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I think the team height of a potential 1-4 of Banton, Teddy, Thor, Shamiel, would mean we can have someone like Lat at the 5 for stretches.

bumping because i forgot to give an update. the brisket was awesome, smoked it for about 15 hours overnight. it fed 6 people on friday, 3 on saturday and today, and tomorrow I'm making chili with whats left and that should last me through most of the week as a single guy. quite a deal, considering i paid 80$, 25 of which was shipping. thanks again @cipsucks! expect another order some time before summer is over, a bigger one this time.

See, to me it's Walker's two years at Tennessee and a year as a redshirt that makes me think he is more of a known commodity than Mayan who had a partial season at TCU and then one at JUCO. Combine that with Mayan weighing just shy of 210 and it becomes very hard to picture him guarding centers in the B1G unless he has superior rebounding, shot blocking and/or shooting attributes. He certainly has more range than either Yvan or Walker but I just don't think it's going to be enough to displace the girth those guys bring. Why else are we still recruiting traditional centers? Hopefully we shall see.

Doc Sadler and zone defense?!

Playing some Baylor-style zone defense with that lineup should work.

Good point. Shamiel has enough heft to hold his ground in the post on defense, and the other guys listed would make us long enough to double and recover if we had to double the post. I'm not trying to tear anyone down. I think it's possible that Walker and Ouedraogo have both made significant strides since they last logged official minutes. But just going by what I think I can reasonably rely on, I'm picking Lat to start. It's just a wild-ass guess, really. Anyway, that would certainly be an intriguing combo.

Whatever the lineup, is this more of a: Pikiell at Rutgers rebuild second season (3-15, 14th place in 14-team conference); a Miles at Nebraska rebuild second season (11-7, 4th place in a 14-team conference); a Hoiberg at ISU rebuild second season (12-6, tied for third in 10-team conference); OR Somewhere in between. I think this roster lands us somewhere in between Pikiell and Miles/Hoiberg, but that's a huge space to occupy. The early non-partisan analysis like this and this, have us struggling to rise much above Pikiell's benchmark, and unless Allen emerges as a Pettway-style all-conference type player and we have other players emerge and complement in the fashion of Rey Gallegos, Shavon Shields, Walter Pitchford, Tai Webster and Benny Parker, they may be right.

hmm....isabel palmer is at least the 19th DI wbb player from Australia to enter the transfer portal this off-season. (from raoul on twitter) i don't know how many players from Australia are playing at the DI level, but, it sure seems to be a rather high percentage of transfers. i could be wrong, though.

You may be right. And I considered that. Maybe if I'd seen more of Walker, I'd think differently. But I look at his numbers from Tennessee (very small sample size) and, unless he's really REALLY improved, he probably isn't going to see a lot of time on the floor. (I get that he was buried on the depth chart on a very good Tennessee team, but while it's true there were a lot of good players in front of him, it's also true that his numbers would have kept him off the floor even on a bad team -- 29% from the foul line? Yikes.) Yvan has a lot to offer in terms of strength and heft and holding his position defensively on the inside. But he also has a lot of work to do on skill development. And I'd like to see him look a little more explosive. He was tentative taking it to the basket when he was in scoring position and, as a result, wasn't very effective scoring inside. I think the game was still going a little too fast for him at the end of the season. He could make huge strides this off-season. But it'd be helpful if he was here. Meanwhile, we have this kid who is as long as anyone on the roster, put up good rebounding numbers in juco, and is a solid shooter, including over 80% from the stripe. And I think it's more likely that Lat can put on weight and build strength between now and November than it is that Yvan suddenly develops soft hands. And Derrick Walker is still too much of an unknown commodity for me to assume that he's transformed his game since his days in Tennessee. Maybe he has. But he'd have to in order to get the starting nod here. I'm fairly comfortable that starters will include Banton, Allen, and Webster. I took Thor over Shamiel. But that could be a foot race, honestly. And then I looked at all the possibilities to fill the big man role. And I decided they all have their strengths and they all have some glaring weaknesses (absent updated info on Walker). So, whose balance of strengths and weaknesses will benefit the team the most? I went with the springy, long kid who shoots the ball well and rebounds.

Meanwhile we went 7-25 without him last season.

I agree with this. I like a Stevenson and Lat rotation at the 4. I think it's a 9 man rotation like this. Banton----------------| > Thor Webster--------------| Allen--------------------| > Lat,Arop Stevenson------------| Yvan---------------------> Walker

I thought you were pre-med? Pre-law, pre-med. What's the difference?

There are a number of things that could happen to impact eligibility. Maybe he didn't go to classes the last semester. Maybe he didn't take enough credits each semester to show academic progress. Maybe he was borderline academic probation. Maybe his credits didn't transfer over. The 2nd part of your puzzle I have no idea how to answer so I give up. My solution is...it's water under the bridge. The 13th spot has been refilled and I am moving on.

'Put the system on trial'

You always were her favorite, right?