early 2000s, when the Kings-Lakers playoff showdowns made for rich global entertainment. That pairing makes for quite a dynamic as the Hornets aim to produce a winner in a sport that has managed just two winning seasons since moving from Division II to Division I in 1991.

The venue, located just past the north end zone of Hornet Stadium, has been busy with activity for months. The new floor covered is covered by plyboard sheets to hold materials, new 24-second shot clocks and equipment. Expected to be ready by summer, the pavilion will feature 3,200 seats, two big video boards and other trappings that sparkle in rendering images.

The days of the Hornets basketball teams competing in the 73-year old Nest, a charming yet outdated 1,000-seat venue, are over. The Nest will remain as a practice venue and be used for other sports, but it will no longer be labeled as the poorest Division I basketball venue in the country.

“Big improvement,” Sacramento State president Luke Wood said Friday. “No more lipstick for a pig.”

The pig reference was from when Wood said in a November 2023 interview with The Sacramento Bee that all the new green paint in the tired old Nest was nothing short of putting “lipstick on a pig.”

On Friday, Wood along with Hornets athletic director Mark Orr, Bibby and Otto Construction project manager Corbin Martin took The Bee on a venue tour of the new home court.

“It’s a sign of progress,” Orr said. “We’ve needed this for years. It’s the evolution of the program. Since I was a kid growing up here in Sacramento, Sac State has always been looking for a sustainable venue. We will finally have it, and our school and our student-athletes deserve it. We want to maximize the student experience.”

A moment later, Orr pointed to the ceiling to announce: “Look! We even have air conditioning!”

Hornets Want a Rabid Home Setting

Bibby was radiant in peering into the venue and into future.

He envisions a Duke-like atmosphere in this pavilion, to channel some of the decades-long love affair that Sacramento has showered on the Kings into this venture. He can see students and fans standing, cheering, stomping in this venue during games, and having to shout during time outs to be heard above the noise.

Bibby has 12 newly signed players on board, mostly through the transfer portal. He has former Kings strength and conditioning coach Al Biancani on his staff to get players in tip-top shape. Bibby wants to pressure teams on defense and to “run teams out of the gym”, adding, “We’re going to be exciting, and 3,200 seats may not be enough.”

The project has been anchored by the relentless efforts of Wood and Orr, experts in rubbing elbows and working a crowd and the phones. Sacramento State in late 2023 announced that funding for an events center in The Well fitness and health facility had been approved. Wood thought this was a more feasible plan of a basketball venue than trying to raise some $100 million for a brand-new arena on campus, which could take years. Wood doesn’t want years. He wants now.

In late 2023, the Board of Directors for the nonprofit that runs The Well and Sac State’s University Union hall unanimously approved a resolution to provide up to $5.2 million from reserves for the project. Wood and Orr said their phone lines are open for potential signage and sponsorships. The two hustled off to the airport Friday morning to meet with donors in Southern California.

Who’s Playing at The Well?

Sac State’s current roster has no holdover players from last season’s 7-25 campaign. Turnover like this is common as athletic scholarships are a year-to-year deal, and college sports has become something of a turnstile of players coming and going. The Sacramento State football program has brought in national-leading 50 players through the portal, with more coming, under first-year coach Brennan Marion.

Bibby vowed to bring in big names when he was hired. His first big name addition was Shaq’s son Shaqir O’Neal, a 6-foot-8 forward who will be a senior this season after transferring from Florida A&M.

Another four-star prep prospect now in the program is 6-3 guard Mikey Williams, who scored a San Diego Section-record 77 points in a high school game as a freshman. He later accepted a scholarship to Memphis and wound up at UCF, where last season he played in 18 games and missed 19 due to injury.

Taj Glover, the son of retired NBA player Dion Glover, is a 6-3 guard who transferred from South Florida. Jahni Summers is a 6-6 guard who comes from Indiana State. Jeremiah Cherry is a 6-11 post from UNLV, and Brandon Gardner is a 6-8 forward from USC. In a dunk contest in Los Angeles, Gardner soared over eventual NFL No. 1 overall pick Caleb Williams, now a quarterback with the Chicago Bears.

There is also a local flavor on the revamped roster. Sacramento Bee Player of the Year Mark Lavrenov, a 6-8 forward, was signed by the previous Hornets coaching staff and appears to be the sort of player Bibby wants — fundamentally sound, versatile, easy to coach and tough-minded.

Former Capital Christian High School of Sacramento star Jayden Treat is a 6-2 guard who transferred in from the Utah Utes. He played three seasons at Jesuit before his transfer to Capital Christian, today known as Destiny Christian Academy.

Bibby said he expects to sign three more player to fill out the roster at 15. He said that the emails that pour into the basketball office include hundreds of video clips from players from across the country.

Bibby feels the buzz because he’s a big part of that buzz.

“We’re giving guys an opportunity to play, to get coached up,” Bibby said. “We can do big things here.”

https://www.sacbee.com/sports/college/article306007126.html

He is slender for sure but he's quick, can get up and down the floor fast and can leap. I think his quickness and leaping ability can help him become a disruptive, rim protector while staying out of foul trouble.

I watched a couple of short highlights videos of Noudjihidi on Hudl and he's long, very athletic and runs the floor really well for a 6'11 post. He looks like he could be an elite defender with the ability to score close to the rim and has a lot of growth potential.

Good points. It's hard for FCS programs to land WR's with both size and speed. The P4 programs gobble them up especially now that they can legally pay them big NIL money. I like having smaller receivers with blazing speed who can run great routes, create separation and get yards after the catch with their speed and quickness.

Marion continues to recruit at a breakneck pace. According to 247 Sports, he has secured 16 hard commits already for 2026 and has given out a mind-boggling 384 offers! No wonder they have such a large coaching and support staff for football. Can you imagine the time and effort it must take to make contact with this many potential recruits?

2026 Commits:

https://247sports.com/college/sacramento-state/season/2026-football/commits/

2026 Offers by Position:

QB - 8
RB - 17
WR - 68
TE - 11
OT - 27
OL - 27
Edge - 31
DL - 41
LB - 27
CB - 44
S -22
Athlete - 61

https://247sports.com/college/sacramento-state/season/2026-football/offers/

Jaden Rashada breaks silence on lengthy transfer process, Sacramento State pick: 'I had more pure intentions'
Brennan Marion's Hornets have cleared the runway for Rashada to be QB1 in Sacramento

Jaden Rashada's college recruitment has been under a microscope since he announced his commitment to Miami almost three years ago. The decorated quarterback from the 2023 recruiting class has become one of the most recognizable faces and cautionary tales of the NIL era due to a series of high-profile events, which includes a fallout with Florida that resulted in a lawsuit against, among others, coach Billy Napier.

"We are definitely in on (Jaden) being our guy," Marion told CBS Sports. "For us in every room, we want guys who can be draft picks, starters and stars. In every room, if you look at what we are doing in the transfer portal and what we have done with high school recruiting, every single room had that. Except for the quarterback room, we did not upgrade to the level I liked."

Whole article here: https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/jaden-rashada-breaks-silence-on-lengthy-transfer-process-sacramento-state-pick-i-had-more-pure-intentions/

Georgia QB Jaden Rashada sues Florida coach Billy Napier, among others, over botched $13.85M NIL deal

Georgia quarterback Jaden Rashada has filed a lawsuit against Florida coach Billy Napier, top Gators booster Hugh Hathcock and former football staffer Marcus Castro-Walker over a failed name, image and likeness deal that would have paid the quarterback $13.85 million, according to a suit filed in federal court on Tuesday.

The bombshell lawsuit, which features the unprecedented action of an active SEC quarterback suing a sitting rival head coach, is the most notable NIL-related lawsuit to date. In many ways, Rashada became the face of the chaotic nature of early NIL that was full of big promises with little oversight on the heels of his Florida deal falling apart.

Whole article here: https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/georgia-qb-jaden-rashada-sues-florida-coach-billy-napier-among-others-over-botched-13-85m-nil-deal/

Sac's football roster includes a GM and and Assistant GM. I've never seen so many coaches and support staff on a roster. They list 30 under the heading of Coaching Staff and 9 more under Football Support Staff.

Basketball is showing 6 Coaches and 6 Support Staff.

https://hornetsports.com/sports/football/roster

https://hornetsports.com/sports/mens-basketball/roster

It will be interesting to see if Mani will reach his potential at Fresno State. He was injured a lot here and, when he did finally get some playing time, he seemed to have a tough time with the physicality of defending in the paint. He certainly has a beautiful 3 point shot so maybe Fresno will use him as a tough matchup on the perimeter.

Quite a pitching duel! I looked at the box score and the game started at 6:06 pm and finished at 10:52 pm...4 hours and 46 minutes long with a good crowd of 1885 in attendance. I wonder how many stayed until the end?

The Aggies are now 22-23 overall and 9-13 in the BW with 10 games to go. I'm sure they'd like to finish above .500 for the season. Go Ags!

Article from today's Sac Bee by Joe Davidson:

Sac State football signs 50 via transfer portal, most in nation. Who’s coming?

Brennan Marion vowed to upgrade the football roster at Sacramento State when he became head coach in December.

He wasn’t kidding, and he isn’t finished.

In the whirlwind nature that has become college athletics, Marion has gone to the transfer portal to rework the existing Hornets roster. Because scholarships are only a year-to-year binding deal, change is allowed and does happen at this level.

On top of securing the top recruiting class in the FCS during the signing period, Marion has brought in a national-leading 50 players through the portal. Some players were starters from higher-level FBS programs and were four-star recruits in high school. Some played for some of the top college programs in the country, or were at least on the roster.

At FCS-level Sacramento State, Marion is offering players in the portal an opportunity to compete for a starting job, to be part of the rolling momentum of a program that seeks entry into the FBS and could well be a preseason Top 10 team in the FCS this fall.

Mostly, Marion is offering players a chance to experience his motto of “One great year can change your life,” something he embraced growing up in Pennsylvania before coaching took him across the country.

“That’s what we say, and now I have players who come up to me now and say that line,” Marion said. “We can turn your career around here, even if we just have you for one year, because one year can change your life. We did the same thing when I was (the offensive coordinator) at UNLV the last couple of years. We brought in 30-plus guys and reached the conference championship game both times."

‘We’ve flipped our roster’

Before the portal became a crucial part of college football in 2018, programs largely built their rosters or retooled through high school recruiting. Now the portal affords programs a chance for a quick fix with significant upgrades for players who have already been vetted, so to speak, in the college game.

It can come across as cut-throat, welcoming in scores of new players to take the roster spots of those already in place. But such is the nature of the game now. New coaches bring in their people, be it coaches or players.

“Some may wonder, ‘What are you doing, flipping the roster like that?’” Marion said. “From our perspective, we want to bring in the best players we can. We’re getting mainly FBS transfers, guys who played some at their previous schools but want a fresh start. We’ve upgraded our roster. We’ve flipped our roster.”

Sacramento State has floated the idea that NIL — name, image and likeness — funding can swell up to $50 million in coming years, especially if the football program’s recent waiver to the NCAA to move up in classification as an independent is approved.

What Marion can assure is a chance to be part of a football movement in the only top 20 media market in the country that does not have an FBS program. Sacramento State won Big Sky Conference championships in 2019, 2021 and 2022 and reached the FCS playoffs in 2023 before sliding to last place in the Big Sky last fall amid injuries and late-game losses.

College football teams are allowed to carry 105 players. Marion can’t keep all of the hold-over players and still bring in new players because the roster would be too large, certainly.

So Marion has encouraged existing players to jump into the transfer portal, and he has endorsed them with glowing comments on social media.

Marion has helped outgoing players land

“Anyone who has been under my tutelage, whether it’s been years or weeks or months, I want them to succeed in life and in their careers, in any field they want, and I’ll help them transfer,” Marion said. “We want them to get offers. That’s our job. When you keep it pure, it’s really just helping the kids. If a player here went through a plan and a process and did it every day, I’ll help them for the rest of their life. The guys who have remained here want to show that they belong.”

Entering the weekend, Marion said he has 65 players in place. In the summer, he will have as many as 50 more additions, meaning more coming and going.

“I still have a few more surprises coming,” Marion said.

Recruiting still comes down to people skills, Marion said. A player can be wowed by the potential of a program, the future, but there has to be a connection between coaches and players for it to work.

“I’ve always been a player’s coach,” Marion said. “That used to get frowned upon - a player’s coach. But a player’s coach, those are the guys who are winning and adapting to the changing college climate.” The Hornets want players who fit in Marion’s wide-open “Go-Go” offense and they want stoppers on defense because college teams score in bunches.

Who are some of the new Hornets?

In recent weeks, Sacramento State has signed out of the portal the following:

▪ Jaden Rashada, a 5-star quarterback recruit out of Pittsburg High in the Bay Area. He attended Arizona State and Georgia.

▪ Oscar Moore, a safety who played in 23 games over two seasons at UTEP and was a 3-star recruit in high school in Texas.

▪ Savion Red, a running back who rushed for 687 yards and eight touchdowns for Nevada in 2024 who originally signed with the Texas Longhorns as a star prep player from the state.

▪ Sam Adams II, a running back who played in 31 games with the Washington Huskies and was the No. 3 prospect in the state coming out of high school, according to 24/7, a national recruiting site.

▪ Malik Tullis, a defensive lineman who played two seasons at Eastern Michigan and was a 3-star recruit in Georgia.

▪ Gavin Thomson, a receiver who attended Pittsburg and UNLV, where he played for Marion in 2024.

▪ Melvin Swindle II, a defensive lineman who played in 35 games at Eastern Michigan over three seasons and was a 3-star recruit from Michigan.

▪ Dylan Hampsten, a defensive lineman who played in 13 games for San Jose State in 2024.

▪ Warren Smith Jr., a 3-star cornerback recruit from the Bay Area who played at Washington State in 2024.

▪ Diesel Gordon, a defensive back who was a 3-star recruit in Texas, played at Washington in 2023 and at Butler Community College in Kansas last season.

▪ Deven Wright, an edge rusher who played at Boise State and Texas State.

▪ Jordan Herman, a 6-foot-8, 335-pound offensive lineman who played for Florida in 2022 and 2023 and for Charlotte in 2024.

Overloaded on talent? Can a roster have too much talent? Is there such a thing? Can everyone fighting for the same spots cause friction?

“It’s funny to me, at previous stops for me, the thing was filling up rooms with the best players to create the best competition,” Marion said. “Some say recruiting rankings don’t matter. It actually does matter how much talent you have. You want to have the best people you can get in the building, in the room.

“With (the Texas Longhorns), when I was coaching there, everything was about recruiting rankings, having the top recruiting class, getting the top guys, everyone in the room a starter or stars. At UNLV, we had a lot of talent, because that’s the goal. Everyone wants to nr a starter, so you want that competition.”

Marion added, “It’s my greatest challenge as a coach here. I love it. It’s fun. It’s what can make us unique and special. We have a chance to be really good in the summer, and it’ll be exciting to see what we can do.”

https://www.sacbee.com/sports/college/article305501421.html

Eric Olen has brought in 8 recruits since taking over the New Mexico including several who are highly rated. The MWC is going to be very challenging for the Ags in 2026.

Lobos Land Four Impact Transfers for 2025-26, Including JUCO All-American, USC Duo, and 7-Foot Big Man

The New Mexico men’s basketball team is reloading with serious firepower for the 2025-26 season.

One thing is clear about New Mexico’s new athletic director, Fern Lovo: He knows the kind of coaches he wants to hire and wastes no time hiring them.

Coaches like new Lobo basketball hire Eric Olen from UC San Diego and football coach Jason Eck from Idaho—leaders who come from smaller programs with a mindset focused on great opportunity, not limitations the might have had at past schools.

They’ve proven themselves at the mid-major level and arrive in Albuquerque with a hunger to compete, confident in their ability to succeed in the Mountain West.

Head coach Eric Olen announced the addition of four transfers who bring a mix of size, scoring, pedigree, and potential: junior college All-American Antonio Chol, brothers Kevin and Kallai Patton from USC, and JT Rock, a 7-foot-1 former Top 100 recruit from Iowa State.

Olen, entering his first full recruiting cycle at the helm of the Lobos, is already leaving a distinct mark on the roster by targeting players who bring not just talent, but versatility and long-term upside.

Whole article here: https://www.mwcconnection.com/2025/4/23/24414782/lobos-land-four-impact-transfers-including-juco-all-american-usc-duo7-foot-gaurd-gaurd-uriah-tenette

It seems like some Hornet fans are getting a little nervous about how many players Marion is bringing in that have had serious problems elsewhere. The following is a sequence of posts from a topic over on the Hornet football forum:

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After our latest announced recruits, I feel we have to have this discussion. We have several new players who have had felonies in the last few years and we are coming off a down season.

We just lost our best LB and our starting QB to the portal. It's not looking good.

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I don't think people really care about felonies these days... we just elected a convicted felon to lead our country.

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I believe the new players overall will be on good behavior if they’re taking football seriously at all. It’s not like you go to Sac St and don’t play well or get arrested then think you’ll have P4 schools or nfl owners interested.

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The whole "do things the right way" mantra went out the window when fans were calling for coaching heads during last season, regardless of the circumstances (starting senior QB quit, litany of injuries at various positions, redshirt freshman QB at the helm, etc). It should be evident more than ever after that campaign that fans only care about winning.

Couple that "win now above all else" fan sentiment with the current atmosphere in college athletics with the portal and revolving one year agreements with players and we are where we are. We've made our bed, now we get to lay in it.

I'll add that Coach Marion and Co have assembled a very talented roster. We should stack a good amount of wins next season regardless of who left in the portal. Enough wins to prevent Hornet fans from calling for Coach Marion's head? Well I guess that will remain to be seen.

https://bigskyfans.com/threads/which-will-we-see-more-of-from-hornet-football-in-2025.30068/

Gauchofreg took a look at the current rosters in the BW and he shows us as being guard heavy in a big way at the moment. We definitely need some front court players.

Davis: Unbalanced. Two open rides. Biggest need: frontcourt
PG: 1
Guard: 9
Wing: 1
Forward: 1
Center: 0

https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/bigwest/current-status-of-bw-rosters-t29680.html

Full Riverside press release about Argenal:

https://gohighlanders.com/news/2025/5/1/mens-basketball-gus-argenal-named-uc-riverside-head-mens-basketball-coach.aspx

I'd like to see us get in a Top 25 Mid-Major Transfer list like this one. UCSB is #3, Hawaii is #13 while UNLV is #1 and 4 other current MWC teams are on this list.

I would assume that they can until they are actually in the FBS but I'm not positive about that...??

Great post! :up: