Transfer portal

[Da Coach]

There are now more than 1,250 names in the D1 transfer portal, and another 685 in the D2 portal, with more being added every day. And the great majority of them are uncommitted. Unlike past years, they are not mostly the marginal players who are looking for another school offering more playing time. Many of them are starters, key players, and talented players from good mid-major and high-major schools who are looking for better NIL deals than they have. There are lots of good guards and forwards, and a limited number of centers. Looking at the overall talent available, Rienk Mast is among the better centers and should get a good NIL deal when he commits. However, with all the good guards and wings available, I'm not sure Zek will find anywhere near the demand he was hoping for. Pop Weathers will probably end up in the SWAC or an equivalent low-major program.

D1 portal- https://verbalcommits.com/transfers/2023/D1
D2 portal- https://verbalcommits.com/transfers/2023/D2

[tomahawk chop]

I am hoping we can get some visits these next 10 days and get at least a few commitments in players we have targeted that fit our needs. I really want players that can contribute now. We have enough bench players.

[Dubl R 1]

Illinois' RJ Melendez in the portal. I know he will undoubtedly go higher, but I'd love to have him at BU. He was incredibly underutilized in my opinion at Illinois.

[Da Coach]

Indiana State walk-on freshman Isaac Holmes has entered the transfer portal-

https://verbalcommits.com/players/isaac-holmes

Bio- https://gosycamores.com/sports/mens-...ac-holmes/7361

He did not play at all this season, so probably redshirted.


MVC player in the portal- the list now has at least 39 names-
Jace Carter- UIC
Jalen Jackson- UIC
Blaise Beauchamp- Evansville
Jonathan Dunn- Missouri State
Evan Brauns- Belmont
Dawson Carper- Missouri State
Kenny White, Jr.- Murray State
Cam Palesse - Valparaiso
Frank Jacubicek- Belmont
Michael Shanks- Belmont - transferring to Tennessee State
Antoine Smith- Evansville
Jonathan Mogbo- Missouri State
Joe Petrakis- Illinois State
E.J. Bellinger- Belmont - transferring to Tennessee State
Okay Djamgouz- Drake
Rienk Mast- Bradley
Alston Andrews- Illinois State
Bryceson Burns- Drake
Trey Hall- Evansville
Liam McChesney- Illinois State
Issa Samake- Drake
Ben Krikke- Valparaiso- Transferring to Iowa
Cameron Crawford- Indiana State
Zach Hobbs- Indiana State
James "Pop" Weathers- Bradley
Chris Moncrief- Evansville
Preston Phillips- Evansville
Zaveion Chism-- Evansville
Gabe Spinelli- Evansville
Matúš Malovec- Evansville
Dalton Banks- SIU
D.J. Burns- Murray State
Zek Montgomery- Bradley
Logan McIntire- Evansville
Marcus Domask- SIU - Transferring to Illinois
Rob Martin- Indiana State- transferring to SEMO
Lance Jones- SIU- transferring to Purdu
Jaxson Edwards- Murray State
Isaac Holmes- Indiana State
Max Nelson- Valparaiso
Preston Ruedinger- Valparaiso
Alex Kotov- Illinois State
Foster Wonders- SIU

[yoda]

Perry is exploring his NBA Draft options but did not hire an agent, so may yet return.

https://www.murrayledger.com/sports/murray_state/racer-perry-declares-for-nba-draft-does-maintain-college-eligibility/article_313f043c-cde2-11ed-b1e9-23deff74e099.html

[Stryker]

11 of the 16 players from the 2022-23 postseason All MVC 1st, 2nd, and 3rd teams are either out of eligibility or in the transfer portal. Only 5 are currently slated to return to the MVC-

https://twitter.com/WyattWheeler_NL/status/1641519166610866176

That's a pretty hard pill to swallow. MVC is going to get gutted annually until this stuff stops. Hopefully the 2nd transfer for a player will actually be much tougher and this environment is not the norm going forward long term.

Hopefully the MVC can reload with great players from smaller conferences.

[Da Coach]

11 of the 16 players from the 2022-23 postseason All MVC 1st, 2nd, and 3rd teams are either out of eligibility or in the transfer portal. Only 5 are currently slated to return to the MVC-

https://twitter.com/WyattWheeler_NL/status/1641519166610866176

[egib52]

The more players that transfer out of these Valley teams the better for us. Do a great job recruiting and we could still be at the top or the league. We have better pieces to start then most teams.

Only if we win the MVCT, if we don't a weaker conference hurts us.

[tomahawk chop]

The more players that transfer out of these Valley teams the better for us. Do a great job recruiting and we could still be at the top or the league. We have better pieces to start then most teams.

[Da Coach]

A couple other significant potential departures from Murray State-

Murray State's leading scorer this season, 6'4" junior guard Rob Perry, has announced he will enter the 2023 NBA Draft, while maintaining college eligibility.
https://www.murrayledger.com/sports/...eff74e099.html

This comes a few weeks after Murray State's Jamari Smith, a 6'8" junior forward who was their 2nd leading scorer, announced he will leave college and seek to play professionally-
https://www.wpsdlocal6.com/sports/mu...9f48debeb.html

With 6'7" junior center DJ Burns and 6'7" sophomore forward Kenny White in the transfer portal, these latest moves could result in the loss of 4 of their starting five, and result in a massive rebuild for the second year in a row for Murray State coach Steve Prohm.

[Stryker]

And there in lies the stupidity of it all....it's all relative. Dumber yet is that when we beat Drake, they were only a quad 2 team at the time, but by the time we lost to them in the tourney they were then considered a quad 1. LOL ITS THE SAME TEAM!!!

So stupid

I'm not talking about quad whatever wins. Pick whatever metric you want. Most people that have a problem with the "experts" point to total wins instead. Fine. Lets go with total wins. By that measure BU was pretty good with 25 this year.

However, the only teams BU beat with 20+ wins this season were ISUb, Belmont. Drake, and SIU. ISUb, Belmont, and SIU were clearly not great teams. Against Drake BU was 1-2, with both losses 20 pt blowouts, and the only win at home with a sellout crowd. The bottom 6 teams in the conference went 36-84 in conference play. The top half of the league just beat up crappy teams. Add an extra 2 games, and it wasn't hard for 5 teams to get to 20 wins overall. Didn't make them good though. The MVC went 1-3 in post season play, with the only win in the CBI. The entire MVC only got 2 wins over ranked opponents this year, and one of them, Drake vs MSU ended the season with MSU being unranked.

There is no metric that says the MVC was strong, or really that any of the teams in the MVC were strong. An argument could be made for Drake though I think. However, saying BU was a great team when they went 1-7 against opponents that were actually good, and all 7 losses were by double digits, is not an argument I would want to defend, ever.

All that said, I really enjoyed the season, I will always remember the MVC regular season championship, it was very memorable and I enjoyed it immensely.

[houstonbrave]

Not a transfer but a valley coaching staff change. Pat Monaghan leaves SIU to be an assistant at Green Bay.

[Da Coach]

Murray State's Jaxson Edwards is in the portal-

https://verbalcommits.com/players/jaxon-edwards

Edwards is a freshman who also had offers out of high school in Indianapolis from Illinois State, Drake, Evansville, Indiana State, among others.
He only played a few minutes in 11 games, and scored a total of 6 points this past season. 2 of those points came in Murray State's 83-48 loss at Bradley in which Edwards played 3 minutes.
Bio- https://goracers.com/sports/mens-bas...n-edwards/9349
Stats- https://www.espn.com/mens-college-ba.../jaxon-edwards

[Da Coach]

Marcus Domask-

https://verbalcommits.com/players/marcus-domask

Lance Jones rumored to be next.

SIU's Lance Jones has also placed his name in the transfer portal-

https://verbalcommits.com/players/lance-jones

MVC player in the portal-
Jace Carter- UIC
Jalen Jackson- UIC
Blaise Beauchamp- Evansville
Jonathan Dunn- Missouri State
Evan Brauns- Belmont
Dawson Carper- Missouri State
Kenny White, Jr.- Murray State
Cam Palesse - Valparaiso
Frank Jacubicek- Belmont
Michael Shanks- Belmont - transferring to Tennessee State
Antoine Smith- Evansville
Jonathan Mogbo- Missouri State
Joe Petrakis- Illinois State
E.J. Bellinger- Belmont - transferring to Tennessee State
Okay Djamgouz- Drake
Rienk Mast- Bradley
Alston Andrews- Illinois State
Bryceson Burns- Drake
Trey Hall- Evansville
Liam McChesney- Illinois State
Issa Samake- Drake
Ben Krikke- Valparaiso
Cameron Crawford- Indiana State
Zach Hobbs- Indiana State
James "Pop" Weathers- Bradley
Chris Moncrief- Evansville
Preston Phillips- Evansville
Zaveion Chism-- Evansville
Gabe Spinelli- Evansville
Matúš Malovec- Evansville
Dalton Banks- SIU
D.J. Burns- Murray State
Zek Montgomery- Bradley
Logan McIntire- Evansville
Marcus Domask- SIU
Rob Martin- Indiana State
Lance Jones- SIU
Jaxson Edwards- Murray State
Isaac Holmes- Indiana State

[BUfan14]

I agree, the bottom of the MVC really really hurt the conference this year. However, I completely disagree with your assessment on how weak the MVC was this year. Neither Drake or BU had a signature win all season, unless you count the games they played against each other. Maybe Drake with the MSU game. BU was 1-7 against good teams, with the sole win against Drake, and every one of the losses by double digits. The difference is that BU and Drake didn't win a post season game and the CUSA teams sure have. That is the difference, and enough for me to say the MVC was weak this year. Also note the good records by the top MVC teams was likely just due to the terrible rosters of the bottom MVC teams, along with the addition of 2 more conference games.

I agree with you. Bradley was a top 2 team in the conference, and we did really badly against anyone of significance outside the conference, and really badly against Drake 2 out of 3 times (the other top 2 team in conference). Not just sort of bad, but really bad. If a top two team in your conference isn't competitive against good teams (multiple times over), then that shows the conference isn't that good unfortunately. In no world were we good enough to be a tournament team this year. The system did not look poorly upon us, we just didn't step up in the big games (which Wardle indicated when asked about tournament consideration).