Iup basketball

[IUPbigINDIANS]

I'm not disputing anything you say here, but if Joe's cleaning house like this, does that not fall on him in some capacity? He brought in these guys he's (supposedly) booting from the program. If 50% of your roster transfers because you make them, that's not exactly a great look currently on your recruiting or evaluation skills. And if you need to do that to try to land a big fish, that's a really, really risky lifestyle you are living in today's NIL and portal era.

I'm not being hard or critical of Joe. Having a down year was bound to happen regardless simply given the experience they had on this most recent roster and how graduation was going to hit them. But I'm also growing rapidly tired of the young players who could be helping the program and growing simply getting cast off and ultimately transferring, whether by their own choice or not.

Bathea had a ton of hype coming in. Was that overblown some? Perhaps. But was he that bad that they needed to give up on him in just one year. He was the first guy off the bench against Syracuse for goodness sake. Polce could shoot it and was an aggressive defender, but he was nowhere to be found down the stretch. Is Kyle Polce as good as Mathis Keita? No. But I'm not sure why he's gotten so against "role players."

Joe was surrounded by great assistants for years. Last year not so much. Fudala was their star recruiter for five years. He's long gone. I don't think Joe's done much actual recruiting the past 8-10 years. He's doing it now.

Bethea will likely come back to haunt them. Polce won't be that hard to replace. He had potential but was hurt (or in Joe's dog house) far too frequently.

Joe has money and a lot connections. Those are two very important items.

The lack of news is causing most of the panic. His returning core is still pretty good. If Ethan is actually healthy that is a major boost.

[Ship69]

Like I said a couple weeks back, Joe didn't have a good year in the coaching box. I know his worshipers will say he was 32-2. He was. I also think you or I could have probably went in the 30-4 range coaching that lineup.

His refusal to use his bench past January ultimately just wore his starters down to nothing by the end. That team was dang lucky to get out of Round 1 (and probably shouldn't have). They got past Round 2 pretty easily because that was probably the one team in the Atlantic that somehow actually shot the ball worse than they did.

Ousmane Diop, Jaheim Bethea and Kyle Polce should have been in the rotation all season long. Even in limited roles, it would have helped keep people fresh while at the same time engaging them in the program and developing them.

Joe's won with very small rotations just about his whole career, but there was something different with this team. Most of Joe's teams have all gotten much better in February. This team got much, much worse as the season went along. The (mostly narrow) winning masked many of these issues to the outside world. If fact, you could tell who on this board actually watched every game because those were the people not all warm and fuzzy about what they were seeing night after night.

This group was nowhere near an elite team down the stretch. I could easily point out 6-7 games they could have -- or, should have -- lost. They found ways. I'll give them that. But, it's no secret this wasn't a strong PSAC this year. Let's keep in mind this 32-2 team had major struggles with hapless Gannon, was in a war with hapless Edinboro inside the KCAC, needed a miracle comeback to win at Clarion after getting blasted for 32 minutes, etc. The timing was good for this team. In a strong PSAC year, they'd have probably lost 7-8 games.

What happened in mid-January? We can only speculate. But, that's about when it started to become a one-man show. The crisp offense we've come so accustomed to seeing vanished -- and warped in to some hybrid version of AAU meets Playground. One could say that happened because they couldn't make any deep shots. But, they kept chucking all year, anyway. Night after night of 5 for 34 from outside. Two of the alleged best deep shooters on the team (Dillard and Stewart) were rarely given shots. It was the most predictable offense I've ever seen. They ran the same inbound plays game after game. They ran the same 'last shot before half' play at least 17 times this year. They were so easy to scout but nobody else in the PSAC had the power to match-up with them. But, of course, we saw what happened when a hungry, deep team finally got them.

Maybe there's a reason Joe cleaned house. Just sayin'

We can't really make any assumptions until we see who these next three players are going to be. Three good transfers and they may come out of this stronger. Three high school players and, well, it's a rebuild. I surely don't think he's going to waste Ethan's last year on a rebuild.

Good post. It was a funny year for the league as most teams seemed to have their ups and downs (as you said IUP had the talent to mask their downs until they ran into WL). Mercyhurst was fairly steady in the West, but their lack of size and depth caught up with them at regionals. UPJ and Slippery Rock matched up decently against some teams, not so much against others. East Stroud has a good season, but I think it's safe to say more was expected of them, certainly by those of us in the Eastern Division. For the second year in a row, Shippensburg was weirdly erratic. They dominated decent West Chester and Lock Haven teams, but were blown out by an East Stroud team that had losses to both West Chester and Lock Haven. They dropped their opening two games with CIAA teams in close fashion and three excruciatingly close loses to Fairmont State and Millersville (twice) kept them out of NCAA consideration. It was a good season for the Raiders, but for the second straight year it feels like it could have been better. Lack of experienced depth certainly hurt them. Millersville mugged its way to some wins, but definitely fell off from the previous season.

And now, with the portal, who can tell about this season. As you say, it might be a rebuild with high school players and for Ship that would be more of a rebuild than IUP this season. Chris Fite has mostly gone with high schoolers, and it's been great to watch the career arcs of guys such as the Sleva brothers, Carlos Carter, Jake Biss and others in recent years. But he'll probably have to pull something out of the transfer hat to be competitive this coming year. There's a lot more uncertainty for all of us PSAC watchers than there used to be.

[IUP24]

Like I said a couple weeks back, Joe didn't have a good year in the coaching box. I know his worshipers will say he was 32-2. He was. I also think you or I could have probably went in the 30-4 range coaching that lineup.

His refusal to use his bench past January ultimately just wore his starters down to nothing by the end. That team was dang lucky to get out of Round 1 (and probably shouldn't have). They got past Round 2 pretty easily because that was probably the one team in the Atlantic that somehow actually shot the ball worse than they did.

Ousmane Diop, Jaheim Bethea and Kyle Polce should have been in the rotation all season long. Even in limited roles, it would have helped keep people fresh while at the same time engaging them in the program and developing them.

Joe's won with very small rotations just about his whole career, but there was something different with this team. Most of Joe's teams have all gotten much better in February. This team got much, much worse as the season went along. The (mostly narrow) winning masked many of these issues to the outside world. If fact, you could tell who on this board actually watched every game because those were the people not all warm and fuzzy about what they were seeing night after night.

This group was nowhere near an elite team down the stretch. I could easily point out 6-7 games they could have -- or, should have -- lost. They found ways. I'll give them that. But, it's no secret this wasn't a strong PSAC this year. Let's keep in mind this 32-2 team had major struggles with hapless Gannon, was in a war with hapless Edinboro inside the KCAC, needed a miracle comeback to win at Clarion after getting blasted for 32 minutes, etc. The timing was good for this team. In a strong PSAC year, they'd have probably lost 7-8 games.

What happened in mid-January? We can only speculate. But, that's about when it started to become a one-man show. The crisp offense we've come so accustomed to seeing vanished -- and warped in to some hybrid version of AAU meets Playground. One could say that happened because they couldn't make any deep shots. But, they kept chucking all year, anyway. Night after night of 5 for 34 from outside. Two of the alleged best deep shooters on the team (Dillard and Stewart) were rarely given shots. It was the most predictable offense I've ever seen. They ran the same inbound plays game after game. They ran the same 'last shot before half' play at least 17 times this year. They were so easy to scout but nobody else in the PSAC had the power to match-up with them. But, of course, we saw what happened when a hungry, deep team finally got them.

Maybe there's a reason Joe cleaned house. Just sayin'

We can't really make any assumptions until we see who these next three players are going to be. Three good transfers and they may come out of this stronger. Three high school players and, well, it's a rebuild. I surely don't think he's going to waste Ethan's last year on a rebuild.

I'm not disputing anything you say here, but if Joe's cleaning house like this, does that not fall on him in some capacity? He brought in these guys he's (supposedly) booting from the program. If 50% of your roster transfers because you make them, that's not exactly a great look currently on your recruiting or evaluation skills. And if you need to do that to try to land a big fish, that's a really, really risky lifestyle you are living in today's NIL and portal era.

I'm not being hard or critical of Joe. Having a down year was bound to happen regardless simply given the experience they had on this most recent roster and how graduation was going to hit them. But I'm also growing rapidly tired of the young players who could be helping the program and growing simply getting cast off and ultimately transferring, whether by their own choice or not.

Bathea had a ton of hype coming in. Was that overblown some? Perhaps. But was he that bad that they needed to give up on him in just one year. He was the first guy off the bench against Syracuse for goodness sake. Polce could shoot it and was an aggressive defender, but he was nowhere to be found down the stretch. Is Kyle Polce as good as Mathis Keita? No. But I'm not sure why he's gotten so against "role players."

[IUPbigINDIANS]

Not necessarily a knock on Joe, but perhaps, should he be more willing to do things that would prevent total roster depletion? Meaning, that, maybe it's not a great idea to ship the Kyle Polce's of his roster to Siberia anymore. There was likely no keeping Tomiwa. And I understand that the others were down the line walk on types. That said, this team is better with Polce on it than without. If I'm to believe that "all these transfers are not the players just deciding to leave," then I'm also of the opinion that Joe has some to do with the predicament that he's in. You probably aren't reloading quickly via the portal or transfer route now the way you used to at this level.

This may be a tough lesson for Joe this offseason. Not saying you abandon your method entirely, but perhaps you tweak it some.

Like I said a couple weeks back, Joe didn't have a good year in the coaching box. I know his worshipers will say he was 32-2. He was. I also think you or I could have probably went in the 30-4 range coaching that lineup.

His refusal to use his bench past January ultimately just wore his starters down to nothing by the end. That team was dang lucky to get out of Round 1 (and probably shouldn't have). They got past Round 2 pretty easily because that was probably the one team in the Atlantic that somehow actually shot the ball worse than they did.

Ousmane Diop, Jaheim Bethea and Kyle Polce should have been in the rotation all season long. Even in limited roles, it would have helped keep people fresh while at the same time engaging them in the program and developing them.

Joe's won with very small rotations just about his whole career, but there was something different with this team. Most of Joe's teams have all gotten much better in February. This team got much, much worse as the season went along. The (mostly narrow) winning masked many of these issues to the outside world. If fact, you could tell who on this board actually watched every game because those were the people not all warm and fuzzy about what they were seeing night after night.

This group was nowhere near an elite team down the stretch. I could easily point out 6-7 games they could have -- or, should have -- lost. They found ways. I'll give them that. But, it's no secret this wasn't a strong PSAC this year. Let's keep in mind this 32-2 team had major struggles with hapless Gannon, was in a war with hapless Edinboro inside the KCAC, needed a miracle comeback to win at Clarion after getting blasted for 32 minutes, etc. The timing was good for this team. In a strong PSAC year, they'd have probably lost 7-8 games.

What happened in mid-January? We can only speculate. But, that's about when it started to become a one-man show. The crisp offense we've come so accustomed to seeing vanished -- and warped in to some hybrid version of AAU meets Playground. One could say that happened because they couldn't make any deep shots. But, they kept chucking all year, anyway. Night after night of 5 for 34 from outside. Two of the alleged best deep shooters on the team (Dillard and Stewart) were rarely given shots. It was the most predictable offense I've ever seen. They ran the same inbound plays game after game. They ran the same 'last shot before half' play at least 17 times this year. They were so easy to scout but nobody else in the PSAC had the power to match-up with them. But, of course, we saw what happened when a hungry, deep team finally got them.

Maybe there's a reason Joe cleaned house. Just sayin'

We can't really make any assumptions until we see who these next three players are going to be. Three good transfers and they may come out of this stronger. Three high school players and, well, it's a rebuild. I surely don't think he's going to waste Ethan's last year on a rebuild.

[IUP24]

It's really changed. These guys (like McGee) that are probably seen as fringe players to move up but huge D2-to-D2 targets ... are all finding homes up a level. When this all started a couple years ago it seemed like the vast majority of those moving up from D2 to D1 were post players. Now, we're losing a ton of guards, too.


I would say the 'panic button' is starting to go off inside the KCAC. Joe used to land transfer targets with relative ease. If the 'grapevine' is accurate this off-season, it sounds like he's batting about .100

Not necessarily a knock on Joe, but perhaps, should he be more willing to do things that would prevent total roster depletion? Meaning, that, maybe it's not a great idea to ship the Kyle Polce's of his roster to Siberia anymore. There was likely no keeping Tomiwa. And I understand that the others were down the line walk on types. That said, this team is better with Polce on it than without. If I'm to believe that "all these transfers are not the players just deciding to leave," then I'm also of the opinion that Joe has some to do with the predicament that he's in. You probably aren't reloading quickly via the portal or transfer route now the way you used to at this level.

This may be a tough lesson for Joe this offseason. Not saying you abandon your method entirely, but perhaps you tweak it some.

[IUPbigINDIANS]

Interesting. McGee really didn't have a breakout game against Ship last season — only six in the first meeting and 12 in the second. I'll be interested in seeing how he fares at a D1 program.

It's really changed. These guys (like McGee) that are probably seen as fringe players to move up but huge D2-to-D2 targets ... are all finding homes up a level. When this all started a couple years ago it seemed like the vast majority of those moving up from D2 to D1 were post players. Now, we're losing a ton of guards, too.


I would say the 'panic button' is starting to go off inside the KCAC. Joe used to land transfer targets with relative ease. If the 'grapevine' is accurate this off-season, it sounds like he's batting about .100

[Ship69]

Former West Chester guard Kyle McGee has signed with Sacred Heart (NEC).

He's the third IUP target to sign with a D1 program.

Interesting. McGee really didn't have a breakout game against Ship last season — only six in the first meeting and 12 in the second. I'll be interested in seeing how he fares at a D1 program.

[IUPalum]

Former West Chester guard Kyle McGee has signed with Sacred Heart (NEC).

He's the third IUP target to sign with a D1 program.

Guess he wanted to go play at a dump just to say he "played" D1.

[IUPbigINDIANS]

Former West Chester guard Kyle McGee has signed with Sacred Heart (NEC).

He's the third IUP target to sign with a D1 program.

[Ship69]

Hard to say. Joe has enough right now to be solid. A couple more pieces and he could be dangerous. It's going to be a lot of new faces, which obviously takes some time to gel.

If he goes the high school route, his reign is over. Cal will hammer them next year. If he adds 2-3 more ready-to-roll, Day 1 players, he may be able to match up with them.

Well, Ship has nobody near the status of a Porterfield returning. They're going to need a big leap forward from frosh and sophomore players such as Trey Martin, Denzel Figueroa, Andrew Recchia, Satchel Ball, and Ty Crespo, but their ability to be at all competitive will hinge on whether Chris Fite can bring in any experienced height. The tallest player returning from last season is 6-4.

[IUPbigINDIANS]

Although IUP might not be the team of last year, it's probably not an ideal year for a completely rebuilding Ship team to hit IUP as its first PSAC opponent.

Hard to say. Joe has enough right now to be solid. A couple more pieces and he could be dangerous. It's going to be a lot of new faces, which obviously takes some time to gel.

If he goes the high school route, his reign is over. Cal will hammer them next year. If he adds 2-3 more ready-to-roll, Day 1 players, he may be able to match up with them.

[Ship69]

2023-24 crossover schedule:


@ Shippensburg 12-1 (Friday)
@ Lock Haven 12-2 (Saturday)

Mansfield 12-18
Bloomsburg 12-19

@ East Stroudsburg 12-30 (never a good time to go there but Dec. 30 is a whole lot better than when students are on campus)

Shepherd 1-3



Non-conference: Walsh will visit the KCAC in November. That's the only confirmed game I'm aware of at this point.

This would probably be the year to schedule a couple cupcakes to kick off the season.

Taking another look at that schedule, Ship, Lock Haven, Mansfield and Bloom all have taken very significant hits due to graduation or the portal. East Stroud might be your only challenging game in December, depending on whether the aforementioned four schools can come up with something significant in the transfer portal.

[boatcapt]

They better. About half his upcoming roster isn't signed yet.

If you are stocking your team with portal players vice HS'ers, isn't that more an attempt to reload vs rebuild? Portal players should come in ready to rock and roll from day one...just point them at the court and FIRE!!

[IUPbigINDIANS]

I've been told Joe don't schedule cupcakes! How will they be prepared for a deep tourney run if they schedule cupcakes in November??

They better. About half his upcoming roster isn't signed yet.

[boatcapt]

2023-24 crossover schedule:


@ Shippensburg 12-1 (Friday)
@ Lock Haven 12-2 (Saturday)

Mansfield 12-18
Bloomsburg 12-19

@ East Stroudsburg 12-30 (never a good time to go there but Dec. 30 is a whole lot better than when students are on campus)

Shepherd 1-3



Non-conference: Walsh will visit the KCAC in November. That's the only confirmed game I'm aware of at this point.

This would probably be the year to schedule a couple cupcakes to kick off the season.

I've been told Joe don't schedule cupcakes! How will they be prepared for a deep tourney run if they schedule cupcakes in November??