With no center to back up, or practice with Krutwig & with short, but talented power forward 6-5 Jackson, who has played nothing but center for the height challenged Ramblers, LU currently has no one to start or backup at the power forward position without signing more big men.

We need a power forward (not a small forward or a swing man) to protect whoever is playing center & a back up for both center & power forward (with Jackson finally starting at power forward).

We need 2 or at least 1 more big man & add to that an assistant coach who knows & can teach the 4 & 5 position or we will be looking at a repeat of the last 10 losing conference seasons for our head coach. I want a turn around for him.

Neither Smith, nor Chastain, will be seeing playing time with LU. If we wish to be nice we can give them non-basketball scholarships, but niceness should not be our main criterion for the team roster.

Totally agree with the coaching needs to add a big man representative. Porter was a guard, Mullins was a guard, Seltzer was a guard, Gordon didnt even play, and London was a guard.

If we are bringing in big man talent we need to atleast help them out and have coaching that can help groom them.

Call me dubious until there's more weight behind this rumor about Chastain. He gave every indication about becoming a solid contributor to the team before he went down, To transfer and have to sit out another year would be tragic. Really pulling for this kid and I hope he's part of the rotation next year. The guy has talent.

6'8 forward Jimmy Ratliff is on campus visiting today. He's coming out of Kingston prep school, following his senior year of high school he had a D1 offer from UNC Greensboro and interest from Ohio and West Virginia (???). Looks like a stretch 4.

Most recent video I could find on him https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-UlayUR6i0o

Hasn't seemed to garner a whole lot of D1 Interest, looked at by WVU and Ohio but no offers. Could be a stretch 4 for us, needs to put on weight. Not sure how I feel about it. I do like his game if it translates well, but the lack of recruitment confuses me.

Edit: Also visiting Marshall

We do need to sign a big if Chastain leaves, but Christian Negron is also a 4.

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MBB Scholarship Chart

At this point I don't think we're gonna find anyone who's a game changer unfortunately. It's really can you take a raw prospect that can contribute from the end of the bench. In recent memory i can think of a few recruits late in the cycle, to varying degree of success... Igor... Tyson... Julius...

That said a lot of schools experience late transfers so it'll be interesting to monitor that market as well.

Just curious to see what the situation actually is with all 3 of our knee injury guys.......Again I do not want to see us become a program that runs guys off.....My thought is that one of either Chastain or Negron will not be able to play next year due to their injury and will get a medical red-shirt.

Moser seems to like the idea of players who are more suited to being a 2 playing at the 3, and 3s playing as 4s. I think he likes the mobility and matchup problems it causes for the opposition. He's had success with players like Thomas, Crisman, Doyle, Ingram and Aundre Jackson doing that, but sometimes it takes some time for a player to buy in to the idea and learn some new skills. Also, the height/reach disparity is often obvious. It's probably OK to have one player on the floor at a time doing that, but when there are 2 or 3 at a time it shows up.

JCT has it about right re PM and the teams he has had at LUC--BUT I feel that a good BIG team will beat a fine smaller one such as we have had. Our new bigs may just solve our dilemma --WE just NOT have been big enough, I look for this to change

IF Chastain and others go, so be it--They go !! If they leave on their own or are asked to leAve, it is what it is. We move on--so long as PM has a plan !!!