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3 Guys Before The Game - Josh Eilert Visits (Episode 485) · 3 Guys Before The Game

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Just when you thought you had us figured out, we go special edition on
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you. Like they think they thought, they thought they are lovable listeners.
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They thought, well, it's football season. They're gonna go preview, review,
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preview, kind of like a kind of like a pickleball match. They
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go preview review, preview, No, no, no, no, A
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slide one in on you. Ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to a special edition
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of Three Guys Before the Game. It's episode number four hundred and eighty five
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with our special special guests. Would you please welcome to the program the head
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basketball coach of your West Virginia Mountaineers, Josh Eilert. Long story, I
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mean, you know how many obstacles we had to go through to get this
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guy in here. Six gatekeepers, six gatekeepers, fifty two. I mean
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it's not true. That is not true. No, he was all over
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the world. I mean, you know he was been in Morgantown seventeen years.
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This is my first invite, first invite. I mean, there wasn't
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a slow weekend. There's somewhere he's just slide, Josh, He's gonna fit
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in. Just find he's been here fifteen sex. His firing shots. We've
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only been on six. We've only we've only done this for six. I've
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been here in the last six two. Yeah, this is going swimmingly well.
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Okay, oh, it's good. He gets an honor. No,
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thanks, thanks for having it's good. It's good to have you here.
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Josh Eilert, his withers were talking. Hoops coming up. And our program
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Three guys. Also brought to us by the one wonderful folks at Coomac's Business
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people are outstanding, outstanding service people. It kind of go above and beyond,
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don't. They showed up at my house yesterday ye came to the house,
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business data was safe, secure and efficient for twenty five plus years and telling
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me they're terrific. You think, what if Tony had NIL back in the
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day. He's been, he's been embracing it for years. A coach.
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Coach he has been. He's always been working in IL. Believe me,
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he's always been working side deals. Futurist. I'm a futurist in the NIL
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kind a beautiful lou Wendell boat out on Somersville Lake in the last episode Hoppy
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of these beautiful Someone texted us back on that and they said, you guys
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missed one of the things in the in the water. There was a dog
3:27
in the water. Didn't see that. Didn't see the dog we saw flying
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at the flying WV on the seats and the flag and in the background there
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the dog. I don't even have to go back and look at the picture
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to see. Maybe Luke can bring that up. Luke find that picture again
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of the pontoon, but we gotta find the dog. Also, three guys
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is brought to us by the people to put the gas in all the pontoon
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boats in West Virginia. Gomark go for good Times. You go for Gomart
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save money on your fuel, save money on your food. And they now
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have just brought in a few of the location have a seventy one pound rec
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it. Most of them will fit in the back of a pick up.
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Put the seventy one pound recy cup back there along with a seven foot slim
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Jim and you're in business. Go for good times, go for Gomart.
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Unconfirmed as to which those four locations are. Yeah, I haven't waiting on
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that waiting on that list. By the way, Mountaineer Man Trip Gomart gets
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two people in the Mountaineer Man Trip. That'll be Saturday for the first time.
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They announced the winners last week, So congratulations to all those. Should
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be great weather for that, right, should be really should be really nice.
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Oh kay. So here's the delio. Josh Eilert is with US Mountaineer
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basketball coach and I want to start off because you know, throughout the course
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of this six years that we've done this podcast, I may have gone overboard
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a little bit at times. Well I exiled the entire continent of Australia when
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one of their punters never showed off. Had to mend that fast. I
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need to apologize to you because mark that down. Well you'll remember this.
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In a second shock, he remembers several weeks ago when you made the trip
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to go see jesse Ya, thank you. We were I was. I
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said, I said, look at this video that look at this video that
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WVU shot, and I said, look, think about this. Whoever's doing
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the creative video for WVU basketball, they got a free trip to go with
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Josh to go on this trip. I said, that's a great deal.
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And Brad said, I don't know if they I think Josh shot that.
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I went, what are you talking about? Josh shot that? And then
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low and behold, I call your confident Brian Mesley, who runs the whole
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as you well, runs the whole basketball department, go to the control and
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he said, no, Josh shot that. Yeah, that's a heck of
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a job. Well, what do you expect? That was a video coordinator?
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Thank you? Literally what I said, thank you? I mean,
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think about the cameras these days. I mean, the quality is amazing.
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I just turned it away and that's all we have, like six second clips
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and I just kept on bombarding our our creative guy with six ten second clips.
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And there you go. That was putting all together. I mean when
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you had the shot when you were taking off, but then you had the
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thing and like you making the whole trip over the plane hoppy. You just
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were on a twenty four hour flight. So I thought it was really we're
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really well done. Give me your schedule, coach, you give him your
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flight schedule because you were you were well, I mean that that week.
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I mean we're supposed to go to Italy that week. And I came up
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with the ideas like, hey, what are we doing. You can't go
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out recruiting, so let's go connect. You know, our assistant coaches are
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fairly new for the most part, So I said, let's go connect with
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our our own players. Let's recruit our own players. Let's go sit down
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with their families, Let's go spend some time with them while they have that
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break. And so my original idea is to go to Estonia first and seek
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her. His plans changed and he wanted to go, you know, off
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in the neck of the woods to see his grandparents before he came back.
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So back to the right schedule, I go in a week's time, which
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you put it on paper. You're thinking, I can't do it. I'm
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young, I'm I can handle this. So I go Pittsburgh to DC,
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DC to Munich, Munich to Riga, and I'm like, I'm good.
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This is now. You did you get a rental in Riga? Yeah?
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Yeah, okay, you just took by yourself Yeah, there's other than the
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signs that they all mean the same thing. Yeah, jeering wheel on the
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same side as everything was good, no problems there. Uh. And then
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less than twenty four hours or twenty four hours later, I spent that whole
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day with the Netherlands national team. I turned around and came back. So
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I went Riga to the Munich Munich to Chicago, Chicago to Pittsburgh, and
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that's six flights and coach coach, by the way, not business class,
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you fo, coach, Well fancy coach. They gave me the exit rows
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to me as good, to me just as good. You know what,
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I know, it's first class, first class, totally with that. Yeah.
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Then I turned around two days later and as all planned ahead of time,
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I'm gonna go see Ray Ray kwon battle in Seattle right in reservation and
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too late the tribe and see him on his home turf. So two days
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later I'm I'm taking a four and a half hour flight to Seattle and then
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then doing the red eye coming back. So wow, it it beat me
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up. I was I felt it felt good for the first day back,
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but then the day two and day three kind of wore on me, and
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it took me a while to get my bearings. But I mean this day
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and age, if you have eight flights and none of them are canceled,
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dude, yeah, that's lots of win. You're living large, which with
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this new league that's coming up, you might as well get used to that.
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But anyway, who who held the camera when you surprised? Jesse Edwards?
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That was the one shot you didn't shoot? Yeah, twofold. I
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had a lot of time to sit there and wait because I had an insider
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that was working with the Netherlands team of course was giving me all the deep
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tales when they were coming in X, Y and Z, so I also
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I didn't know that they were going to film it. So I had the
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two ladies the front desk. I said, can you this is what's going
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on. It was late at night too, It was like, this is
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what's going on? Can you film this interaction? And I didn't explain it
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well the first time. They looked at me like this guy's a creep.
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Yeah, it's a creeper. Creeper yeah, So I said here and maybe
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willingly did it once I explained it better. But the shot that you guys
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saw was I think a manager or strength coach. I just told from the
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inside, like you need to, because the whole team knew I was coming.
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Jesse didn't know I was coming, So they did a good job of
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of welcomed me. And I spent a whole day with that team and really
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got to know their players, their coaches, their strength coaches. And it
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was just as much for me an experience, but as it was for Jesse
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to see see his coach and seeing outside men and join him. It was
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awesome. Well it was genuine. You could tell when he saw you.
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It was like genuine, like, oh my gosh, you're here. And
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you could tell that he appreciated that. Now, well that being said,
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and you said, okay to your staff, let's go out there and visit
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our kids where our kids are. How much of that has been on your
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mind to make sure that you build this because it's, let's face it,
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this is as odd as odd could be. And how how important is that
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compared to the actual lexus and knows At this point I thought it was a
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critical from the jump, I mean, before they started looking at you and
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drawing up plays. They gotta they gotta trust you, and they gotta respect
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you and I told our our coaching staff, like, well, we I
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mean, let's let's build that. Let's start from from a solid foundation and
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build those relationships up and and that's what we kind of intended to do,
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and that's what our game plan was moving forward. And we got great guys.
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It wasn't like, hey, I don't want to go see this guy,
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know what he means, but you know, it was everybody's like,
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yeah, I'm on board. Let's do it. Because the opportunity, you
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know, get in front of families and that recruiting process that was lacking because
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we didn't recruit them a lot of them. So we need to rerecruit them
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in a way. Because I kind of got the idea. I mean,
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Joe Joe's parents immediately came in. They traveled in and they got like five
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or six kids, and they spend a day there. But they wanted to
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feel comfortable with who was coaching them. So we sat down for two or
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three hours one day and I said, we need to do this. We
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need to go out there and spend some time with them on their home tour.
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One clarification, so Joe Joe is Josiah Harris who is going to be
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a true sophomore that's already graduated. Yeah, how in the heck did he
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do that? Yeah? How does that happen? I mean, how did
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he? Was he taking college courses in kindergart I think I think he was,
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But like his mentality was I was talking to today, his mentality was
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take as many classes as you can while they're paying for which is you don't
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see very many kids. He's similar to Hoppy, Like when he goes to
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a place that's got free food, he packed bags. He just two years.
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That's I mean, that's taking that to the extreme. That's a great
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theory. We've seen guys do that, not two years. No, right,
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and he's gonna have his masters, he's probably in a year. And
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like I was like, what are you gonna do? Get a PhD?
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Yeah, I don't start it so we can start medical rounds junior year.
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It just starts medical rounds after the season. This day and age, where
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do you see that? I mean, guys taken advantage of their education and
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really value on that. And I think it's just beautiful. Just and you
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can just keep playing. Just don't I mean for years, just don't even
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you know, just let him play, right, Well, I mean that's
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my thing. Oh, it's my thing. See, before all this COVID
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stuff happened, I always used to say, one team should every college team
12:30
should have a franchise player that can play for ten and the pretty good idea.
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I'll take that. Yeah, you get one really good player that's not
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well, hell with nil. Now it doesn't matter. It's the same thing.
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You can go make seventy thousand venezuela, or you can stay here,
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make two fifty and nil and just be here for ten years. Face of
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the program. I love that idea. See if you can pull it off.
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Yeah. Hey, the raekwon Battle one was interesting. That had to
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be a different eye opening experience on the visit. What was that like?
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It wasn't it wasn't. We connected really really well from the beginning, even
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when he came in on his visit. So I don't know if you guys
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know, Tony might know. In the early nineties, I spent two years
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on a reservation growing up. So I was twelve thirteen years old and I
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was forced by divorced to be moved up to South Dakota, the Pine Ridge
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Reservation in South Dakota. It was one of the poorest counties in the country.
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Oh, I never knew I had a background and that type of lifestyle
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and that type of you know, the poverty and the drug abuse and all
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those things that kind of happened, you know, on a reservation. So
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I was. I made that quick relationship with him on his visit, and
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so I was excited to see him on his home turf and see all the
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things that he's went through in his life and learned from his grandmother or his
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grandfather, his mother, his brothers, everybody on that that entire reservation,
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and how they look at him as like complete inspiration and the way he got
13:54
out of there is making so much of his life. I would imagine then
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that when you had conversation with him first, when he came here and you
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you shared your story, that had to be like it was. It was
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a connection right off the bat. And the crazy thing is that that visit
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happened really fast, and it was part of the reason why he came in
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because that connection that we had on the on phone calls and and he made
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the decision to come in while I was, you know, on the road
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recruiting and I was supposed to get back on a certain day, have dinner
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with him, take him to the airport the following day, and have about,
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you know, twelve fifteen hours of quality time with him, talking about
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flights Earlier, I get about thirty minutes to the airport and Atlanta, I
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get a text, your flight's been rescheduled for tomorrow morning. I'm like,
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I can't do this. I gotta go see this kid, have a I
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have a great connection with him thus far, and I don't want to miss
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my opportunity to spend some time with him. So I just turned the car
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around from Atlanta back to Morgantown on a nine ten hour drive and got there
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in time. I got there late, but the whole morning I get to
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spend with them, take them to the airport. So I got about you
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know, six seven hours. Wow, that is incredible, So coach that
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this is all fascinating. So how much when you're when you're talking to these
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players, you're recruiting, you're rerecruiting, and we were talking before the show
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about nil, So how much is how much are you going to pay me?
15:16
And how much is it that they feel they and their families feel comfortable
15:18
with you in the program. I mean, what's the what's the equation.
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I think that the younger the player is the high school I mean, they're
15:26
gonna go through the whole recruiting process and they're gonna want to see this,
15:28
that and the other. But when you're dealing with transfers, it's it's more
15:33
of a condensed timeline. They've been around the block, they've been on the
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visits. They don't really want to be seeing all the bells and whistles.
15:41
They know what's important to them. When you talk about NIL in terms of
15:45
being a variable, it is a big variable now, but it's it's also
15:50
who you're playing for, what type of facilities they have, what type of
15:54
fan base they have, what kind of connection you have with the fan base,
15:58
what conference you're playing, and in UH system get system questions like how
16:03
are you going to play? All those variables, and then the way I
16:07
see it, they kind of narrow it down to two, three, four
16:10
schools and then on the back side, the NIL piece comes into it,
16:14
and then that's negotiate On the back end, that's out of our control.
16:18
So you got to do your best on the recruiting side of things and hope
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that the NIL and the trust and everything like that works in your in your
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favor. So you've described these amazingly hectic, unusual circumstances that you've gone through
16:33
here in the last several months. It was an absolute whirlwind. As we
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record today, the sixth day of September, do you finally feel like you
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can breathe yet? Yeah. The other day, the Labor Day weekend,
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I really took a step back and like I didn't have anything going on.
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Yeah, I could like, hey, Teddy, what are we doing?
16:56
Uh? So, Teddy's as youngest son. Teddy is my six year old.
17:00
He's he's a daddy's boy, and he wants to do everything with me.
17:03
So so I got three days with my family. I mean, we
17:07
put the big screen out on my back deck on Saturday and put the game
17:11
on, end up bringing five or six of the players out to come watch
17:15
it with me and my family. And it was a great day. It's
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a great day. The following day, you know, we did some things
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as a family and went to the pool, played a little golf with my
17:23
oldest son, and like, I finally kind of got a chance to sit
17:27
back and relax and realize how grateful I am for the position I'm in not
17:32
exactly the way I thought I'd get it, an opportunity the way I thought
17:34
I would get it. But here I am. If you're prepared, good
17:40
things can happen and be ready for it. I think this will go down
17:45
as one of the all time greatest stories about patience. I mean mine numbing
17:52
patience. Yeah, like sixteen years of patience. I mean that to me
17:59
is like one of the all time greats. To see how this happened.
18:03
And I'm a big family man, Tony, and you know that, and
18:06
family is so important to me. And I remember looking my family in the
18:11
eyes when all the uncertainty was happening, and I realized, we've been here
18:15
fifteen years or sixteen years, and in this business when there's that type of
18:22
security and job security and there's there's I mean, that's that's a blessing,
18:26
and you don't see that very often. So yeah, I was I was
18:30
patient, and I worked up. I mean I started a ga K state.
18:33
I was a video coordinator here when I got in here in oh seven,
18:37
I did director of operations. I stepped in and got a taste of
18:40
it as an assistant coach when Ronnie went out for a year, and I
18:44
chased Oscar around all year and then I went back to my role, and
18:48
you know, I bumped up to assistant a d for director for a for
18:52
basketball operations. Then I finally got that years an assistant coach and it happened
18:56
fast. Like like I said, I mean, I've seen every area of
19:00
that building. I've set and you know, probably five different offices in that
19:04
in that building, there might be four, but regardless i've been I've seen
19:11
it all there in that program. And I was working for a Hall of
19:14
fame coach that really knows his stuff and how he operates. So I learned
19:19
a lot from him, you know, every day in the building. And
19:23
obviously we don't see on everything. And now I can take what I thought
19:27
was we had differences and put those put my stamp on on West Virginia basketball.
19:33
So two part questions, maybe three part questions. So that's a really
19:37
good point. You've seen it from all angles. First part, at what
19:40
part in that journey did you say, Okay, I want to be a
19:42
head coach or has it always been that number one and then number two along
19:47
the way. How are you cataloging all of those different things? Because you
19:52
mentioned you got this in a way that's non traditional. But when you got
19:55
it, you had to be ready to go. So how are you cataloging
19:56
all those things that you wanted to do once the time came that you took
20:00
over. I'm not I'm not a big I don't put it on paper like
20:03
I just stored away up here. You know, I've always wanted to be
20:07
a head coach. Well, I wouldn't say always. You know. I
20:11
went to school Case State. I was a finance and marketing major. I
20:15
worked outside of basketball. My first year after I graduated, I was a
20:19
loan officer and Seneca Kansas doing ag loans. So I found out real quick
20:25
that's not what I wanted to do. I mean analyzing credit and going and
20:27
counting cattle for collateral. I was like, I mean, I'm a farm
20:32
boy and I have a lot of that in my background, but this isn't
20:36
me. And my wife, Brandy, to her credit, she's like,
20:40
dude, I mean you're young, we're engaged, we're young. She was
20:44
still going to school Case State, like figure it out, do what you
20:47
want to do right now, and and she was right. I went right
20:51
back to Jim Olridge at Case State and jumped on with him as a GA
20:55
as a graduate assistant and got that masters and college student personnel and Eric leege
21:00
athletics, so I got my foot in the door. I knew he was
21:03
probably on his way out because he hadn't made postseason in five years. This
21:06
is a sixth year, but I was gonna take that chance. And coach
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Huggins came in as my second year as GA. We hit it off.
21:14
We're pretty much you know, you know, down to earth people and we
21:18
saw basketball the same way, and so we connected for a year. I
21:22
had a great year and turned things around at Case Dight, and then opportunity
21:26
arose when he came out here took the job, and I was like why
21:30
not. Brandy's like, let's do it. Let's take the opportunity and come
21:33
out here and get a jumpstart our career. Coach at Rin Baker said at
21:37
the announcement that you're the interim head coach, that he was not going to
21:42
make any decision until after the season was over, So that gives you a
21:45
lot of leeway. So as you prepare for the season, how often do
21:49
you think or do you think about Okay, not only am I trying to
21:52
win games and coach the team. But I'm auditioning for the job or is
21:56
that on your is that on your mind? I mean it comes into play.
22:00
I mean, first thing when it when it all went down, you
22:03
look up at the graphic and the interim was so stinking it was I'm like,
22:10
who in the graphics department has a zero faith in me? Just like
22:15
we did we need sixty five font Yeah, I mean I hadn't proven anything.
22:23
I got it, so like, let's let's move on, let's figure
22:26
this out. Uh So we worked through that. But the way I look
22:30
at it, I'm I'm the head coach for a ten month contract, and
22:34
I'm gonna treat it like I am the head coach and I'm here for long
22:37
term. And that's the way we operate every day, and that's the way
22:41
you have to operate. We recruit for long term. We were building our
22:47
program in terms of what we're doing x's and knows everything is is. We
22:51
have a long term vision and we want to be here. And credit to
22:55
some of our staff members. I mean Dayshaun Butler leaves the New York Knicks
22:57
to come and he couldn't get here fast enough. He said, I'm in
23:02
let's go, let's go to work. And he's been awesome and everybody on
23:07
our staff, and we're young, we're energetic, we're excited to be here,
23:11
and I love the fact that we got an opportunity to prove ourselves.
23:14
Can you slip day Shaun in? I mean, you know the kind of
23:17
he can hell slipt Alex in too off, I mean, DeMar Johnson,
23:22
Jordan, you got a heck of a that's a heck of a staff there.
23:26
If you want to line up any staff in the country, there's no
23:29
question, literally and DJs is DJ is competitive as anybody, so he'll put
23:33
that out there all the time like anybody wants to try us. Let's go.
23:37
So that'd be a good one one at five on five games. I
23:41
see you post and build self up instantly, just as just give it to
23:44
me, just bring it down the block. So what what do you think
23:49
is being over talked about as far as the staff and the fact that it
23:57
is a bunch of newcomers with the exception of Dermar But I mean, you
24:00
know Alex and Jordan and day Shawn, you know PELI, well, they
24:04
haven't called a time out, had that I'm not gonna I'll give you my
24:08
opinion after you give me yours, but my me go ahead. I mean
24:14
they're right in saying that, and that's fine. I mean it comes with
24:17
a job, and I mean there's gonna be critiques, critics everywhere. But
24:21
we've been around basketball. I mean, like I said earlier, I've been
24:25
every facet of this organization. I've seen it firsthand how it's operated. So
24:30
have they, And they've had each of one of my assistants have a heck
24:34
of a lot better playing career than I have. But so they understand the
24:38
game. Have we called a time out? And no, I mean we
24:42
did add coach Dickie to the fault. I mean he's been a head coach
24:45
of three different high major teams, so he brings a crazy amount of experience
24:52
to the table. And and it's an asset that you know, people don't
24:56
realize we have that kind of went under the radar or when we hired him
25:00
because we kind of made the big splash with Dayshaun and Alex and Jordan and
25:03
DJ had been retained. But he's he's a great piece. Every day,
25:08
he's he brings a different angle to the table. And says, hey,
25:12
just think about it this way or or or I know we're moving forward here
25:17
to have you thought about this? So even not only for me as a
25:22
head and new head coach, for every single one of our assistants that you
25:26
know, they're kind of first time assistant coaches, so he's help helps them
25:30
from a day to day basis as well. So my take on it was
25:33
this because, as you said, you have seen i mean unbelievable amounts of
25:38
basketball. You've been sitting there. You know when it's time to call a
25:42
time out, you know when it's time to change the defense, you know
25:45
when it's time to run a special, you know when it's a time I
25:48
mean, it's in the it's just what you do. Yeah, So that's
25:51
that's what our lifestyle has been right last twenty years. So whether it be
25:56
the playing days or not, it's not always gonna be. Everybody's gonna be
26:02
on the same page. But the head coach is the CEO of the program.
26:06
He's taken in information from everybody and trying to do right by everybody,
26:10
but ultimately trying to win games. So sure it would have been nice to
26:15
have those Italy games and kind of get some dry runs, but they're not
26:18
you've been over there, they're not all that real. I don't know how
26:22
healthful they would have been. All right, you're right, I mean we
26:23
get it. We get a dry run and a scrimmage which we're going to
26:27
scrimmage, a close scrimmage with the high major SEC team. He can't can't
26:32
say who it is, secret secret, don't. God forbid, we wouldn't
26:36
want to say that. Don't want to don't, don't. Don't. Just
26:41
gave you the conference us. It would seem though, with with this particular
26:44
group, I would think the player relationship one. The skill development as you
26:48
move throughout the season, You've you've got a heck of a staff there when
26:51
it comes to skill development, and Alex already doing it great. Jamar right,
26:52
you're gonna listen to him day, Shaun and Jordan those that's about as
26:56
good as it can getting skilled. We've been using that. That's a huge
26:59
self for resturant. Yeah, if you want to get better, no better
27:02
place than in West Virginia because we got young, energetic staff members that really
27:07
put attention to detail on all those skills and developing those skills and whether it
27:11
be Jordan from the point point guard perspective, or or they're really talented six
27:17
nine wing out there, or a guard that can be developed by Damar Johnson
27:22
think about him. I mean, we've played one year as a six nine
27:26
guard and went on the league and would have had a lot longer career than
27:30
eight years in the NBA had not gotten a car wreck. So then day
27:33
Shawn's got all those connections overseas, Alex got all those connections overseet sees.
27:37
So I feel like we got such a well rounded staff. We're young,
27:42
Let's be honest, we're young, but we're excited. We're excited. We're
27:45
feeding off that energy from each other. How do you want to look?
27:51
Do you have? If you have you gotten to the point yet where you've
27:52
seen enough of them running up and down the floor where you know what you
27:56
can do offensively, well, what will this look like a little bit tony?
28:00
I mean, we've we've got a bare bones playbook that I sat down
28:06
and we built, and we've got through some transition, we've got through early
28:10
offense, but we've really mixed and matched everybody from a practice perspective to just
28:15
see who plays well with each other, who plays who doesn't play well with
28:18
each other? So we're really we're in an experimental phase when a lot of
28:22
teams right now are just doing skill development. We're taking that four hours that
28:26
we have on the floor and it's all teamwork and it's just like we're practicing
28:30
and we practice, you know, we're trying to get that, you know,
28:34
because we're a little bit behind the eight ball in terms of a lot
28:37
of those teams have that structure already in place, but everybody's new in terms
28:42
of what we're doing. So we're trying to learn and we're trying to throw
28:45
that out on pretty quick and we're building and we're like, yesterday we had
28:51
our first two hour practice, went great, The energy was amazing, people
28:55
were making shots, they're feeding off each other. So there's gonna be a
28:57
lot to be excited about. You for Mountaineer Nation. Is that combos you're
29:02
trying to see who plays well together? Mostly what I know you have a
29:04
general idea of what skill set each guy has, But is that what we're
29:07
trying to find there is? Yeah, and you got a match up in
29:10
lineup last week. We finally got two pieces in that we were still waiting
29:14
for yeah. There for the longest time we shoved the practice if somebody was
29:18
hurt or had his brained ankle. We're dealing with nine guys. I'm like,
29:22
hey, can we just get ten? So we can just because I
29:26
mean, we had a lot of moving parts. Jesse was coming back from
29:29
the Netherlands. Uh, you know, we had a cook coming in.
29:32
We're trying to get him cleared. So we had a lot of these things
29:34
going on the same time. And now we got you know, fourteen guys
29:37
to work with and we're going full steam ahead. You're gonna run though,
29:41
right, but we're gonna try to play fast. Get absolutely, we're gonna
29:45
try to play fast. Here we go, yep, going why not try
29:48
to score easy? Or you got athletes beating down the floor? That's right.
29:52
Coach, who's the do you have? Have you identified the alpha dogs?
29:56
Because coaches can only do so much. And then you know, the
29:59
coach leaves a lot room and then who's gonna be the guy or guys it
30:02
says listen, man and and and helps hold the thing together because every great
30:06
team, every good team has guys like that. So has that been identify?
30:08
It's definitely concern of mine. Trying to figure out who's gonna step up
30:12
in the hard when things get hard, who's gonna step up in the right
30:15
direction, and and and get those guys, let's go, let's pull those
30:19
other guys along. It's definitely concern of mine. But they really haven't been
30:22
in a position yet to really show that. I hope that you know,
30:26
a couple of guys and a few and I have in mind they're gonna pull
30:30
that pull that direction when we get there, but they haven't really been in
30:33
a position to show that yet. So I'm I have that as a concern,
30:37
but we haven't got there, and some of that just emerges, right
30:40
and you're gonna see who takes over who plays, and people will naturally gravitate
30:44
to those and we gotta can't force that. We can't just go in and
30:47
a sign that hey, Ray kind you're gonna be the leader who that that'll
30:49
organically organically happen. If it doesn't, it's not gonna work. So we
30:55
got guys with a lot of experience. We had an old team and if
30:57
you look at the probably the core of what we got and they have a
31:02
lot of experience. And I'm not trying, I'm trying to put a solid
31:06
structure in front of them and let them play off each other because they are
31:08
veterans in a lot of ways, and I don't want to stand in the
31:11
way of their natural, instinctual way that they play basketball. We've talked a
31:15
lot about Ray kawon Battle and your visit out there. Obviously, his waiver
31:19
is still up for debate, and I saw a stap that I didn't like,
31:23
like last week that less than twenty percent of the second time waivers are
31:30
being approved. You have after one hundred and ninety percent of them were approved
31:34
Kurchable. Yeah, that's that's a bit. What are the rules months ago
31:38
you were eligible? Come every now and then somewhat applies to rule and otherwise
31:42
well, I mean NCA less the cat out of the bag and starts approving
31:45
everything rubber stamp, and then then then then don't and they leaves a lot
31:49
of kids hanging because it's like, oh, what happened, And so we're
31:55
working through that. I think we got a really good case on Ray.
31:57
I feel really good about it, regardless of the numbers, and if anybody's
32:01
saw and really dove into his story, it'd be a no brainer from the
32:07
NCA absolute no brainer, and I hope they see it that way. I'll
32:13
give you some of these names and tell me what you liked and when you
32:16
put this roster together, because there's a bunch of different guys from a bunch
32:22
of different places. So we'll go with the Florida State transfer and Jeremiah Benbury,
32:28
highly touted injury, didn't play last year red shirt at Florida State.
32:32
What's he bring you? He brings athleticism in length, and he's he's gonna
32:37
look at trying to eat up some of those minutes from back, back up
32:43
point guard perspective, but he's got a lot to learn. He's never played,
32:45
he's never played one bounce of college basketball, So trying to get his
32:50
feet wet, so to speak, and get him some of those reps,
32:52
he's going to be a challenge right off the bat. But he has a
32:55
lot of potential, absolutely a lot of potential with his length and and I
33:00
really I've always liked long, big guards, and especially with that type of
33:06
athleticism. I hope he can get to a point where he shoots it a
33:07
lot more, uh, you know, gets at a higher clip shooting the
33:13
ball. And we'll figure that out. We're gonna rep him and rep him
33:15
and rep him. But that's gonna come with some confidence playing the game.
33:20
What do Mountaineer fans need to know about Kirk CARESSA He's fun, He's fun
33:23
to be around. I think that once they really dive into this personality Kirk
33:28
Cresa, Uh, they're gonna fall in love with him. And saw that
33:31
video he had when he was home with those animals. Animals you never know
33:36
was gonna come out of his mouth, and this is very entertaining. We're
33:38
gonna have to have him on the radio show sure from time of time.
33:42
Style of play, what's he like? He is a everybody would want to
33:45
play with Kirk Cresa. If you're a basketball player, he's gonna find you
33:51
when you need to touch the ball. He is a pure POINTU so he's
33:53
the past first point past this point guard. And if you don't like playing
33:57
with Kirk Cresa, you're not playing a game the right way. So I
34:02
mean that, and that's huge in recruiting. We got Curve first and then
34:07
Jesse Edwards. Uh, those two got connected. Like who wouldn't want those
34:10
two combination? If I'm Jesse Edwards, Like I want to play with the
34:14
point guard like that in a pick and roll situation. So we got those
34:16
hooked up and and like we were talking about early hot Hoppy, sometimes your
34:22
your players are your best assets in the recruiting game, especially if they get
34:25
along that they don't shy away from competition. So all those guys want to
34:30
win, so so they kind of pleat off each other, and especially in
34:32
the recruiting aspect of things. What about Free Oh Fred is young. Uh,
34:39
he's definitely a piece that's got so much, so many things. So
34:44
many times you see in practice like how what did he just do? You
34:46
know he's got a lot of the European games, don't we just really skilled?
34:51
Right? Yeah, he is very skilled. He just he's got a
34:54
we know in the Big twelve like strength and athleticism. Uh, he just
34:59
can't him in here. And his weight is so low and mainly because his
35:04
age, but he's never really seen a weight room. Now that weight room
35:07
has put on seven past seven eight pounds on him already, So he's just
35:12
got to develop and develop and get that strength because the skills there, the
35:15
skills one hundred percent there, and he's gonna do things that that kind of
35:20
like you're gonna look at each other like what just happened? And he does
35:23
those things in practice, and so long term he's going to be a big
35:28
piece. All right, let's go into Quinn Slozinski, who actually played at
35:32
Huntington Prep from Houston. Was at Iona Quick Coffee Stop Saint John's. Now
35:38
he's here. Why do you want him? Is IQ? First and foremost
35:44
his basketball. IQ is probably one of the better ones on the team.
35:46
He's top two or three and and that's invaluable, especially for a first time
35:51
head coach to be able to not have to explain as many things, like
35:53
he picks it up and he's been coached by very good coaches, so when
35:59
he came in, I mean it was it was not allowed to explain.
36:01
He's like everything comes quick, and so he knows how to play off each
36:07
other. He knows how to make the right pass, he knows what we're
36:09
looking for defensively, and he can pick it up and then he can make
36:13
shots. He's a stretch for that's gonna make shots. So he's gonna he's
36:17
gonna play a big role. Jo was a Perez who obviously the most talked
36:22
about mountaineer that's never played yet. Is he here years unconfirmed? But you
36:29
know, he's also one of those guys who's a huge in recruiting process.
36:31
I mean, he connects well with people off the floor. He has a
36:35
really good connection with people, and if you're with him every day, you'll
36:38
fall in love with him. He's very unorthodox in the way he does things,
36:43
but he has a way and a knack of putting the ball in the
36:45
basket. And you've probably seen him at practice last year and Teddy Allen esque.
36:51
Yeah, he has that Teddy Allen to him, and his head on
36:54
a lot straighter than Teddy Allen's. But yeah, we can He's certainly can
37:00
do a lot of things. And when we look at jose and and how
37:05
we do things defensively, we'll have to get a lot creative. But he
37:07
has a he has a knack for scoring at basketball, score more than shooter.
37:13
Yeah, he can clear out end of the shot to isolate him and
37:16
he can find a way to score it. You know, fifteen foot in
37:21
and at a very high clip. You needed size, and so you went
37:25
and you went to get a transfer from Georgetown. But we played against him
37:30
when he was at Yukon in a cook A cook a guy another guy's played
37:32
a lot of basketball. What do you see his role being? He was
37:37
probably the biggest. Like just such a pleasant surprise and a breath of fresh
37:40
air for what we're trying to do because he is so active defensively and he
37:45
runs the floor so well. And I think they had him tabbed as the
37:50
Big East Defensive Player of the Year before he transferred US. And he has
37:54
shown that in practice. I mean he can, he can get to the
37:57
ball, he can alter shots, you can use him to you could switch
38:01
one through five with him. He can still he can really he can sit
38:07
down and guard about anybody on the floor because it moves that well. Holy
38:12
So that's that's that's to have that versatility with guys like that, it's it's
38:17
it's you know, he's he coaches raising expectations here. I'm getting he's not
38:22
here to lose, he's here to understand. I'm just he's gonna win these
38:24
guys. I'm like, let's go. Yeah, we didn't really have any
38:27
We didn't really we didn't really have any size to back up Jesse either.
38:31
So and I went on when I went over to lot Va, I'm sitting
38:34
there watching these games and and I'm like, you got two fouls in the
38:37
first three minutes. I didn't fly all the way from from your the flights
38:42
culture schedule earlier. I didn't fly all this way for you to sit on
38:45
the bench because you got two fouls. We're gonna gonna have to figure this
38:46
out really quick. So we're gonna have to get creative with Jesse, mainly
38:51
because he's been sitting in that zone for for four years at Syracuse. So
38:54
the first questions we had when he came in, it's like, you know
38:58
how you do things on ball screen cut, So he's gonna have to do
39:01
some things he's not used to. And we're repping that right now to figure
39:06
out what what's our strategy to keep him out of foul trouble And anytime I
39:09
see him, whether it be a like yesterday he rolled into a man on
39:15
a pick and roll, and it's gonna be a foul in this league every
39:19
night, night in and night out, Like, we gotta clean this up
39:21
right now. So we got we gotta be really meticulous with making sure we
39:24
keep him out of foul trouble. And and we have some pieces there,
39:30
but we can slide a cook, he can play the five, and he
39:34
can give us that versatility. But uh, we're gonna find out real quick.
39:37
You're gonna want Jesse Edwards on the floor. But you can play them
39:39
together. You're gonna play a couple. Yeah, they can play. Absolutely.
39:44
I think he's a couple of good shot blockers there, And especially when
39:46
you have some question marks on the perimeter on how well they guard. Having
39:50
Jessee and a Cook to clean things up on the back side, that's definitely
39:53
and give those guys a lot more confidence to get up there and guard people,
39:57
and god forbid they get b They got help on the backside much huge.
40:01
We mentioned Ray quite Let's talk about him specifically as a player. This
40:05
is a dude. Yes, yes, he's probably our purest athlete. And
40:10
he's just smooth with everything he does so and and when you when you watch
40:15
him take a shot and he lifts so well, so quick, and he
40:20
releases a high kind of like Dooce did. He can get a shot off
40:22
about anywhere on the floor whenever he wants. So he's a guy you can
40:27
you can put the ball in his hands and go get get a shot.
40:29
Now, he's not gonna He's not gonna go buy people on the dribble and
40:32
this, that or the other, but he can go get his shot with
40:36
one or two dribbles and rise up and got to him. Those guys take
40:39
it over people. And so he is a key key piece not only from
40:44
the offensive standpoint, but the defensive standpoint because he is such a good athlete.
40:47
He can stay in front of about anyone. I know they probably didn't
40:52
ask him to do that at Montana State, but because he was such a
40:54
big piece offensively, but having him, he's a well rounded player, well
41:00
rounded person, and just a guy that you want to be a part of
41:07
your program. Perimeter wise shooting, who are you looking to there? We're
41:10
gonna look at Seth. Wilson's gonna to take a big step up. So
41:15
Seth and Kur's gonna have to take shots when he's open. I know he's
41:17
a pastor, first point pass, first point guard, but he's got to
41:21
look for a shot. Kobe Bryant, Kobe Kobe Johnson as well. He's
41:28
made like four or five threes yesterday in practice. You might go week and
41:31
not see him take four or five threes, and he made four or five
41:36
yesterday. The confidence is up for him, yes, And I told him
41:39
two weeks ago, I said, we're gonna work really hard to get certain
41:43
shots and if you're open, you have to take it. I don't care
41:45
if you don't feel comfortable with or not, which he wasn't that aggressive offensively
41:50
in the past. He's got to take that shot. And I think we've
41:53
in then last week or so come leaps and bounce with his confidence. And
41:58
to have him as a verse fatility piece as well as well as he guards
42:02
and he can back you up at the point if you need to. It's
42:07
really nice to have him really building some confidence here early Joe Siah Harris.
42:14
You guys loved him last year and think he can be a real, really
42:16
good player. How has his one year to two year ago? It's been
42:20
good. I mean, he's he's worked as hard as anybody in the gym,
42:22
and he's you know, it's you look at how hard he's worked academically.
42:28
It's the same carry over in the gym. So he is working that
42:31
hard every day this summer to get better and works hard about him. He
42:37
doesn't do anything great, but he does everything well. And he's one of
42:40
those really really good glue guys throw in in the game, and especially as
42:45
at a sophomore, I feel like you can trust him to do the right
42:49
things. He's not gonna mess the play up. He's gonna guard to a
42:53
high enough level to where you're happy with. And he's gonna make shots.
42:57
He can knock down threes. Yeah, he can make shots. So we're
43:00
excited about him. I mean, never underestimate the value of a really good
43:04
glue guy. You gotta have guys like that. He's gonna play a critical
43:07
role. You just hope him going simultaneously to law school and medical school won't
43:12
get in the way. I hope he's still able to get shot. Most
43:14
of that's online, so he'll be able to do both. To do that,
43:16
he'll be on the bus. He'll just take in any kind of practice
43:19
and play. He'll be all right, except when he's got labs. When
43:21
he's over at the medical saw review too. Yeah, mood court, moot
43:24
court, pat some neck banger back up, go in there and grunt work
43:31
it right. Yeah. And he's one of our strongest guys. And he
43:35
watched him in the weight room, is like he's he's he's up there,
43:37
is he at your level. We're it's it's tight, we're neck and neck.
43:45
I'm not gonna give it to him yet, but he probably is.
43:47
But regardless, like he can go in there and bang with the five,
43:52
he can give you mans the five like he did last year. I don't
43:53
know if he wants to. He's more of a natural four and but I
43:58
just need to see him make shot more consistently. He's gonna get his his
44:01
button a gym and really work on that because if he's gonna be that stretched
44:06
four for us, he's gonna make those shots, those picking pop shots.
44:08
So his opportunity, I mean he had with the way everything unfolded this summer.
44:14
You know, Jesse came in and then one by one all of our
44:17
bigs left. I guess Jimmy was in the portal prior to all this going
44:22
down. He saw the writing on the wall, so he went and took
44:24
the opportunity of Misissippi State. But then he saw James and Mo both bail
44:30
and we never really had a legit. You know, we had a couple
44:35
of pieces at the four, but he can play both at four and five.
44:37
And I keep telling him, like there's opportunity there there's opportunity there to
44:42
five, there's opportunity to four. You gotta just learn both positions and give
44:45
us whatever you got when he when you're out there. He's personal favorite,
44:49
by the way, great interview. We've had him on multiple times. He
44:52
really truly he's a great interview. We love having him on. He's a
44:54
great kid. He's a really good kid. So another one of those guys.
44:59
You know, I've said from the beginning, let's bring in really high
45:01
character guys, guys that we want to be around every day. And I
45:05
want to coach it, want to be coached and want to bring that excitement.
45:07
And that's kind of where we're at. I don't want to take shots
45:10
at anybody, but you're better at five than you were a year ago.
45:15
It's not even close. No, it's not even close. It was we
45:19
had three pieces last year that we couldn't figure out who our go to guy
45:22
was. Jimmy was very serviceable and you knew what you're gonna get from him,
45:28
but trying to score it, I mean, you weren't gonna throw it
45:30
close and score it. You just didn't have enough lift. And you know,
45:36
so I was the Biggs coach. I watched him every day, and
45:40
having losing Moe late in the season really hurt because Mo gave you a different,
45:45
different look at the five that a lot of teams didn't see, and
45:50
that hurt us down the stretch when we were playing Maryland, we didn't have
45:52
somebody else to go to. Defensively, what do you want to be?
46:00
We're trying to figure that out. I mean, we're taking a lot of
46:01
the same principles and the same drills, and coach Huggins was a great defensive
46:07
mind and it's ingrained in me. That's what we've been doing for seventeen years.
46:12
So will we have some different wrinkles to how we do things, maybe
46:15
on ball screen coverage or what. Yes, are we gonna come out hot
46:19
and try to take everything away and deny everything? Yes, it doesn't mean
46:24
we're not gonna have to adjust. I mean every coach is gonna have to
46:28
adjust based on their personnel. So it's easier. It's just kind of like
46:31
the being a kindergarten teacher. You gotta come out hard to begin with.
46:35
You know, you got a bunch of Teddy's out there, so you gotta
46:39
put the hammer now. And we're gonna we're gonna do this and then maybe
46:43
later in the year you go back off and figure out what's the smartest thing
46:45
to do. So, so, how much at this point in the season
46:49
will be here before we know it? I mean, it's here. How
46:52
much is? This is what I want to do, this is what we
46:55
as a staff want to do, and how much is But here's here are
47:00
the pieces. So we have to we have to adjust because of what the
47:04
pieces can do. Yeah, you have preconceived notions based on you know,
47:09
the film, you've watched, what they've done in the past, what you've
47:13
seen your guys do here in our program in the past. So you certainly
47:16
have preconceived notions with how those pieces interact and how they work together. But
47:21
until you really get on the floor and you really take a deep dive and
47:22
what they're doing together and what they're capable of, you can't really make those
47:28
calls. So do you know now, do you know? We don't know
47:31
enough? We don't know enough. I mean we've we've probably only had ten
47:37
hours on the floor with them, with the whole team, maybe less.
47:40
So we're still experimenting with like I said earlier, with different combinations and whatnot.
47:46
And there's so many things you got to do from a breakdown perspective that
47:51
you don't really get into the five on five stuff that much for this time
47:54
of year. And some of that's got to come when you play somebody else
47:58
too, right, I mean, there's so much their stuff going on when
48:00
you're just contained with yourselves. That's why those other games they're going to be
48:05
invaluable. See what they do against somebody else. So they don't know what
48:07
we're gonna do. We don't know what they're gonna do, and how you
48:08
play, the coaching changes, so uh, we're just gonna go out there
48:13
and experiment and figure out what we're best at and and okay, let's back
48:19
off. If something's not working, let's adjust. And it's got to be
48:22
a fluid situation. We all know that we gotta we gotta be fluid with
48:27
what we're doing and be able to make changes on the fly. Do you
48:30
have enough real quick on that? Do you have you talked about one of
48:32
your players with great basketball IQ? Do you think you have enough basketball IQ?
48:36
Because it's it's one thing everybody thinks we'll just do something different, But
48:39
I mean, you've got five guys people coming in and out, and people
48:42
have to have basketball IQ to be able to make the changes. Yeah.
48:45
Yeah, I think our top six or seven, like some of the older
48:47
guys, they have enough experience where they can they can change on the fly.
48:52
There's certainly guys at the bottom of the roster that you look at like
48:55
they haven't got that experience that it's going to be really hard to make those
48:59
adjustments. But when it gets to, you know, the end of the
49:02
game and it's crunched time, you're gonna have the right guys on the floor
49:06
that you can make those adjustments. And those those younger guys are just gonna
49:09
have to learn and figure it out and get their reps in practice as this
49:14
thing evolves. Do you have some mile posts in your mind. I'm looking
49:17
at the schedule right now, so as we record, we're fifty one days
49:21
away from George Mason. Do you have some some mile posts in your mind
49:24
where you want to say, Okay, by this time, I want to
49:28
know this, By this time, I have to be here. We're like
49:30
one are the next big moments? Yeah, I mean, like I said
49:32
earlier, I've I've got through a lot of my early offense and transition.
49:36
I'd like to like even Thursday and next week really start getting in some my
49:39
man and man action, and then I'm looking at two weeks away from trying
49:44
to mix in some zone and then really figure out some other ways to change
49:47
the defense. You know, there's a lot of teams out there. They're
49:52
ninety nine percent, you know, man to man. So I don't know
49:54
where I'm gonna be at there, but I'm definitely gonna have to have a
49:58
couple of things in my pocket in order to change the game. Every coach
50:02
does, so I'm gonna have to look at an alternative defense as well to
50:07
throw in there. I don't know how far down the line I want to.
50:09
It's probably gonna see. You're gonna have to feel that out to figure
50:13
out how far you are along with what you have to have in first and
50:16
foremost. Yeah, you got any side out, you got bounced plays,
50:22
you got going offer up somewhere. I mean, it's not rare to get
50:24
that. You want to draw some up, take up all the players and
50:29
put them behind the line and have them all run greatest play ever run basic
50:36
teach happy, some of the ternament blob. We're gonna have to teach them
50:37
like basically a lot of bolence blob, basically a lot of bounce. Yeah,
50:43
sob No, I don't know anything. You should slob you know,
50:45
slob woman will send them later. No, I'm sure he'll send. Yeah.
50:55
Some guys that you've been associated with through the years, Frank Martin has
51:00
come out and said very nice things, what is your phone call situation?
51:04
Ben? Because this is so unique and this is so unusual. The first
51:08
week was absolutely overwhelming and trying to I'm the type of person that wants to
51:15
respond to every single person and so I work pretty hard late into the night
51:19
to do that. But it's it's uplifting in so many ways. It gives
51:23
you a lot of confidence that you got that many people that are so excited
51:28
for you and excited for that opportunity. And its slowed down after a week
51:32
or so, but you still get new ones like, Hey, I just
51:37
wanted to kind of soak this in. I know you're unguarded. Here's congratulations,
51:40
You're going to do great. And those things are invaluable to me because
51:45
sometimes you forget, you get so busy, you forget you've just been tasked
51:51
with an incredible opportunity, and I'm incredibly grateful for the opportunity and I'm excited
51:55
about it. So it kind of puts things, puts things in perspective.
52:00
If with how far you know, you talked about patience earlier. It took
52:04
an incredible amount of patience to get here. So, uh, those things
52:07
are great. I mean, I've been overwhelming amount of support from Mountaineer Nation
52:13
and being here seventeen years, I've never lived anywhere longer for a stretch of
52:16
time than Morgantown, West Virginia. So West Virginia and Morgantown it's home.
52:21
It's home. It's home home for me, my wife and my kids.
52:24
If they know nothing less than Morgantown, West Virginia and the old Golden Blue.
52:30
So it's it's special. Like you said earlier, having that that three
52:34
days off with nothing to do and kind of reflect and enjoy it a little
52:37
bit, that was that was awesome. Yeah, it's amazing, dude.
52:40
I remember we're standing in the Coliseum parking lot with you about twelve years ago
52:45
when the Big twelve thing was happening, and you're going, what do you
52:47
think, dude, We're going to big I'll never forget that that argument.
52:52
You were totally against the Big Five. I wasn't anything to do it.
52:54
I go like, what are you talking about it? We're gonna go to
52:58
Iowa. Now, we don't want to do that. And I've always been
53:00
had several since we've gone through it. I said, you know, with
53:02
the exception of the geography of it. Well, and since Western has joined,
53:07
it has been the best basketball league in America. That's that may be
53:10
the upset to some people that didn't realize how good the clear number one certainly
53:15
for the last few years without even any argument there, you know, and
53:19
you just coach. I mean, you well know you just as good as
53:22
the league is. I mean, you'd like a couple breathers, you know,
53:23
I mean somehowne And you don't need to tell him talking about breath So
53:30
I was talking to the mess on the way in here. It was like
53:31
I was there was another moment for me. I was on a zoom call
53:36
with every single one of the new head coaches, the head coaches from the
53:38
league and the new ones coming in. And he's talking about eighteen games schedule
53:44
over his twenty game schedule, this, that and the other, and I
53:45
said, I'm definitely in favor eighteen. But when you get to twenty,
53:51
Okay, we're gonna have an off week. Is there gonna be a bye
53:52
week in there? Because and they knew what I was coming from, because
53:57
think about the travel that some of us go through, and Tommy Lloyd he
54:01
immediately spikes, yeah, he said, yeah, I just assumed there's a
54:07
bye week in there because they come from the PAC twelve or they have a
54:09
bye week. But I think he's gonna be invaluable for everybody as much travel
54:13
as everybody's gonna be doing, to have that that breather, whether it be
54:16
in late January or early February. You know, you mentioned Tommy Lloyd,
54:20
so he's the head coach at Arizona, but like we've played those guys seventy
54:22
two times, so like you had to run in him through the years,
54:25
right when he was the assistant Akin Zaga. I mean, it's like we
54:29
did very no, we did not know. Probably didn't need to go back
54:32
out there anyway, But anyway, that's beside the point. But I mean,
54:36
it's such a small crazy the way this thing goes around. Everyone knows
54:42
everyone that sees everyone in your back and it's just like, what you know,
54:45
James Dickey's here, he was an Oklahoma's state and you're like, here's
54:49
Lloyd now he's a head coach at Arizona. It's just these pieces are just
54:52
they just moved, but they stay the same. Yeah, and now we're
54:55
looking at the I mean, I grew up in the Big Eight days.
55:00
That was the hardcore eight. Whether you know it is Oklahoma and Nebraska and
55:05
football every year. I mean everybody's talking about it. For instance, the
55:07
Colorade in Nebraska game coming up. That's an old school Big Eight game,
55:13
and so yeah, it's it's it's come a long way, but uh,
55:15
you know here we are. You gotta what is it adapter Parish? Is
55:21
that we have that in the weight room above the wall, paying up their
55:24
adapter Perish. And that's kind of what West Virginia has done over the years
55:29
by jumping into the Big twelve and embracing it because you had to. Had
55:32
we not, I'd hate to know where West Virginia is had we not gotten
55:37
the league at that point in time. I think you're the perfect, absolute,
55:40
perfect temperament for this situation that you've inherited. I mean, you are
55:45
like it ain't too big for you. You can just tell it. And
55:49
the way you're handling it, it's not like you're not Type A all hell
55:52
flipped out and like copy gets really nervous, puts lip bomb on all the
55:55
time because gets very just compliment Josh, why you have to take a shot.
56:02
But you understand what I mean though, Yeah, well yeah, I
56:05
mean, I didn't say you were wrong. I just don't know why you
56:07
have to take shot at it. I'm just saying you're the perfect temperament for
56:09
this. Yeah, I've I've I've told our guys over there, especially when
56:13
we're doing scouting, it's like we might be coming off a two game law
56:15
or like two losses in a row. You can't get too low. There's
56:20
another game coming. You can't get too high. You might have a big
56:22
win against Kansas. You can't get too high. So you gotta guess stay
56:29
even keel and and and just keep grinding every day and figuring out a way
56:31
to keep growing. And that whole getting too high getting too low was never
56:37
my personality. Just trying to stay as even keel as possible, which will
56:42
be your sideline to mean or two. I just you're just gonna be you,
56:44
and I don't know. I mean, I might lose my mind at
56:45
time. Have you have you given any thought to that? Or surely it's
56:50
just gonna come naturally however it works out. I mean, I'm gonna like
56:52
preconceived notions of how I'm gonna throw a chair across the I hope there is
56:55
a got to lose your mind at some point. There's your mind. I
57:00
don't need to tell him to lose is my hell at something? Sometimes you
57:01
got to lose your mind and get the expention of everybody. He'll he'll be
57:05
fine. I mean, I've been creating relationships with all these referees behind years.
57:09
You kind of gotta be the middleman between. Yeah, he's like the
57:14
good guy and a bad good bye bad guy. Now, sometimes gonna have
57:16
to be the bad guy. So you gotta kick the ball into the stands.
57:19
Sometimes some of those relationships that built over the years comes into and comes
57:22
in handy. They'll, yeah, they'll they'll respect you for the We're talking
57:28
about the Big twelve earlier and and I you know, everybody knows who's playing
57:32
who and where they're going this year, so it's kind of refreshing for the
57:37
first year us being in the Big Twelve, we're not the ones traveling more
57:43
than someone else. Someone's traveling more than us, So by U in Central
57:47
Florida will be will be traveling. We're the third most in the league.
57:52
So like even they have a home and home, which makes zero sense between
57:57
their caddy corner away from each other and the Big Twelve. So uh,
58:01
those two have a home and home, so that probably builds up their travel
58:05
numbers. Left the game, I mean, yeah, it's good, but
58:10
we're still waiting to see how it all plays out in terms of how is
58:14
it laid out right, because you know as well as I do, Tony,
58:17
in terms of the rest and and and if you have the advantage on
58:22
the rest into things. And we looked at last year. Okay, we
58:24
played Texas early in Austin. Now they hadn't played since Monday. We played
58:31
on a Wednesday and traveled out there and we just walked right into it and
58:37
they were fresh as heck. Yeah, and that time of year, I
58:39
mean, that's incredibly, invaluable, incredible, So you look at even the
58:45
backside of things. Same thing happens when K State has to come to Morgantown,
58:50
for Senior Night. We hadn't played since Monday. They played on Wednesday.
58:54
You remember how the second half of that and they were a really good
58:58
team came to Morgantown and caught up with him. So when the schedule comes
59:02
out, I'll do a deep dive into that. It's like, you know,
59:06
we got a pretty fair from an opponents standpoint in a draw. How's
59:12
that gonna how's that going to compare to how we drew in terms of the
59:15
way it's laid out. Do you hear what he just said though? He
59:17
just actually made a good argument for adversity for Kansas State coaches normally think they're
59:22
getting screwed all the time, and he just said he just pointed out the
59:25
other side of that case case stay Grad, Kase, stay Grad. He
59:29
was just wasn't apologizing for that and nor given the win back. That's part
59:34
of the deal. Sorry, you can't tell you I didn't want to win
59:37
that one any other games. He was just pointing out there was no for
59:43
as good as those guys were and what they did in the NC double a
59:45
turn. That was a great one. That was a great one. That
59:47
was a great Saturday Inside the call, Sam now everybody. We're going to
59:52
turn the music on. We're to let you go. We really apologize by
59:53
not inviting you on anything for seventeen years. Seventeen years. You know we
59:59
can make Yeah, I mean we can make your regular It's just that I
1:00:01
don't know. So I'm the first men's basketball head coach ever be on show
1:00:07
on three guys before the game. Yeah, that's groundbreaking. Did you was
1:00:12
it good? You did? This is excellent? Yeah, it's fun right
1:00:15
fighting. I've I've always wanted to be on the show, but never got
1:00:17
to invite. We never got an invite. He doesn't say a word.
1:00:24
It's Tony lines up to guest coach. So I just want you to know.
1:00:28
Well, I'll tell you what we can do, Josh. Next time,
1:00:29
we'll invite you in with a Burdette camper. That's right right now.
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They sell family funds. Visit Lou Wendell Marine Cells dot I've see the
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circle to the left. There's the dog in the water, probably a mountaineer
1:01:30
dog. Probably golden blue flippers, golden blue flippers on underneath the water.
1:01:37
There beautiful summers late also we have so they should use that in their promotional.
1:01:40
We also had a studio guests. Hey Bratt, we had a studio
1:01:44
guest back Laura A left. Yes she big p one listener. Did she
1:01:47
bring a big thing of fudge? There's a lot of stuff out there.
1:01:51
There's Pepperoni rolls, there's fudge. Yeah we love Laura, Yes we do.
1:01:55
We love Laura and your fudge too. All right, we're back Special
1:02:00
Edition with Josh Eiler. Thanks so much for being with us. We're back
1:02:02
again. Next episode of Preview, The Mountaineers and the Ducane Dukes that Beat
1:02:07
Tomorrow. Thanks for being with us. Our producer Lucky Luke Rowsey. Special
1:02:10
production assistance by Brian Messerley for the crew here. Thanks for being with us,
1:02:15
three guys before the game, over and out