Messages

Mp91 - a mascot name change will have minimal effect on Valpo's business status. Since you brought the business perspective up, why doesn't the Valpo focus on getting the balance sheets sorted out and provide a basketball program and facility comparable to the MVC?

Too much energy spent on trivial matters. Valpo has bigger issues than this.

Our leaders (business & political) have run out of problems they feel they can tackle during their tenure.  It's altogether too easy to ignore the long and difficult projects in favor of quick hitting, inconsequential projects such as mascots (pro or collegiate).

In this one regard democracies fall short, short term solutions to long term problems.  We no longer have leaders who expect to be at the helm for careers, so what incentives do they have to effect '10-years out' if they'll be on their third job?

I don't really care if they change the mascot name, I just think it is a waste of energy.  If Valpo does not take care of their current financial situation, the decision of a mascot is a moot point. Professors and students need to focus on keeping the university strong and out of a cash sink, especially during these trying times.

Amen brother on all points!

https://youtu.be/7sb8xh69_Uw

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Was that posted on April 24th?  That was quite early.

[Georgia reports lowest number of COVID patients in a month]

Georgia reports lowest number of COVID patients in a month

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/georgia-reports-lowest-number-covid-patients-in-a-month

Georgia opened up before anyone else. Wasn't this predicted to be an unmitigated disaster?  Even President Trump was mad at their Governor. As someone who is anxious to see our country return to some sense of normalcy sooner rather than later, this is good news. But how will the moral narcissists react?

Moral narcissist: A liberal who projects moral superiority to discredit or dismiss conservative views. Moral narcissism is self-aggrandizing. It requires no personal evidence of adherence to high moral standards on the part of the claimant. It is pretense.

I agree with being smart while letting businesses open.  And imo Sweden has done its population a great service by not putting it in lockdown and causing panic (the same panic that prevents people who have had heart attacks from going to the hospital to get treatments that would've save their lives and a myriad of other health problems).

So please do not take this the wrong way but it was my understanding that we won't see the results of this opening for between 2 to 4 weeks when any current infections peek out.

So let's suppose that we cannot play in front of fans for the first semester this coming season.  Just a mental exercise, not looking to debate whether or not it will happen.  But what type of revenue is the men's team going to lose by not having fans in the stands?

If we average 3,050 attendees a game for home games . . .

Chairbacks ($25 ea?) x 200 = $5,000
Lower Bowl Bleachers ($15 ea?) x 500 = $7,500
Upper Bleachers ($10 ea?) x 2,300 = $23,000
Students (free) x 50 = Free

Total $35,500 before concessions/parking/misc

Last year it appears we had (5) home games before conference so -$177,500 for conversation sake.  Is that akin to (2) coaches salaries not covered?

I know I am probably in the minority here, but with my wife being the head of a Life Sciences department and a daughter on the front-line in Washington DC, it is frustrating to not hear or see data in its proper context. I know that DC is worse than Indiana, but some of the stories we are hearing first hand are frightening. Complications from this virus are still very unknown and our daughter says very unlike any respiratory virus she has seen. Since I work with Indiana County Health Departments and their Vital Records software recording deaths, investigating the best prediction models has become a project for me so I thought I would do some sharing of data from May 6th. In my opinion Indiana has been pretty slow and low in its testing, especially here in Allen County. Until the drive through testing was opened here about 2 1/2 weeks ago Allen County was worst of the 20 most populous counties in the state. To put that in context, Marion county, at that time, was testing at a rate almost 8 times that of Allen County. To be totally transparent, that difference as decreased drastically to 2.65 as of May 6th, but Allen County, the states 3rd most populous county, still ranks 49th of the 92 counties in testing. Here is some data on how Indiana is doing according to the Harvard Global Health Institute.


So don't go up to the podium and tell us we are going to reopen because here is how many new cases and deaths we had today... give us some meaningful data that instill confidence in that decision.

For those of you who think this is no worse than the flu, our total deaths from flu in Indiana during the 18-19 season was 113. Yes, in the past decade we had a flu season where deaths where over 350. Here is the link to Indiana's influenza statistics. Indiana Influenza Reports Automobile deaths for 2018 were 858. Covid-19 deaths by early August now estimated at over 5,000. Yes, that many, imagine what the toll would have been if the schools, restaurants, concerts, sporting events and churches had not closed. Just look at the infection rate in the food processing plants here in Indiana if you want to know what could have happened.

Currently the most accurate prediction model for the US has been Youyang Gu model. Here is a link to their site Covid19-Projections.com

One of our family businesses (restaurants) has been hit very hard by the closures.  We will be able to reopen this coming Monday at 50% capacity. Other than "all employees must wear masks and employees and patrons must practice social distancing" we have not been given any real idea as to what those instructions mean. I have heard at least 10 different ideas as to what restaurants must do during this limited reopening. Our leaders aren't being decisive and when they are one side thinks it's bad and the other thinks it's good. Can the political bias please stop. Sorry for the ramble.

Thanks for your real life input, it's invaluable in a time where most headlines are reporting on the craziest 1% of stories out there.  Keep us informed as you can please.  Because it's clear you have more real time examples than any of us could ask for in the embellishment of media today.

If the basketball season is affected, which it shouldn't be,  you are going to have a lot more to worry about than sports.  The viability of some colleges and universities  will be hanging in the balance. and some will close their doors if students do not return to campus in the Fall.  This close down has to end soon or this country is in deep doo-doo.  As long as some of the press, some academia and some in the public health sector keep promoting shut down instead of concern for getting the economy back up and running, people are going to run scared.   What are we going to do in the Fall when the regular flu season returns on it's annual basis?  Shut downs, masks, social distances, gloves , etc. every time someone sneezes,  coughs, or has a fever?  Many seem to be oblivious to common sense these days.  While some precautions need to be practiced right now,  lets not blow this all out of proportion.

And drop the Mic!  100% onboard with common sense here.  We are not evolved enough in medicine to begin to think we can entirely control the world we live in.  The business world is quite aware of what risk and reward is, as they deal with it on a daily basis. We should continue to consider what medical science knows today but we also have to make a business decision at some point and I think it's fairly safe to say that Sweden didn't fall apart so continue to open up intelligently and realize we may have jumped the gun on this one.

Correction:  I am not saying he is lying.  IF he actually is transferring,  IF...  declaration of his intent now shows a flaw, especially after his recent comments about  VU.  Things as important as this do not develop overnight.  The turning pro somewhere along the line holds no water with me.  Alec Peters pursued the draft and was told he should stay at Valpo and it would not effect his situation as far as a professional career was concerned.  If a college player is good enough for the pros, he will be identified as such no matter at what level he is playing in college.  There are  many examples to prove that.  Let's face it...some young men do make mistakes and execute poor judgement at times, sometimes listening to the "wrong" people for advice.  Sorry...at this point I am not buying the narrative.  I am sure that somewhere along the line the facts will come out and  perhaps prove my thinking was incorrect.   Time will tell.  Wouldn't it be great if he decided to return to VU?  In any event, I am looking forward to a fun and good upcoming season of VU hoops!

Javon is a special player, he would have continued to have the green light to shoot whenever he wanted at VU.  But if his shooting percentage stayed relative low it would have looked very bad at a mid-major school where he had the green light?  Maybe he was given a perspective that said if you can improve your efficiency from deep in a more serious league to boot . . . . well maybe that is the path to NBA.  I truly don't know, but it is safe to say he didn't have a ton to prove to himself at VU after this last season.  I wish him well and hope that this team has the offensive chops to replace his volume with more efficiency (and more consistent defense at times).

He is an outstanding player and young man (from what has been reported).  Good luck Javon.

Congratulations Jacob!

https://twitter.com/MichaelOsipoff/status/1243517272443871233

As I am sure is the case with many of you, I have been taking long walks around my own and adjacent subdivisions in the last few weeks. Among the neighbors that I have gotten to know (or know better) - at a safe distance - is a new neighbor who is a former D3 college player and assistant high school coach in Wisconsin. He has seen Jacob play. His comments were that Jacob is very skilled, but not that athletic. His stats are obviously inflated some because of playing against such small schools, but he was surprised that he did not generate more interest from Wisconsin, Iowa, etc. He thinks he could be very good at Valpo.

Thank you for sharing with the rest of us.  I am glad to hear of his skill level and personally I think that carries a player much further.  Frankly a young Parker Hazen was primarily athletic and taller than his competition, I bet he improves in college and is a good contributor as a senior somewhere.  But if a player relies solely on athleticism or size then I'd rather have a player that has honed his skill like a Dan Oppland.  The fact that Jacob has progressed as he has at the high school level means more, imo.

Robbins with about the fastest declaring to transfer to signing with a new school ever.

Turns out his uncle is Assoc HC there.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/247sports.com/college/basketball/recruiting/Article/Liam-Robbins-Minnesota-145735190/Amp/

I like HH but this tweet caused a $hit storm on twitter with Valley fans. Why be happy when other teams good players transfer? We should be rooting for other teams to be strong because it raises the play and profile of the league over time. Need to think big picture.

Plus, how would we feel if other fan-bases celebrated when it looked like JFL was going to transfer last off-season? It's bad taste, imo.

The MVC is much more of a community than the Horizon League and we should root for each other outside of the Conference regular season and when we go head to head in recruiting battles with them. As rising tide lifts all boats.

https://twitter.com/TSeghetti11/status/1246532027408691217?s=20
https://twitter.com/happeninghoops/status/1246531466055561223?s=20

Honest question, does Happening Hoops post on this forum?  Who is he to us on this forum?  I know some of you follow him on twitter and other mediums but is he active here?

Aaron Cook is transferring from Southern Illinois. Their website says he was a senior so either he is a red-shirt senior or verbal commits has it wrong.  He was an impact player being their leading scorer. That bring their total up to 4 and the total for the Valley to 15.  National total up to 556.

I guess that means they are losing a total of 6 players as senior guard Matt Chastain and junior forward Taylor Bruninga have decided to end their playing careers due to chronic injuries.

Those 2 are Illinois State (medical)

Seems like the total number of transfers across the country is way, way down,

Ag
Not sure about way way down!  Were at 493 now.  Christopher Agbo from Indiana State is transferring. That bring the Valley total to 9.

When did I say that?  Think you attribute the quote incorrectly.

Just curious because I don't know how recruiting and transferring works - but is the transfer network shut down with the rest of the economy.  In other words, when things start happening again, will there be a flood of transfers.  Seems like the total number of transfers across the country is way, way down, and I assume that this is related to the shutdown.  If the country-wide 'timeout' goes too long, do would-be transfers say "too late now, I'll stay where I'm at for now"?  I guess I'm just curious as to what the summer transfer list looks like, assuming things start to veer toward 'normal'.

I've been under the assumption that the inability to travel to the prospective landing places (campuses) will put a damper on the number of kids entering their names in the portal.  I don't see how a responsible effort to find a new school can be achieved without a campus visit and the key months for that have to be April - June.  TBD on when these governors start to open up their states and more importantly when these schools decide to open up their campuses again.

Anyone know if our International players were able to get home to their families?  Are they still here in the states?

Krikke
Freese-Vilien
Siggy

Geez, Wichita State now has (6) transfers.

Make that (7) transfers and (1) Senior so he is needing to replace (8) players on his roster.  Here is a well detailed article on the situation and it sounds eerily like Valpo to some degree after 2018/19 season.

https://www.kansas.com/sports/college/wichita-state/article241321281.html

Geez, Wichita State now has (6) transfers.

I'm living inside your head rent-free.

If you are speaking of vu84v2 that is a distinct possibility, the rest of us not so much.  I do think it's a sad situation if that is your end game.  That is no kind of life, but that is just one mans' opinion.  Have a nice day!

Ognacevic finished as a finalist for Wisconsin Mr Basketball but he did not win. Still plenty of good reasons to be really excited about this kid! Go Valpo!

So was he like JFL who finished (7th I think)?  Do you have the story you can share?

So fraudulent leadership is fine, as long as you fill seats and have a good game experience? And there are examples of "Christian-based" organizations who committed rampant fraud (MCI Worldcom), so the two are not always unrelated.

One other thing about Grand Canyon...they better somehow hope that the WAC will continue to exist (UMKC is leaving, Chicago State is on life support), because I strongly doubt any other conference will take them. In fact, one could argue that they are hiring Bryce Drew to attempt to build some legitimacy (though such legitimacy would still be false).

You are almost as convincing as Just Sayin 

I agree USC4Valpo! Not sure if it is high ask though but I can see high reward. He will own the program. Reminds me of Valpo first going D1 with Homer. Read Bryce's quotes.

What is he risking?  Coaches move between schools with more reckless abandon then ever.  He is at a level where his pedigree interests recruits and his lack of success in the SEC is yesterdays news.  Good luck Bryce.

P.S.  They are a fellow D1 sports program, I don't have the animosity towards their academics like some others do. 

[Dunk happens at 3:01]

Maybe this one dunk in Jacob Ognacevic's senior year compilation puts the athleticism question to rest... maybe.

Dunk happens at 3:01.

I'm curious at what % clip he'll shoot from the perimeter.

Do we expect them to get a volume of shots (say 3+ attempts per game) from deep?  I'm asking because I don't know his real game when he's playing other D1 athletes.

Beating Loyola, all the 3s vs Bradley, Mileek becoming one of our top 3 point shooters when others here were calling for him to stop shooting 

You take Mileek, I'll take Krikke and we'll see long term who actually reaches the supposed high ceiling ppl keep talking about.  I hope both for next year for the sake of the program though.

Wichita State has (5) transfers already.

http://www.verbalcommits.com/schools/wichita-state

An additional year of eligibility for our seniors?  Spring sports athletes too?

https://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/28898928/ncaa-discuss-granting-athletes-eligibility-relief

Unworkable. I see no way this could benefit honor bound mid major programs and coaches.

Kiser is done so at best it would be Fazekas (one player).