It did not take Few and his staff long to lock up the former Kansas commit
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00:00 Hey everybody.
00:03 Welcome back to another episode of the good zagging nation podcast.
00:06 Christian Pedersen, Dan Dick.
00:07 We hope you guys are doing well this off season.
00:10 We're on the back half of the off season and we are getting closer to the regular season.
00:14 And that means bigger and more relevant news.
00:17 Every time we check back in with you.
00:18 And as a reminder, you can subscribe to consangination wherever you get your podcast.
00:22 You can also follow us on social media at fan nation zags.
00:25 Dan, there was big news this weekend.
00:29 You did a whole Marcus Adams Jr.
00:31 Breakdown that I encourage people to go check out both on our website and wherever you get
00:35 your podcast.
00:36 But Gonzaga landed a big recruit.
00:38 Let's give them the cliff notes as maybe a little teaser for them to go check out that
00:43 episode.
00:44 Yeah, you know, it's I think it's a great pickup for Gonzaga.
00:48 When you look at the schools that were involved with him directly out of high school, you're
00:53 talking about some some heavy hitters, USC, UCLA on the West Coast.
00:58 You're talking about nationally, obviously, Kansas, who he ended up committing to.
01:04 And then he went to Kansas.
01:06 So a lot of times now after your high school graduation ceremony, sometimes you got a week
01:11 or less before you head off to college for summer school and kind of get settled at your
01:18 at your next stop.
01:19 Well, he did that and he didn't think it was the right fit for him after spending a little
01:23 bit of time on on campus in Lawrence.
01:27 And so he decided to transfer before even really being part of that program, so to speak.
01:35 So it was a quick transfer and opened it is recruiting up and pretty quickly narrowed
01:40 it down to a number of schools.
01:42 I believe USC, UCLA were back in the mix.
01:45 I think I heard Washington, maybe Washington State.
01:49 Then there were some others in the Midwest and the East.
01:51 But, you know, he chose Gonzaga.
01:54 And I think Alex Tui from Australia, with his commitment as a similar position type
02:01 player in that class, I think opened up the opportunity to bring in to Marcus Adams, Jr.
02:08 Watch more clips of him over the weekend.
02:10 And I think what you're getting is a pretty skilled player.
02:15 I think he's he's he's got a good size, looks to be about six, eight.
02:19 I would say he's a good athlete, not a great athlete.
02:22 He can definitely finish above the rim, but he doesn't look overly explosive, but a good,
02:28 good athlete to put it that way.
02:31 He can shoot it a fair bit from beyond the three point line.
02:33 He's got some good skills with the ball.
02:36 You know, he had a number of games in high school.
02:38 Now, granted, the competition didn't look great.
02:41 You know, at least one game I saw he had 50 points down in Southern California.
02:46 So if you if you're putting up a 50 piece, that means you can at least put the ball in
02:50 the hole. And that's one thing that coach few always values guys that can shoot it,
02:56 guys that can find a way to score, whether or not he earns a ton of minutes.
03:02 It's hard to say right now, you know.
03:04 But that being said, I think he's a nice ad for Gonzaga.
03:08 I think it's a great pickup, especially this late in the in the pickup being so unique,
03:14 I think it shows you that Gonzaga is being proactive in every way that they can to continue
03:19 to, you know, to elevate the program, to continue to stay relevant in the minds of all types
03:24 of recruits and transfers.
03:26 You certainly have my curiosity, Pete, if this is the first or like the quickest NCAA
03:33 transfer ever to school and then not really ever actually gone to the school.
03:38 All sorts of very confusing.
03:39 But you definitely hammered home last week when we were talking about who you thought
03:42 would be the starting five, which we've now dubbed the Steel Venters disrespect episode.
03:49 But you had mentioned that at the end, though, I know the way that it gets.
03:53 I don't know.
03:54 I'm the bad guy for not correcting you and saying, what about Steel Venters?
03:59 But no, you mentioned that coach few likes offense and he likes his versatility.
04:02 And it seems that Marcus Adams checks every one of those boxes.
04:06 And he's it just seems like if you're going to lose an Alex to me, this is not a downgrade.
04:11 This is not even necessarily a lateral move.
04:14 This is a good move for Gonzaga to pick up a piece like this.
04:17 And I would say overall, you're telling the fans to be excited, right?
04:20 Yeah, I mean, I think Alex to you is going to be a really nice addition to Gonzaga.
04:25 I mean, there's a reason he was in the Nike Hoops.
04:28 I mean, game is one of the best international players at his age.
04:32 There's a reason the NBL's next generation program signed him to a professional contract
04:37 because he's very talented.
04:38 You know, and on the flip side, there's a reason Marcus Adams Jr. was going to Kansas,
04:44 you know, a team that if Gonzaga is in recruiting battles with schools like UCLA, Arizona, Kansas,
04:51 Kentucky do consistently, which they are now, that shows you the type of player that, you
04:58 know, values Gonzaga program and wants to be a part of them.
05:02 So I think, you know, it's another opportunity to get a high level player.
05:07 And I think coach few has shown over the years that he has enough talent on the roster, which
05:12 typically he does.
05:13 He does an unbelievable job of molding it and getting guys in the right roles in the
05:17 right positions and putting together the right rotations to have a success.
05:22 Next question we got for you.
05:23 And once again, you can follow us at wherever you get your podcasts by subscribing to Gonzaga
05:29 Nation.
05:30 You can also find us at Band Nation Zags on social media.
05:32 Dan, is it is it too early to talk schedules?
05:36 I'm not saying that we got to talk about every single game, but is it too early in general
05:40 to talk schedules?
05:41 Yeah, I mean, we're we're kind of getting there because, you know, the majority of college
05:46 rosters outside of the rare exception, like we just talked about with Gonzaga, the majority
05:52 of rosters are complete.
05:55 And you know, that's one thing that fans are always excited to look, look deeper into.
06:01 And they also like to look deeper into schedules.
06:04 And it caught my eye over the last couple of days.
06:06 I think it might have been on Friday or Saturday, kind of scrolling through Twitter.
06:11 Pacific's already released their non-conference schedule.
06:14 So that gets me thinking, wow, we are, as you mentioned, to start the podcast, we're
06:19 on the downhill slide of summer now when you're starting to see non-conference schedules come
06:23 out from schools.
06:25 So that's that's exciting.
06:26 I know we've got an idea of parts of Gonzaga's schedule.
06:30 We know they're going to play Kentucky.
06:32 We know they're going to play UConn now.
06:33 We know they're going to play UW.
06:35 We know Yale is going to come out.
06:38 But we don't have all of the schedule for Gonzaga.
06:41 So to see Pacific's full non-conference being released, that means it's going to be close
06:47 where all these other schools release their non-conference schedules.
06:51 And I would imagine, you know, people are extremely excited to get the final look at
06:56 Gonzaga's, which I still think we're a little bit a ways away from.
07:00 But you know, it's it's nice to anticipate it, that's for sure.
07:05 Looking across the WCC, because these are our WCC weekly episodes, what are you looking
07:11 for in terms of.
07:13 I don't even know how to correctly maybe ask this, but you know how to grade it or the
07:19 quality are you looking for singular big game?
07:21 Like, do you want to see every team has one power five conferencing?
07:26 Like, do you want to see just an elevated amount of play?
07:28 Do you want to see that?
07:29 What does you the discerning basketball analyst look for in these non-conference parts of
07:35 the schedule is just in terms of the health and quality of the WCC?
07:38 Well, I think I think this the league has done a tremendous job of putting an emphasis
07:44 on scheduling and figuring out how to schedule to positively impact their net ratings at
07:50 the end of the year so they can put multiple teams in the NCAA tournament.
07:53 I think that's something that that was helpful getting San Francisco in a couple of years
07:57 ago.
07:58 You know, it's one of those things that, you know, I think the WCC, I can't say you're
08:03 going to rely on two teams every year, but you should have two teams every year.
08:07 And then I think if they continue to schedule and improve the way the league has, you should
08:12 be in conversation to have a third team in every single year.
08:15 That's just the way if you schedule right and then you perform at a high level with
08:21 that schedule, you're going to have that chance.
08:23 You know, I think when you look at LMU and you look at Pacific and you look at Portland
08:28 and these other teams that are trying to make a push and run to that upper tier, you need
08:33 to have enough teams that are scheduled around that 100 mark in the net so that if at the
08:43 end of the year you get those wins, those could become quad, at least quad two wins.
08:51 Depending on how their season goes, it might slide down to a quad three, but you can't
08:55 have any quad four losses.
08:57 That's for sure.
08:58 That really impacts.
08:59 So you're trying to get as many quad two wins, I think, as possible.
09:04 And you want to also sprinkle in opportunities for quad one wins if you can.
09:08 You know, I think LMU, I don't think they released their whole non-conference, but I
09:14 think they kind of it's leaked that there's a couple different games that are out there.
09:19 And one that I really like with LMU is the Nevada home and home, right?
09:23 Nevada out of the Mountain West has been pretty good in recent years.
09:27 They made the NCAA tournament a year ago.
09:30 I think they were, if I remember correctly, they were probably about 55, 50 in the net,
09:37 somewhere in there.
09:38 So those are the kind of schools that if the WCC can keep scheduling and it doesn't have
09:43 to be the Mountain West, it can be the Pac-12, it could be Missouri Valley, if you can find
09:47 other schools.
09:48 If you can find teams in that, you know, 50 to 75 range where, you know, they're going
09:54 to be top 100 in the net, if you can schedule those out and you can win enough of those,
09:59 that's really going to impact your own net rankings.
10:02 And if your own net rankings and enough teams in the league have positive net rankings,
10:08 every team rises because of that.
10:11 You know, there's a rising tide situation.
10:13 Yes, 100%.
10:14 There were times last year where, you know, a team would lose to Gonzaga or lose to St.
10:21 Mary's, but their net ranking wouldn't go down.
10:23 Matter of fact, it went up at times.
10:26 Their RPI would go up at times because you're playing good competition.
10:29 That's one thing about the Big 12, the SEC.
10:34 Sometimes a loss doesn't impact you as much numbers wise as it does maybe health wise
10:43 as the fans, fan base wise.
10:46 So lots of things to look at.
10:47 I think lots of positives are starting to come out with other schools and other teams,
10:52 how they're handling their non-conference schedule.
10:54 The only thing you say when I can, the only thing I could think of when you say that is
10:58 I just, I hear Jack Ferris panicking and struggling and breathing into a paper bag through an
11:03 early non-conference loss and you going, dude, it's fine.
11:08 This is good for the overall health of everything.
11:10 And he being the barometer of the fans, blood pressure is panicking, but you're like, yeah,
11:14 no, it's going to be all good.
11:15 It's going to be all good.
11:16 Anything else we got going on this week in the WCC, Dan?
11:19 No, I mean, this becomes a quiet time for the NBA.
11:23 So, you know, the, the guys that were recently drafted and played in summer league, you know,
11:28 typically this is a time for them where they're, they're probably off in their new city trying
11:33 to figure out where they're going to live.
11:35 And then they probably are going to take marching orders from their coaching staff of where
11:39 they need to spend the rest of their summer to get ready for training camp.
11:43 Because next, next thing, you know, NBA training camp is going to be here at this, you know,
11:50 in a month, month and a half or so.
11:53 So, you know, I think that's about the only things else that maybe we're going to get
11:58 an episode of an, of an exclusive apartment hunting in Milwaukee with Drew Timmy is the,
12:04 is the next one that we're going to get.
12:06 The only thing is he might need to stay out of the Pfister hotel.
12:09 That's a, that's a traditional hotel that most teams in the NBA would stay at.
12:14 I stayed there a number of times and supposedly that hotel is haunted.
12:19 Do we have a Dan, is there a Dan how it goes story?
12:22 Is this episode taking a paranormal turn?
12:24 I mean, just Google it.
12:26 I mean, there are plenty of documentaries on the history channel, whatnot about the
12:31 Pfister hotel is haunted.
12:33 So I don't know if Drew Timmy, maybe with his personality, he wants to go check out
12:37 the Pfister.
12:38 You never know, but it's well-known in NBA circles.
12:41 Many teams stay there.
12:43 Some guys absolutely hated that hotel because they felt that it was haunted and there was
12:49 something about it.
12:50 I never had personal experiences, but best of luck to Drew.
12:54 If you're staying at the Pfister in Milwaukee.
12:56 Appreciate it, Dan.
12:57 Thank you very much for checking in on another episode of consagination.
13:01 Make sure, like I said, everybody you subscribe to us wherever you get your podcast, follow
13:04 us fan nation zags on social media.
13:06 We'll talk to you guys soon.