NT Portal Entries

UNTLifer · April 7

I know there are other individual threads, but thought maybe we could just consolidate them all.

247 shows Vice, Howell, Newell, Cotton, Smith and Lorient as in the portal

https://247sports.com/college/north-texas/season/2025-basketball/transferportal/?institutionkey=24114

Verbal commits shows all of these and Tyran Mason. I think we will really regret not playing Mason.

https://verbalcommits.com/schools/north-texas

Edited April 9 by UNTLifer

UNTFan23 · April 7

I'm not at all surprised that we will be rebuilding the entire roster from scratch.

BleedingGreen · April 7

110% agree that losing Mason will be a major regret !

Marty · April 7

Some may have been encouraged to leave.

UNT86 · April 8

You probably don't encourage anyone to leave unless they were a cancer on the previous team. I don't think that was an issue. Nothing along those lines ever showed.

But, we will have to start all over again.

UNTLifer · April 8

3 hours ago, Marty said:

Some may have been encouraged to leave.

I think they all met with Coach and he shared his vision for how he will build his roster. This doesn’t mean they all will leave, although they probably will, but since he doesn’t know any of them well, I would guess he encouraged them to check out all their options.
Mason is the one I really hate to see leave. He just has that look of a ball player that knows how to score. It is in how he carried himself in the court and his build. I could be wrong, but I think he’s really got something. You don’t lead a major metro area in scoring without having something in your bag.

NT80 · April 8

1 hour ago, UNTLifer said:

Mason is the one I really hate to see leave. He just has that look of a ball player that knows how to score. It is in how he carried himself in the court and his build. I could be wrong, but I think he’s really got something. You don’t lead a major metro area in scoring without having something in your bag.

Yes, he was already playing with confidence in the few minutes he got. He has a huge upside; sad he didn't get more time here. He will do well somewhere...avoid West Va.

keith · April 8

15 hours ago, UNTFan23 said:

I'm not at all surprised that we will be rebuilding the entire roster from scratch.

So we will not have anyone returning from this year's team. Weird, but it seems like that may be the way it's going to be going forward. Unless you can get a day 1 starter (unlikely), I don't know why we (or anyone else in our position) would ever recruit a high school player again just to have them sit on the bench for a year or two and then leave without getting any meaningful production.

Censored by Laurie · April 8

1 hour ago, keith said:

So we will not have anyone returning from this year's team. Weird, but it seems like that may be the way it's going to be going forward. Unless you can get a day 1 starter (unlikely), I don't know why we (or anyone else in our position) would ever recruit a high school player again just to have them sit on the bench for a year or two and then leave without getting any meaningful production.

I get this logic, but disagree with it for a handful of reasons.

1. I don't believe what we've seen the last two seasons is fully indicative of what we will see in perpetuity moving forward...I think we've seen two unique situations...one being a bunch of seniors transferring up for their last year of eligibility (hard to say they made the wrong choice with all 4 key parts making the Dance) and two, this year, a coaching change which will usually precipitate an exodus.

2. I think building a roster of 13 upperclassmen transfers all expecting play is a recipe for locker-room unrest when invariably a coach will land on an 8-9 man rotation. Vice and Mason and Howell were awesome, engaged cheerleaders all season...and I gotta assume that enthusiasm also carries over into practice. I doubt you get that kind of buy-in from a senior transfer if he ends up glued to the bench

3. we may literally not be able to afford a roster of 13 upperclassmen transfers.

4. as top programs basically build their rosters with transfers and top 50ish high school recruits, I think the level of incoming freshmen potentially available to us will go up. 3-4 star dudes who would sign with a Big 12 team to "develop" may want an opportunity to play now (and it seems from his CSU record, Robinson is more willing to play freshman than Hodge appeared to be)

5. mostly, we're only a few years into this new landscape and I do think there will soon be a normalization back toward keeping players for at least 2-3 seasons. development isn't dead...and given #4, I think we're in a position to benefit.

we'll see what plays out

keith · April 8

11 minutes ago, Censored by Laurie said:

I get this logic, but disagree with it for a handful of reasons.

1. I don't believe what we've seen the last two seasons is fully indicative of what we will see in perpetuity moving forward...I think we've seen two unique situations...one being a bunch of seniors transferring up for their last year of eligibility (hard to say they made the wrong choice with all 4 key parts making the Dance) and two, this year, a coaching change which will usually precipitate an exodus.

2. I think building a roster of 13 upperclassmen transfers all expecting play is a recipe for locker-room unrest when invariably a coach will land on an 8-9 man rotation. Vice and Mason and Howell were awesome, engaged cheerleaders all season...and I gotta assume that enthusiasm also carries over into practice. I doubt you get that kind of buy-in from a senior transfer if he ends up glued to the bench

3. we may literally not be able to afford a roster of 13 upperclassmen transfers.

4. as top programs basically build their rosters with transfers and top 50ish high school recruits, I think the level of incoming freshmen potentially available to us will go up. 3-4 star dudes who would sign with a Big 12 team to "develop" may want an opportunity to play now (and it seems from his CSU record, Robinson is more willing to play freshman than Hodge appeared to be)

5. mostly, we're only a few years into this new landscape and I do think there will soon be a normalization back toward keeping players for at least 2-3 seasons. development isn't dead...and given #4, I think we're in a position to benefit.

we'll see what plays out

Agreed that the last couple of years may be outliers, but it seems like every team is playing musical chairs now. We'll have to see how this goes. We obviously need practice players and players to step in if there is an injury. Not sure how important cheering on the team from the bench is, but as you said, they were definitely engaged and provided some energentic support to the on-court players. There is a cost to the athletic department, however, to fill those roles with scholarship athletes. Some estimates based on UNT budget numbers. By necessity some of these are averages and not specific to basketball as those numbers are not available. Football can skew some of these.

Cost of full grand-in-aid: $23,696 for in-state, $36,296 for out-of-state. Let's use $30,000 as an average.

Additional operational costs per athlete:

Travel: $10,600

Equipment/Uniforms: $4,100

Meals (non-travel): $2,800

Medical/Insurance: $2,800

So we are around $50K annually for a scholarship athlete. If we have four players that don't really see the court, that's $200K a year, $400K if they don't really see it for 2 years. Maybe that's a bargain for getting the most out of your 8-9 man rotation...who knows? I'm not sure how we sustain that level of investment for athletes that only see a minute or two of mop up action in a handful of games over a couple of years. As a comparison, we only generated $359,524 in ticket sales for men's basketball last year (probably less this year given the attendance drop-off). Maybe they are on partial scholarships so the investment is much less.

Censored by Laurie · April 8

1 hour ago, keith said:

Agreed that the last couple of years may be outliers, but it seems like every team is playing musical chairs now. We'll have to see how this goes. We obviously need practice players and players to step in if there is an injury. Not sure how important cheering on the team from the bench is, but as you said, they were definitely engaged and provided some energentic support to the on-court players. There is a cost to the athletic department, however, to fill those roles with scholarship athletes. Some estimates based on UNT budget numbers. By necessity some of these are averages and not specific to basketball as those numbers are not available. Football can skew some of these.

Cost of full grand-in-aid: $23,696 for in-state, $36,296 for out-of-state. Let's use $30,000 as an average.

Additional operational costs per athlete:

Travel: $10,600

Equipment/Uniforms: $4,100

Meals (non-travel): $2,800

Medical/Insurance: $2,800

So we are around $50K annually for a scholarship athlete. If we have four players that don't really see the court, that's $200K a year, $400K if they don't really see it for 2 years. Maybe that's a bargain for getting the most out of your 8-9 man rotation...who knows? I'm not sure how we sustain that level of investment for athletes that only see a minute or two of mop up action in a handful of games over a couple of years. As a comparison, we only generated $359,524 in ticket sales for men's basketball last year (probably less this year given the attendance drop-off). Maybe they are on partial scholarships so the investment is much less.

again, I definitely hear you...but that $200K/year, in what I'll just call "sunk cost" for the sake of this discussion, has always factored into financial math of a basketball roster. you'd be pretty hard-pressed to find a team that goes too much deeper than 10 players for a season, so there are always 3-4 non-contributing scholarship players

now, you could make the case that those 3-4 players were thought of as developmental and NIL has taken that away...but I A. think the sample size is too small to definitively say that and B. would suggest that you could go back pre-NIL, 20 years, 30 years ago and agin you'd be pretty hard-pressed to find a roster that had 13 eventual contributing scholarship players...players transfer, players don't develop...there's always a miss-rate

now, if you wanna make the argument that we somehow cut down to only using 10-11 of our scholarships...and maybe get creative with the accounting and funnel some of that savings into NIL...I'm listening.

also, I really don't know the answer here, is a scholarship an actual expense? or is it just a sort of debit to the university's ledger?

keith · April 8

33 minutes ago, Censored by Laurie said:

again, I definitely hear you...but that $200K/year, in what I'll just call "sunk cost" for the sake of this discussion, has always factored into financial math of a basketball roster. you'd be pretty hard-pressed to find a team that goes too much deeper than 10 players for a season, so there are always 3-4 non-contributing scholarship players

now, you could make the case that those 3-4 players were thought of as developmental and NIL has taken that away...but I A. think the sample size is too small to definitively say that and B. would suggest that you could go back pre-NIL, 20 years, 30 years ago and agin you'd be pretty hard-pressed to find a roster that had 13 eventual contributing scholarship players...players transfer, players don't develop...there's always a miss-rate

now, if you wanna make the argument that we somehow cut down to only using 10-11 of our scholarships...and maybe get creative with the accounting and funnel some of that savings into NIL...I'm listening.

also, I really don't know the answer here, is a scholarship an actual expense? or is it just a sort of debit to the university's ledger?

That's essentially what I was leading to. Could we redirect that (some or all) to NIL for our rotation players. These are definitely expenses that show up on the AD financial statements. I'll admit, some of the accounting and back-and-forth from the university to the AD and then back to the university could definitely use some sunshine. What I've listed is basically direct expenses for a scholarship athlete. There are also indirect costs of the coaching staff's time to work with the players and develop their games. Our fully-loaded annual expense for the basketball coaching staff in FY24 was $1,825,690 or ~$130,00 per player per year. In the past, you hoped to get that investment back when they matured or became upperclassmen and moved into the starting line-up or rotation. Now, if they leave after a year or two, all that development accrues to a different program. Of course if we're bringing in similar transfers then we're the beneficiaries of another coaching staff's investment. We just need to hope they were as good or better than our staff at developing talent.

Shark84 · April 8

On 4/7/2025 at 3:27 PM, UNTLifer said:

Verbal commits shows all of these and Tyran Mason. I think we will really regret not playing Mason.

I hate to lose Mason as well but it wouldn't have mattered if Hodge had played him or not. If he had played well, he would still be gone. I would have loved to see how he would have developed but...

UNTLifer · April 9

Floyd is in the portal. All are gone outside of Allo.

Glory to the Green · April 9

Allo’s in the portal.

23 minutes ago, UNTLifer said:

Floyd is in the portal. All are gone outside of Allo.

UNTLifer · April 9

11 hours ago, Glory to the Green said:

Allo’s in the portal.

Don't see him listed. Is that because he was a walk-on? I think I saw that kid miss two shots total in warm-ups over the years

Rudy · April 9

On 4/7/2025 at 5:16 PM, Marty said:

Some may have been encouraged to leave.

Yeah, by a shitty admin telling them they, and athletics don't matter.

2020 Sucks · April 9

A team needs 15 for practice. You can't just carry 10 and get the work in that you need. So somebody has to be out there doing the work to make others better...and hopefully getting better themselves as well. Anywhere you see a successful team, I guarantee you that the practice squad is also good! UNT needs to be bringing in young talented players, but we need a way to get them to stick around.

Glory to the Green · April 9

4 hours ago, UNTLifer said:

Don't see him listed. Is that because he was a walk-on? I think I saw that kid miss two shots total in warm-ups over the years

Dannymacfan · April 9

What will we do? All of our players are departing us!

GrandGreen · April 9

I can't stand this continued charade, that college athletics makes money. With close to 80% having their primary funding being the school and student fees, there may be 20% of schools that generate a true (not student funded) profit.