What Grade do you give Coach P for her portal signings?

Your grade is -

  • A

    Votes: 67 80.7%

  • B

    Votes: 15 18.1%

  • c

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • D

    Votes: 1 1.2%

  • F

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Inc.

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • Total voters
    83
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Gopher_In_NYC

Gopher_In_NYC

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I’m going with an A.

I’m certainly a novice to this side, but most of the comments have been very favorable and it seems like we have a deeper team with additions of Merkle, Thomas & Harmon (a firm you can trust)😃
 

A+ when you factor in how she was also able to keep all but one player who had eligibility left.
 

Easy A- for me.

First off you retained everyone with eligibility outside of Holloway. I do think Holloway would not have been in the rotation, with that said she is a loss off the court, its hard to find people who do accept their role as a bench player and do their best to lift others up. Hard to quantify how big of a loss Holloway will be.

Then the Gophers add 3 productive power 4 players to the team. All 3 have some flaws but they have all proven they can play at this level. On paper Merkle is an upgrade from Hart and Thomas is an upgrade from Tonga, that is not a slight on those 2 players they both were fantastic in their role on the Gophers last year. They probably take a slight step down from Battle to Harmon but Harmon is probably a better natural scorer than Battle.

I do think the Gophers got a little worse defensively this offseason albeit still good but their offensive potential went way up!! My biggest concern is they don't have a natural pass first PG. Not saying that is a bad thing but it is my biggest concern and I am curious how Harmon/Braun/Tori/Kussow fill that role.

I did not give it an A because they did not add a straight blue chip player (Merkle is really close to that), but its hard to do better than the excitement Dawn is bringing to the barn. The progression of this program is amazing and excited to watch them next year.
 

Sometimes we fans forget that most of the players in the portal receive multiple offers. So it was never a given that Coach P and staff were going to do as well as they did in the portal. I'm guessing that last year's success certainly helped in getting players interested in the Gophers. Also the large crowds for the NCAA tourney home games were a testament to interest in this program. And Coach P's ability to retain players has been excellent. That seems to be a indicator that players like playing for her and also a testament to the loyalty the players have had to the program. Can't wait till the season starts. Go Gophers!
 




Gopher_In_NYC said:
I’m going with an A.

I’m certainly a novice to this side, but most of the comments have been very favorable and it seems like we have a deeper team with additions of Merkle, Thomas & Harmon (a firm you can trust)😃
Click to expand...
How can you go A the lesson of the NCAA's is thatcyou need quality size in the poat we has Hart and Tonga but they actually were not big enough to match up against high quality posts. We got nothing there! U ouggt to be able to pick up guards in the portal n she has more guards coming in. We once again will be a relatively mobil and good shooting team ( but not super mobil) and no siE inside so the best this team will do next year maybe top 8 or 9 if they execute otherwise lower half of the conference. Love her as a coach very mediocre recruiter
 

A-/B+. Dawn did great given we probably didn't have the booster NIL of some other schools. An A+ would be if we pulled a coup and got McGill or Trygger. But altogether a great management of the portal this year.
And we'll get to see Merkle vs Trygger at some point. Don't know if ISU is on our schedule. Maybe we'll realize we got the steal of the portal...
 

MTBeaudry said:
How can you go A the lesson of the NCAA's is thatcyou need quality size in the poat we has Hart and Tonga but they actually were not big enough to match up against high quality posts. We got nothing there! U ouggt to be able to pick up guards in the portal n she has more guards coming in. We once again will be a relatively mobil and good shooting team ( but not super mobil) and no siE inside so the best this team will do next year maybe top 8 or 9 if they execute otherwise lower half of the conference. Love her as a coach very mediocre recruiter
Click to expand...
What?
 




MTBeaudry said:
How can you go A the lesson of the NCAA's is thatcyou need quality size in the poat we has Hart and Tonga but they actually were not big enough to match up against high quality posts. We got nothing there! U ouggt to be able to pick up guards in the portal n she has more guards coming in. We once again will be a relatively mobil and good shooting team ( but not super mobil) and no siE inside so the best this team will do next year maybe top 8 or 9 if they execute otherwise lower half of the conference. Love her as a coach very mediocre recruiter
Click to expand...
While I appreciate your thoughts, I am completely unaware of what you’re specifically trying to communicate 🤷‍♂️ May I suggest sentence structure and proofreading?

I’m sure you picked us to finish third this season, congrats👍, and wisely never would have offered Tori or Grace either in the first place.

As someone whose spent most his life as a contrarian for real, and not on a message board, you’re not very good at it🤠
 

MTBeaudry said:
How can you go A the lesson of the NCAA's is thatcyou need quality size in the poat we has Hart and Tonga but they actually were not big enough to match up against high quality posts. We got nothing there! U ouggt to be able to pick up guards in the portal n she has more guards coming in. We once again will be a relatively mobil and good shooting team ( but not super mobil) and no siE inside so the best this team will do next year maybe top 8 or 9 if they execute otherwise lower half of the conference. Love her as a coach very mediocre recruiter
Click to expand...
Spell Check can be your friend.
 

MTBeaudry said:
How can you go A the lesson of the NCAA's is thatcyou need quality size in the poat we has Hart and Tonga but they actually were not big enough to match up against high quality posts. We got nothing there! U ouggt to be able to pick up guards in the portal n she has more guards coming in. We once again will be a relatively mobil and good shooting team ( but not super mobil) and no siE inside so the best this team will do next year maybe top 8 or 9 if they execute otherwise lower half of the conference. Love her as a coach very mediocre recruiter
Click to expand...
Just gonna say that I watched many games this year where 6'5" Sophie Hart was the tallest player on the court, and now we added a center who is a whole inch taller....
 



We added a playmaking point and a dominate center along with Thomas from Northwestern, I believe an A is in order! None of those Minnesota kids were coming here, they’re out for big pay days not allegiances to home state.
 




Who would give anything less than an A? Players see the building of the program.
 


did someone really vote a D? or did they hit the wrong button?

she brought back our top 3 scorers and brought in the pieces we needed..
 


Gopher_In_NYC said:
I’m going with an A.

I’m certainly a novice to this side, but most of the comments have been very favorable and it seems like we have a deeper team with additions of Merkle, Thomas & Harmon (a firm you can trust)😃
Click to expand...
I voted D yesterday because we got one year transfers and no true center that moves to a A / A- now that they got Merkle. If they stay healthy they will be very good!
 


Gophermangeek said:
One year transfers? Harmon and Thomas both have 2 years of eligibility left
Click to expand...
I was about to point out the same thing.

Also, ideally we'd be growing some of our own talent in the long term so we don't need bandaid solutions from the transfer portal. So I'm kind of hoping that after this upcoming year, some of the underclassmen like Christian, Bershers, Kussow, Oehrlein, and Paben will be ready to have significantly increased roles. In my opinion, it's infinitely better to have someone taught your system from the beginning rather than just brought in for a year or two.
 

MTBeaudry said:
I voted D yesterday because we got one year transfers
Click to expand...
They’re not one year transfers, as both Harmon and Thomas have two years left.

MTBeaudry said:
and no true center that moves to a A / A- now that they got Merkle. If they stay healthy they will be very good!
Click to expand...
MY thread was posted after the Merkle thread about her committing; I know as I posted it, specifically mention Merkle in my OP - additions of Merkle, Thomas & Harmon (a firm you can trust)😃, and just confirmed it by looking at the time stamp on both threads.

So my friend, maybe you wanna slow your roll a bit?
Or not?

However, this didn’t work out so well🤷‍♂️
 

Gopher_In_NYC said:
They’re not one year transfers, as both Harmon and Thomas have two years left.


MY thread was posted after the Merkle thread about her committing; I know as I posted it, specifically mention Merkle in my OP - additions of Merkle, Thomas & Harmon (a firm you can trust)😃, and just confirmed it by looking at the time stamp on both threads.

So my friend, maybe you wanna slow your roll a bit?
Or not?

However, this didn’t work out so well🤷‍♂️
Click to expand...
And with Merkle & Thomas transferring in, Zoey Bershers another year older, and Woodson coming back from injury; the pressure to play the freshmen bigs will be nil.
 


I can't think of any recent years where a player or players haven't gotten injured either for the season or at least several games. These will be the 'next lady up' opportunities for the freshmen to get minutes. They will undoubtably occur.
 


"The Athletic" has a post-portal Top 25 and the Gophers are at #9. A lot can happen; as Gopher fans we know that only too well, but Dawn has the program in a very good place. W have what looks to be a really deep team.
 

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