I always thought that Jen Gross might be in the running for the Stanford job when VanDerveer retired. I've heard that she and her husband have a good relationship with VanDerveer and they have helped VanDerveer with the Princeton style offense.

There are 1537 players in the portal as of today.

https://verbalcommits.com/transfers

I believe that the players should have freedom of choice and have the right to transfer but, along with the lure of NIL money, the "rich are getting richer" in D1 basketball. More and more, programs like the Big West schools are seeing many of their best players leave for "greener pastures" each year and,
consequently, the smaller, mid-major schools are forced to rebuild year after year. I think it's ruining the ability of smaller conferences like the Big West to grow and become more competitive at the national level.

College football has FBS, FCS, D2 and D3 levels of competitiveness and national championship tournaments at each of these levels. I'm ready for college basketball to have the same kind of structure. Players want to compete in the post-season and have a chance to play in a national championship tournament. This kind of competitive structure helps the smaller programs retain their players and build fan support. Just look at what schools like North and South Dakota State and the the Montanas have built at the FCS football level.

Football has the longest history of success and has the most fan support at Davis and is still growing. Each season, Aggie football has a goal of getting into the post-season playoffs and chance of playing competitively for a national championship. I think it's time for D1 basketball to have a similar structure as D1 football has with an additional level equivalent to what the FCS is in football. Then we would have a national championship tournament for mid-major programs and something for those schools and their fans to really look forward to each year.

The hits keep coming for the Big West teams. Derin Saran, Irvine's outstanding Fr PG, has entered the portal along with their promising 6'10 Fr forward, Carter Welling and his brother, 6'9 So forward, Hayden Welling.

Does TY have 1 or 2 years of eligibility left?

It would be great if Rocak was able to play one more year but we're looking a total rebuild at this point. It's possible that TY won't find another school that he wants to transfer to but I think he's probably going to get quite a few offers from some elite basketball programs...99% chance that he's gone which means we have now lost our entire starting lineup from last season.

Here's a current list of players who are leaving:

Eli Pepper - graduated
TY Johnson - transfer portal
Ade Adebayo - graduated
Kane Milling - graduated
Niko Rocak - graduated
Sam Manu - graduated

Verbalcommits.com is confirming that TY is in the portal.

https://verbalcommits.com/players/ty-johnson2

Check the final four (or sweet sixteen) - it’s full of mid major transfers. If he wants to go to the tournament, this is his only hope. — DrMike

I know, I know, Davis degree….but those days are long gone with the portal and NIL. — DrMike

This sucks big time but, honestly, I expected it. It's simply a sign of the times in college basketball and football especially for mid-major basketball programs and FCS football programs. It's rare that a mid-major player as talented as Eli Pepper, for example, will stay with the mid-major program once they realize that they can play on a bigger state and those big programs come calling. Most players nowadays head out for the brighter lights and the opportunity to earn some money.

I expect that Les will continue to find "diamonds in the rough" and develop them into elite players only to see them hit the portal and leave at some point. Mid-major basketball programs and FCS football programs have now become the "minor league, development programs" for the bigger schools.

Chris Acker, who spent the last 5 seasons as an assistant coach at San Diego State, has been named the the new Head Coach at Long Beach State.

https://longbeachstate.com/news/2024/4/2/mens-basketball-chris-acker-selected-as-the-new-head-mens-basketball-coach-at-long-beach-state

There are now 1323 players in the portal as of today.

The exodus from Long Beach State continues as their second leading scorer, Jadon Jones, enters the portal. Their leading scorer, Marcos Tsohonis, was a senior and now Jones is leaving along with both Traorés and George. The whole starting lineup is leaving.

Yes it is. That's essentially the heart of the team.

Aboubacar Traoré, Lassina Traoré and A.J. George from Long Beach State have entered the portal.

Verbalcommits.com is currently reporting that there are 1007 players in the D1 basketball portal.

UCSD's outstanding guard, Bryce Pope, has entered the portal. He was named to the All Big West First Team this year. San Diego finished second in the conference this year but was ineligible for the BW Tournament due to being in the final year of their 4 year transition. They look like they were set to be a major contender again for next year but losing Pope is a big blow to them.

I think it is surprising that he's transferring since he's a local kid who played his high school ball at Torrey Pines HS. I think he'd be a great replacement for Pepper if Les could land him.

Andrej Stojaković would be a sensational addition to the Aggies and I'd love to see him here. He'd thrive under a great coach like Jim Les and, like you said, he'd be able to play close to home. It appears that academics may be important to him as well since he chose Stanford over many of the top college teams in the nation.

However, I think it's highly unlikely that he'd choose the Aggies over a lot of the bigger, elite programs that will be chasing after him with promises of playing at the at the highest level of college basketball along with some big NIL money to boot. He turned down offers from most of the major D1 programs in the nation to play at Stanford including Duke, UCLA, Oregon, Kentucky, Connecticut and Kansas to name a few and you know many of them will be drooling now that he is in the portal.

Even though he played his high school ball at Jesuit, we didn't offer him probably because Les knew he had very little chance to sign him considering he was the #18 ranked 5 star recruit in the nation. He was offered by USF, Saint Mary's, Santa Barbara and Cal Poly though.

I'll keep my fingers crossed that Jim Les may have special relationship ties with the Stojaković family!

Thanks for the portal survey. I remember Dan Hawkins saying something about not being able to use the portal that much because of the difficulty of getting many of the players into Davis when transferring from another school. I would expect that the same thing applies to Jim Les and the basketball program too but, then again, Les has brought in a few transfers recently: Rocak, Johnson, Milling, Tamba, Roberson...

Sadly, with all the NIL money and all the major, power conferences jumping from one conference to another for fear of getting behind in the rat race for more TV money, we're destined to see fewer and fewer smaller programs who have any chance at all in the tournament.