UMass transfer portal news - 2024

[minutefanjsf]

Essential it's become one and done and look for the better bigger deal. Even all the pundits are saying this is the new landscape. Find older players in the portal to compliment the freshmen. Every year a new team. Each season having to gel and become cohesive. This is not sustainable. At our level even less in the MAC if our players do well in their season they will look to jump. It's become build your team each and every year. Umass had a very successful highly entertaining team this season. Ah well. Wheels have come off. With comments from Izzo saying mid majors don't belong in the tourney I see the power conferences having THE tournament and the NIT will expand so the others will have some post season play. Or something along those lines. Coming to football too. For me I'm all in on Umass Hockey. At least we are in an elite conference and no matter how the semi game went they were awesome this year

I think the mid majors are going to be force out soon or at least their season will end one week early so that they can play in pre NCAA tourney to qualify for the NCAA tourney. What you are missing is that the MAC is not going to be considered a mid major but as a second tier major conference along with the AAC, SB, and CUSA conferences because of football. This is why we had to join either the MAC or CUSA.

Agree! Still can’t wait to see how the Big East figures out its place. The selection committee this year seemed to tip its hand a bit by favoring the football conferences. Indiana State and a couple BE schools had better resumes than some teams selected for the tournament,

[Uminuteman]

Hopefully the fact that the football conferences flamed out early shows the committee that those teams are way over-rated and should not be in because they are from a big conference. Unfortunately, the fix is in for those conferences because that's where the money and power are centralized.

[stevemaz]

Hopefully the fact that the football conferences flamed out early shows the committee that those teams are way over-rated and should not be in because they are from a big conference. Unfortunately, the fix is in for those conferences because that's where the money and power are centralized.

Yes money is always the number 1 factor. One day we will be forced out too and it will be a 30-40 school situation like a pro league.. totally sucks, but times they are a changing... Ugh!

[Quann]

Kind of bizarre that they open transfer portal before the postseason starts. Any hope to salvage the NIT, this is destroying it. Would it kill them to wait a couple weeks until April 10th? This makes no sense to me whatsoever.

I'm quoting my own post to bump this up. Any idea why the NCAA would do this?

[Big Guy]

What made March Madness what it was were the mid majors and small schools who pulled off the upsets in the first weekend of the tournament. Nobody gives a crap about the 8th place team from the Power 5 who make a run in the tourney.

If Izzo and his Power 5 brethren kick the mid majors and small schools out of the tourney, March Madness will die.

[NilesGold]

I continue to be fascinated by this exchange.

Running offense through the post his first year here wasn't totally effective. We had some defense and rebounding in Wildens, but our big guys missed way too many shots in the paint. It was sort of the opposite this past year.

My read on Tyler Mason is he's skilled offensively and has decent size. No idea about his defense and rebounding. My guess is Mathok won't be ready yet for serious minutes next year.

This is the biggest question for me: who will start in the middle next year, and how will Frank use them on offense?

I don't know what's going through Frank's head, but I really just hope he doesn't repeat the mistake of his first year where he didn't have any centers who were good offensively, but he tried over and over to get the ball into them for post-ups, despite all evidence showing this was a failed strategy.

[Mykl_18]

I continue to be fascinated by this exchange.

Running offense through the post his first year here wasn't totally effective. We had some defense and rebounding in Wildens, but our big guys missed way too many shots in the paint. It was sort of the opposite this past year.

My read on Tyler Mason is he's skilled offensively and has decent size. No idea about his defense and rebounding. My guess is Mathok won't be ready yet for serious minutes next year.

This is the biggest question for me: who will start in the middle next year, and how will Frank use them on offense?

I don't know what's going through Frank's head, but I really just hope he doesn't repeat the mistake of his first year where he didn't have any centers who were good offensively, but he tried over and over to get the ball into them for post-ups, despite all evidence showing this was a failed strategy.

Don’t think he will. Looks like they’re going after Venning

[DoctorJ]

Who says we are after Venning?

[inthescoop]

Another day and Matt Cross still hasn’t transferred. Fingers crossed that he stays here for good!

[Mykl_18]

Who says we are after Venning?

Assistant B. Steele and UMass basketball started following him on twitter last 2 days

[Juice Stand]

What made March Madness what it was were the mid majors and small schools who pulled off the upsets in the first weekend of the tournament. Nobody gives a crap about the 8th place team from the Power 5 who make a run in the tourney.

If Izzo and his Power 5 brethren kick the mid majors and small schools out of the tourney, March Madness will die.

I agree with the above, and another thing that makes March Madness special is star power, and the transfer portal is ruining that. Guys play for a year, then they're gone. Did they go to the NBA, transfer to another school? Nobody knows and nobody cares. Here today, gone tomorrow.

[Floyd]

I've watched a few tourney games and a few NIT games this weekend and I can't believe how much traveling goes uncalled. Seems like they're just letting it go

[DoctorJ]

Who says we are after Venning?

Assistant B. Steele and UMass basketball started following him on twitter last 2 days

Oh wow. Thanks for lmk. He'd be a good replacement for Cohen.

[JoleonLescottsHair]

The Houston-A&M game is on at the bar. I have absolutely zero interest in this game, and the tournament in general other than the dude from Oakland, but it just occurred to me that Leveque is a rental for the Aggies and the pre-NIL couple from New Orleans played for Houston and the slippery K.Sampson. It’s hard to express how shitty college hoops has become.

[inthescoop]

^What a game so far. Love a buzzer beater 3 to force a game into OT.