Latest / Spiders Sound Off / Episode 24: Tourney Preview Special

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Episode 24: Tourney Preview Special · Spiders Sound Off

0:09
Hey, everybody. Welcome back to Spider Sounds
0:12
Off. This is Tom.
0:13
And this is Porter. Well, I want to thank the our
0:17
opening band. That was the spider sound off
0:19
mariachi band leading us into our kickoff.
0:23
That's a little of the Cancun theme.
0:25
We'll be talking about that tournament later.
0:28
Also thought I was listening to some of our old podcast and I
0:30
think when we started off we did some intro kind of explain who
0:33
the heck we were. I think we've lost a little that
0:36
and we, you know, we may be getting some new listeners every
0:38
time. So maybe just as an
0:40
introduction. Just a couple random guys in
0:42
Richmond shirts sitting in front of a Richmond wall talking.
0:45
I don't even have a basketball. Today I've been working too
0:47
hard. But anyway, we are alumni, we're
0:49
season ticket holder, so we live here in Richmond.
0:52
We're friends from college. We live together some after
0:56
college. So but anyway, so we come from a
0:59
fan perspective. We sometimes think we're
1:02
analysts, but we're really just fans.
1:04
We don't, we haven't, we don't coach and we weren't very good
1:07
when we did play. But we are fans.
1:10
We're passionate fans for Richmond Spiders basketball.
1:13
We talk about men's basketball and women's basketball.
1:15
We do and hope if you're new or relatively new, you learned a
1:21
little bit, but you don't tell your friends.
1:22
We want to keep growing this thing.
1:24
We appreciate every good listener that or new viewer that
1:27
comes. Like you're subscribed, they'll
1:28
get sent to you automatically. We're trying to do 2 a week
1:31
during the season and we'll try to keep it going in the
1:33
offseason. OK, well we just did our pod for
1:37
the first time in the Robin Center.
1:40
Porter, what were your thoughts about, you know, the interviews
1:42
we did with Allie and Coach Russell and just General going
1:46
away from our normal Henrico studios?
1:48
Yeah, First off, thanks to the communications department for
1:52
allowing us to do that. That was really neat.
1:55
Have an alley. And Coach Russell on the episode
1:57
was really special because, you know, you see, you know, only
2:02
not only what kind of pros they are on the court, but what kind
2:04
of, you know, people they are, you know, when they're talking
2:07
about the program, when they're talking about, you know, their
2:09
teammates, etcetera. So that was just really special
2:12
for me. I really enjoyed it.
2:14
I am shocked actually that we pulled it off because, you know,
2:17
there's a fairly large amount of technical work behind the scenes
2:20
to move the Henrico studio to a different place and set it up
2:24
and successfully record. You only get one take when
2:26
you're bringing in, you know, players and coaches, so you
2:28
can't mess that up. So hats off to my sound guy over
2:30
here who does all of our sound work for for making that.
2:33
Work, Yeah, I would say the one thing we learned is as we were
2:35
kind of a little bit on the fly, we didn't know who we we knew we
2:37
were going to try to talk to coach, but it wasn't a guarantee
2:40
and we didn't know which player because the game had to be
2:42
played and some of that depended on on that.
2:44
So we are winging it a bit. We realized afterwards we could
2:48
use a few more transitions between segments.
2:50
So hopefully you guys bared with us as we went from one segment
2:53
to another. I'm going to have a really cool
2:56
transition right about now. OK, so let's talk about the
3:05
games we got this week. That's really the purpose of
3:07
this pod. We're not.
3:09
We don't need to talk about any games that happened because
3:11
we've done that already can. We do the men first system.
3:13
And yeah, so we can do the men. So this is the Terry's Chocolate
3:17
ESPN Events Invitational, and we're in the imagination
3:21
bracket. I'm not even sure what.
3:22
Terry's Chocolate is Is that a brand?
3:24
So I was hoping to get some. I couldn't find it but I know
3:27
what it is. So Terry's chocolate and I'm
3:29
curious if you like this or not. It is.
3:32
It's orange chocolate. OK.
3:34
And it comes in like a like the shape of an orange.
3:37
Oh yeah. And you like smack it down and
3:39
then the pieces all come off and they're like chocolate covered
3:42
orange slices. Never, never heard of it.
3:45
So I've never had it. I don't, I do not like chocolate
3:48
orange in general. You get like, you know, the
3:49
chocolates in the big pack and you have the little ones you
3:51
try. If it's orange chocolate, I try
3:53
to, I try to stay away. But this is our, I guess the
3:55
sponsor, Terry's Chocolate. This is in Orlando.
3:58
It's a Disney World, the ESPN events center there.
4:01
And there's a bunch of teams there.
4:02
Like we're in one bracket called the Imagination Bracket.
4:05
They've got all these other brackets they don't get, you
4:07
don't play the other brackets. So I think they have probably a
4:10
dozen teams down there and some of it started today.
4:14
But whatever, it's a money maker, I'm sure for somebody.
4:18
And we have our first game Thursday, I mean.
4:21
Furman How great is it that we've got Thanksgiving on
4:24
Thursday and we've got we're bookended on both parts of
4:27
Thanksgiving with spider basketball. 11 AM, the men. 9:00
4:31
PM The women. Two games to indulge in.
4:34
And plenty of time to eat in between.
4:36
Yeah, absolutely. Right, it's the Furman.
4:38
Whatever your tradition is. Yeah, it's the Furman Paladins,
4:41
right? That's a great name, by the way.
4:43
I love that. Furman's our first opponent.
4:45
They opened up at 1:33. In the Ken Palm rankings,
4:48
they've slipped to 163. They're going to be known for
4:51
probably the tallest team we play all year.
4:53
They're #3 in the country in terms of average height.
4:56
That's another advanced metric that Ken Palm tracks.
4:59
How advanced is that? You're just measuring height
5:01
well. Actually, no, there's more to it
5:03
and I figure you might ask me like, it's not just measuring
5:05
height. You want to give you the actual
5:07
formula, I'll do it now. You don't have to.
5:08
It's computed by taking the average listed height of every
5:10
player on the team waited by minutes played.
5:12
Players that have played less than 10% of their minutes are
5:14
not included in the calculation. So if you got like A-76 guy who
5:17
never gets in, he doesn't. Count doesn't count, right?
5:19
They actually play 2. They start 2611 guys.
5:22
So we have a frontline of a power forward and centre
5:24
combination that are both 611. So presumably Walls and Beagle
5:29
are going to be very busy in this game.
5:31
Usually are a lot of size inside the Johnston, who's one of their
5:36
big bigs averages about 10, a little bit over 10 rebounds a
5:39
game. Bowser's the other one.
5:41
Then they've got they go 67646567 are the other four guys
5:46
who play a lot of minutes. So there's not a not a not a
5:48
short, short guy on the team. They're all pretty tall.
5:51
That doesn't mean they're good basketball.
5:52
So myself being a great representation of that, but they
5:56
they are going to be tall so. Did you say the guy's name was
5:58
Bowser? Bowser, do you remember?
6:00
It wasn't Bowser from like the. Sha Na Na yeah.
6:02
Yeah, exactly. Was he?
6:05
He was the deep voiced. One we just dated ourselves.
6:07
Yes we did. Yes we did.
6:10
Anyway, so they the the. They haven't had a good year so
6:15
far, haven't, I mean. They're not doing what they
6:17
expected to do. I mean, they're, they're
6:19
they're, I think they're a better team than people realize.
6:22
So far, it looks like looking at the results, their three-point
6:25
percentage has been really. Really, I just want to do it
6:27
one. OK, sorry.
6:31
That's the end of you. Got to go deeper to get 1000.
6:33
He was super, the best I can do. Go ahead.
6:36
So anyway, they got a freshman point guard named Wilkins who's
6:39
looks like a stud, so that'll be interesting to keep our eye on.
6:43
They just haven't been great at shooting the three-point shot.
6:46
Now the problem with teams like that is if they get hot from
6:49
three, you could get a, you know, positive regression
6:51
result, which could be a problem for for the Spiders.
6:54
I think this is going to be a tough game for us.
6:56
It's the first away game for us all year.
6:58
And you know, away games always present their own set of
7:00
obstacles. Now it is neutral court.
7:03
It is a neutral. Court.
7:04
I suspect it's probably not many fans in attendance at an 11:00
7:08
game in ESPN. On Thanksgiving Day in Florida,
7:10
Yeah, because both schools aren't in Florida.
7:12
So I would say, you know, Bartorvic and Ken Palm, see
7:16
between A5 and six point win for Richmond, they give Furman about
7:19
a 30% chance of winning the game outright.
7:23
I think it's going to be really important to keep the momentum
7:26
that we've built with these non con games.
7:28
I mean, you just got to come out real quick and just get it.
7:30
Just light him up from the start.
7:31
If you can get up, if you can put him on their heels.
7:34
I really like our chances, but you're going to have to play
7:36
that pressure filled, you know, game where you just every
7:39
minute's being maximized by fresh legs.
7:42
Yeah, it's certainly an advantage.
7:44
And I don't think, you know, this is not a fundamental part
7:46
of why Mooney's playing so many players.
7:48
But when we talked to Coach Russell the other day, like when
7:52
he was talking about back to backs, he kind of knew and he
7:55
accepted that he's got players putting up a lot of minutes.
7:58
But you know, that's the way his team is constructed right now.
8:00
He's not worried about it. But it is part of the challenge
8:03
of back to backs. Like we have none of that with
8:06
our team. I mean, no one's playing 35
8:08
minutes a game and has been like pushed so hard through that five
8:13
and O streak so that there's a nice advantage.
8:16
And I don't know how Furman and Charlotte and Illinois State
8:18
look minutes wise, but at least for us, we're not going to have
8:22
issues with legs. Yeah, I think Richmond when I
8:24
checked and I I meant to write this down, but I think we are
8:27
fourth in the nation and and bench minutes.
8:30
So we play you know more people than just about everybody in the
8:33
nation. So that should be an advantage
8:35
on a back-to-back day like this, at least for the second game.
8:38
I'm not sure how much it helps you in the.
8:39
First game, yeah. At a minimum it just helps you
8:41
in that if someone's really off or, or even just the, you know,
8:45
we had two players out in the last game but they're towards
8:48
the bottom of the bench, but we lose 1 player because they have
8:51
the flu. It's not, you know, there's no
8:53
one on that team where you're like well now we're dead because
8:56
we just lost that person. So that's just an advantage.
8:58
Hopefully we carry all season. I mean, you know, when you when
9:01
you get these games, a lot of people will say you want to play
9:04
the better team. So you it helps your ratings.
9:06
It only helps your ratings if you beat them and beat them with
9:09
efficiency, right? So you want to play the teams
9:11
that you can beat efficiently. And that's the main thing to
9:13
keep in mind. So the second game will be
9:15
against either Illinois State or Charlotte.
9:17
Illinois State's the favorite in that.
9:19
Game Illinois State's the favorite in the first game.
9:21
They started at Ken Palm, 121, moved up to 114.
9:24
They've got a couple really good players on that team.
9:27
They could be dangerous, but you know, Charlotte could be
9:29
dangerous as well. I mean, I think the guys you got
9:31
to worry about on that team look to be look to be their guards.
9:35
Actually, it's Coleman who who scores.
9:38
It's Kinsinger. Those are the kind of guys that
9:40
are putting up, you know, double digit points a game.
9:42
And they also get a lot out of their six, their 69 center.
9:46
So those those. You're talking to Illinois
9:48
State. Talking to Illinois State, the
9:49
two guards in the center look like they're putting up pretty
9:51
good points. The thing that's kind of
9:53
interesting about Illinois State is they play elite 3 point
9:59
defense. They're 7th in the nation
10:00
allowing their pones only shoot 23.9% from 3.
10:03
So that's something to keep an eye on.
10:04
That's I think a a strength of the Spiders this year in the
10:08
last two. Games.
10:08
Yeah, it sounds like a game where Jaden Daughtry could.
10:11
Really, I'd love to see Daughtry just pounded inside Charlotte.
10:15
They started at KP 190 as Ken Palm, now at 179.
10:19
Their defense does not look to be very good this year.
10:22
They're 293 and overall defensive efficiency this year
10:24
out of 365. That's not great.
10:28
Their team, you know, looks like they're they have one really
10:32
very large man on that team. It's a center.
10:35
He's 7 foot 2. He's a junior and he he's a
10:37
rebounding machine. So that's going to be, you know,
10:41
this is, yeah, this is Charlotte's team.
10:43
But I think their points are coming from their small forward
10:46
in this game. And he's he's 6 foot.
10:48
See if I can. Read I'm assuming they play
10:50
after us. I mean, we're playing at 11.
10:52
I assume we're the first game of the day.
10:53
That's a good question. I don't know that for a fact,
10:55
but the yeah, it's either going to be, it's going to either be
10:58
Charlotte or Illinois State. I don't know which one I really
11:01
want to play. I guess the one that I want to
11:02
play is the one that we beat convincingly because you know,
11:04
you don't want to get into a a really close game.
11:06
Well, I think Illinois State, out of these three teams has the
11:09
best chance of being a top 100 team at some point.
11:12
I agree with this year. So I'd like to play them and
11:16
obviously get a win come out of this tournament 7 or no.
11:19
I mean that's what we really you know if we're thinking any
11:23
chance of at large bid, we know we're out of conference schedule
11:26
doesn't give us. You have to win these.
11:28
Games, yeah, we've got to win these.
11:29
Games you got to go 7 and O and then you got your first real
11:31
game where you're not predicted to win at Belmont following
11:33
these two games, but you kind of need to win these two neutrals
11:37
go 7 and OI think you'll start getting some some more
11:40
interesting attention to if you're 7 and O sitting on you
11:43
know that that start. So we'll see.
11:45
We'll see what happens. OK.
11:46
And then we've got the women's plan in the Cancun Challenge.
11:51
I saw that the AP poll came out today has, you know, we're in
11:56
the receiving other votes for 29th.
11:57
Yeah, that's great. So we moved up in the AP poll
12:01
and we'll move up a lot more I think, if we go to and O in this
12:05
tournament. Yes, the first first up is TCU
12:09
and TCU is a behemoth. They are top ten team no matter
12:14
which way you look at it. And that's a 9:00 PM game on
12:17
Thursday. That's what, yeah, that's what
12:18
Coach said do us. So after some food, some pie,
12:22
some football. TuneIn The only challenge is I
12:25
think it's on flow sports, which isn't my favorite way to watch a
12:27
game. I love the ESPN plus contracts,
12:29
by the way, those that's the way to watch spider ball.
12:32
I've got to figure out how to get flow sports for a couple
12:35
games on some, you know? Yeah, I think it's like 30 bucks
12:38
a month or something like that. So I might have to indulge and
12:41
and just plunk that down. But yeah, so this will be a good
12:44
game. TCU is they're not.
12:45
I don't think they're Texas. I said early in an early episode
12:48
at my one of my hot takes was they'd be better than Texas.
12:51
I'm after watching Texas. I'm not sure that's true.
12:53
But TCU is very, very good. Coached by Mark Campbell.
12:58
Mark started off at Sacramento State.
13:00
Since coming to TCU, you know, he's been 8th in the country,
13:03
finished 8th in the country. Last year.
13:05
They were a two seed. They made the Elite 8 and
13:07
they're 8th in the country right now.
13:09
So he's turning this program into a behemoth.
13:13
The big player is Olivia Miles. She was transferred into TCU.
13:17
Where? Is she from?
13:18
I think she's Notre Dame. I think she's one of the best
13:21
players in the country, so that's something to keep an eye
13:23
on. She's 510 so that will be an
13:26
interesting match up for whoever has to.
13:27
Guard her. That's going to be Alicia's
13:29
assignment I suspect from the start.
13:30
And we'll see how she does rain right?
13:32
Will be ready to come in too, if the height.
13:36
Yeah, looking at their adjusted, so just looking at their, this
13:39
is a Bartorvic advanced player rating.
13:42
It goes miles Hunter. And then my my printing is a
13:46
little small here and I, my eyesight is not nearly as good
13:48
as it used to be, but it goes mile Hunter, Miles Hunter,
13:51
Suarez, big B and sure are the highest rated players, but then
13:56
you've got Silva playing 54% of the minutes and she's 6 foot 7.
14:03
So you're going to have a six foot 7 post player inside and
14:09
guess what, if she doesn't do very well, they got two more 6
14:11
foot seven players behind. Her yeah, I know coach mentioned
14:14
that they've got some bigs that are going to cause us trouble or
14:17
could cause us trouble so that's.
14:19
Going to be a tough game. I mean, if we win that game, we
14:22
are firmly in, you know, the at large spotlight.
14:26
And you know what, the game after it's not going to be easy
14:28
either. So the women's, you know, season
14:30
of the incredible schedule continues.
14:31
Yeah, that's right. So this is a different than the
14:35
men's bracket. The men's, when we talked about
14:36
the men's team, you play the winner of a game.
14:39
This is more of an exhibition, like it's set up.
14:42
It's similar to the tournament that Henrico does.
14:45
Like we know who our second team is.
14:48
We're playing Green Bay, coming all the way from Lambeau Field.
14:51
So Green Bay's already beaten Kansas State.
14:54
They beat Loyola Chicago, who's an 810 team.
14:56
They lost by 4 on the road at Wisconsin.
14:59
They're coached by Kayla Carius. We know we have the best mid
15:02
major coaching staff in all of basketball, but this is a rising
15:05
star that they've got last. Last year she took Green Bay to
15:09
a 29 and six finish and a 12 seed in the Into the Blade
15:13
tournament. This year she's got him five and
15:15
one. That makes her 30-4 and seven in
15:17
her last 41 games. And it's a good team.
15:21
It's a really good team. So they're ranked 86 a card
15:24
according to Bartorovic. Right now they feature Megan
15:29
Schultz, who is there probably most efficient player.
15:31
She plays only about 60% of the minutes.
15:34
The most minutes are played by Maddie Skorupski, who plays 81%
15:39
of the minutes and is pretty highly regarded.
15:41
That's a six foot 4 sophomore and A58 senior.
15:45
And then they have Daphne, Pepler and Boozle all between 5,
15:49
seven and 5:10 that are rated pretty highly from a from a
15:54
efficiency perspective, according to Bartorvic.
15:56
So it's going to be a tough game right now.
15:59
And they play, just so you know, I was just looking this up, they
16:01
play NC State, yes. They have a tough game
16:03
beforehand. NC State, who still made it into
16:05
the AP Top 25 despite being 3 and.
16:07
Three, I'll, I'll, we'll go a little bit around the A10 and
16:10
I'll talk about NC State. Yeah.
16:13
So that's. Yeah, they do have a game the
16:14
day before. They're at 3:00 PM and then I
16:17
guess the Friday game is at 8, so it's a late game on Friday.
16:22
Or maybe it's 9:00 PM. I think it's 8 Green Bay time.
16:25
According to the advanced stats, we should lose to TCU and beat
16:29
Green Bay. But you know you want the
16:31
advanced stats. Don't play the games the players
16:33
do. And you know, I, I was just so
16:35
impressed with the interview with Ali, just to hear her kind
16:37
of compliment the other players on the team and what they're
16:40
good at. Like the thing that we don't
16:42
talk enough about with this women's team is how much they
16:44
play for each other. That's something that I'm super
16:46
impressed. Well, it's interesting just
16:47
looking at some of Green Bay scores.
16:49
So you said they beat Kansas State 47 to 44 was that game.
16:54
And when they beat Loyola Chicago 5546, now they have
16:58
some, you know, they can score if they need to.
17:01
So it's not like they they can't play when they lost Wisconsin
17:04
and it was 7672. But that just sounds like a game
17:07
where we need to push that pace, like we can't be in a 47 to 44
17:10
battle that that's going to be trouble for us.
17:12
Dare I mean, we're going to need, you know, this is a game
17:15
where we're going to need all of our our big three to show up and
17:18
and have a big game. You know, I think to beat TCU,
17:23
you're going to need all, you know, eight of the players who
17:26
played meaningful minutes or 9, whatever that number is to have
17:28
a really good game. Everybody's got to play their
17:30
best game to beat TCU, but we're going to need the Big Three to
17:32
show up and show out to beat Green Bay.
17:34
Yeah, that's right. OK, so let's do a little round
17:37
the A10 and we'll condition that to that NC State.
17:40
So there was a big A10 women's team victory.
17:45
Rhode Island beat ranked NC State, so that's a nice win for
17:51
our conference, but it made me also look when the AP poll came
17:54
out today, like you said, NC State is still ranked at 3:00
17:57
and 3:00, and I'm coming up with a new term.
17:59
I don't know if I really created it, but I'm calling it the PFF,
18:03
not BFFPFF. That's a Power 5 fraud.
18:08
You're a Power 5 fraud with a ranking way.
18:12
Too high. You're a power.
18:16
Five fraud. Barely.
18:17
Worth the time. Power 5 fraud and I'm calling NC
18:25
State a Power 5 fraud. On the women's side, they did
18:29
beat 14 Tennessee, so that's like their mark win.
18:32
If you can beat Tennessee. But the other two wins are
18:34
unimportant. Coastal Carolina and Maine.
18:37
They lost to TCU. They lost to Uri, who's
18:42
unranked. They lost to USC, who's ranked
18:46
so that they got some good losses.
18:47
But like that one win and three losses, including a loss to Uri,
18:52
still has them ranked. And let's be clear, I did some
18:55
more research. USC, They're another Power 5
18:59
fraud. The only game that they've won
19:02
that's as as any of note is against NC State, who's a Power
19:06
5. Fraud.
19:07
Come on, people, Who's got the voting?
19:08
Who's votes for this? This is just like, yeah, it's
19:10
not. Spider sound off.
19:11
And you know, I'll, I'll come up with maybe next week some men's
19:14
Power 5 fraud. But I think in the women's side,
19:16
NC State, you stink. And guess what, USC?
19:20
You stink too. You know, my son went to NC
19:22
State. Well, I, I, I'm, I'm OK with the
19:24
universities and the people who go there.
19:26
I'm just saying they're ladies teams.
19:27
I. I got you.
19:28
I got you. Yeah.
19:28
They shouldn't be 25. Three and three should not be
19:30
25. In the nation, OK, on the men's
19:32
side, the A10 like, and this is true on the women's, but I think
19:36
on the A10, we're always thinking of how many bids are
19:37
we, can we get more than one bid?
19:39
Yeah, can we get back to two? Can we back to three?
19:42
And this week is huge for us like most of our teams are in
19:45
similar tournaments that we're in, some even better in terms of
19:49
getting to play some top 20, some top 50 teams.
19:52
So there are some games we need to win.
19:53
Unfortunately, did not start well today.
19:56
This is Monday when we're recording that the men's team
19:59
from Rhode Island lost 1000. Now Thousand's AI mean they're
20:04
ACAA potential winner, so they're a good team.
20:06
But again that like. Our teams are even our middle of
20:09
the road teams need to beat CAA teams.
20:11
Yeah, they do. OK, so the week did not start
20:14
well tomorrow, Tuesday. And so this will be probably
20:18
published Wednesday or Thursday. So some of these games hopefully
20:21
we have the right results. So Tuesday the Bonnies play UNC
20:23
and again, these are all really neutral court games right now.
20:26
So that's that's a game that bodies that are not expected to
20:29
win, but have an opportunity for really nice win for them and for
20:32
the conference, George Washington and their tournament,
20:36
they play 2 like mid major teams, Murray State and MTSU.
20:41
So those are teams that are again, they're they're probably
20:44
1 and one bid leagues, but they're the ones who may win
20:47
those leagues. So those are games like GW right
20:50
now is our highest ranked or them in Saint Louis are two
20:53
highest ranked teams when you're looking at the stats.
20:56
So like they have to win both of those games.
20:58
Like we want to keep GW in that top 50.
21:02
Yeah, here's your here's your top six in the A10 and I'll get
21:04
it to six because Richmond is 6. Remember we were preseason pick
21:07
10th, which I thought was very disrespectful.
21:10
St. Louis is 51 in Ken Palm, VCU 53,
21:13
George Washington 63 after their tough loss, Dayton 69, George
21:18
Mason 82 in Richmond one O 1. So we are expected to be 10th.
21:24
We are currently sitting 6th. You win a couple down here on a
21:27
neutral court, you might see us move up to 5th or 4th and you
21:31
know we got the rest of the A10 in our sights.
21:33
So and then where we're going? Other games Wednesday, VCU play
21:36
South Florida, so not you know, they're not playing a top 20
21:39
team, but you know, that's, you know, VCU lost to Utah State
21:42
earlier. Like South Florida's another one
21:44
of those teams that you know, they could be at 8 seed, nine
21:47
seed, 10 seed like you got to win that game.
21:49
And then Thursday, we've got a couple big games in the
21:51
conference, again not including ours that we already talked
21:54
about, Saint Louis, play, Santa Clara.
21:56
So again, 22 mid major teams, those are wins that aren't going
22:01
to get you in the tournament, but you want to have those on
22:03
your resume. And then Dayton, Georgetown,
22:05
again, Georgetown's kind of a researching program.
22:08
They're doing pretty well right now on the kind of the rankings.
22:11
Dayton's obviously a perennial top team in our league.
22:14
So again, none of these games are going to you know, are the
22:17
CBS game that's on TV, but these are kind of we're in these
22:23
tournaments against mid major opponents outside of the UNC
22:26
Bonnie's game and and these are games you see us win.
22:29
You can see our conference continue to to be strong even
22:32
though the Loyola Chicago. Yeah, we always want to root for
22:35
the A10. We always want to root for the
22:36
A10 teams when they're in their non con.
22:38
And that's hard, you know, 'cause we don't ever want to
22:40
root for VCU, but we really want VC to win in their non con
22:42
'cause it only helps us during the conference play to have
22:45
really strong a 10 teams. So that's important.
22:49
One other kind of nugget for you.
22:51
So Richmond started off with between 15 and 17 wins projected
22:55
by the by the projection services.
22:57
Now we're up to 19 and in some cases eighteen wins projected.
23:01
So like I said, just keep stacking wins and keep moving
23:04
that needle up and to the right and we will do good things.
23:07
I got to get Porter shirt that says stacking wins.
23:09
Stacking wins your favorite saying these days.
23:12
Stacking wins. OK, so it is Thanksgiving week.
23:17
We can debate, you know, I'm from the North, Porter from the
23:19
South. So there's this whole kind of
23:20
debate on what was the first Thanksgiving and what we're not
23:23
going to get into that debate here.
23:25
That's, you know, debate that at the Thanksgiving table with your
23:28
with your family this year. We don't have, we don't have our
23:30
Turkey, but hopefully you guys have Turkey and you got spider
23:33
ball on Thursday. Yeah, that's right.
23:35
And we thought we would wrap up our our the special Thanksgiving
23:39
episode with what we're thankful for.
23:42
OK. So we'll do three items each.
23:46
We'll kind of maybe alternate and we'll give our thanks and
23:50
this is all kind of, you know, spider basketball theme or
23:53
somewhere in that bucket. I'll let you start.
23:55
Porter, what's the first thing you're thankful?
23:57
For first thing I'm thankful for are our four year Spider players
24:02
who have started their career at Richmond and finished their
24:06
career at Richmond. Being a Richmond college
24:09
basketball fan, you guys are the core of what we're trying to do
24:14
and building, you know, a national contender year in and
24:17
year out. So that's Mike Walls on the
24:18
men's side, Maggie Dugan, Rachel Allstrom, Jada Green on the
24:21
women's side. I'm thankful that you guys
24:25
decided to commit to Richmond and I'm thankful that you played
24:27
your whole career at Richmond. So that's my first.
24:29
That's a good one. My first one's similar, although
24:32
this is more they'll fit that criteria next year.
24:35
I'm thankful for Mikel time. I think there are times we take
24:39
him for granted. I mean, you think his his
24:42
freshman year, he was a key backup to a great team that we
24:45
had, but still had to put up a lot of minutes backing up Hunt
24:49
at the point guard last year. Hunt goes down like he has to
24:52
really carry the team and we had a bad year, but I think he he
24:56
had to play a whole lot more than I think Mooney was planning
24:59
and and and and he became a leader of that team.
25:02
I think by the end of the season, him and Walls and now in
25:05
his third year. I mean, I think last year, you
25:07
look at his stats like his three-point shot struggled, but
25:10
our whole team did. I think, you know, you talk
25:12
about winning is contagious. I think losing was contagious
25:15
last year, but tying this year's got a three-point shot going.
25:19
He looks like one of our best players on the court when he's
25:22
out there. His defense, we all remember how
25:25
great Gilliard was at defense. He's not Gilliard, but I've seen
25:29
some of that like quick hands stealing the ball one-on-one.
25:32
So I'm thankful for Mikel Tyne and again and next year he'll be
25:36
a four, four year Richmond guy. So, Mikel, thank you that you're
25:40
doing what you're doing. Yes.
25:41
Thank you, Mikel. OK, what do you got next?
25:43
I'm actually thankful for the city of Pittsburgh, Tom, and
25:46
here's why. So spider, sound off.
25:48
We're now in 21 countries and we're in all the states or most
25:52
of the states. The second biggest state of
25:54
listeners is the state of Pennsylvania and the biggest
25:57
area in Pennsylvania that are tuned in the Spider Sound
26:00
office, the city of Pittsburgh. And I have no idea.
26:03
I don't know too many people from Pittsburgh.
26:04
I know a few. We do have two of the women's
26:06
recruits. That's true.
26:07
Two women's recruits from the Pittsburgh area.
26:09
But like, we have a lot of listeners in Pittsburgh, so I'm
26:11
thankful to the city of Pittsburgh.
26:12
We'll keep trying to do good content and keep all you folks
26:15
who are Love and Spider basketball in Pittsburgh
26:17
interested, yeah. And it could have nothing to do
26:19
with it, but, you know, I'll shout out to Duquesne, 'cause
26:22
that's the A10 team in Pittsburgh.
26:24
So maybe they're just, you know, really loyal to basketball and
26:28
want to hear the podcast from the other teams.
26:30
A lot of listens to. Pittsburgh.
26:31
So I look forward to what we get to play Duquesne at some point
26:33
and we can talk more about it. What's your #2?
26:35
OK, my number 2 is maybe it's, it's too obvious, but I know, I
26:40
know we haven't thanked them over our 22 plus episodes, but
26:43
it's, it's just natural. I got to thank the Robbins
26:45
family. So you, you we're always in the
26:48
Robbins Center when we're not in our Henrico studios.
26:51
That's where we live. And and we've got the Robbins
26:55
Stadium next door. You know, the Robbins family
26:57
really put Richmond on the map with big donations, I think back
27:01
in the 70s and continue to give. And that's a family that you're
27:07
really everything we have in basketball is because of them.
27:10
At some point, who knows where would be playing and what little
27:13
gym we'd have or what our facilities would look like if it
27:16
wasn't for all that they contributed to.
27:17
Thank you to the Robbins family. The facilities are just so
27:20
incredible over there. I mean, really, really love it.
27:22
Thank you, Robbins family. I'm actually going to give a a
27:25
universal thank you to both the men's and women's teams.
27:29
We're now getting and going into the Thanksgiving break and we're
27:32
talking about two teams that are 10 and one.
27:34
They didn't have to be 10 and one.
27:36
This could this podcast started. It could have been, you know,
27:38
four and seven or three and eight.
27:40
And, you know, we're just very grateful to be talking about our
27:42
our teams. We love and they're both playing
27:44
very well. So hats off to all the players
27:47
on both the men's and the coaches on the men's and the
27:49
women's team. Spider Ball is back.
27:51
We're 10 and one. Both programs are moving in the
27:54
right direction and I'm thankful for that.
27:55
Yeah, that's. Great.
27:56
Well, and let me wrap this up and saying like when we started
28:00
this podcast, I think we would, if we got like one person to
28:04
listen to us, we were going to be happy.
28:07
So I want to thank you to those who've listened, who have told
28:10
their friends about it, who have continued to listen or maybe
28:14
you're listening every now and then.
28:15
I saw the other day we had someone like we can't see like
28:19
exactly who's listening to what, we just see some numbers.
28:21
But someone had listened to the 1st and the second episode.
28:24
Oh, starting from So some new people coming in and checking
28:27
in. So check out the interviews with
28:29
Mike Skrocky and Addie and Katie.
28:31
Those are some of my favorite episodes.
28:32
If you're going back to the beginning, check those out.
28:34
Those so anyway, appreciate to all you guys.
28:36
Thank you to the listeners who have listened and now some of
28:39
you who are viewing and have not.
28:41
And after 5 minutes of looking at us, said that's enough of
28:44
that, which was another surprise.
28:48
We have a yeah, this has been an evolution.
28:49
We didn't, we didn't show up as podcasters.
28:51
We just were fans trying to figure out, you know, how we can
28:53
talk about the teams that we really like and and that we
28:56
follow. And so we're we're hopefully
28:59
putting content out that you guys find interesting.
29:02
We've evolved a little bit from just us doing audio to us
29:05
interviewing people with audio to now us doing let interviews
29:08
with video and us doing video. So hopefully we're doing right
29:11
by you guys. We'll keep pushing out content
29:13
just as long as you guys keep listening and finding it
29:15
interesting. Yeah, that's right.
29:16
And and, you know, while I guess it didn't make our top three,
29:19
none of this would really be possible without Jason Vita.
29:23
Yeah, and Keelan. And Keelan, who, you know, both
29:26
work hard on the men's and women's programs, kind of
29:29
getting that communication out and have been very receptive to
29:32
our ideas and. Yeah, you guys don't understand
29:35
how hard the communications team over there works.
29:37
I mean, we're just one of many media sources that they have to
29:40
handle and they are, they work their butts off.
29:42
So thanks for those guys for sure.
29:44
All right well, thank you everybody have a great
29:46
Thanksgiving. I hope this preview prepped you
29:48
for these games. We've got Thursday and Friday
29:51
and we'll I'll be back to talk about the results of those games
29:54
and the games we got going the the week after Thanksgiving soon
29:58
enough. But until then, this is Tom,
30:00
this is Porter, and this is spider sound and offs women and
30:03
men spider sound. Off spider sound off spider
30:11
sound Off spider Sound off.