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Thank goodness basketball season starts tomorrow. No additional explanation required!

I need this season to start

Formerly known as Texas Pan American

Fred was on Big Red Wrapup on PBS / NPM this week: https://nebraskapublicmedia.org/en/series-media/big-red-wrap-up/season-24-video-15847/ohio-state-recap-50024407/ He starts at around 29 minute mark - summary - For us to get competitive at ISU right away was through transfers – back when transfers had to sit out – after we got good with the transfers, we started getting the right freshmen in our program Now everybody is in the transfer market – and then NIL is a whole different perspective – people are still trying to figure it out, especially with revenue sharing coming in next year – we appreciate 1890 in helping us build a team – have to have it to be competitive now NIL is important, but we still try to sell them on what we can do for them and how we can help them get to the NBA – we’ve had 12 players get to NBA out of ISU and NU Oldest team in the league last year and that played a big part in our success – even the year before, I think we’d have been a tournament team if we stayed healthy - that being said, we regrouped after the injuries and had some guys step up and had the best record in February that year – that momentum carried over to last year Last year, the players never had any agendas – everyone came to work every day – enjoyable to coach Our coaches wanted to set up this year’s team to be older again and I think we accomplished that With Sam, he’s one of the hardest workers – after Bandoumel got hurt, we talked on the plane ride back from PSU and he just stepped up and played well – been a staple ever since – he has the respect of his teammates because of how hard he works – he’s earned it – but sometimes I take a step back as a parent and it’s pretty cool to experience this We miss Mast a lot – he helped Keisei so much with his passing – Allick did a nice job too Meah & Morgan are completely different players than Mast along with Berke – we have different ways we can play with those 3 - Morgan is really good with his back to the basket – Berke can facilitate and score from 3 – Meah is a shot blocker – none of them replace Mast fully, but we can win with them Williams finished the year on a high note – played the best at the end – he’s going to be our go-to guy and we have to play through him a lot – benefited him last year playing the point to gain confidence in his ball handling for this season – excellent versatility for a 6-7 guy Feel good about point guards this season – You have Ulis who’s been a B1G starter on good Iowa teams – Worster has been great at Utah – talked to people in the Pac 12 and they love his attitude as a winner – he’s all about getting us organized offensively and defensively and getting everyone involved – both of them are in the 5th year and will be great for us League is a monster – no nights off, not going to face any team that’s a gimme – have to try to stay consistent through the highs and lows I like our non-con schedule – good tourney in Hawaii – St Mary’s is good – road vs CU – good mid-majors – I think the non-con will prepare us well for B1G play Gary hit some timely 3s last year even though he slumped later in the year – we want him to shoot the open ones – when he’s contested, we need to work on driving or making a play for someone else Biggest job for me and the staff this year is narrowing the rotation – don’t know that we’ll figure it out right away – may take some time like we did last year – I think we have 13 guys who could help us – can’t play that many – we always speak about keeping yourself ready as roles may change We have a lot of energy guys that can try to replace Keisei – Worster has good natural leadership skills – Sam too – Brice has grown in leadership – we need Gary to be that guy too – when things get tough you have to have a guy that can bring everyone together on the court – I tell them all the time I only have 4 timeouts, so you guys have to figure it out on the floor - we need that guy to help pull us through the inevitable ups and downs Our atmosphere is great – when we brought in Griffiths and Essegan, they mentioned PU and NU as the best places to play in the B1G – great atmosphere for us vs PU last year but also the big comeback vs WU – that was the biggest win of the season – crowd really carried us through that game

They still have time to clean that out with another off-season surgery

Yes, thanks.

Go big red!