We’re all waiting, impatiently, for the plume of white smoke to rise up from JPJ, to signal that UVA Basketball is, again, active on the transfer portal.
It’s been two weeks since Ryan Odom landed his last recruit.
What’s going on here?
I’m hearing things.
One, with regard to Elijah Saunders: Odom wanted him, thought he’d be a good fit, as a 6’8” stretch four – Odom loves bigs who can shoot threes.
Saunders, as you know, ended up at Maryland, with Buzz Williams.
What happened?
Remember that Top 10 NIL budget that Carla Williams told everybody about at the Odom reveal last month?
Well, we got outbid, is what I’m being told.
Two, on VCU freshman big Luke Bamgboye: still interested, still hopeful, just waiting for the spring semester to end, so the admissions people can do their best to find a reason to reject him, I guess.
Yes, I’m being told that admissions is playing a big role in why things are quiet on the portal front.
I don’t know how much of that is just grasping for excuses.
The hard part for me to figure on that is, Tony Elliott hasn’t had a lick of trouble landing a Top 20 portal class for his football program this offseason.
The argument back to me on that observation: maybe the athletics folks are using all of their peremptory strikes on football.
I’m told that the French kid from VCU, Martin Carrere, started his freshman year with enough college credits from high school to be in good graces with the admissions folks.
So, admissions issues, and we got outbid, apparently, on an in-house target.
Not troubling developments at all.
And all of that is going on to make it harder for the new coach to get his footing, as UVA Athletics is trying to charge exponentially more for season tickets.
At least we have capable people in charge over there.
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Chris Graham
