here is the reality of 2008-2009 season.

[jctnhoya4ever]

with the two transfers,as of now we will not have enough depth to compete for a big east title next year.i am sorry but we are now to thin and inexperienced to really compete for another big east title.if braswell does not make it we have 4 players with big east experience in free,wright,sapp,summers.add freshman monroe,clark and simms.that is just 7 players ,what about the depth and if we have a injury? we can't expect this team to be that good next year.i do not see the freshman having that kind of impact that we can compete for a big east title.if they do pretty well it will still be hard we just don't have the bodies we need to give the starters enough rest.7 players won't cut it.omar and nikita will not help either. with mack and rivers and braswell i thought we could be in the top 4-5 range. now without any depth we may really struggle.monroe and clark and simms will need time to develope at least a year. i see us going to nit ,unless coach brings in at least one good jc player that is a solid player that can help off the bench?and it still may not be enough depth if braswell don't make it. i wish we could have had one year that 2-3 players did not transfer. i really hope that we find a mike beasley in one of our freshman.it will take it to make ncaas.

ihope i am wrong,but i am being truthful and realistic.
go hoyas!!!!!!!!

[vcjack]

Our remaining guys are good enough to get into the tourny. Cuse had a shorter bench and less talent on their team last year and they almost made it. I think you'll find that few of us expected to compete for the BE title this year (preseason top 10 rankings are fools gold), but we are damn sure to be competative nonetheless

[SFHoya99]

Some counterpoints, JC.

1. I understand assuming Braswell won't be eligible when talking about depth, but I don't understand it when talking about how good we will be. Quite a few articles have been very hopeful, either in first or second semester.

2. Macklin and Rivers are not the difference between contending for the Big East title and not making the NCAAs. Yes, depth is an issue and injuries could really hurt us. But playing Jason Clark, Henry Sims and Greg Monroe more isn't going to kill us.

3. I do not see why Omar and Nikita won't help us. Yes, they got little to no time next year, but Omar showed some things in garbage time and both have a year of development under their belts. I do not think either will be a liability out on the floor.

4. I think you are underestimating the returning four and our recruits. Wright, Freeman, Summers and Sapp are either extremely talented, experienced or both. Greg Monroe might not produce like Beasley, but there's no reason he can't produce like DaJuan or even Jeff did his freshman year. Same goes for Sims, Braswell and Clark. We've had five freshman starters in four years, and several significant contributors.

5. The Big East is going to be very tough, but I expect us to be an NCAA team.

[jgalt]

i agree that a BE title is not something to expect, but i wouldnt put gtown in the NIT so quickly. I think there is enough talent to remain competitive nationally. A solid year in next years BE (9 or 10 wins) should be enough to make NCAAs, as long as not all of those wins come against SJU, or Providence.

[Dhall]

If you think Vernon Macklin and Jeremiah Rivers would be the difference between contending in the Big East or not, you must not think the Big East will be very good. Without looking at the stats, I'd say it's about the same as UCONN losing Wiggins and Kelly.

[vcjack]

May 7, 2008 15:20:40 GMT -5 Dhall said:

If you think Vernon Macklin and Jeremiah Rivers would be the difference between contending in the Big East or not, you must not think the Big East will be very good. Without looking at the stats, I'd say it's about the same as UCONN losing Wiggins and Kelly.

Actually this is a very accurate parallel, both teams lose a backup center with height but unskilled, and lose a valuable but flawed role player (Rivers and his bad shot, Wiggins and his legal issues/Calhoun's dislike of him)

[kghoya]

i expect this team to contend for a big east title...we have very good players returning who i expect to get better

we are bringing in very good players who can contribute next season

i hate that we lost these two guys, but get a grip

this is a good program and we will put out a good team that will contend in and out of conference

[GIGAFAN99]

The situation really hasn't changed here. We need someone to step up as a back-up at the 3. Clark getting Rivers' minutes shouldn't substantially impact the team. Yes Clark is a freshman, but we're talking about a non-scoring reserve role. I'm pretty sure the Met PoY can handle that. It would have been nice to have Jeremiah's experience but it's not such a killer that it changes our team's make-up.

Macklin's transfer is still the one that hurts more because it makes Dajuan a full-time 4.

[SFHoya99]

Put it this way: III's first year we were a bubble team that went to the NIT, but barely.

The teams are strikingly similar, but next year's team should be superior in almost every way.

1. Both teams are likely to be running a 7 man rotation (or close to it). But if Braswell is eligible, I expect us to rotate eight.

2. Both teams were thin in real big men. Remember, in the first year, Jeff and Roy were our only big men, unless you counted the 2 minutes of AKD. We may have a similar situation next year with Sims and Monroe, but we may also have Braswell, we'll have Julian Vaughn in practice, and you can make a strong argument for Sims being more ready than Roy was as a frosh.

3. There's minimal experience. The first year had three juniors, one sophomore, and three freshmen in the rotation. We're likely to have three to four freshmen, two sophomores and one junior and one senior. That's an identical amount of years - but this year's group has players with NCAA experience, Final Four experience, etc.

However, this year's team also a) isn't brand new to the system and b) probably has more physical talent.

I don't know if we're as good as some folks think, but I really don't think we're an NIT team.

[RBHoya]

We went to the Sweet 16 and almost the elite 8 in 2006 with a 7 man rotation. Matter of fact next year's rotation will be very similar to that team was:

Sophomore Wright ~~Sophomore Wallace
Senior Sapp ~~ Senior Cook
Sophomore Freeman ~~ Sr. Owens (on production, hopefully)
Freshman Clark~~Freshman Sapp
Junior Summers ~~Senior Bowman
Freshman Monroe ~~ Sophomore Green
Freshman Sims ~~ Sophomore Hibbert

It's real similar in terms of lineup balance. I think that freshmen Monroe/Sims will almost definitely be worse than sophomore Green/Hibbert, but there's a chance if they both pan out that it will be close. And I think there's definitely potential for Soph Wright > Soph John, Sr Jessie > Sr Ashanti, and Jr DaJuan > Sr Bowman. So on overall talent and output, I think next year's team will resemble the '05-'06 team.

As for competing for the Big East title, yea, probably we'll be overmatched. But that's more a product of the strength of the conference I think. Pitt, UConn and Louisville are all Top 10 teams. While our team should be solid next year, we won't be on that level. After 2 years of being at that level, we're due for a little bit of a down year, before having another pretty strong team next year I suspect.

[Boz]

I always love to hear from jc, but I think I agree with everyone else that the situation is not all that dire.

It's just a lot more uncertain, for a couple of reasons. One being that we are going to have a tough time if we get hit with any kind of injury bug next year. Second, while everyone has high hopes for the (knock on wood) four incoming freshmen, they are freshmen and you're never 100% certain about how they will pan out. I certianly think all of them can be strong contributors even in their first year, just don't know if they will.

This has nothing to do with Macklin leaving - or very little to do with that - but I do think this team needs a Braswell. Could have used him this year, honestly, so hopefully things will work out with him for next season.

[vcjack]

May 7, 2008 15:46:54 GMT -5 Boz said:

I always love to hear from jc, but I think I agree with everyone else that the situation is not all that dire.

It's just a lot more uncertain, for a couple of reasons. One being that we are going to have a tough time if we get hit with any kind of injury bug next year. Second, while everyone has high hopes for the (knock on wood) four incoming freshmen, they are freshmen and you're never 100% certain about how they will pan out. I certianly think all of them can be strong contributors even in their first year, just don't know if they will.

This has nothing to do with Macklin leaving - or very little to do with that - but I do think this team needs a Braswell. Could have used him this year, honestly, so hopefully things will work out with him for next season.

You know that Braswell will not be qualified?

[Boz]

I thought he still had a chance, at least for second semester. If that's not true, my mistake.

[TBird41]

May 7, 2008 16:00:44 GMT -5 Boz said:

I thought he still had a chance, at least for second semester. If that's not true, my mistake.

He still has a chance to be qualified at the beginning of the year and come in w/ Monroe, Sims and Clark. 2nd Semester is the pessimistic thought and missing the whole year is the worst case scenario

[Hoya TMF]

May 7, 2008 15:40:00 GMT -5 RBHoya said:

We went to the Sweet 16 and almost the elite 8 in 2006 with a 7 man rotation. Matter of fact next year's rotation will be very similar to that team was:

Sophomore Wright ~~Sophomore Wallace
Senior Sapp ~~ Senior Cook
Sophomore Freeman ~~ Sr. Owens (on production, hopefully)
Freshman Clark~~Freshman Sapp
Junior Summers ~~Senior Bowman
Freshman Monroe ~~ Sophomore Green
Freshman Sims ~~ Sophomore Hibbert

It's real similar in terms of lineup balance. I think that freshmen Monroe/Sims will almost definitely be worse than sophomore Green/Hibbert, but there's a chance if they both pan out that it will be close. And I think there's definitely potential for Soph Wright > Soph John, Sr Jessie > Sr Ashanti, and Jr DaJuan > Sr Bowman. So on overall talent and output, I think next year's team will resemble the '05-'06 team.

As for competing for the Big East title, yea, probably we'll be overmatched. But that's more a product of the strength of the conference I think. Pitt, UConn and Louisville are all Top 10 teams. While our team should be solid next year, we won't be on that level. After 2 years of being at that level, we're due for a little bit of a down year, before having another pretty strong team next year I suspect.

That's a pretty good comparison. Still, you can underestimate the potential ticket had to improve going into next year, but his experience in the system and five fouls would have incredibly valuable. Baby Doc's defense was indispensible last year. These are big blows.

You also forget that the Big East has never been as good as it will be next year. It easliy goes 9 deep in the Big Dance, and we very well could be that 9th team. That would have us playing two extra games in the BET and having a much harder road to the tourney.

Also you can't really compare freshman to sophomores. Being a first year player in a much different basketball system against much better competition can't just be ignored. We are going to take some lumps next year. I guess you could argue we would take lumps even with Ticket and Baby Doc, but its not like this is addition by subtraction.

[Boz]

Thanks. I thought that WaPo story said he could still qualify with course work this summer, but I thought maybe I misread it after vc's post.

[vcjack]

May 7, 2008 16:11:03 GMT -5 Boz said:

Thanks. I thought that WaPo story said he could still qualify with course work this summer, but I thought maybe I misread it after vc's post.

Oh I see, no I wasn't trying to imply anything. I don't know nothing and was just wondering if you knew something that we didn't

[The Stig]

I think we can still have a solid year next year. We'll still have talent, although we don't know just how much yet. A lot of it will depend on how the team we have plays together. If the guys gel and play well in the system we could have a very good year.

I don't think we'll be seeing a repeat of two years ago, but I still think we'll have a respectable Big East record, win a game or two at the BET, and make the NCAA's. That will be enough to make it a successful year (but not a great year) in my mind.

[RBHoya]

May 7, 2008 16:10:24 GMT -5 Hoya TMF said:

That's a pretty good comparison. Still, you can underestimate the potential ticket had to improve going into next year, but his experience in the system and five fouls would have incredibly valuable. Baby Doc's defense was indispensible last year. These are big blows.

You also forget that the Big East has never been as good as it will be next year. It easliy goes 9 deep in the Big Dance, and we very well could be that 9th team. That would have us playing two extra games in the BET and having a much harder road to the tourney.

Also you can't really compare freshman to sophomores. Being a first year player in a much different basketball system against much better competition can't just be ignored. We are going to take some lumps next year. I guess you could argue we would take lumps even with Ticket and Baby Doc, but its not like this is addition by subtraction.

It's a hybrid of our '04-'05 and our '05-'06 teams. Our backcourt is like '05-'06 only a little better and our frontcourt is like our '04-'05 team, which was a bubble team.

Nobody knows quite how good Monroe will be, but I think he can definitely be as good as Jeff was his freshman year, which is to say he can be an impact player from the start. Jeff got better but did not have an enormous jump from his freshman to sophomore year (bigger jump from so-jr years). And yea, it's difficult to be a first year player in a system like ours but guys like Jeff and DaJuan have shown that it's possible to have success, and Monroe is that caliber a player.

Also I didn't dismiss the difficulty of the conference. It's gonna be a very tough league next year. I can see us finishing anywhere between 4 and 9 depending on how the freshmen adjust and how much better Chris/Austin/DaJuan get. However, we were going to be somewhere between 4 and 9 with Jeremiah and Vern too.

We'll definitely take our lumps, that's a given. I hope all the chicken littles hear that now rather than bugging out next year when we're not playing like a top 10 team all year long (and even when we were a top 10 team all year long everybody had negative things to say).

[HoyaSinceBirth]

I can understand a wait and see, but i can't understand just assuming were not going to be that good. We're definitely a NCAA tournament team. I expect us to be in the top 6 of the big east at the very least. I understand not getting expectations for the freshman out of control. But come on these are high level recruits. These guys are impact recruits. These guys are big east ready. We will compete with the top of the big east and we will compete in the NCAA. We'll be just fine next year.