Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - 2 Hawkeyes enter the transfer portal, Spring Football starts as we hear from Kirk Ferentz

Episode Date: March 23, 2023

Two Iowa Hawkeye basketball players have entered the transfer portal with Ahron Ulis and Josh Ogundele. Trent Condon breaks down what the roster currently looks like and what it can be going forward.A look at the future of Iowa hoops and an big opportunity for Iowa basketball to change who they are going forward.Some talk on the Kirk Ferentz press conference as spring football has begun. A lot of injuries to talk about and a pending quarterback issue.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKEDON15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.FanDuelMake Every Moment More. Don’t miss the chance to get your No Sweat First Bet up to ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS in Bonus Bets when you go FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Iowa basketball loses two players to the transfer portal, including a starter. This is actually good news. And spring football has begun. We hear from Kurt Ferentz today. All today on Locked on Hawkeyes. Our Locked on Hawkeyes, your daily podcast on the Iowa Hawkeyes. Part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome in.

This is the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. I'm Trent Condon, and thanks for making Locked On Hawkeyes your first listen every day. That's what we do here on the Locked On Network, your team every day. We got you covered as we talk Hawkeyes basketball offseason. Spring football is here. And of course, the Iowa women's basketball team continue to play on as we get ready for Friday night and the matchup against Colorado.

A win puts them in the Elite Eight with Ole Miss and Louisville waiting on the top side of the bracket and a potential run to the Final Four. Well, we got a lot to get into today. We'll break everything down Hawkeye-related in the news. We kick things off with the news from earlier on the day on Wednesday as two Hawkeyes have entered the transfer portal. We kick things off, no surprise at all, a year ago,

Josh Agundale, the big-bodied man from across the pond. He was in the transfer portal, couldn't find a home or maybe a place of his liking. Regardless, he was welcome back and went out there and had an injury plagued season where we just didn't see a whole lot out of Big Jelly. He was always a fan favorite. He was a guy that provided a couple of moments in his career, came in there, banged around a little bit, played well in the Big Ten Championship game a year ago against Zach Eadie, did some things at times disappointing. I mean, the hope was always that he was going to develop into a little bit more than those two to four-minute spurts that we get out of him or any game situations where we're just hoping the big guy would put one in the bucket, but it just never happened for him.

Didn't put in the requisite work to rechange and retool his body. And because of that, it's going to be one of those guys that'll be remembered, but not remembered for the right reasons. The other one, of course, is a loss out of the starting lineup. And that is Aaron Uless. Now, a lot of people look at this on the surface and say, boy, you lose a starter at the point guard position. This is an absolutely, this is a big blow for Iowa basketball. I couldn't disagree more. We saw glimpses of Aaron Uless, but what we've seen throughout the three years in an Iowa Hawkeye uniform is he is not a

starting caliber point guard for an elite Big Ten team. He is fine, but just that fine. Look at the numbers throughout the course of the season, average six points a game, a couple assists and a rebound. I mean, that's all that you're getting out of Aaron Uless. If I was going to make that advancement, we always hear year after year, right? We get to March Madness, winning games in March. You need elite guard play. Aaron Uless is not an elite guard. He's not even close to it. Adequate backup? Absolutely. But he was thrust into the role this year. He gets the starting line, a nod over over DeSante Bowen, the freshman coming in. Of course, Joe Toussaint transferred, ended up at West Virginia.

So he wasn't part of the program. I think he saw the writing on the wall that it was not going to be his job going into this season. A lot of people thought it was going to be DeSante Bowen. And though we saw DeSante Bowen play well in a little glimpse in the NCAA tournament loss to Auburn. Your number one was a disappointment for him. They have a walk-on there in Nimmers.

Not your prototypical Iowa walk-on, though. A guy with a lot of athleticism, a lot of speed, a lot of size to him. He put out a highlight video the other day that I know Udinod. Remember, it was a highlight video. They didn't have the lowlights in there, and you always have to take those with a grain of salt. But the big news of Aaron Ulis departing here, I'm fine with it. Now, you look at this Iowa roster. We know that it is going to be Chris Murray departing. He is going to be off to the NBA. He's going to move on. So you have that component of it. But right now, this is what Iowa has for scholarship players that played minutes a year ago. Josh Dix. Glimpses? I'm

all right with Josh Dix, right? I think you can see certainly a future for him and a guy that can help you out in a backup point guard role. I don't think he ever develops into a starting type of point guard, but a guy that can fill in five, eight minutes a game, something like that. If you need him, I think he'll develop into a very nice two guard. You have that ability, the shooting ability that we saw out of him.

Really smart floor game. What he did defensively against Indiana in the game at Carver, that always stood out to me of what he was doing on that end of the floor. Now off the dribble, he still got work to do, but also remember, he was recovering after a very devastating injury from a year ago. I think you're still going to see a lot of good basketball out of Josh Dix in a Hawkeye uniform. Peyton Sanford. We know Peyton Sanford had the shooting slump this year, was able to shoot out of it. I think this offense, depending on who they get in the transfer portal,

is certainly going to be geared towards Peyton Sanford and getting him the most opportunities to get shots up. You think back early in the Fran McCaffrey era, a lot of the things that they did with Matt Gatins, I think you can see a lot of those similar things that are going to be happening for Peyton Sanford, his development. He's got to be better off the bounce. He's got to see more versatility to his game, become more than just a shooter.

And he has done that already throughout the course of his career. There's definitely more steps and more upside to the game of Peyton Sanford. DeSante Bowen, we talked about him a little bit. He is back from a year ago. He's got to take a big step in year number two if Iowa's going to be out there. If he's going to get that starting point guard job, what is Iowa doing in the portal? Look at the names that they have been interested in, some of the names that have been thrown out there. A lot of big guys. No surprise that is big guys. Also, we've seen a lot of combo guards,

small forward scoring guards, that type of thing. Not at the point guard position. Does that mean that they think that Bowen's going to be the guy? We will see. Maybe it's Brock Harding, the incoming freshman. Patrick McCaffrey back. We talked about Patrick a ton. Riley Mulvey, I don't know. Maybe it's a big guy that the light bulb suddenly comes on in year number three in the program. It happened with Les Jepson, right? Maybe. We'll see if it happens here with Riley Mulvey. And finally, Maybe we'll see if it happens here with Riley Mulvey. And finally, my man, Tony Perkins, TP, back. Those are the six guys on scholarship from a year ago that'll be back with this team for 2023-24.

This is an opportunity to retool the roster. This is an opportunity to retool Iowa basketball. One of the reasons that I always have so much respect for Kirk Ferentz is though, yes, he has a lot of ways that he does things and he's not going to budge on them. Zone blocking scheme, that's not going to change. Those are, there are certain definitely pillars of the Iowa football program that aren't going to change, but he's willing to adapt. We haven't seen a whole lot of adaptation from Fran McCaffrey.

And that is my question here this offseason, because what they've done is very good. Look, Iowa would have been in the tournament back in 2020. Five straight NCAA tournament bids. Eight out of ten years. These are things that haven't happened in the Iowa program since Lute Olsen. Lute Olsen was the last coach that took Iowa to five consecutive NCAA tournaments. Dr. Tom missed four tournaments in his 13 years as a head coach. There is a lot, and there was an 11-year gap in between the Sweet 16s, and everybody talks like it happened year after year. That wasn't the case. They win the first game and then lose in the second game, almost where we are now, of course,

this year. In the last two years, that didn't happen, but Frank McCaffrey has done good things, but in order to get over that hump, and i think this program can get there the development that we've seen out of mcafree and this program i think there is another level they absolutely can get to is frame willing to put in the work is he willing to make the changes necessary to make it happen that remains the big question we'll continue on here. Iowa basketball, Iowa football today. Of course, we get ready for Friday night and the Iowa women against Colorado here. This is the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast.

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As always, thanks for making Locked On Hawkeyes your first listen every day. Hit that subscribe button if you're watching us on YouTube. Helps us get in front of more Hawkeye fans. So we talked about Aaron Ulis and his departure to this team. It's just the numbers never worked for Ulis. Look at the game log for him. First of all, your point guard. Last three games.

The three disappointing games for Iowa to end the season. The loss to Auburn, loss to Ohio State in the first game of the Big Ten tournament, and the regular season clunker against Nebraska at Carver. He didn't have an assist in any of those games. He's your starting point guard. He played 16, 17, and 13 minutes in those games. Didn't have an assist. Put up three points. Total in three games. He's your starting point guard. He played 16, 17, and 13 minutes in this game. Didn't have an assist. Put up three points total in three games. It's just not good enough. He didn't have more than two assists in a game since back on February 12th against Minnesota.

He had three in that one. He had the stretch against Ohio State, against Michigan State, and against Rutgers where he scored in double figures. But that was basically it. It just, it was not a good season for Aaron Ulis. He was not the guy that is certainly going to deliver. And in Fran McCaffrey's offense, when your numbers are that poor to assist a game as a point guard in the Iowa system, that's not good. There's no way about it. Wasn't a great shooter.

He was an average defender. Now I think that's more scheme than it was talent on that side not good. There's no way about it. Wasn't a great shooter. He was an average defender. Now, I think that's more scheme than it was talent on that side of things, but he was miscast as a big 10 starting point guard backup. Absolutely. You can get by with Aaron Ulus as your backup point guard. You can't with him as a starter again, if we're talking about this program ascending and going to another level, a lot of names that are out there right now. BJ Mack, he is a transfer from Wofford. He released his top 10 the other day. I was among those top 10. Some big prospects as well. Big bodied prospects out there. A big guy from the Ivy League playing at Yale who has big time suitors after him. But I was involved right now. I was absolutely involved and they are very interested in augmenting this roster.

It's a chance to retool, but is anything going to change? And back to what we were talking about a little bit earlier with Fran and what he does with the program and they have to be, they have to have a better identity on the defensive end. You know, we see that pressure defense room. And again, our memories are tainted a little bit I always bring up Dr. Tom because I think the comparisons are so apt to what this program is today and what it was during the 90s with Dr. Tom Davis and and we think of the defense and the full court press and having Chris Street at the front of it and having the big body, long arm, power forward up there. Jay Webb waving his arms around those guys and seeing that and Russ Millard and on and on and on. We think the great moments and the mini spurt that you get.

You get a couple of steals and Carver gets rocking and you're right back in the game. Or you extend the lead and all of a sudden you're up double digits. We think of those moments. But also, remember there was the negative side too. And it was that flat 2-3 zone. And it felt like anybody could hit 1,000 three-pointers, and usually more times than not that they did. It wasn't perfect by any means during that era.

But there was an identity, right? There was an identity attached. And if you're going to be as poor as Iowa is, you're in a year out defensively. And it's not always a physical thing. And Iowa basketball is not going to out-athlete guys, right? I mean, one through five and one through eight or nine, whoever's playing on the roster, that's not Iowa's identity. That's not who they are. Is they're going to go out there or they're just going to beat you because they have more athleticism? That's not the way this

team is built. That's not the way that they recruit. They look for skilled basketball players. That is what Fran has identified. And that's what he develops year in, year out. But on the defensive end, it wasn't just the physical nature. Where a guy gets beat, get beat off the bounce, guy gets to the 10, what are you going to do, right? Tip your ball cap and you move on. It wasn't so much that. It was the lost nature that we continually see from Iowa. It doesn't matter if they're in man, doesn't matter if they're in zone. The rotations are brutal for a Big Ten program year after year. The missed assignments that they have on the defensive end of the floor, I would like to see

that attacking style continue. Now, more than anything, what I'd like to see is for Fran McCaffrey to go out and do much like we saw John Beeline do at Michigan early after the early portions of his tenure. And he went on and he found a defensive coordinator, Luke Yakulich, who did an incredible job. And suddenly Michigan went from a very solid program, kind of like Iowa at that time. They're good. They scored a ton. They were on a 1-3-1 zone. It was terrible. You get threes in the corner against it every single time, and they were bad on that end of the floor, and they went out there and coupled with better talent,

but also a lot better defense, and they made two Final Fours, and they played for a national championship, and they lost that one to Louisville, but that one ultimately was vacated. That aside, they got over the hump. They did it by swelling your pride, understanding that there are certain things that you don't do well,

and bringing somebody in to do that. Now, I don't have hope that Frank McCaffrey will do that because he is a very prideful guy. And he's a guy that believes more than anything that he will be able to figure this out, that he's going to get it done and he's going to do it my way, right? Cue up to Frank Sinatra. He's going to do it my way, right? Cue up to Frank Sinatra.

He's going to do it his way. I think it's short-sighted. Ultimately, I don't think that he's going to be able to do it alone. I think he needs help to get this team defensively at the level they need to be to take that next step as a program. But this is the opportunity right now. You are completely reshaping your roster. Now, after we've seen this happen a lot with Iowa

basketball, a big change in the roster, a big turnover, and it feels like it's going to be a rebuilding year. Go back a couple years ago. Luka Garza goes on. Joe Wieskamp, those guys off to the NBA. Oh, they're not going to make it back. Well, we saw Keegan develop into an All-American. And this year, my expectations were they were going to be a bubble team. Right side of the bubble, wrong side of the bubble. They were going to be a bubble team. They were going to be a team that goes into the final week or two right on the bubble. They were better than that.

This year, we talked about the roster. It's going to be difficult. It's going to be difficult for them to get there. Now, that depends on the portal. And we will get into those names here in the coming days on Lockdown Hawkeyes. We'll continue to break things down, get you some of the prospects that they are after, and they'll be identifying. We'll get a deep dive into that as we roll through here, because it is an important time

for freshmen coming in in next year's class. Six scholarship players coming back, as we know it right now. That is assuming, and that is an it right now. And that is assuming, and that is an assumption right now, that nobody else joins them in the transfer portal. We've seen some crazy ones in the past, ones that you don't see coming, not just in the Iowa program, but in college basketball in general. You just never know. So don't be blindsided because as we have learned, anything can happen. guys that you think are signed sealed and delivered and coming back for another year that is not always the case there's work to

be done and there's also work to be done for the fan base and the swarm collective look financially most people donate their money to the collective and they have it for football there are not many people that are investing right now and listening to br Heinrichs, who runs the Iowa collective, and reading some of the things that he has said. There just is not anything close to the amount of money that is dedicated to the basketball side of things. And that's where people, they want their money on the football side. Well, if you want Iowa to get over the hump, the reality is you got to pay.

You got to go out there and you got you gotta pay to get those big time prospects we saw it a year ago with Vardaz Amok who ended up in Texas Tech now he's back in the portal again but we've seen this happen before and it's gonna happen again here this spring if you want Iowa to have those players you gotta pony up that's just the reality of the situation wrapping things up speaking of football with a little football talk, Iowa football had their first practice yesterday. We'll talk a little bit about Kirk Ferentz. He met with the media.

Some big news and notes from Kirk Ferentz as we roll through here. This is the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. Trent Conner back with you one final time on the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. Hey, hit that subscribe button right now on YouTube. If you're a podcast listener, five-star reviews, that's what we're looking at over there. Helps us get in front of more Hawkeye fans. All right, let's get into what we heard from

Kirk Ferentz today and a couple of the biggest takeaways from the press conference. First of all, is the injury concerns. The wide receiver room, it looks scary once again. Now we know Brody Brecht is over playing baseball. I have long maintained that Brody Brecht should never be back on a football field, at least in a uniform, maybe over the intermediate fields. He can go over there and dominate a little bit in the fall, but he should not be. He's a multi-million dollar pitcher. He's got a multi-million dollar arm. Some of the things that you see with him and what he does, not just the 101 mile an hour fastball that he has, but coupled with just that frisbee slider that he throws up there,

the off-speed stuff is elite. Yes, he's got to be better controlled, but there are scouts out there that maintain he is not just a first-round draft pick when he's eligible for the 2024 amateur draft, but he'd be a first- rounder this year. Well, that's not going to be the case. Some people believe he could be as high as the number one pick. I've seen a couple of scouts talk about that and go back and forth about that idea. He has so much upside as a pitcher and what ultimately he can become because of the million

dollar arm. No more messing around with football. Well, there's another blow to the wide receiver room for Iowa. Great news, obviously, getting a veteran back, Enrico Raggini. But Seth Anderson, there's our transfer buzz that we had coming in from Charleston. Excitement. All right, this is a guy that certainly put up big numbers. You're excited about that? Well, he's dealing with a soft tissue injury. It is, once again, a scary, scary look. When the portal opens up again for football, and it will May 1st through the 15th, a much shorter window than they had back in the wintertime,

but the window will open up again. There is no doubt. Iowa has to go out there, and they still need to find more in the wide receiver room because there just isn't anything there. Jacob Bostic, I know they're excited about him. Dude can't stay healthy. He wasn't healthy in high school.

Hasn't been healthy since he's been on campus. He's battling another injury, a foot injury that he's going through right now. That's a guy you just can't count on at this point in time. We're looking at walk-ons. We're looking at the same old, same old, the Alec Wicks of the world. It's hard to get excited about those kind of guys. There's a kid from Wisconsin, a walk- walk on that they were talking about a little bit today in the press conference.

I mean, let's be honest here. You're going to chase down Ohio State and Michigan and Penn State with those kind of guys? The reality is that's not likely to happen if you're going to be doing that and trotting those kind of guys out there every single time. The offensive line was a disaster the last two years. And now it sounds like they're practicing with seven scholarship guys right now. Okay. That's a problem because they need reps. The young guys that you're hopeful maybe can break through. And we saw some breakthrough moments

a year ago, Mason Richmond of a bad group. He was the best of them. No, that's not great, but Hey, somebody had to be the best of a bad group. And that was him. But we definitely saw a jump from him last year during his sophomore year. Now an upperclassman, you think that development's going to continue. Well, we're going to have a lot of those stories. And though they bring in a Rusty Feth, he'll be coming in this June after he graduates from Miami of Ohio. De'Jon Parker is going through spring practice.

That's good as he comes in from Saginaw. You have those guys out there. Still, the question marks remain. And if your offensive line's not going to be good, the offense is not going to be good. And we can yell about Brian, and we can complain about Spencer Petras, who, oh, by the way, we got something on that

coming up here. But ultimately, it comes down to what you do up front. I'll complain about wide receivers. The tight ends are going to be good. Awesome to see Eric Gull is out there. Now, ultimately, it comes down to Cade McNamara as well. And Cade McNamara still working his way back from the knee surgery that he had back in his days when he was playing at Michigan

and working his way back. He's going through seven on seven. He's not going to be a full participant. They don't want to have any contact. They don't want to have anybody falling around him, anything like that. It's seven on seven work, no pass rush, anything like that. That's what you're going to see out of Cade McNamara here during the spring practice. And that's fine. You know what Cade McNamara is. And Cade McNamara, he's not a guy that's going to go out there and

wow you with arm strength. He's not going to be a guy that you say, whoa, this is completely different. That's not what it is. It's leadership. It's understanding. It's smart. And it's accuracy. Things that don't always show up in a seven-on-seven scheme as comparison to what you're going to see on real 11-on-11 football. So that's just a couple of things there. Mention the quarterback position, though. So I told you guys, back when it was announced that, don't worry, yes, Spencer Petras is going to remain

on scholarship for the spring semester, but he's having this major surgery. He's not going to be out there. This is what Kirk said today. Quote, I don't think he'll be playing, speaking of Petras, but we'll see. We'll let that thing play out. It is that infection that Kirk just can't get rid of. I know Spencer Peaches is a great person.

I understand that. He's a terrible quarterback. He's a bad Big Ten quarterback. And there is some blind spot that Kirk has about him that he just can't quit him. I think it is bad for the program if he has come back for his final year of eligibility, even if they don't think he's going to be able to play until the end of the year. Yes, he's going to be a backup. He'll be a third team.

He'll be a fourth teamer. If he can't physically throw the football until October, something like that. But there's too much baggage here. There's too much. There's that dark cloud that surrounds Spencer Peterson. Again, not as a person person but with the fan base and these bad feelings that we just have about him

the best thing is for it to end move on if he wants to give it a go if he wants to go somewhere else do your damnedest to go out there and help him out and find a spot it just can't be here it's not good for the program It's not good for the program.

It's not good for the fan psyche. Let's be honest. That's where we are right now. I'm reading that. I'm shaking my head. But am I surprised? Well, I told you guys not to be. And here we are.

Here we are as well. Iowa getting ready for the Sweet 16 in women's basketball. We'll talk about that a little bit more tomorrow also some recruiting talk that's right we got John Garcia stopping by tomorrow on the podcast he's going to break things down and look forward at the 2024 recruiting class on the football side of things Iowa already with three four stars in the mix we'll break them down and some of the big prospects of the Hawkeyes are going to be looking at on tomorrow's podcast as always thanks prospects of the Hawkeyes are going to be looking at on tomorrow's podcast.

As always, thanks for making Lockdown Hawkeyes your first listen every single day. For your second listen, check out our brand new podcast, Lockdown College Basketball. Our experts, Isaac Schottie and Andy Patton, bringing you everything you need to know on and off the court. Plus, you can hear from the big names, the experts, the players, and the coaches all throughout college hoops. You can hear from the big names, the experts, the players, and the coaches all throughout college hoops. Locked on college basketball. Available right now on YouTube and wherever you get podcasts.

We'll talk to you again tomorrow. Go Hawks.