The Hoops HD Report: Examining New Transfer Rules

Posted on September 27, 2022 by David Griggs

A full Hoops HD panel examines the new transfer rules, particularly the new transfer portal, and the new rules proposals that could potentially allow a player to transfer an unlimited amount of times without having to sit out a year, and the idea that a transfer player would have to be guaranteed a scholarship and a roster spot by the school they were transferring in to.  We also discuss how many players transferred after last season, and how so many of them ended up with no D1 or D2 offers.

And for all you radio lovers, below is an audio only version of the show…

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Season preview: HoopsHD interviews Lipscomb women’s assistant coach Sydney Shelton

Posted on September 27, 2022 by Jon Teitel

We are still a couple of months away from the tip-off of the college basketball season this fall, which means that we have plenty of time to start preparing for the action ahead. We will do so via a series of season previews featuring the best players/coaches in the country. HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel continues our coverage with Lipscomb women’s assistant coach Sydney Shelton, who talked about her team’s young roster and her expectations for this season.

You began your college career at Butler, where you were named to the 2017 Big East All-Freshman Team: how were you able to come in and contribute right from the start? I knew that it would be hard as a freshman and that I would have to work really hard and do what they needed me to do. I was not trying to make the all-freshman team: it just goes into your level of buy-in.

You were the best freshman 3-PT shooter in the conference that year with 49 3PM: what is the secret to making shots from behind the arc? Confidence and practice.

You only played 11 games the following season: what made you decide to transfer, and why did you choose Lipscomb? I was not in a good mental place during my sophomore year. I was diagnosed with anxiety/depression and had an eating disorder so I had to step away from the game for a little bit. I was idolizing the game but knew that I needed something different. I wanted to be in a Christian environment and I had some friends who went to Lipscomb: it was the best decision that I could have made.

In 2019 doctors found that you had a fracture in your femur and a torn labrum in your left hip: how close did that come to ending your career, and how were you able to get back onto the court? It honestly should have ended my career and my doctor said that I should never run again. I healed pretty well…and then hurt my other hip! I did lots of rehab and was honest with myself about helping myself so I watched a lot of film and managed my time on the court.

You played for Coach Lauren Sumski and were hired to be 1 of her assistants last June: why did you take the job, and what is it like to have a head coach who is married to 1 of your fellow assistants? It has been incredible and I would not want to work anywhere else. You get a lot of basketball but you also get a family environment. Lauren and her husband Chris have an awesome dynamic: they do a phenomenal job of working together but they can also separate basketball from their relationship. They know that basketball is not the most important thing in life: they are special people.

You were a 2-time member of the ASUN All-Academic Team: how did you balance your work on the court with your work in the classroom? I have always had good study habits so I blocked off time and planned my day hour-by-hour.

You graduated in 2020 as a psychology major: how much does your degree come in handy as a coach? Every single day! You need to know how to work with/connect with people so it is the foundation of everything in coaching.

You have a lot of young players this year with a roster featuring just 1 senior/2 juniors: does your coaching style change based on the experience on your team (or lack thereof)? No: we treat it all the same. The girls who are young are so far ahead of where we thought they would be: they love the game and are extremely coachable. They are very fast learners so we will continue to challenge them because we know what they are capable of.

You only have 4 players from Tennessee: what sort of recruiting philosophy do you and the rest of the coaching staff have? We have tended to get players from specific states. In the past it has been harder to get girls from Tennessee because there are a lot of other good schools around here, but now that we are doing better there are more girls who want to be a part of that. We are able to extend our reach beyond the usual states and get players from Florida/Spain/etc.

What are your goals for this season, and what are your expectations for this season? Our mission is to glorify God 1 workout/practice/game at a time. We try to do everything with excellence/high character. Our other goal is to maximize our potential and be the best that we can be. We want to be ASUN champs and get to the NCAA tourney and go on a run and make it as far as we can, which is always the goal.

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Happy Birthday!: HoopsHD interviews Western Michigan legend David Kool

Posted on September 23, 2022 by Jon Teitel

David Kool finished his high school career in 2006 as Mr. Basketball of Michigan, then arrived at Western Michigan and became Mr. Everything. In 2007 he finished 5th in the nation with 91.7 FT% and was named MAC ROY, in 2008 he was named to the All-MAC 1st-Team, and in 2010 he graduated as the leading scorer in school history with 2122 PTS. HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel got to chat with David about being a great FT shooter and a great student. Today is David’s 35th birthday so let us be the 1st to wish him a happy 1!

In addition to basketball you played soccer/track/football in high school: which sport did you like the most, and when did you first realize that your future was in basketball? My favorite sport other than basketball was soccer. I realized that my future was in basketball when I was a sophomore in high school. I got some advice from a person I trusted that if I wanted to play D-1 basketball then I would have to give up my other sports. Basketball at the D-1 level was always my dream so it was an easy decision.

Many big-time colleges passed on you after you tore your ACL prior to your senior year, even though you became your high school’s all-time leading scorer and were named Michigan’s Mr. Basketball in 2006: what school was highest on your wish list, and why did you choose Western Michigan? If I had not torn my ACL then I would have ended up at Michigan State. I was in close contact with them throughout high school and it would have been a dream come true to play for their program. I chose WMU because they always stayed with me even after my ACL tear: that made me feel really good. They said they would take me anyway and did not care about my injury and I really appreciated that. Also, it was close to home so my family could come and watch all my games, which was very important to me.

After sitting out the start of your college career due to a hamstring injury, you ended up scoring 11.4 PPG and being named MAC ROY: how were you able to bounce back from the injury, and how were you able to come in and contribute as a freshman? Hard work and perseverance is how I live my life. I have been blessed with many gifts and I could not succeed without my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I always lean on Him when I get into trouble and need help (which is every day), so I just put my faith in Him, as I did with my ACL. I had faith that I would come back strong as long as I worked hard.

You finished your freshman year 5th in the nation with 91.7 FT%, which also set a conference single-season record: what is your secret for making FTs? My secret for FT shooting is being confident and consistent and just practicing. I shot close to 100 FTs everyday and always kept the same motion/rhythm. I always made them so I was confident. When getting into games it is important to rely on muscle memory and know that you will make every shot because you have practiced like that.

You ended your college career with a career-high 39 PTS/12-21 FG in a loss to Akron in the 2010 conference tourney semifinals: was it just 1 of those scenarios where every shot you put up seemed to go in because you were “in the zone”, and what was it like to play your best game in your last game? The Akron game is unforgettable. I remember hitting my 1st shot from the corner and after that it was like I was out there by myself: I literally could not see anything else on the court besides the bucket. I was in a rhythm that had never happened since high school and I thought that every shot was going in. The basket was enormous and I was “in the zone”. Playing my best game in my last game was great because I went out with no regrets and gave it my all. I could not have done anything different, which makes me feel so good inside!

In 2010 you were named conference POY/All-American: what did it mean to you to win such outstanding honors? It just goes to show that all of my hard work and all of those hours in the gym paid off. It made me feel as though all of my decisions dating back to high school and everything I have done in my life has paid off. It feels great to be rewarded after working so hard.

You remain the all-time leading scorer in school history: did you realize at the time how prolific a player you were? I think I will realize more of what it means when I am older. It was kind of surreal back then and remained that way for a long time. After I stopped playing I had time to think about what happened at WMU and realized how special it really was and what it all meant. I know that WMU is such a special place with people who love the basketball program: they will always have a soft spot in my heart. I could not have ever imagined a better career than the one I had.

You were a 3-time Academic All-MAC performer: how did you balance your work on the court with your work in the classroom? The academic honors are just as important to me (if not more important) because that was my future. I was going to play basketball for a little longer, but after I was done I was going to fall back on my education/degree from WMU. That is my bread maker so academics were always #1 in my life. Basketball was great, but I was at WMU to receive a quality education and set myself up for success in the real world…and that is what happened.

You participated in the 2010 Portsmouth Invitational, where you only had 1 turnover in 3 games: what did you think about your performance, and which player impressed you the most? Portsmouth was really interesting: I did not know what to really expect from it. It was basically an open gym where players were very, very selfish and tried to do things that they simply could not do. I went in with the attitude to just play my game and control what I could control and I did that. My goal was to have 1 NBA team/scout/GM watch me and say that they wanted to give me a shot to make their team in training camp. I continued to work hard and hoped that I impressed at least 1 team. I wish I would have shot the ball better but I did everything else well: I played good defense, talked on the floor, got rebounds, and took care of the ball. I was most impressed with Jerome Randle from California: it was amazing to me how easy it was for him to get into the lane and score over bigger defenders even though he is so small. He is a great competitor who is extremely talented.

How do you want people to remember you the most, and what do you hope to do in the future? I want people to remember that I played the game of basketball the right way and worked as hard as I possibly could to win every single game. I was a fierce competitor on the court and did everything it took to win, but off the court I was a kind/caring person who tried to help everyone that I knew.

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Independent Media Day Recap and Response

Posted on September 23, 2022 by David Griggs

CLICK HERE for All of Hoops HD’s Continued and Extensive Preseason Content

Okay, there was no Media Day for the two independent teams, but I did not know what else to title this.

COMMENTS FROM DAVID

-Hartford is in year 3 of reclassifying as a D3 school.  They are still technically D1…but only technically.  They were a rather sub-par 12-20 last year (although they were a respectable 9-9 in America East play), and nearly every player who saw regular minutes is now gone.  This has been a rather unfortunate story.  It was only two years ago that we saw Hartford make the NCAA Tournament.  The decision for them to transition down to D3 is questionable at best, unbelievably stupid at worst, and if you follow them on Twitter is not a decision that has been widely accepted by those who support the program.

-Chicago State will also be an Independent this year after playing in the WAC and finishing in last place for about the last nine or ten years.  It has been a while since Chicago State was considered to not be one of the ten worst programs in all of D1.  Their 30-game schedule this year has them playing just eight games at home, and only four of those are against other D1 opponents.  They did win seven games a year ago, which was a seven game improvement from what they had done the previous year (to be fair, the previous year was the COVID year where they only played nine games and cancelled all the rest)!!  They have a lot of new transfers, many of whom saw limited minutes at other D1 programs.  The optimistic way to put this is to say that it is a roster of guys who will have the opportunity to see more minutes than what they did at their previous programs and become contributing players!

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Season preview: HoopsHD interviews Columbia women’s coach Megan Griffith

Posted on September 22, 2022 by Jon Teitel

We are still a couple of months away from the tip-off of the college basketball season this fall, which means that we have plenty of time to start preparing for the action ahead. We will do so via a series of season previews featuring the best players/coaches in the country. HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel continues our coverage with Columbia women’s coach Megan Griffith, who talked about breaking the school record for most wins in a season last year and her expectations for this season.

You were a 3-time captain/2-time All-Ivy player at Columbia: what is the key to being a good leader? I believe in consistency and an unwavering confidence in yourself. I learned it from experience but have also been around some great leaders. You need to be even-keel without getting too high or too low.

You graduated with a degree in economics and then played pro basketball for 3 years in Europe: what is the biggest difference between basketball in the US vs. basketball overseas? The 1 thing I learned is that the game is much faster overseas, due mostly to using a 24-second shot clock. Europeans also move differently, such as the patented “Euro-step” that goes east-to-west rather than north-to-south. There is also less isolation/high ball-screens overseas: they are tactically sound.

In 2015 as an assistant to Coach Courtney Banghart at Princeton you finished the regular season 30-0 before eventually losing to Maryland in the NCAA tourney: how was your team able to stay focused for the entire season, and what was it like to have President Obama in the stands during the tourney to support his niece (Tigers forward Leslie Robinson)? That was a special season. When we beat Wake Forest in Cancun over Thanksgiving in a convincing fashion the assistants looked at each other and felt it was going to be a good season. We had mature players who had been in our system for a while and a strong leader in Blake Dietrick. We had a special group that followed our leader and trusted the system. Leslie is such an amazing human being. We had a chance to meet Barack/Michelle Obama when we played at American before heading to Cancun: I think they sold out the arena that day! He is just another person looking to support his family…but it was amazing.

You were hired as head coach at your alma mater in 2016: why did you take the job? It was a chance to come back home and be a head coach. I like to defy the odds and be the 1st to do things so I had a lot of motivation. I also like building things: I was talented but was not the very best player so I learned the importance of everyone rowing the boat in the same direction.

In January of 2017 you got your 1st Ivy League win by 3 PTS in quadruple-OT at Dartmouth (tied for the longest game in Ivy women’s history): I am sure that the players were exhausted, but how was your own blood pressure doing by the end of the night?! That was a very long night…but we sure earned it! What made it even more special was turning around the next day and taking Harvard to the wire. It was neat to see us come together and try to accomplish a hard task. Even though we lost it showed the potential of what can happen if you have the right people around you.

After getting the 1st WNIT bid in school history last March you overcame a 17-PT deficit to beat BC and set a record for the largest comeback win in school history: how on earth did you do it?! A lot of people would say it was great coaching but all of the credit goes to the players for handling the adversity. That is when they really learned how to adjust during a game. We were a great 3-PT shooting team…but went 0-21 that night, so we totally flipped and made it about defense. We had total buy-in to our game plan and also some nice heroics by some of our returning players.

You finished the season with 25 wins (shattering the school record for most wins in a season, which had been 21): can you keep the momentum rolling this year or is every season so unique that you have already moved on? I think it is a little bit of both: you have to remember in order to progress. We want to build on that but we have a lot of seniors so we can take it on as a new opportunity. We were right there and could have qualified for the NCAA tourney, but now we know what it takes. To have the target on your back is valuable: you need to take those lessons when trying to win a title.

At the Women’s Final 4 in Minneapolis you were named the Asian Coaches Association Women’s Basketball COY (presented by CBB Analytics): how crucial are analytics to your success, and do you have a favorite metric? Analytics have been a huge part of our success. We have found a way to drill down: our Director of Video & Analytics (Kyle Hutson) has been phenomenal. We have invested in software and looked at various websites. It helps our shot-selection by rating shot-quality but the 1 thing we hone in on is net rating: as long as we are in the green for efficiency that is a good thing. We have become more efficient on offense and our defense is finally getting out of the red. There are always better ways to do things if you are more sound. It has really helped us shave off some of the time needed to get to this point.

You have had 3 straight players be named All-Met Women’s D-1 ROY (Sienna Durr in 2019/Abbey Hsu in 2020/Ivy season canceled in 2021/Kitty Henderson in 2022): how were they all able to come in and contribute right from the start? I want to credit my staff here: recruiting is so important and we are always thinking about the future. Just having the same message and being able to go out and find the right people for our program is important. When they arrive they start to get game experience, which is what helps make you a great player. They are all coachable and have a great work ethic.

What are your goals for this season, and what are your expectations for this season? Our largest goal is to continue on this championship mission. The by-product is winning championships/going to the NCAA tourney, but I strongly believe in being a response-driven team. We will not take shortcuts because every day matters. It is critical to hold ourselves accountable to our high standard so we just need to take care of the little things along the way.

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Season preview: HoopsHD interviews Auburn coach Bruce Pearl

Posted on September 21, 2022 by Jon Teitel

CLICK HERE for All of Hoops HD’s Continued and Extensive Preseason Content

We are still a couple of months away from the tip-off of the college basketball season this fall, which means that we have plenty of time to start preparing for the action ahead. We will do so via a series of season previews featuring the best players/coaches in the country. HoopsHD’s Jon Teitel continues our coverage with Auburn coach Bruce Pearl, who talked about his team’s trip to Israel last month and his expectations for this season.

You spent about 15 years as a student-manager/assistant coach for Tom Davis at BC/Stanford/Iowa: what made him such a great coach, and what was the most important thing that you ever learned from him? He had a real system of how to play/coach the game. It was 94 feet: he believed in full-court pressure defense. He was very committed to up-tempo basketball so we made our opponents get back in transition. He taught me how to be patient and told me to be myself (so that I would always be authentic) and recommended that the foundation of my head coaching experience come from him (because I knew it and then could tweak it to make it my own, which I did).

In the 1995 D-2 title game as head coach at Southern Indiana you had an 8-PT win over UC Riverside: what did it mean to you to win a title, and did you ever think you would see the day that the Screaming Eagles would become a D-1 program? I thought/hoped that I could be a successful head coach after working for Tom at several different schools. I was unsure if I could do it but we had success right away at Southern Indiana and won a title during my 3rd year there. They LOVE their basketball in Indiana and I am very excited for “Superman” Stan Gouard to lead them into D-1. The campus/school/community are all ready for it.

In the 2019 NCAA tourney as coach at Auburn you became the 2nd team ever to defeat the 3 winningest programs in college basketball history (Kansas/North Carolina/Kentucky) in the same season: how did you do it?! We are the only team to beat them 3 in a row: Arizona beat them all in the 1997 NCAA tourney but not in a row. It was not just those 3 schools, it was Bill Self/Roy Williams/John Calipari: talk about a mismatch! We were a more talented team and played like it. I believe we averaged about 12 3PM in those games thanks to shooting the ball extremely well. I also had great guard play, which I think translates into championships. We had to beat UNC at their own game because nobody is better at fast-breaking than they are. They say it is hard to beat a team 3 times and Kentucky had swept us during the regular season with several future pros including Keldon Johnson/Tyler Herro/PJ Washington. Chuma Okeke was hurt but our guards outplayed their guards, as Jared Harper/Bryce Brown combined for 50 PTS. We respected them but were not afraid of them even though we were the “Cinderella” team who was playing with house money.

Last year you finished the regular season with 27 wins and just 4 losses away from home by a combined 16 PTS en route to being named 2022 SEC COY: do you feel like you are a better coach now than ever before, and if so is it based on wins/losses or some other factor? I would base it on championships/consistency/graduation. The reality is that I have had great players/coaches/staff. We have had tremendous player development, particularly at the big guard position.

You have won more than 600 games despite being 1 of the few D-1 basketball coaches who never played high school basketball: do you think that more guys who were not high school players should be given a chance to coach since you have proven that it is not a prerequisite for success? I would have played in high school had it not been for a career-ending injury as a freshman. I was around the game my whole life so you have to be in it to win it. I stayed in it by being a manager/assistant coach: God just had a different plan for me.

You had 2 players selected in the 1st round of the NBA Draft last June (Jabari Smith/Walker Kessler): how will you try to replace all of that talent? You cannot replace a pair of guys who were drafted #3 and #22…but that being said, the 2 big men we added (freshman Yohan Traore/Morehead State transfer Johni Broome) will play a lot for us this year and both have the potential to play professionally. The question is how good our other newcomers are and how much our returning players have improved. I think we will be picked around 5th in our league, which should put us in the top-25 nationally. We were picked 5th in our league last year…and ended up winning an SEC title. I love our depth, but the cream will need to rise to the top.

In August your team played 3 exhibition games in Israel: what was the best part of the trip for you either on or off the court? The best part was getting 5-6 of our players baptized in the Jordan River. The 2nd best part was for our players to see what a beautiful country Israel is. The fact that they got to see their Judeo-Christian roots was very special.

The SEC is 1 of the toughest conferences in the nation and you also have USC/Washington/West Virginia on your non-conference schedule: what is your philosophy when it comes to scheduling? Our players deserve to play against the best: there is no better message you can send them than showing that you believe in them. Our fans also deserve to see great players/coaches in Auburn Arena. This is the toughest non-conference schedule that I have ever had: we also have a tough tourney in Cancun in November. We will have 2 games against each of Alabama/Tennessee/Texas A&M: I think they will all finish in the top-7 of our league.

What are your goals for this season, and what are your expectations for this season? Over the past 5 years we have won more games than anyone else in the SEC. I would like to be able to say that after 6 years…but it will take some doing.

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