Just saw announcement that UR Football will be moving to the Patriot League. While I understand that our football program is lower tier, but I would argue a good program on that level - the reasons given by our administration on the move COULD possibly raise some concern in the coming years as the college athletic landscape changes. Here are some of the reasons directly from our AD.

Academically, the schools of the Patriot League are among the top institutions in the country and share Richmond’s commitment to academic excellence.
The past few years have been marked by significant change in the college football landscape
Geographically, many of our alumni live in close proximity to Patriot League schools, and this will provide more opportunities for our fans to support Spider Football.

We all know big time college football landscape has changed dramatically, not sure how much effect that has had on FCS level, but it appears to have trickled down enough that UR wants to leave the CAA. My concern is that we all expect this landscape change, along with NIL to have an impact on basketball as well - and does that trickle down to hoops, which in turn would then include all other sports. From an academic standpoint, as they stated - we are probably more closely aligned with the Patriot League than any other conference. So does this move in football, give UR a leg into the conference for POTENTIAL movement in the future with other sports - IF and WHEN the basketball landscape begins to spiral just as much as the football?

Should this concern any basketball fans that this doesn't look good for the future of athletics at UR?

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it's Championship November!...since the 2021 season Richmond is 9-1 counting Playoff games in November...it sure seems like we own it!

The Homecoming game versus Towson will be the biggest game of the season until next week's game!

at 4-0 in the CAA the Spiders control their Championship destiny, but each week the games will get tougher as the bullseye on UR's back get bigger each game...we'll likely get every opponent's best game...Towson could be quite a challenge, they play physical, have a group of very strong QB, RBs and WRs who can make trouble for the Spiders...

but the Spiders offense appears to have finally arrived and the strong defensive effort has been consistent...the players featured this week in media sessions seem focused, confident and aware of the challenges Towson presents.

after all the work it's taken to recover from the 0-2 start I don't see the Spiders stumbling now...

enjoy the Prologue and the Homecoming celebration!

Go Spiders

Great writeup on Richmond's fall tournament against Loyola and Marquette.

I know a couple of these things were brought up in the game thread, but I know this is monitored by UR athletics, so thought it is own thread would bring a bit more attention to those issues.

1. Video scoreboards: Didn't work half the night, when they did the stats were wrong. This is an ongoing issue for as much as was paid for them, you would think they would work consistently and not be blank for significant sections of the game.
2: Sound: The sound was really bad/garbled from where I sat. You could barely hear the in game announcer, not sure if he needs to turn his mic up but he adds a significant element of excitement after made baskets and/or clarifications on fouls and what is going on during the game and you could barely hear him.
3. Timeout media personality: I know this has been discussed but you literally can not hear 75% of what she says and a number of folks commented around me that when she does talk the pitch is almost akin to fingernails on a chalk board. I don't know what can be done about this, maybe you close caption when she talks so the crowd can understand what she is saying, tune her mic differently. Or maybe get a new person. I'm sure she is great person but her job is literally to communicate to the crowd and if you can't understand her, well I would say that is a problem.

All in all, I left thinking that they literally turned the lights on a couple hours before game time and had not tested any of the technology/sound prior. Please fix this, it detracts significantly from the fan experience and frankly the crowd's ability to support the team.

Interested to see what people expect from OOC schedule this year given recent scrimmage information and expectations. I think Board is in agreement this is not an overly difficult schedule by any means, but that is why they play the games.

I know, with the losses and roster turnover - we have a ton of X factors. However - I feel like we have decent amount of "knowns". Am expecting between Walz' steady improvement year to year, and Beagle's solid numbers last two years the "5" position is in really goo shape. Hunt, feel good about him. Tyne - at minimum will be a solid contributor on D and expecting improvement on offensive side. If healthy we know what Roche can do. B.Artis when healthy is proven commodity IMO. Even GW3 - I think he is going to be a good contributor shooting the ball, and hopefully other areas. Dusan is a proven commodity on offensive side.

My X factors as to whether the 7 to 8 spot or lower predictions come through, or we compete at the very top of the A10 again are like this:

Robinson / Soulis - Group these guys together because I feel like both are really high potential guys, that bring something unique to the lineup.
Soulis. As we know, was very high on Soulis last year, but he was not healthy. Slow start this pre-season due to health again, but no need to rush. I think when healthy, he brings a really intriguing blend of size (looks huge in team picture), athleticism, and skill (based on his HS tape). Would love to see him be 100% healthy and be so good that he gets big minutes - but if he can be a 5-10 minute contributor at some point, think he brings some unique attributes into the game - also think he could be an impactful shot blocker possibly.
Jaylen - Strong, super athletic. With the losses of Bigs, Dji, and Harris - we lose a lot of athleticism, toughness, rebounding and D. Jaylen looks like a guy that may be able to fill that role from day 1. Based on HS tape, he looks like a Kevin Smith, D Garrett, Burton type of athlete, and that can translate immediately on boards, defense, if not right away on O.

Glou - Probably the guy on the roster hardest to wrap my head around. Hardly any tape from him in Greece. Not much PT at Uconn so hard to say there. Have to assume if they recruited him he was a top 100 type talent. If that guy can show up and has the skillset at the 3 - think it makes us really really solid.
Tanner - If not Glou, could really use Tanner to be a 3 and D guy. Good reports out of camp it seems. I want to see toughness in that Harris/Bigs mode in addition to shot making. Just need one guy to step up and be a + contributor on the wing.
Graham - crowded back court, but if Roche is not healthy - could see Graham stepping into a zone buster role at times. Looked a step slow last season, but reports seem to indicate he has found his D1 sea legs. Great NEPSAC season as senior. 4 for two guy

2024

Signees (7 spots available)

- Jaylen Robinson (SF: Providence School, Jacksonville, FL)
- Bryson McGlothin (SG: John Paul II HS, Plano, TX)

Transfers
- Jonathan Beagle (PF: Albany, 2 years remaining)
- Dusan Neskovic (SF: Dartmouth, grad with 1 year remaining)
- George Washington III (CG: Michigan, 3 years remaining)
- Apostolos Roumoglou (SG: UConn, 2 years remaining)
- B. Artis White (PG: Western Michigan, grad with 1 year remaining)

Walk-ons
- Kirby Mooney (CG: William Tennent HS, Southampton, PA)
- Jack D'Entremont (F: Washington & Lee, grad with 1 year remaining)

Offers
- Jayden "Juke" Harris (SG: Salisbury HS, Salisbury, NC) - Wake
- Thomas Sorber (PF: Archbishop Ryan, Trenton, NJ) - Georgetown
- Jakel Powell (SG: Raleigh Christian, Raleigh, NC) - Florida Atlantic
- Ty Davis (PG: Mountain Brook HS, Birmingham, AL) - Creighton
- Ryan Mela (SF: Newman School, Natick, MA) - Providence
- Colin White (PG/SG: Ottawa-Glandorf HS, Ottawa, OH) - Ohio State
- K.J. Windham (PG: Ben Davis HS, Indianapolis, IN) - Northwestern
- Kayde Dotson (PG/SG: Beaumont United HS, Beaumont, TX) - New Mexico
- Austin Swartz (SG: Cannon School, Concord, NC) - Miami
- Isaiah Johnson-Arigu (SF: Totino-Grace HS, Fridley, MN) - Miami
- Jamie Phillips Jr. (PG/SG: Winter Haven HS, Winter Haven, FL) - Stetson
- Caleb Harrison (PF: Huntsville HS, Huntsville, AL) - Samford
- Nick Coval (PG: Parkland HS, Allentown, PA) - Davidson
- Trent Noah (SG: Harlan County HS, Baxter, KY) - South Carolina
- Ebrahim Kaba (SF: Peddie School, East Orange, NJ) - St. Bonaventure
- Caden Diggs (SG/SF: Bullis School, Waldorf, MD) - Old Dominion
- Max Green (PG: Oldham County HS, La Grange, KY) - Holy Cross
- Jovan Milicevic (SF/PF: Dream City Christian, Toronto, ON) - New Mexico
- Jack Daugherty (SF: Brookfield Central HS, Brookfield, WI) - Illinois State
- Adrian Wooley (SG: Bryant HS, Cottondale, AL) - Kennesaw State
- Lewis Walker (SF: Winston-Salem Christian, Winston-Salem, NC) - UMass
- Brandon Jennings (PG: St. Christopher's, Richmond, VA) - VCU
- Mason Ritter (PF: Bowling Green HS, Bowling Green, KY) - Columbia
- My'Kel Jenkins (SG/SF: Woodside HS, Tarboro, NC) - Norfolk State

2025

Signees (4 spots available)
- William Harper (SG: Gonzaga College HS, Bowie, MD)
- Donovan Richardson (PG: Steward School, Richmond, VA)
- Aiden Argabright (PG: John Marshall HS, Alexandria, VA)

Offers
- Colt Langdon (SF/PF: Millbrook HS, Raleigh, NC) - Butler
- Silas Barksdale (PF: Woodside HS, Newport News, VA) - VCU
- Omari Witherspoon (SG: St. John's College HS, Washington, DC) - Pittsburgh
- Tre Singleton (PF/C: Jeffersonville HS, Jeffersonville, IN) - Northwestern
- Vincent Chaudhri (SF: Northfield Mount Hermon HS, Wallkill, NY) - George Washington
- Tyler Kropp (SF/PF: Olentangy Liberty HS, Powell, OH) - Northwestern
- Eric Chatfield, Jr. (PG: Pace Academy, Atlanta, GA) - Georgia Tech
- Jaylen Cross (SG: Caldwell Academy, Greensboro, NC) - Charlotte

ARCHIVES

Looks like much better results this time + a breakout performance from the GLOU! Spider23 will be hyped.

Seems like this team is going to really shoot it.

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I am disgusted by Biden's open borders policies. We must never forget those whose lives have been taken, because of harm caused them by Bidens immigration disaster.

Jocelyn Nungaray’s murder in north Houston, Texas on June 12, 2024. She was found strangled to death in a creek. Her killers were criminals from Venezuela. One crossed into Texas on May 28, 2024, the other in March 2024. Both were released into this country at El Paso, Texas.

I don't know if we need a new thread or not, but they don't cost anything so here we are.

I mentioned in the Gilly NBA thread that he's on the Grizz Summer League roster, and now Grant is officially on the Nuggets' Summer League roster.


The Grizz are in the Salt Lake summer league event, playing a round robin July 3–6 against OKC, Philly, and Utah. They'll then head to Vegas for the main Summer League July 7–17. The Nuggets aren't playing in an early event and will instead hold their own mini-camp before heading to Vegas.

In Vegas, each team plays four games, with the top 4 then playing semis and a final for the championship. The other 26 teams will get matched up to give them all a fifth game.

Who is the greatest band? I’m in the “Who” crowd.

Seeing scrimmage stats rolling in got me thinking about what is the best realistic shooting team we might see together at times this year, possibly for extended stretches? Realistic in the sense that we know that Hunt will play 30+ minutes, and that we’re not going to play AP at the 5 etc.

Can we play AP, Tanner and Roche together, or will we get smoked defensively?

I also wonder how the injury to B. Artis might affect rotations since others are getting opportunities right now.

We are beginning to see the initial outlines of the Harris Doctrine- turning this country into Venezuela. Instead of fixing the root causes of inflation, government policy, Harris wants to fix prices by attacking price gouging.

Catherine Randall in the Washington Post writes...

“Price gouging” is the focus of Vice President Kamala Harris’s economic agenda, her presidential campaign says. She’ll crack down on “excessive prices” and “excessive corporate profits,” particularly for groceries.
So what level counts as “excessive,” you might ask? TBD, but Harris will ban it.

It’s hard to exaggerate how bad this policy is. It is, in all but name, a sweeping set of government-enforced price controls across every industry, not only food. Supply and demand would no longer determine prices or profit levels. Far-off Washington bureaucrats would. The FTC would be able to tell, say, a Kroger in Ohio the acceptable price it can charge for milk.

At best, this would lead to shortages, black markets and hoarding, among other distortions seen previous times countries tried to limit price growth by fiat."

Adrian Wojnarowski retiring from ESPN to become the GM of Bona basketball, his alma mater.

Login to view embedded media good stuff. we start at 24:10

Go to MEDIA
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FBS transfers:



TRANSFER WINDOWS
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It is that time of year. We get to consider what a train wreck William and Mary football can become. They lost today to a Billy Cosh coached Stony Brook Seawolves.

Here are my favorite comments on the Waste Management message board:

Sure, we will all root that we make the playoffs....but we will also all know that we really don't deserve it and will go nowhere even if we do make it.

Right now the only thing left to root for is to ruin Richmond's season, their CAA championship aspirations, and playoff seeding.

It is utterly absurd that I have to pay FLO sports to watch this embarrassing level of football.

At least I got to see the end of the Carson-Newman vs Emory & Henry game

Embarrassing performance by players and coaching staff.

Tribe defense getting exposed, and Tribe offense is disappointing. Need to wake up or call it a season. (Hint: call it a season.)

As the only path, with this schedule, is to win the A10 tourney, CM now has the luxury of experimenting with different player combinations, offenses and defenses to blaze a path to the ultimate goal, as the win loss record is meaningless.

Saw this on ESPN and it looks like in as soon as next year - schools will have the ability to pay players directly, with this article estimating that there will be a cap in place and estimate it starting at 20 million dollars.


I think the effects of this will only widen the gap between the power conferences and everyone else. Those power conferences already control the transfer portal because they have the NIL and collective money to buy all the players they want, now if the NCAA gives them the ability to pay the players themselves as well - they will also benefit and this just adds to the amount of money available for them to hand out. Obviously - this initial impact will be hard on football and basketball.

Something to keep a close eye on.

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all week long the question for Coach Huesman and the players has been can they avoid a letdown after the big Delaware win...the squad played at its highest level against the previously undefeated Blue Hens and this week faces CAA newcomer Bryant who is winless in the CAA and a significant underdog

the Spiders have played four games as significant favorites: Wofford, Charleston Southern, Delaware State and NC A&T...we struggled significantly in three of these games...it was painful to watch at times...

despite this inconsistent play UR at 3-0 in the CAA now controls of our CAA Championship hopes... fans have to hope that Richmond's ascension to a higher level versus Delaware was not an anomaly...

Coach Huesman believes it was outstanding preparation and execution...throw in a little focus on Bryant with some emotion and hopefully the Spiders have the formula to avoid a staggering upset...the outcome of this one is all on what we take the field with Saturday...it's not the early season anymore...it's almost Championship November...l hope this one puts to bed our worries versus struggling opponents!

enjoy the Prologue!

Go Spiders!

Ok, it was just a scrimmage, but guess what, what else are we going to talk about?

Some positives and/or interesting notes:

AP - 4 / 5 from 3. Like the sounds of this. 0 rebounds, but hey maybe Beagle and Walz are grabbing them.
Tanner - 3 / 4 from 3. 5 rebounds. Good stuff. Combined with AP that is some good shooting.
Beagle 23 minutes. Walz 16 minutes. Combined for 18 points and 11 boards and 6 assists. That is some good production from the center position. Wonder if any minutes together.
Hunt - 3/5 from 3 and Dusan 3/3 from 3. Roche and GW3 with some production. GW3 8 points in 11 minutes on good shooting.
Tyne 3/10 overall and 0/3 from 3 continuing trend from last season so far. Graham with 11 minutes.

A candidate speaks the truth. Sherrod Brown of Ohio admits he is losing.

It’s Sen. Sherrod Brown and ....
I’m facing the toughest race of my life against Trump’s handpicked candidate, Bernie Moreno (R), and polls show me 2 points down. Experts are saying Senate control will be decided here,

The 2024 baseball schedule just released, link is below. Only two games against power conference opponents (BC & UVA) and looks to be a pretty soft schedule overall, which makes sense for what will be rebuilding team with a first-year coach. Also, the Atlantic 10 Baseball Championship has now been moved to a neutral site at the new Capital One Park outside their HQ in Tysons Corner.

"UR will host non-conference series against Mount St. Mary's (Feb. 23-25), Marist (Mar. 8-10), Cornell (Mar. 15-17), and single games versus Princeton (Mar. 11) and Lafayette (Mar. 13) before heading south for a weekend series at High Point (Mar. 22-25).

The 2024 Central Virginia Challenge opponents include Boston College (Mar. 1), Sacred Heart (Mar. 2) and Central Connecticut State (Mar. 3).

Richmond will also face in-state non-conference foes: William & Mary (Feb. 20), at James Madison (Mar. 6), home (May 14) and away (Mar. 19) against Old Dominion, at 2023 Men's College World Series participant Virginia (Mar. 26), against VMI (Apr. 9), home (Apr. 16) and away (Apr. 2) against Longwood, and host Norfolk State (Apr. 23). The Spiders will also split a home (Feb. 27) and away (May 7) series against Towson.

The Spiders host Atlantic 10 Conference series against George Mason (Mar. 29-31), George Washington (Apr. 12-14), Dayton (May 3-5), and crosstown rivals VCU (May 16-18). UR will hit the road for league games against Fordham (Apr. 5-7), Davidson (Apr. 19-21), St. Bonaventure (Apr. 26-28) and Rhode Island (May 10-12). The 2024 Atlantic 10 Baseball Championship has moved to a neutral site at Capital One Park in Tysons, Va., over May 21-25."

Strengths
Very quick, strong on ball defender.
Hit the ground running and stepped in very well as a true freshman when Hunt went down with injury.
Fearless going to the hoop and beating man off the dribble, and has shown ability to hit layups over taller defenders with a variety of one handed scoop shots.
83% FT shooter
I was very impressed with his ability to come in as a freshman and not just try to "run the offense" but rather look for opportunities to score, or drive the lane and make an opportunity for himself or teammate.
Needs Improvement
3 PT shooting - Shot 27% on the year. He had a few hot games, shot 5-7 from 3 vs Florida.
Overall FG % was 32% - half his shots were 3 pointers pulling this down. I think his shooting in general will improve with another year adjusting to college game. While he does not appear to have Kendall Anthony's shooting touch, I think he can be an upper 30's % from 3. I am very hopeful that all the experience and adjustment to the speed and size of the college game will translate into improved shooting this season.
Passing / Assists - Averaged 2 assists per 40 minutes. Needs to be better at finding open man, that is a low assist number. I do think he can create opportunities with his speed with the ball.
Outlook:
Lot of fun watching Mikkel this season. He came in and beat out Smith from Day 1, he looked like he belonged and had a few really productive games. Also had some struggles scoring and making plays on offense. Mooney brought in plenty of competition at guard this offseason, and seemingly White would impact his minutes the most, and possibly GW3. Big key is taking that next step to consistently make shots. I think he gained a bit of confidence with Mooney early and that will carry over - will have plenty of opportunity. Would love to see the summer and fall practices. As much as I like his potential to score at this level, he already is a good defender and ball handler. Would be beneficial for him to focus a bit more on his playmaking and facilitating as well. Not counting him out at all for starter type minutes, but definitely not a given with the talent in from the portal and Hunt returning.