Burnt Roux: Mylik Wilson Portals to Texas Tech

[NewsCopy]

Could the Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns soon be losing their second-leading scorer from the 2020-2021 men's college basketball season?

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[Scott Malkinson]

Don't care if this is the new thing, it's a gut punch!

Players won't leave a successful program. We have been mediocre for years now

[wscoog]

Players won't leave a successful program. We have been mediocre for years now

In the new world of college sports where players can transfer without sitting out players will leave all the time. Davion Mitchell left Auburn after a final 4 run. Caleb Mills left Houston in the middle of the season this year. In some ways players are now officially mercernaries. Marlin is not getting it done. Mylik needs to be pushed to get stronger and play tougher.

[zephyr]

The one time transfer rule with no penalty became official today, although everyone knew it was coming. This has essentially created free agency, the last I remember there were about 1,400 players in the transfer portal. Many schools have far more entering the portal than we have. Sun Belt player of the year Devante Jones is transferring from Coastal Carolina, as well as Sun belt 1st team Michael Flowers from South Alabama (already committed to Washington State). Building yearly teams instead of programs is here to stay in college basketball whether you like it or not.

I knew another guard would probably leave after the Greg Williams commitment, I just hoped it wouldn’t be Wilson. I think he will get a lot of interest from some major programs, especially having 3 years of eligibility. La Tech has been mentioned and with this coming on the same day as the Josten Crow announcement and with that being Wilson’s backyard I guess that is a possibility as well.

As far as guys who have stayed in the program 4 years Kasey Shepard, Jonathan Stove, and Bryce Washington are all 1,000 point scorers who did that that you failed to mention. As much as I hate Wilson leaving I really don’t think the retention problem is any worse here than the average program these days. Wilson and Jalen Johnson (who by the way is back in the portal) last year are probably the only guys who have transferred out in the past 7-8 years against the staff’s wishes in my opinion.

First of all, many leave their programs when coaching changes occur or they feel they can go play at a bigger school which is understandable. You don't expect guys to leave a program that Marlin believes is the best in the league, where he is the top player on the team and the coach is going nowhere.

And we're not just talking about players leaving on their own accord when we talk about retention. The criticism for Marlin is that he moves so many guys in and out of his program as well. He recruits kids and then discards them when he feels he can get someone else better. There's either a problem with his recruiting skills or he isn't going to generate much trust in incoming guys.

[CrazyCajun]

Look at the mid majors that make runs in the tournament, almost all of them are veteran teams that played together for 3-4 years with majority of the same squad.

[Hatch]

First of all, many leave their programs when coaching changes occur or they feel they can go play at a bigger school which is understandable. You don't expect guys to leave a program that Marlin believes is the best in the league, where he is the top player on the team and the coach is going nowhere.

And we're not just talking about players leaving on their own accord when we talk about retention. The criticism for Marlin is that he moves so many guys in and out of his program as well. He recruits kids and then discards them when he feels he can get someone else better. There's either a problem with his recruiting skills or he isn't going to generate much trust in incoming guys.

In a radio interview with Brock Morris around this time last year he said that in the current landscape they are now looking to build a team yearly instead of a program. He also said that with scholarships 1-10 they look to build a starting 5 and bench and that scholarships 11-13 they are looking for guys that are more of projects with the potential to develop. Now due to injuries the past few years we have seen more of those 11-13 guys playing than they would probably like. I still say besides Wilson and Johnson every other transfer in the last 7-8 years would have either been in that 11-13 range or a disciplinary issue.

By the way here is the current Sun Belt breakdown of players in the portal this year.

South Al 9
Texas St 7
UTA 7
Ga Sou 5
ULM 5
LR 4
Troy 4
Coastal Car 4
App St 3
UL 2
Ga St 2
Ark St 0

There will probably be 1,500 players in the portal by the end of the day (1,496 as of now). Roughly 40% of D-1 schools have at least 5 players in the portal.

[CajunAmos]

I guess we should be grateful that it's only a one time transfer waiver without having to sit out a year, unless you are a grad transfer.

[RaginDave]

Players won't leave a successful program. We have been mediocre for years now

This is not a true statement, the new transfer rule is getting everyone.

https://247sports.com/Season/2021-Ba...ransferPortal/

Look at the quality of player and quality of teams with players in the portal this year. Just a quick search includes the following without going to deep.

Kansas
Indiana
Kentucky
Illinois
Texas Tech
Memphis
Iowa State
Duke
Oklahoma
Stanford
Virginia
Texas A&M
Marquette
Florida
Oregon

All of these guys are 4 and 5 star players. It is affecting everyone. Their are 173 Guards in the portal, 150 Forwards and 27 Centers, that is a total of 350+ players already in the portal and I am sure more to come. Their are 348 D-1 Basketball teams, so that is an average of at least 1 per team transferring out. NCAA Champion Baylor has a 4 star transferring out, he is a 6'10" Junior that 2 years ago averaged 14.6 points per game. App state who won the SBC tournament ha 3 players in the portal

[Hatch]

This is not a true statement, the new transfer rule is getting everyone.

https://247sports.com/Season/2021-Ba...ransferPortal/

Look at the quality of player and quality of teams with players in the portal this year. Just a quick search includes the following without going to deep.

Kansas
Indiana
Kentucky
Illinois
Texas Tech
Memphis
Iowa State
Duke
Oklahoma
Stanford
Virginia
Texas A&M
Marquette
Florida
Oregon

All of these guys are 4 and 5 star players. It is affecting everyone. Their are 173 Guards in the portal, 150 Forwards and 27 Centers, that is a total of 350+ players already in the portal and I am sure more to come. Their are 348 D-1 Basketball teams, so that is an average of at least 1 per team transferring out. NCAA Champion Baylor has a 4 star transferring out, he is a 6'10" Junior that 2 years ago averaged 14.6 points per game. App state who won the SBC tournament ha 3 players in the portal

247 doesn't have everyone listed, verbal commits does a much better job of tracking the portal. Take a look at my numbers above, they are actually much higher. They do list walk ons as well, so that skews the numbers a bit. If you go back a few years you will see guys like Eli Mouton and Jordan Adebutu listed for UL.

https://www.verbalcommits.com/transfers/2021

[moorecajun]

This one time transfer rule will probably change the way teams recruit; I don't see how you can spend as much time recruiting and trying to build with high school players anymore.

Every year will be a different scenario so you can't really plan on anything long term. The best thing we can probably do is pick up some of these transfers every year because they would not be that likely to transfer out since they used up their one-time transfer.

This rule will really change the landscape of college recruiting; we'll see if it is good or bad.