MBB: Other Teams' Summer Practices and Exhibitions

[UNCfan]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qrgi2gjzco

[JasonEvans]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qrgi2gjzco

A Carolina scrimmage!!!

How about a little warning!! No one here wants to watch that!



In all seriousness, if you think the scrimmage looks a little funky, that is because they did not wear official uniforms. This was a NIL event that was technically not connected to the UNC program. It just happened to be the UNC players taking part in a separately organized scrimmage. The players were paid for the event and for the pre-game autograph session. You could attend the game for $10-12 per ticket and go to the autograph session for $150.

I wonder how much the players made for the event. I would guess they might have gotten a couple thousand dollars each (attendance was described as "modest" which says to me they got a few thousand people to show up).

[MChambers]

Looks like a naked link to me. And a UNC naked link at that.

Avert thine eyes.

[plimnko]

$150 for an "X"? No thanks lol

[brevity]

ESPN: Way-Too-Early Top 25 men's college basketball rankings 2022-23: Standouts from a summer of international tours

I'm not sure if Jeff Borzello was really paying attention to these teams on international tours, or if he just wanted an excuse to put out a slightly revised Top 25. (I use the term "revised" loosely, as no team moved up or down. #1-25 are exactly the same as before.) My guess is that he watched Auburn and Kentucky on the SEC Network, and watched some replays of a few other teams on YouTube. Kind of like I did, actually, only I don't have the massive corporate backing and paycheck that he gets from Bristol.

Anyway, Borzello has updated the entries for the teams that went abroad for the summer: #4 Kentucky, #8 Baylor, #9 Arkansas, #13 Auburn, #18 Virginia, #19 Oregon, and #20 Alabama. Also, St. Louis, Michigan, and Wyoming are listed among the five teams that are Next in Line. He does exactly what I chose not to do in this thread: speculate on a player's college performance and/or NBA readiness based on what they did over the summer, a set of meaningless exhibition games against an indeterminate level of competition. (My in-depth game analysis in this thread was limited to "Keyonte George averaged this many points" and "Kel'el Ware sure didn't rebound very much".)

It's fine. Speculation is his job, not mine. Borzello offers a projected starting lineup for each team, and I don't know if he made any changes to the above teams based on their summer tours. (If you're wondering about #5 Duke, he has Roach, Whitehead, Grandison, Filipowski, and Lively.)

[brevity]

Somehow Kentucky is continuing to make UNC look bad this summer. Another appearance for charity. This time it's their version of Family Feud:



A summary if you don't feel like watching...

Name something that is turned on most of the day.

Spoiler!

7. Air conditioner
6. Cell phone
5. Radio
4. Lights
3. Computer
2. Television
1. Ashley Judd in the Rupp Arena stands

Name something that might be a foot long.

Spoiler!

7. Shoes
6. Arms
5. Feet
4. Sandwich
3. Ruler
2. Hot dog
1. Coach Cal's ego

It doesn't end well. Ultracompetitive players and amateur game show judging do not mix. Jacob Toppin was not pleased that Sahvir Wheeler's team got to play Fast Money.

Somewhat telling that the host -- whoever he is -- has to remind each side not to confer when they have provide individual answers. Cheating for charity!

[brevity]

New Mexico State

I mentioned the Aggies in my write-ups for Ole Miss and Loyola Marymount above, so I thought I would give them their own entry. They won the WAC last year and entered the 2022 NCAA Tournament as the 12 seed, beating Connecticut in the first round but losing to Arkansas in the second.

This squad will not resemble that one. All five starters are gone, and their head coach, Chris Jans, took the Mississippi State job. He was replaced by Greg Heiar, who in one year as head coach of JUCO Northwest Florida State College had a 25-game turnaround and produced a national championship. He had previously been an assistant coach at Wichita State, LSU, and East Tennessee State. So he has Final Four experience and a few of his players are in the NBA. A rising star in his field, but this may be a transition year. The new roster has three returning players and twelve newcomers (six JUCO transfers, two Division I transfers, and four freshmen).

The Aggies took their summer trip to the Bahamas, and went 4-0 in the aforementioned Summer of Thunder.

New Mexico State 105, Discount Distributors Rockets 78 (tweet, box score, full game)
New Mexico State 118, Bahamas Select 73 (tweet, box score, full game)
New Mexico State 123, Abaco Squad 71 (tweet, box score, full game)
New Mexico State 113, Caro Contractors Pirates 92 (tweet, box score, full game)

Late to the party, but somehow this video popped up in my YouTube feed. It was posted 6 days ago by a New Mexico State freshman who played hoops in high school but doesn't appear to be part of the team or the student media in any official capacity.



Video title: "WHAT A D1 COLLEGE BASKETBALL PRACTICE IS LIKE!!! NEW MEXICO STATE UNIVERSITY!!!" Ease up on the caffeine. There's no need to yell.

Actually, I could have used some louder speaking. The freshman sort of mumbles his play-by-play narration throughout the video. I guess this is how sportscasting careers get started?

At about the 19-minute mark, it becomes a three-team, 5x5x5 scrimmage. Red, white, and yellow jerseys. Two teams stay on opposite ends of the court on defense, and one team drives the ball on offense and attempts to score. If they succeed, they stay on offense and go to the other end of the court. If they don't, then they stay behind and the other team gets to play offense. I haven't seen this format before, but the freshman says that anyone who had high school basketball practices should be familiar with it.

[House P]

Apparently there is some interest in expanding the opportunities for Summer basketball. Currently, a school can take one foreign trip every 4 years, but this article from Matt Norlander discusses a proposal for allowing teams to play made-for-tv summer exhibition games each year.

Here are a few relevant quotes from Norlander’s article.

“A lot of details need to be determined, but if allowed, the rule change could enable men's and women's college basketball teams to organize two or perhaps as many as three unofficial games with the capacity sell tickets and provide NIL qopportunities for players in the heart of the summer.

There might even be an opportunity for teams to come together and hold four- or eight-team multi-team events instead of one standalone game.”

I think this is a fantastic idea. While I am less interested in the NIL-opportunities-for-players aspect of the proposal, I think it would be a great opportunity to raise the profile of the sport. I wouldn’t expect the ratings to be stellar, but I think it would be an excellent opportunity for fans to get to know the players in this age of high roster turnover.

There were a lot of reasons why the Zion/RJ season was memorable, but I think the fact that first got to see them in mid August instead of late Oct/early Nov helped us “get to know the team” a bit better. I imagine that the level of interest would only increase if, instead of paying Ryerson and McGill, they played in an 8 team exhibition tournament with a bunch of power conference teams.

[brlftz]

$150 for an "X"? No thanks lol

I wanted to spork this, but the sporkinator is not available in this thread for some reason. Well done.

[UrinalCake]

Louisville lost by 10 to Lenoir-Rhyne, a division II school that was 10-18 last season. Yikes!