Arkansas, Kentucky, Michigan, USC, Louisville and DePaul began the offseason with new coaches -- and virtually no rosters. Here's how they retooled.
New Arkansas head coach John Calipari perfectly summed up the state of the men's college basketball offseason -- what was, essentially, an offseason for high-major rebuilds. This spring and summer, 14 power-conference programs changed head coaches, and with them came the need for complete roster reconstruction. Just a few years ago, returning only three or four scholarship players would have seemed like a disaster scenario for a program.
"He came back last year, he was a growing leader on our team," Pope said of Robinson. "Getting to travel a journey with Jaxson, it's super special. ... He knew the door was open . There's nobody in the world that was more excited about that than me.
"That was actually the beauty of building a team from zero," Pope said. "When you're recruiting high school kids, you're spending a lot of time projecting. It's much easier to recruit guys that have played in college. You have film on them, you see the type of plays they make, see what's in their wheelhouse, see what's out of their wheelhouse. ... We're going to go handpick the guys that we actually see making the plays that we make.
"I really wanted FAU to continue the trajectory we established," May said. "There were a couple guys that wouldn't go back, no matter who got the job, or if I stayed. Every situation was different. Most of those guys, I had been with them so long. It was real, honest relationships: 'Here's the role for you there, here's what it would look like.' We had just been through so much as a group, there was a mutual level of respect.
"Word travels quickly in college basketball. We expected Vlad to be with us. If he wasn't in the NBA, he was going to be with us," May said. "Every big guy we recruited asked about Vlad. And I told them I would anticipate him being here. With Danny, everyone was using that against us. But with his skill set, his mobility, he might be more equipped to play the 4 in the Big Ten.
In fact, he asked USC athletic director Jennifer Cohen for a two-hour window before he flew to Los Angeles, to ensure he had phone reception when the news broke. "I know more about Big Ten basketball in the 1970s," Musselman said earlier this offseason. "How many Big Ten games have I watched of late? Not many. The TV was always SEC. I've tried to randomly ask coaches. 'Hey, what are the top three hardest places to play? Who are the top three coaches in the last two minutes?' As soon as I walk away, I hit the staff thread. We're trying to gather a database.
That last statement is something Musselman added to his transfer criteria this offseason: looking at the head coach at a player's previous stop. Holtmann focused primarily on players who would transfer up a level, landing productive low- and mid-major players originally from the Chicago area. He still also mixed in a couple of proven high-major players.
Calipari's meshed the two approaches effectively, landing five freshmen and six transfers, though he admitted not everyone would be a part of the rotation, and he wanted to
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