Recruiting 2023-2024 The Simon Era

[guest44]

Plenty of players are left in the portal. They aren't done yet.

[Falconwriter]

I'm guessing Simon will try to work it so that he'll have 3-4 scholarships to give to high school kids in his first recruiting class. Most of the guys on this team have at least 2 years of eligibility left and coaches usually don't like to overload their roster with one recruiting class. If he dips into the portal for guard help, I'd look for him to sign a grad transfer or two, some people with only one season left to play, depending on how the classes shake out.

[Hdog]

Athletics website has 2023-24 Roster. 8 players listed

[Flipper]

No... Curtis or Lightfoot

Sorry to see Chandler Turner leave...don't think Huger got as much out of him as he could have

[jpfalcon09]

Briggs article yesterday confirmed that Lightfoot and Curtis are both gone. Agee, Towns, McComb & Felt are the only four players returning.

[mbenecke]

Briggs article yesterday confirmed that Lightfoot and Curtis are both gone. Agee, Towns, McComb & Felt are the only four players returning.

Just to touch on the article, not the players:

I thought it made Simon sound like an absolute grinder. Dude is sleeping on a mattress on the floor and driving his mom's 1997 minivan while he's out on the recruiting trail. His office is empty, but he's in there until 2:00am watching film with his staff. He said every moment they are living is about putting a championship roster together, because it would be a disservice to the BG community not to.

Of course, lots of coaches talk the talk. But I really have bought into this guy. I cannot wait to see his teams play.

[Tricky_Falcon]

Briggs article yesterday confirmed that Lightfoot and Curtis are both gone. Agee, Towns, McComb & Felt are the only four players returning.

Just to touch on the article, not the players:

I thought it made Simon sound like an absolute grinder. Dude is sleeping on a mattress on the floor and driving his mom's 1997 minivan while he's out on the recruiting trail. His office is empty, but he's in there until 2:00am watching film with his staff. He said every moment they are living is about putting a championship roster together, because it would be a disservice to the BG community not to.

Of course, lots of coaches talk the talk. But I really have bought into this guy. I cannot wait to see his teams play.

Sounds a lot like Urban when he took over the football program.

[Hdog]

Yes, Simon impressive so far. I mentioned this in the coaching hire thread a month or so ago, you can tell by the way this guy talks he is going to get this program playing hard, smart, entertaining basketball. There is an interview [chalk talk] I found on YouTube from a couple years ago on a basketball coaching podcast where Simon gets deep into detail on Xs and Os on offense, his approach to practice [not typical], importance of relationships, etc. He talks alot about what metrics he uses to determine if the team is playing the way he wants them to. He comes across very well and very driven to be elite. Its about 45 to 50 minutes long, but I found it entertaining.

edit : here is the link https://youtu.be/bAhzYMaMOFc?t=1

[mbenecke]

When he was first hired, I watched this video (77 minutes) about him explaining his approach offense at the NABC Conference in Las Vegas last year. I believe Coach Fralick had also been a speaker at a conference like this before. It just... made sense. The way he talks about it isn't complex, but it's really just logical offense. He seems like a regular guy, and I can see why it is easy to play for him and to follow this guy as a leader. I came away pretty impressed. He knows exactly what he wants out of his team, and he prepares them to execute.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fc18OM0eRcI

[Hdog]

Using my flimsy theory of players followed by both Todd Simon's and BGSU Men's Basketball's Twitter accounts, it appears we can identify "targets":

Four 'new to BG' players met this double follow criteria: Javon Jackson [transfer portal from Southern Nazarene University - DII], Jason Spurgin [committed], DaJion Humprhey [Juco transfer discussed earlier in this thread], and PJ Edwards [committed].

It appears we offered Javon Jackson on March 19th, the day he put his name in the portal. He has accumulated several mid-major DI offers. He also appeared to visit BGSU today: https://twitter.com/_JavonJackson/statu ... 79265?s=20

I believe there are other offers out there if you have the time to piece together everything. I ran out of patience. lol

Spurgin is a huge get. The most versatile frontcourt BGSU has had in years in terms of depth. I've heard the staff has had recruits/transfers on campus most days this past week. Plenty of guards still left in the portal.

Update to the "Twitter double-follow target list": Trey Thomas added [committed], Kyron Gibson, guard, added [entered transfer portal April 24th from UT Arlington]. I believe UT Arlington is in the WAC, so Simon and staff would have scouted him for conference games.

Javon Jackson, one of Simon's targets, has committed to Utah State.

[fanatic13]

I'm happy we got the bigs figured out first because usually there's a thinner talent pool at those positions. The only player I would add for a big is a guy who can play 3/4 and stretch the floor. Similar to Turner but more polished and a better shooter.

Finding guards who can score is usually easier to find and if we put them in the right system we will be just fine in year 1. Excited about the guy from vanderbilt he has starting experience and could score in high school. He should be able to adapt easier in the Mac compared to vanderbilt so hopefully we can see his points per game actually improve

[BleedOrange]

...
Finding guards who can score is usually easier to find and if we put them in the right system we will be just fine in year 1. Excited about the guy from vanderbilt he has starting experience and could score in high school. He should be able to adapt easier in the Mac compared to vanderbilt so hopefully we can see his points per game actually improve

I can't get enthused about a 1 year player who was a mediocre, 1-dimensional player and a middle-of-the-pack power school. As a BG fan, believe it or not, I still have too much pride.

[Falconwriter]

...
Finding guards who can score is usually easier to find and if we put them in the right system we will be just fine in year 1. Excited about the guy from vanderbilt he has starting experience and could score in high school. He should be able to adapt easier in the Mac compared to vanderbilt so hopefully we can see his points per game actually improve

I can't get enthused about a 1 year player who was a mediocre, 1-dimensional player and a middle-of-the-pack power school. As a BG fan, believe it or not, I still have too much pride.

Doesn't he have two years of eligibility left? I believe so. To this point, I don't believe the coach has brought in any one-year rentals.

[JohnFloyd4Life]

Yes. He has 2. No one year rentals yet. Although I wouldn’t mind if he got a couple. It doesn’t really look like there’s a PG on the roster right now. I’m hoping he adds a mixture of youth and experience to round the guards out. As of right now Agee, Spurgin, Thomas and Towns are the only guys on roster with significant D1 experience.

[Globetrotter]

Yes. He has 2. No one year rentals yet. Although I wouldn’t mind if he got a couple. It doesn’t really look like there’s a PG on the roster right now. I’m hoping he adds a mixture of youth and experience to round the guards out. As of right now Agee, Spurgin, Thomas and Towns are the only guys on roster with significant D1 experience.

One-year rentals are fine in this situation. You don't want to give a 4-year "contract" (I know they can cancel at any time) to a freshman who isn't worthy.