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St Thomas
Mar 30, 2021 13:01:33 GMT -6
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Post by hoopsmom on Mar 30, 2021 13:01:33 GMT -6
With St. Thomas moving from D3 to D1 next year, there’s obviously going to be a talent upgrade needed. I know that several D3 players chose to play at St. Thomas because of academics. However, I think we can all agree that it is a different experience. In addition, the St. Thomas coach, Ruth Sinn, is very active in the Minnesota AAU scene, having coached for the Minnesota Fury and recently for North Tartan. I have noticed on the transfer tracker that quite a few Minnesota girls are entering the portal. Some from Summit schools, some from others, including two from the D2 school where Maddie McKeever is now coaching. It makes me wonder how many of them are going to be contacting St. Thomas...
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Post by fightsd on Mar 30, 2021 13:34:23 GMT -6
Interesting topic. The portal makes it possible to bring a team up to speed quickly when moving up a division, or 2 in this case. In theory, you can bring in an influx of talent and hope to put a fairly competitive starting 5 on the court. I guess my question is, how attractive is St. Thomas for potential portal players? I never played basketball at the college level and I don't think the transfer portal was even a thing when I was in school, but my impression has been that there are 2 common scenarios that lead to a player entering the portal. 1 - the player wasn't highly recruited by the top teams out of high school but had a strong enough college career to get them their shot. Or 2 - the player wasn't really happy with the way their college career went (whether it be playing time, coaching, whatever) and they want to have a year to see the court somewhere else. I suppose there are cases where the player wants to pursue a grad degree that's not offered where they currently play, but I guess I just don't hear about those as much.
So is St. Thomas going to be an attractive spot to land for people transferring out of other 'area' schools? I have to think it would be a tough sell for them to bring in a player from a Summit League team, especially a competitive one. We will have to see I guess.
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Post by kiyoat on Mar 30, 2021 13:51:07 GMT -6
is this a good source for current players in the transfer portal? wbbblog.com/womens-basketball-transfers-fall-2020-summer-2021/or is there a better place to look? I'd say that St. Thomas is uniquely situated to take advantage of the fact that tons of players are recruited from the MSP metro to other places. Some players simply get homesick, or want the opportunity for their families to come to more games. I'm guessing they will be a formidable opponent both on the floor and in the living room.
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St Thomas
Mar 30, 2021 15:18:40 GMT -6
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Post by hoopsmom on Mar 30, 2021 15:18:40 GMT -6
St. Thomas is a very good academic school. Their women’s coach, Sinn, is phenomenal, and has been very successful in the D3 arena. She was also a very high level AAU coach in the Minneapolis area.
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Post by Yotes on Mar 30, 2021 20:23:14 GMT -6
I think St Thomas would be really unattractive to players looking to transfer right now, unless it's someone just looking to go home to MSP. That program has such an uphill battle moving to D1 (gonna lose a lot of games), they can't play in the postseason for at least 5 years, facilities are at a D3 level, and the hype around the program hasn't increased at all yet. That location might mean the world to a lot of players though.
In the future though? Absolutely. With the right vision, St Thomas could turn its program into something like Marquette or Creighton. It's a long road though. I feel like facilities are one of the first road blocks and as far as I know there is no plan there yet. I caught an interview with the St Thomas AD on the radio the other day and he was specifically asked if there were any facilities requirements moving up to D1. The answer was basically "no, we aren't held to any attendance requirements so we do not have to act at this time". I'm sure that they plan on making improvements, but this sudden transition coupled with a pandemic probably means it's going to be many years before they can show recruits something resembling D1 facilities.
Who knows. There's so many resources in the area that they might be able to find creative solutions in the interim to mitigate this shortcoming.
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Post by elcoyote on Mar 30, 2021 21:33:56 GMT -6
St. Thomas is a very good academic school. Their women’s coach, Sinn, is phenomenal, and has been very successful in the D3 arena. She was also a very high level AAU coach in the Minneapolis area. I don't quite understand this. I would think the NCAA would frown deeply on a college coach being heavily involved in a summer program for high school players what with recruiting restrictions, timelines etc.
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St Thomas
Mar 30, 2021 21:48:13 GMT -6
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Post by hoopsmom on Mar 30, 2021 21:48:13 GMT -6
St. Thomas is a very good academic school. Their women’s coach, Sinn, is phenomenal, and has been very successful in the D3 arena. She was also a very high level AAU coach in the Minneapolis area. I don't quite understand this. I would think the NCAA would frown deeply on a college coach being heavily involved in a summer program for high school players what with recruiting restrictions, timelines etc. But she was a D3 Coach, and they don’t recruit in the same manner that D1 coaches do. There are quite a few local D3 coaches that spend their springs and summers coaching local AAU teams. Another thing to consider is that D3 players don’t work out together in the summer. They don’t start their team activities until mid autumn.
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Post by Coyote Fan on Mar 31, 2021 1:06:47 GMT -6
If it were up to me I would rather invest in people than facilities. Poor facilities didn't stop the Coyote Women's program from getting good in a hurry. The dome is nice for football but one of the worst facilities for basketball. People are more important than buildings. With that said the SCSC is a nice facility. I don't think it has made as big of a difference as Craig Smith, Amy Williams and Dawn Plitzuweit have or did. Todd Lee is still a work in progress so that could go either way yet but he is obviously trending up. I will always say I would rather watch a great team play in a sub standard arena than a crappy team play in a great facility.
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Post by fightsd on Mar 31, 2021 14:47:25 GMT -6
If it were up to me I would rather invest in people than facilities. Poor facilities didn't stop the Coyote Women's program from getting good in a hurry. The dome is nice for football but one of the worst facilities for basketball. People are more important than buildings. With that said the SCSC is a nice facility. I don't think it has made as big of a difference as Craig Smith, Amy Williams and Dawn Plitzuweit have or did. Todd Lee is still a work in progress so that could go either way yet but he is obviously trending up. I will always say I would rather watch a great team play in a sub standard arena than a crappy team play in a great facility. Facilities play a big part in recruiting these days. It's not really an either or thing with coaches and facilities. You need both. I'll also add that I think the dome gave us an advantage in basketball. It was such a weird setup that other teams weren't used to playing in.
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Post by Coyote Fan on Mar 31, 2021 15:48:39 GMT -6
I am not sure that the advantage of having the weird shooting atmosphere in the dome trumps the advantage of having a louder arena where more fans are closer to the court. Obviously that is up for debate. I would rather have a louder and more intimate arena over an arena that has a weird shooting background but half the sound gets drowned out 100 feet in the air. I know as an athlete I imagine they would rather be in the SCSC, not for the amenities but for the atmosphere.
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Post by fightsd on Mar 31, 2021 15:57:30 GMT -6
I am not sure that the advantage of having the weird shooting atmosphere in the dome trumps the advantage of having a louder arena where more fans are closer to the court. Obviously that is up for debate. I would rather have a louder and more intimate arena over an arena that has a weird shooting background but half the sound gets drowned out 100 feet in the air. I know as an athlete I imagine they would rather be in the SCSC, not for the amenities but for the atmosphere. O I agree the SCSC is much better venue. Was just pointing out that the old dome was a tough place to play.
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