I will repeat something I've written here before.
Danny Sprinkle of Washington was last year's Niko Medved - he was a very successful coach in the MWC, and was universally praised as a great hire, both within the fanbase and outside. Unlike the Gophers this year, they even brought in a high-dollar transfer (Great Osobor) among the many new players on the roster. They were still mostly under-talented compared to the rest of the league, though, and they struggled. We'll see how this year goes, but they did have a highly-ranked recruiting class and got USC's starting backcourt to come to Seattle.
This year for Medved is very analogous to Sprinkle's 2024-25 year (perhaps with even lesser talent). To expect better results than Sprinkle's year one/zero is perhaps being a little optimistic.
