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The five walk-ons will be gone shortly, as will Marshall, Cuomo, and Holmes. David Allen is mildly problematic, as he was an academically ineligible signee. My predecessor apparently thought it would be cute to put all of his practice minutes into study hall. Not only in his freshman season, mind you, which any informed coach would do, but for the last two seasons as well. I will have to be certain that he is off of the depth chart completely so he does not want to return for a fifth year.

Both of the point guards I'm inheriting are nice players, and Mireles would be impressive if it weren't for his work ethic. In theory, I could field 3/5ths of a respectable starting lineup with the players over from last year's debacle. I will, however, likely be handing out promises like free samples of chicken at a mall food court, in order to fill up my team. I'm sure Hilliard and Lumpkin and Mireles will get their minutes, but it might be as backups.

I'm going to look to sign some transfers and JuCo players, in order to round out the classes. I'll also look for an ineligible or two, and I'll certainly want to redshirt somebody. Along with that, I may have to leave open a scholarship on purpose. That's if I'm lucky...I could certainly fail to fill the team.

I will be looking for three and four star recruits, most likely. The important thing right now is to get a base and create some continuity to set up the school for future generations of players. This method has also worked for me at Iowa, in Crum, where it even took me as far as the Championship Game on my first batch of guys.

I'm also going to be installing the Press and abandoning the Man-to-Man. I have yet to decide whether I'll switch offenses to the Triangle, which is the system I've used on all of my teams for some time. I may or may not eventually install the Zone as a halfcourt defense (something that has worked very well for me at the lower levels and at Iowa, but which may be unnecessary at MSU).

Congrats colorblind79, GL with the new job.

thanks guys.

I think I should post, for reference, the Big Ten as it stands before the start of the new season:

Name	Yr.	Pos.	A	SPD	REB	DE	BLK	LP	PE	BH	P	WE	ST	DU	FT	TOT
Dwayne Hilliard	Sr.	PG	92	94	1	96	6	9	76	97	97	59	81	57	A	765
Parker Lumpkin	Jr.	PG	97	97	11	56	1	23	72	97	97	56	77	56	C-	740
Matthew Mireles	So.	SF	89	73	61	75	41	65	83	48	58	22	79	55	C-	749
David Allen	Sr.	PF	39	42	60	58	49	45	17	18	18	58	53	35	D-	492
Averages	-	-	79	76	33	71	24	36	62	65	68	49	72	51	-	686

Offseason improvement/change:

#54 C, #244 Overall, ***, JuCo Junior; promised 15 minutes. Bicknell is huge, which is kinda fun to bring onto my team. He's only going to be with us for two seasons, and I signed him for a cheap reserve who'd help me round out my classes. I think he'll do pretty well in his time here, though I suppose that depends partially on if he knows the motion. I don't know at all whether he or Triplett does, because I didn't scout them.

#11 PF, #30 Overall, *****; promised the start, promised 20 minutes. The last of the big man recruits for the year, Fred Webb is the best player I've ever signed. He's got a ton of room to grow and a great DE rating and he's top notch at the FT line. Granted, he's not the best rebounding big man I've seen, but that'll change. His low post rating will get up to a very high level, too. I was positively shocked to get him without any kind of battle. He will be an NBA player for sure. His team ran the Man-Press on defense but I don't know what he did for offense.