Potential Transfers into program

[JVShocker]

Looks like roster is starting to shape up and it’s getting me pretty excited about the athletes we have coming in. We have four solid starters with Dennis, Wade, Etienne, Gilbert. Now what can we get from IPC and Bilau. Another big, athletic 6’8-6’9 juco or transfer with some experience would be perfect. Someone who is a boarder and can cleanup. Preferably one who can shoot free throws which Udeze had trouble doing. Find that one big and we will be as good or better next year.. IMHO

Agreed. Hopefully one, two or even three of these men will step up and be a leader, both offensively and defensively. Not so sure we had a well defined one last season. By leader, I mean, someone to:
1. Step up and take a charge like Udeze would.
2. Provide direction on the offensive end of the court from the point, not just casually dribble the ball up and then casually dribble away another 5-10 seconds on the clock before making a pass.
3. Go to guy, or even two go to guys in case someone is riding the bench. I can't help but recall Jason Perez's frosh/soph season (?) when things weren't looking so good a few games in, and he stepped up big time in a game at K-State and became a solid initiator on the offense, that carried through the rest of the season and throughout his career. He wasn't too bad getting in those passing lanes from what I recall, and had pretty decent numbers with steals. But this season..... we would have a player go for 20-30 in one game, and then pffffffttt it for 3 or 4 games in a row. Consistency if at all possible, even if it is only 12-15 pts.
4. How about a rebounder. With all the Shocker history flowing on SN this time of year, a guy to step up and make rebounding a #1 priority a la X-Man. Maybe not necessarily his numbers (12-15), but a solid 8-10 per game would be an awesome start. X used it as a springboard for a pretty healthy career at WSU and in the NBA.

[Blackmag]

Agreed. Hopefully one, two or even three of these men will step up and be a leader, both offensively and defensively. Not so sure we had a well defined one last season. By leader, I mean, someone to:
1. Step up and take a charge like Udeze would.
2. Provide direction on the offensive end of the court from the point, not just casually dribble the ball up and then casually dribble away another 5-10 seconds on the clock before making a pass.
3. Go to guy, or even two go to guys in case someone is riding the bench. I can't help but recall Jason Perez's frosh/soph season (?) when things weren't looking so good a few games in, and he stepped up big time in a game at K-State and became a solid initiator on the offense, that carried through the rest of the season and throughout his career. He wasn't too bad getting in those passing lanes from what I recall, and had pretty decent numbers with steals. But this season..... we would have a player go for 20-30 in one game, and then pffffffttt it for 3 or 4 games in a row. Consistency if at all possible, even if it is only 12-15 pts.
4. How about a rebounder. With all the Shocker history flowing on SN this time of year, a guy to step up and make rebounding a #1 priority a la X-Man. Maybe not necessarily his numbers (12-15), but a solid 8-10 per game would be an awesome start. X used it as a springboard for a pretty healthy career at WSU and in the NBA.

I think a big time rebounder and rim protector would be super. Some who has good feet and can finish at the rim too

[rrshock]

Agreed. Hopefully one, two or even three of these men will step up and be a leader, both offensively and defensively. Not so sure we had a well defined one last season. By leader, I mean, someone to:
1. Step up and take a charge like Udeze would.
2. Provide direction on the offensive end of the court from the point, not just casually dribble the ball up and then casually dribble away another 5-10 seconds on the clock before making a pass.
3. Go to guy, or even two go to guys in case someone is riding the bench. I can't help but recall Jason Perez's frosh/soph season (?) when things weren't looking so good a few games in, and he stepped up big time in a game at K-State and became a solid initiator on the offense, that carried through the rest of the season and throughout his career. He wasn't too bad getting in those passing lanes from what I recall, and had pretty decent numbers with steals. But this season..... we would have a player go for 20-30 in one game, and then pffffffttt it for 3 or 4 games in a row. Consistency if at all possible, even if it is only 12-15 pts.
4. How about a rebounder. With all the Shocker history flowing on SN this time of year, a guy to step up and make rebounding a #1 priority a la X-Man. Maybe not necessarily his numbers (12-15), but a solid 8-10 per game would be an awesome start. X used it as a springboard for a pretty healthy career at WSU and in the NBA.

How about just someone with X's attitude? The rest will come naturally with that.

[JVShocker]

How about just someone with X's attitude? The rest will come naturally with that.

A real junk yard dog type. Someone who will go get the ball. Yeah. I can see it.

[Shockm]

Agreed. Hopefully one, two or even three of these men will step up and be a leader, both offensively and defensively. Not so sure we had a well defined one last season.

You mentioned Udeze as a leader because he took charges. While he was willing to do the dirty work, I'm not sure that is what we need to have. We had a lot of players who would have considered themselves that type of leader and many of them left the team, and while they were positive leaders during the good times, they weren't always positive leaders during adversity.

You can't have Freshman as your leaders. It rarely works, and last year, our Sophomore class had a few positive people who weren't negative (there were one or maybe two who were very negative leaders), but they had no skills when it came to positive leadership. Marshall had to "run" the team to death to get them to talk. Our Sophomores either didn't know how to lead properly, or worse, they were a "negative cancer" on the team.

Dexter is the type of leader who is a positive person but he is also a quiet person who isn't going to step out there and criticize his team mates (at least I don't think he's done it in the past). I'm not sure about Werth isn't a negative guy either, but he also doesn't seem to say very much.

I could be wrong, but it seems like Tyson Etienne is the type of positive person who is no longer a Freshman, who is going to be willing to step up and be a verbal leader this year. Additionally, while I don't know Alterique Gilbert and Porter, they seem to like they may be the type of players who are steady, consistent, and hopefully are going to help Tyson in a verbal manner. Fred was a one in a million who would step up by himself and be vocal and we had a good number of other players who were also positive who helped him even though they weren't verbal leaders. While we won't have another Fred, if several of these guys would step up, and help each other, with several showing verbal leadership during the pitfalls, and valleys of a season, this is what we need.

[shock]

You mentioned Udeze as a leader because he took charges. While he was willing to do the dirty work, I'm not sure that is what we need to have. We had a lot of players who would have considered themselves that type of leader and many of them left the team, and while they were positive leaders during the good times, they weren't always positive leaders during adversity.

You can't have Freshman as your leaders. It rarely works, and last year, our Sophomore class had a few positive people who weren't negative (there were one or maybe two who were very negative leaders), but they had no skills when it came to positive leadership. Marshall had to "run" the team to death to get them to talk. Our Sophomores either didn't know how to lead properly, or worse, they were a "negative cancer" on the team.

Dexter is the type of leader who is a positive person but he is also a quiet person who isn't going to step out there and criticize his team mates (at least I don't think he's done it in the past). I'm not sure about Werth isn't a negative guy either, but he also doesn't seem to say very much.

I could be wrong, but it seems like Tyson Etienne is the type of positive person who is no longer a Freshman, who is going to be willing to step up and be a verbal leader this year. Additionally, while I don't know Alterique Gilbert and Porter, they seem to like they may be the type of players who are steady, consistent, and hopefully are going to help Tyson in a verbal manner. Fred was a one in a million who would step up by himself and be vocal and we had a good number of other players who were also positive who helped him even though they weren't verbal leaders. While we won't have another Fred, if several of these guys would step up, and help each other, with several showing verbal leadership during the pitfalls, and valleys of a season, this is what we need.

This team is Alterique’s and Dexters. Plain and simple.

[Shock Top]

while they were positive leaders during the good times, they weren't always positive leaders during adversity.

That was what was so disingenuous about ES calling himself the "leader".

Sure, when things were good he'd be pounding his chest and pumping the crowd and his teammates up.

When things were bad, he'd have the worst slumped shoulder and hangdog look on his face you'd ever see.

[Shockm]

This team is Alterique’s and Dexters. Plain and simple.

I think you’re selling Tyson short. The coaches are most likely guiding him on what he needs to do to lead and from Tyson’s comments, he’s willing to listen. He may become one of our best leaders and I mean a verbal leader.

[MelvinLoudermilk]

This team is Alterique’s and Dexters. Plain and simple.

Did you see who was leading the team during 24 point comeback against SMU even though he wasn't having the best of games himself? If you have it recorded, go back and watch during the huddles. It was Tyson.

[WstateU]

Mark it down, TE will be the man!
TE is the man!

“That is all!”

[molly jabali]

Did you see who was leading the team during 24 point comeback against SMU even though he wasn't having the best of games himself? If you have it recorded, go back and watch during the huddles. It was Tyson.

THIS! WAAAAY back in the day(2 weeks ago) when we were still discussing Stevenson as a member of the team, and there was a Zapruder-esqe look at Eric's involvement, It WAS NEVER DOUBTED that Tyson was ALL IN from the beginning...

[wichshock65]

THIS! WAAAAY back in the day(2 weeks ago) when we were still discussing Stevenson as a member of the team, and there was a Zapruder-esqe look at Eric's involvement, It WAS NEVER DOUBTED that Tyson was ALL IN from the beginning...

“The one guy that I kept hearing positive things from was Tyson Etienne,” Marshall said. “I just love his enthusiasm. Not everyone 100% of the time is giving me positive vibes and positive energy and I’m not used to that and I’m at the end of my rope.”

Instead of telling teammates they were down 24 points, which sounds imposing, Etienne would tell them they were only down eight three-pointers, which was still the truth but sounded much more possible because it was a smaller number.

“I know it seemed far-fetched to come back, but I never stopped believing,” Etienne said. “We weren’t making shots. There were a lot of defensive mishaps. I never lost faith though. I told the guys, ‘We’re not going out like this. We work too hard.’ I don’t care if they say we’re young. I don’t care if we had a little slide. We are a great team and we’ve just got to believe that.”

Sure enough, Etienne’s mind tricks worked with his teammates.

[shockinglyno]

I'm on the Tyson being the leader bandwagon too. I loved what the players were saying about how he never got down when they were down 24 vs SMU and how he put it in a way that was like "we only need 8 3 pointers to catch up!!" to put it into perspective for them. I laughed when I saw he said that bc, I mean, when you put it that way it didn't seem like that much lol and he was just a constant positive force with them. I think next year, being one of the few returners, he'll gain even more confidence with being that kind of force for the team. Looking forward to watching that kid grow!

[shockersx]

I think the more leaders, the better. Rather than just one or two dudes, and I’d think they could lead in different ways. I can see Alterique being that guy that has experience on and off the court that a younger player could look to and he’ll help guide you in the right direction. Dex being the guy who quietly leads by example and the way he plays, kinda how I imagined Tekele was. And Tyson being that high spirited morale dude with contagious energy.

[Kashman]

This team is Alterique’s and Dexters. Plain and simple.

You spelled Tyson wrong