Former Gonzaga All-American Dan Dickau has the latest on Gonzaga's top recruiting targets, where the Zags stand in KenPom rankings heading into the 2023-24 season and more.
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00:00 Welcome back to another episode of the Gonzaga Nation podcast.
00:03 Christian Pedersen joined by Dan Dickout.
00:05 Dan, we've got a lot to talk to.
00:07 So let's get right into it.
00:09 We got a bunch of Gonzaga topics this week.
00:11 And if you guys have been listening to us, any amount of this preseason buildup,
00:16 you know that we are actively in the midst of raging against being forced to talk about conference realignments
00:24 or any more Graham EK health situation.
00:27 Like we are starting to bang our head against certain walls.
00:30 And so we're going to try and go in a little bit different direction, give you guys something fresh as we try to just like,
00:34 we promise two or three more weeks worth of episodes and then there will be fresh new basketball tipping off for you guys to enjoy.
00:41 So Dan, I want to get to a couple of different topics.
00:44 Can we start though with JJ Redick and his comments on Chet Holmgren's competitive edge?
00:50 We saw Cole Forsman writing a little bit about this.
00:52 And if you want to check out the full article at Zag Nation, you can,
00:57 but you had sort of echoed that you think maybe Chet's got a chip on his shoulder on a podcast that we talked about a couple weeks ago
01:04 where you said Chet could be the NBA rookie of the year.
01:07 And it seems like JJ Redick is now catching on to this.
01:11 Your thoughts on JJ's comments, just slash anything else that you think now about Chet's year that he's about to have in the NBA.
01:18 Yeah, I mean, you know, look, JJ Redick in a short amount of time,
01:23 two years or so, has become one of the premier analysts in regards at least to the NBA game.
01:30 You know, I find him to be really insightful, breaks things down in a way that the average fan can understand it.
01:41 But then if you kind of listen to different parts of his podcast,
01:44 and he's had some really good guests on there where they break down high level parts of the game.
01:51 And the conversations that he has with those guys and talking about high level stuff is awesome.
01:59 But he also then describes it alongside his guests in a way that I don't want to say dumbs it down,
02:06 but breaks it down just enough where the average fan can also then kind of get that inner workings of what a high level basketball mind looks at,
02:17 what they work on, what they value, what they see as important.
02:22 And so in saying that and now hearing his comments in regards to the potential he thinks Chet has, I think he's spot on.
02:32 I think it's really good. It's refreshing to hear it take like his because he lives and breathes the game.
02:38 He dives in, he does his homework. And you can tell by the questions that he asks.
02:44 You can tell by the observations that he makes and how he describes many times how he comes to his conclusions based off of his observations.
02:56 It's great to see that he's got a lot of faith and belief and trust that Chet's going to have a good rookie year and a heck of a career.
03:04 Let's move then forward to some recruiting for Gonzaga and Isaiah Harwell, who is in the class of 2025.
03:11 He's one of the top nationally ranked. I know 2025 feels a tad bit hypothetical and far down the road.
03:18 But when you have a guy whose other offers are UCLA, Villanova, Kentucky, Ohio State, this is a national top recruit kind of guy that feels like he could be a big time splash for Gonzaga to get.
03:33 He's committed to coming apparently on campus where he scheduled his visit for commit was a shaky use of that word there.
03:40 He has scheduled his visit. He is committed to come to Gonzaga in February.
03:46 Is this just business as normal, getting a guy on for a visit, or do you feel like this is something that Gonzaga fans really should be like, hey, if he's if he's coming here, we have a real shot at this kid?
03:56 No, I think that Gonzaga has got a legitimate shot. I mean, you've seen that they've gotten, you know, top 50 caliber players.
04:04 You mentioned he's top 25 ish five star kind of type of recruit. Gonzaga has gotten those recently with Jalen Suggs and with Chet Holmgren and proved that Gonzaga can be a stepping stone for a one and done type of career.
04:21 You know, it didn't work out with Hunter Salas, who was a five star, who was ranked as high as I want to say 12 or so in that one recruiting class.
04:29 But that's the beauty and the challenge as well with with these evaluation and rankings.
04:36 You're not always going to get it right. Many times you you you project out to what a player is going to be.
04:42 And if they don't work on certain aspects of their game or if they don't go to a college program that fits their skill set, you know, their their development is going to be flatlined.
04:52 So I'm not surprised they've got one of the best players in the country coming in for a visit.
04:59 I'm not surprised that Gonzaga is on their shortlist. I've heard this name now for a couple of years.
05:05 He's been he he's grown up in Idaho Falls, I believe it is. I know it's in Idaho.
05:12 I'm not sure if it's Pocatello or Idaho Falls is where he started off his high school career.
05:17 Now he's kind of doing that prep school circuit thing where he's he's going to a prep school and playing on some of the higher level academy type circuits.
05:27 But really good player. Don't necessarily pencil him as a one, not necessarily penciled as a two, just an all around really good basketball player from from what I've seen and from what I've heard.
05:41 Is recruiting recruiting is snowflakes, every single one of them is unique and different.
05:47 There's not really any parallels that you could be like the same kind of vibes we were getting out of Chet's recruitment.
05:53 We're getting out of this guy's recruitment. So you know that we're going to lock up this superstar or anything.
05:57 Every one of these kind of unique and you can't really draw parallels.
06:00 Or can you say, hey, if he's here before they go to UCLA the same way as X, Y or Z other player, you know that this is good sign for Gonzaga to land this guy.
06:10 I mean, there's always parallels, right? For Gonzaga's program, the parallels have got to be.
06:17 First off, do you love the game and what's your upside potential to become a really good player?
06:23 If you don't have that, you're not going to get recruited to Gonzaga.
06:27 But then beyond that, you've got to fit the culture of what Gonzaga is.
06:32 Brian Michelson, assistant coach, has recorded a number of segments with me recently that we'll be releasing shortly where we talk about a lot of those things.
06:40 You know, the success that Gonzaga has had over the last 25 years has continued to open up new doors to be able to recruit, in other words, higher profile national guys and recruit outside of just the Northwest,
06:54 which is where the run essentially began with that 99 team being, you know, mostly Northwest guys sprinkled in with a few international players.
07:03 But as Gonzaga has gotten better and they've been able to attract interest from some of these higher level guys,
07:09 they've done a really good job of discerning which guys fit their culture and which guys don't.
07:16 And they don't waste a lot of time recruiting guys that aren't going to fit into the culture.
07:20 Do you think they already have that figured out by the time the guy shows up for the visit or the visit is the opportunity to figure that out?
07:27 It's mostly figured out by the time they've been on a visit, to be honest with you.
07:30 I mean, there is enough legwork going in on the early part of recruiting, talking to high school coaches, talking to the AAU coach, having phone conversations with the family,
07:40 as well as the player to see if that player's essentially if that player's goals align with what Gonzaga's goals would be for that player.
07:51 I mean, if you've got a player who has aspirations to play in the NBA and Gonzaga is recruiting pretty much only players,
07:59 I can't say only players, but they're recruiting players that have aspirations to play at the next level.
08:04 That's the access that you said they have.
08:05 Most of them are in the NBA or want to play in the NBA, yes.
08:09 But if you're looking at a player who if you projecting it out, if there's if you know that clearly they're a they're a program four or five year guy and they shouldn't
08:19 and they're having aspirations to say they're a one and done, that's not going to fix that's not going to mesh well.
08:26 You know, there's got to be a clear alignment of recruit where he feels they fit alongside of where the staff truly feels that they're going to fit,
08:34 because you don't want a player coming in thinking he's a one and done and he should be starting, you know, playing 27, 28 minutes a game,
08:42 not even getting off the bench or being asked to redshirt.
08:45 And that's where, you know, Gonzaga has always done such a good job of aligning me goals,
08:52 which every player needs to have with we goals, which every team and every program has to have.
08:56 The great example currently is Braden Huff. I mean, he was Gatorade player of the year in the state of Illinois.
09:02 Good player. We saw what he did in the craziness in the kennel, had a good initial outing.
09:08 You know, he could have gone to a lot of other places and played, I'm sure, meaningful minutes as a freshman.
09:14 But he redshirted last year, which isn't normal anymore in this day and age of college basketball.
09:19 But he redshirted knowing that, look, I'm not going to play. I'm not going to take minutes over Drew Timmy.
09:24 I'm probably not going to take minutes over Anton Watson.
09:27 I'm not going to take minutes over Ben Gregg or who they thought at the time was going to be ahead of Ben Gregg in the rotation Efton Reed.
09:33 So, you know, the me goals have to align with the we goals.
09:37 I like that the me goals have to align with the we goals. So my goal of getting a hat from Gonzaga Nation has to align with our team.
09:48 Yes. On a serious note, though, I think it is what you are saying is, yes, 2025 is still far away.
09:56 But this is not just news for news sake.
09:59 This is good news, largely that Gonzaga is going to be having this kid coming on campus because he's good talent.
10:04 And if you line up the stars, if you get zoomed yellow one, you get this kid the next year that Gonzaga is trending in the right direction for refilling the stocks overall in the terms.
10:15 Yeah. And the odd thing is nowadays in in the world of college basketball, you're going to get rejected by some guys when you're recruiting.
10:26 They just feel in other places a better fit.
10:29 But with the movement in the transfer portal is you also want to recruit enough guys and get to know them and what they're all about so that if they don't have success or they don't have a good experience in their first spot, you might be a perfect secondary
10:44 learning spot after year one or year two in the transfer portal happens all the time.
10:49 And that's that's done a lot more now than it was in years past.
10:55 That's a weird dynamic to think about that you could be talking to a high school senior saying, hey, look, I know you're in love with X, Y or Z.
11:02 But once reality sets in.
11:05 Yeah, but you wouldn't put it in those terms. Yes. Yeah. But yes, they're just the yeah, that's me distilling it all down into a very, very small sample size there.
11:13 Last topic we got for you, Dan, and we remind everybody, search and subscribe to Gonzaga Nation wherever you get your podcasts.
11:19 If you're a first time viewer or listener, thank you very much for checking in. Also, you can follow us at Fan Nation Zags on all the social media.
11:26 Dan, the Ken Palm rankings are out a lot of different rankings and everything.
11:29 But we want to talk about Ken Palm because they specifically have Gonzaga at five.
11:33 I'm curious your general reaction to that.
11:37 I know that we're still a couple of weeks out from actual basketball and everything is hyperbolic and you're going to give us a lot of generic lines of like, you got to play the game.
11:45 You got to this, you got to that. But five feels like something different to dissect than maybe if they were ranked 22 or something like that.
11:53 It feels like five is. Basketball minds are saying this is still a pretty dang good basketball team.
12:00 Well, Ken Palm is is computer driven, analytic driven, and it's not.
12:06 I test as maybe the AP or the ESPN USA coaches poll.
12:11 So, I mean, this is what the computers are in. Ken Palm has been around for about twenty three, twenty four years now.
12:17 And there's a historical data and value that they place on returning players, a historical data that's placed on a program of what they've done in recent years.
12:27 So, you know, Gonzaga has finished offensively efficiency in Ken Palm, I think the number one team the last three years.
12:38 And so, you know, that will sway it, that their numbers will be strong early on in this season.
12:44 They look at the metrics of their opponents.
12:48 They look at the strength of schedule. They look at away games, home games, neutral games, all those different things.
12:55 But really, the Ken Palm comes down to numbers, what you've done recently and what what what those results were, whether good or bad.
13:05 And it also takes into account the players on that roster.
13:10 So the efficiency of a Graham E.K. two years ago, the efficiency of a Ryan Nembhardt or a Steele Venters, Venters, excuse me,
13:18 that's going to be included in the analytic profile of Gonzaga this upcoming season, which is one of the reasons they're ranked number five in Ken Palm.
13:27 You know, I personally, after kind of starting to do a lot of my deep dive on college basketball leagues and teams for this year's broadcasting schedule,
13:36 I'll have I think, you know, I think. Eleven, twelve, thirteen, eleven being a P-13 when the coaches pull, which is where Gonzaga is.
13:45 I think that's right about true for Gonzaga starting the season.
13:50 You know, there's a lot of newcomers. There's a lot of things they got to figure out.
13:55 Hopefully, though, they figure out them quickly and the results and answers to all of the questions are good results.
14:01 It's all the questions because we are ultimately a Gonzaga podcast.
14:04 So we need them to stay in the top ten all season long. Please be much appreciated.
14:08 Dan, thank you very much for checking in with us again. Viewers, thank you guys for tuning in.
14:13 We will be reminding everybody every time we talk that basketball season gets that much closer.
14:18 So make sure you search and subscribe to Gonzaga Nation wherever you get your podcasts so you don't miss anything like Dan has teased now for a couple of weeks.
14:26 They have been recording furiously in this new studio, but stuff is starting to trickle out.
14:31 Adam Morrison has been releasing some of his perimeter pod again.
14:34 So there's all sorts of reasons to search and subscribe well beyond the filler summer content of me blabbing away, going, hey, look, I got the opportunity to hang out with Dan Dickow.
14:43 But yeah, there's a lot of great stuff coming out over the next couple of weeks.
14:45 So make sure you search the subscribe also follow Foundation's ads wherever you get your social media content.
14:49 Talk to you guys soon.
14:50 soon!