Locked On Hawkeyes - Daily Podcast On Iowa Hawkeyes Football & Basketball - Iowa basketball player Filip Rebraca joins the show to discuss his journey to the Hawkeyes, the transfer portal, and his basketball game

Episode Date: April 28, 2021

We have the newest member of the Iowa basketball team, Filip Rebraca, on the show today to talk about his incredible journey to the Iowa basketball team, why he chose the Hawks, and what Iowa fans can expect to see from the big man next year.Listen to The Ultimate Mock Draft 2021 presented by Audacy and the Locked On Podcast Network. April 19th-26th. Follow the feed today!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 “LOCKED15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.BetOnline AGThere is only 1 place that has you covered and 1 place we trust. Betonline.ag! Sign up today for a free account at betonline.ag and use that promocode: LOCKEDON for your 50% welcome bonus.Rock AutoAmazing selection. Reliably low prices. All the parts your car will ever need. Visit RockAuto.com and tell them Locked On sent you. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You are Locked On Hawkeyes, your daily podcast on the Iowa Hawkeyes. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network, your team every day. Welcome back, Hawkeye Nation, to a Wednesday morning episode of the Locked On Hawkeyes Podcast, your daily podcast covering your Iowa Hawkeyes on the Locked On Sports Network. As always, I am your host, Andrew Wade, and I'm very excited for today's show because we have a very special guest with us. The most recent commitment to the Iowa basketball team, we've got Phillip Rabracha. He is joining the show, transferring out of University of North Dakota to join the Iowa

basketball team for the next year, possibly two years. He is going to be on the show here in a second, but I do want to tell you about locked on today. Get all the sports news you need in under 20 minutes with the locked on today podcast host, Peter Bukowski updates you on the latest news and every major sport with the help of our local experts, follow the locked on today podcast on the odyssey app or wherever you get your podcast app.

Also, after we finish up the conversation with Phillip, we're going to be giving you a little bit of a rundown among Iowa Hawkeye athletics. There's a lot of news and notes. The soccer team, there's some NFL signings, Luka Garza is in the news, Big Ten Player of the Week announcements. So we're going to talk about all that on segment three. But before that, let's get into the main piece of the show today. Phillip Abracha, the latest commitment in the Iowa Hawkeye basketball class.

We're excited to have him on here. Let's go. All right, y'all. I'm honored to be joined here by the newest member of the Iowa Hawkeyes. We got Phillip Rabracha on the call. And, Phillip, I got your name right, so I'm happy about that. How are you doing today, though, man? I'm doing great.

You know, I had a workout in. I had a lift session, ate well, had classes. So it was a busy day, but, you know, I'm doing well. I love it, man. And how many more weeks do you have of classes right now? I have three more weeks, including this one. So I got finals in two weeks, and then I'm done. And you're officially graduating your undergrad degree, correct?

Yes, but I have one summer class to take. So I'll be finishing that during the summer. Are you going to be doing that online or back in North Dakota? It'll be fully online. Yeah. Nice. What are you, what are you planning on heading back to Iowa or heading down to Iowa? I should say. So once my final finals are done, I want to go home to Serbia for a few weeks. I hope, you know,

I haven't been back home because of COVID. So that's what I plan first. And then hopefully I can be at Iowa and like mid June, hopefully, or sometime in June. Nice. And how has that been for you? I mean, that's obviously the pandemic has been tough on everyone, right? But I can only imagine someone who lives a bit further away from home. That's got to be a bit tougher, right? Like I could still go see my parents if I want to, but how has that been for you personally? You know, it's been tough not being able to see people I grew up with, you know, my family members, friends and whatnot. But, you know, I understand what I'm here for.

You know, I'm here to get an education. I'm here to play basketball. So I understand that even though it is hard, I have a goal in my mind. So, you know, I just kind of remind myself about my goals every day to make it easier. Does it ever get tough? I mean, do you ever just kind of get frustrated? I mean, I understand what you're saying, but that's still got to be tough, right? I mean, it definitely is.

You know, there's days I wish I was home, you know, sometimes during the season, you know, when we're having a rough stretch or if it's not going well in practice, you know, at the sometimes during the season, you know, when we're having a rough stretch or if it's not going well in practice, you know, you're kind of like, I just I wish I was home for a few. So, I mean, it definitely has its own unique challenges just being so far away. No doubt, man. So what was the biggest adjustment for you coming from Serbia to North Dakota? I mean, not exactly what you think about when you think about America and no offense North Dakota to be fair anyone in North Dakota no uh so I kind of

so I kind of grew up in the United States because my father he played in the NBA and whatnot you know so it wasn't that much of a culture shock but I've never been in the Midwest to say you know so coming in the Midwest I was like uh I didn the midwest to say you know so coming in the midwest i was like uh i didn't know what to expect you know i thought it was just gonna be empty fields uh crops everywhere and stuff like that but you know grand forks is a nice place uh i've seen other places in the in the midwest so uh you know i wouldn't say anything shocked me too much you know but if it shocked me it shocked me on the positive side you know I wouldn't say anything shocked me too much you know but if it shocked me it shocked me on the positive side you know because I probably had this kind of

kind of a stigma towards uh you know the Midwest thinking there is just you know agriculture and stuff whatnot so I did I felt like I was shocked in a good way you know that there's a bunch of stuff to do in places to see yeah no doubt man I mean that's that's a good thing to be positively shocked in that regard. As far as the recruiting process, what was that recruiting process like for you going to North Dakota? So right out of prep school, when I did my postgraduate year, I had no offers from anywhere. Zero D1, D2, or D3 offers. I had one community college offer when I was coming out of high school in Denver, Colorado. But, you know, after a few weeks of just waiting around,

seeing what was going to happen, you know, I didn't know what I was going to do with my life and my career in basketball. There's a Serbian coach at the staff of UND, you know, and he heard about me, you know, and he showed tape to the head coach that was here. And then, you know, they liked me and that's, I pretty much had to take it. It was my only, my only offer. So that's pretty much made it easy for me.

Yeah, it worked out well. I mean, now, so you're looking at this, you didn't have offers coming out of school and now you're going to be playing D1 basketball. Not that you weren't playing D1 basketball before, but you can play D1 basketball in the big 10 for the Iowa Hawkeyes. What does that path and journey mean to you? I mean, it means a lot. You know, I felt like in each stage of my career, I was a certain, you know, when I started off, I was an underdog in a way, you know, I always had that chip on my shoulder that, you know, no one recruited me hard enough, you know, no one, no one saw the potential that I saw in myself, you know, and at each level, I proved time and time again, that I deserve to

be where I am. And, you know, I exceed expectations. So just, you know, this looking back, I'm just really proud of myself. But you know, this is just – I feel like I can do even more. And now I'm at that point again. I'm a mid-major guy going to the Big Ten. Not a lot of people believe all my skills will translate, but I'm excited to try to prove what I'm worth, I guess. I love it, man. I mean, you picked a pretty good offense to showcase your skills

as far as what I've seen, but there's not a lot of tape on you. It's kind of tough to find some of that tape. So for the Iowa fans out there, what are some of the best attributes of your game? And then what are some of the areas that you're looking to improve on this summer? Well, I feel like, you know, my biggest attribute is my versatility. You know, I can do a little bit of everything. I can score in the post. I can face up in the post. I can shoot from the post I can face up in the post I can shoot from the post the mid-range from outside I can drive a little bit you know so just being versatile at all these areas you know I feel like I'm a little bit above average in all these areas but you know I don't want to give you a cliche answer and say I need to improve everything which I do but the two the two

biggest areas I would say is just my physical body, because I do understand I'm going to be playing the Big Ten. I need to put on a few pounds to be able to battle night in and night out with the competition in there. But, you know, my other one would be shooting. I felt like I was a really good shooter this year, but I feel like my percentages can go even higher. So these are the two main aspects I'd like to, you know, improve on. Considering you hit 36% from three, if you're going to improve on that,

I think you're going to make Iowa fans incredibly happy. I feel like they're looking at that 36%. They're saying we're good. We're fine with that. But if you can improve on that, they will be, they'll be stoked, my man. So you decided to enter the transfer portal. What was the thought process going into that? And I have a couple of follow-ups to that, but just, um, cause what I've seen is it seems like it was probably more educationally based on most first part of your decision-making. So I wanted to get a, um, that answer from you. Well, my primary thing was, um, kind of midway through our season

this year. Uh, I was trying to set up my classes and whatnot, you know, and we're talking, I was talking to my advisor about my future. And then they mentioned me graduating and what I wanted to do. And I said, I want a master's in business administration. So UND's MBA program is going fully online. And I won't be able to take that because I'm an international student and I need to be in at least one in-person class per semester. So with them not being able to offer that, you know, I just kind of kept that to myself the whole season.

I didn't want to distract my teammates or coaches. You know, we had a bigger goal in mind. But, you know, when the season came to an end, you know, I felt like this is something I really have to look at. After looking at the options that UND had, I felt like none of them fit me really well, which was unfortunate. But, you know, that's the way it is. And so that's why I told the coaches, you know, I don't want to sacrifice my education and I would like to transfer elsewhere. So that's kind of the decision. You know, they fully supported me. They said even even if, if this wasn't the case, uh, if you just wanted to leave grad transfer, just because you wanted to, they said, you know, they fully support me, which is always really nice. You know, they, they, you know, I respect them as people. So that's kind of my, my thought process throughout this whole ordeal, I guess.

All right. Y'all need to quickly pause that conversation with Philip. I hope you are enjoying it as much as I did. I do want to tell you about Bilt Bars though, because Bilt Bars are the best tasting protein bar on the market today. They come in so many phenomenal flavors and they are all covered in 100% chocolate and they are soft and easy to chew. But the best part about these phenomenally tasting Bilt Bars is that they are also very good for you. These bars are low calorie, low sugar, high protein, high fiber, great for the keto diet.

I have one every single day, whether it's for breakfast or a post-workout snack. Today, I had one at three o'clock just because I was hungry. So grab yourself a Built Bar, taste the awesome nutritional benefits and the delicious flavor with their Built Bars. And right now, you can actually go to BuiltBar.com and use the promo code LOCKED15, L-O-C-K-E-D-1-5, and you'll get 15% off your next order. Use the promo code LOCKED15 for 15% off at BuiltBar.com. That's such a different story and reason for transferring than what we hear from a lot of players.

I did see your coaches were very, very kind to you in terms of how they said, we're so grateful for you to be a part of this program. We wish you the best of luck. I mean, what a nice message they sent you off with. So it makes sense. But now you're looking to transfer and you want to get to a program where you can, you know, have at least one class in person. What were the things you were looking for and how did Iowa stand out to you?

So there was a few things I was looking for. First, of course, education wise, you know, I need to find a school that can offer me in-person classes, you know, so I can stay there legally. But then basketball wise, what I was looking for in a school, one, I wanted to go to a program that had sort of winning culture. You know, I wanted to be a part of of a bigger thing you know I want to help contribute to winning you know and Iowa has a recent very big very good recent culture you know with Garza and everyone everything else that what they've done recently you know I just wanted to help help the coaches help, help the program, help the team, my future teammates, you know, all that. And then another thing I wanted to someone who can develop my skills even further. So I took a big step this year, you know, stretching out the floor,

doing a little bit of everything even more, you know, and I felt like Coach McCaffrey told me that he, you know, he wants to encourage me to do all these things. You know, he wants to encourage me to shoot more. He wants to encourage me to, you know, drive more, to find open teammates and whatnot. You know, I just really liked the vision he was telling me, you know, he had for me as well, you know, and I just really bought into that. And so I guess that's the reason I chose Iowa in the end. I love it, man. And so you've probably seen Fran McCaffrey talk a little bit about the portal. He's not the world's biggest fan of the transfer portal. He wants to find a guy who is the right fit for the team,

both culturally and fitting in in terms of a playing style. So clearly you fit that mold, which is amazing, and we're so happy to have you as an Iowa Hawkeye. But what are your thoughts on the transfer portal? Because, again, you went into it kind of differently than a lot of, I mean, there's a record amount of players in the transfer portal right now. What are your thoughts on the transfer portal overall and the culture of transferring today?

I'm kind of half and half with it. You know, I felt like some people, it may help some people out. You know, maybe some kids made a mistake. Maybe, you know, they made a mistake by going there. Maybe they were told something else and it doesn't pan out that way. So maybe a one-time transfer thing isn't so bad, you know. But, you know, there's a lot of kids that have multiple transfer multiple times, and I don't know if this is, you know,

something that should be promoted as much, you know. so I'm kind of half and half on it. You know, I feel like in certain situations, it can be good. And then in certain situations, it can be overused. So that's kind of my thought process on it. Yeah, no, I mean, that's kind of aligns with what I think as well. So you talked about the fact that you wanted to find a good educational program. What are you planning on studying at Iowa? Are you going to do an MBA there? Yes, but I don't know what my focus of study exactly will be right now. Nice. And you're starting classes in the fall?

Yes, yeah. Nice. I'm actually, not that this matters to you, but I'm actually starting the MBA program at Iowa as well in a month. So if you need any feedback, I probably can help you out. That sounds good. So as far as the team goes man obviously Fran recruited you he has a vision for you has a plan for you um he probably didn't know at that time that Jordan Bohannon was returning what are your thoughts on Jordan Bohannon returning and what are your thoughts on this team in general who

are you most excited to play with what have you seen so far on tape that you that intrigues you about the Iowa basketball team you know first off you know with him coming back that's like huge you know I know he's the he's going to break the big 10-3 the record this year you know and he's Iowa's I think a leading assist uh uh leading assist whatever it's called I got you yeah yeah he leads the team and he leads the team yes yep exactly that that's what i was trying to say uh you know and just being able to play with a guy of his caliber is gonna be amazing you know a guy that can help you space the floor a guy that can make open shots at or even tough shots uh but you know a guy that can also help uh help you get open is

just so it's gonna be really fun to play with, you know, and I want to learn from him. I want to learn what he does and why he does things like that. And I feel like, you know, we're going to be really good on and off the court. But, you know, I heard of other great players, like the Murray brothers and the McCaffrey brothers, you know, and these are guys that I, you know, and these are, these are guys that I,

you know, want to learn from, and I feel like they can learn something from me as well. So, you know, there's a lot of exciting players. I mean, there's, this was only a few guys that I've mentioned. I can go down the list of players, you know, so I'm excited to meet them all. And I know every guy can bring a lot to the table, you know, and I'm just looking forward to meeting them all and seeing what, what they can do even more. Absolutely. Philip, do you have a brother? Because I mean, I feel like that's kind of the trend with Iowa, right? Yes, I have a brother, but he's younger. He's turning 15 in like two months. All right. Well, Joe Wieskamp and Connor and Patrick all have little brothers around that age. Maybe you can come to Iowa. I have a little trio there. Philip, I've

taken up a bit of your time, man. I just want to ask one more question. Outside of basketball, what is your go-to activity? What do you like to do? What do you do for fun? What's the thing outside of basketball? You know, the cliche thing would be just like playing games, you know, like video games and whatnot. But, you know, I feel like I do a lot of other things, you know, I like playing chess. I like playing board games with my teammates you know I don't know I like taking my girl's dog for walks and stuff like that you know it's just a bunch of outdoors outdoor stuff too you know activities sand volleyball or whatnot yeah believe it or not we have sand volleyball here in North Dakota but you know I feel like I'm an outgoing

guy you know I feel like I can do a bunch of things that I find fun. So what's your, first of all, I've never heard anyone answer that question with chess. So I think that's amazing. What is your go-to board game? My go-to board game. I was really into, what is it called? Oh my God. How did I forget this? It's on the tip of my tongue. I have it in my living room. I can't remember it.

I can't remember it. I really can't. I was leaving you. I was like, ready for it, man. I forgot. It's like with the card, you know, you have the cards and it's kind of like connect for or whatever. But with cards, what is it called? Sequence? What did you say? Sequence sequence. Yes, there it is. There.

I couldn't remember what it was. It calls on tip of my tongue. Yeah. Sequence. I played a lot of sequence recently. I love it, man. That's actually been my wife's, my wife and I go to game the last like couple of weeks. So that's the only way I knew about it uh well philip man i really appreciate you taking the time i know you've probably gotten quite a few requests from people just especially when you join the iowa hawkeye program people love talking about the iowa hawkeye so i appreciate you hopping on any last words you want to say to iowa hawkeye nation

before i let you go man i mean you know i'm really excited to be a hawkeye and i just can't wait to get there you know and get to work so it's gonna be an love it, man. We're looking forward to it as well. Thank you so much, Phillip. Thank you. I appreciate it. All right, y'all, and that does it for our conversation with Phillip Rabracha today. Hope you enjoyed that, again, as much as I did. It was a very fun conversation.

What an awesome young man that's going to be joining the Iowa Hawkeye basketball team. I do want to tell you, though, about betonline.ag, the fastest and the easiest way to bet on all of your sports action. Base is in full swing and you can track all the action at betonline this week also has a ton of sports action on the go the nfl draft is on the kentucky derby is back as the first leg of the triple crown begins this weekend all that you can be betting on at betonline.ag you can also bet on major league baseball nba nhl NHL, and all of our UFC and MMA action. So before the next game happens, before the next opportunity to bet happens, go to betonline.ag right now and sign up for your free account today.

And when you use the promo code LOCKEDON, you'll get a 50% welcome bonus on your first deposit. That's right, betonline.ag. You can get a free account and a 50% welcome bonus by using the promo code LOCKEDON. Don't sit on the sidelines anymore. This is your chance to get into the game as teams prep for their runs to the playoffs. BetOnline.ag, your online sportsbook experts. All right, y'all, we are back for segment three of the Locked On Hawkeyes podcast. As I mentioned, we're going to be kind of doing a quick rundown of sports across the

board. First and foremost, the women's soccer team continues their unprecedented run as they clinched their very first tournament win in the history of Iowa Hawkeyes soccer. They beat Campbell one to nothing in advance in the NCAA tournament. They take on UCLA Friday at 2 p.m. That is going to be a very tough matchup. But what we've seen from the Iowa Hawkeyes women's soccer team is so impressive. Don't underestimate them as they take on a very tough UCLA team on Friday.

On the NFL front, Ike Bucker signed a one-year deal with the Bills to stay with them. Just putting together a very nice, solid career all around. Also on the football front, I know Tyler Linderbaum, Jack Plum, and Kyler Schott, they all spoke to the media yesterday. Unfortunately, we wanted to cover that, but I just felt like giving you this Philip Abracha interview was a bit more important in this instance. And to be honest, the player interviews are very fun.

They're great, but not a significant amount of information to glean from some of those. But when we go through those interviews, we'll make sure to drop any nuggets that you need to know on the Twitter account and on the podcast if we get to that. Still on the football front, we have a four-star corner. Jalen Peoples announced his top five, and that included Iowa. Among SMU, Kansas, Texas Tech, and Baylor, That would be a huge get for Phil Parker's defense. That would be just a lot of fun. And to wrap it up on the football front,

Nick Kendall is going to be joining us tomorrow. Nick Kendall has been a recurring guest, a draft expert, a guy who covers the draft very heavily, especially for the Denver Broncos, but he's a huge Iowa Hawkeye fan, watches every single game, and pays very close attention to the Iowa Hawkeye draft prospects. He's going to be joining us for the next two days. As we give you a preview of the NFL draft and all of your Iowa Hawkeye football players that are going into the draft.

You're going to absolutely love that. So we'll be covering that tomorrow and on Friday, I'm saying Friday because we're not going to have an Iowa Hawkeye drafted on Thursday evening. So we're going to be continuing that preview going into Friday. So all of your draft coverage right here on the podcast, and we'll be giving you some lockdown now, some quick tidbits as players get drafted day two and on day three.

That's all going to be coming right here for the Lockdown Hawkeyes podcast. Moving on into the basketball front. Luka Garza launched a website, lukagarzanftgroup.io to assist college athletes, students, artists, and musicians wherever name image likeness is available starting a seven one. I think what he's doing for college athletics is amazing. I think what he's going to be doing to help out these athletes is truly phenomenal. What we've seen from him is he continues to build on an impressive athletic

career to become an impressive young businessman as well. An entrepreneur. I have no doubt helping being speared by his entrepreneur father, Frank Garza. Luka Garza, though, really entering a unique space that no one has entered. And we've seen a lot of players follow him since he was the first collegiate athlete to create his own NFT. So awesome stuff there. One of Luka Garza's former teammates, Ryan Creener received

Belgian player of the week award. He has been having an unbelievable year. One of the top scorers in the league at 19.9 points per game, averaging 7.8 rebounds per game and shooting 43.6% from three Ryan Creener putting together a very nice first season overseas in Europe. And Jordan Bohannon talked a little bit to the media. And the biggest thing I want to cover is the fact that, well, there's a couple of things. I covered this a lot on yesterday's show, but Jordan Bohannon coming back is going to be huge for the team. And the biggest thing for him was that he wanted to come back as a two. And that's what frame McCaffrey wanted him as. Now, why I say that's the biggest thing is that he mentioned today that one of the big reasons why

he did not want to return is because he wanted to make sure Joe Toussaint had a shot to run the point. He did not want to take over that spot. So until he realized he was going to be that too, then he didn't really want to take away Joe T's opportunity. And I think that just goes to speak about the character for Jordan Bohannon and how much he actually cares about the team. He did not do this for himself, right? He's doing this for the team. He wants to play another year at Iowa, but people want to say he's being selfish. People want to say he's hurting other people's playing times. He very much considered all of that. And it wasn't until CJ Frederick left the team that Jordan Bohannon and obviously Fran McCaffrey started recruiting him very hard.

Jordan Bohannon wanted to come back at that number two spot. And again, as a number two, he's going to have, I believe, a lot more open looks. With him and Joe T on the floor, that could be a really dangerous guard duo. And I'm excited to watch what they can do next year. And I think with Jordan Bohannon returning, if he can be healthy the entire season, Iowa does have a shot to have a very, a surprise, good, a surprisingly good season. So be on the lookout for that. On the tennis front, to wrap up the show,

Kareem El-Aff was voted all Big Ten first team for the Hawkeyes tennis team for the second year in a row. Congratulations, Kareem. And that does do it for our show today. Again, thank you all for tuning in. I hope you enjoyed the conversation with Phillip. I definitely enjoyed that. We're going to be back tomorrow with conversations with Nick Kendall

and on Friday as well as we break down the Iowa Hawkeye draft prospects. And if you didn't get a chance to listen to our episode yesterday, we had 2021 commit Jeff Bowie, a defensive end, probably going to be a defensive tackle at some point for the Iowa Hawkeyes. He joined the show to talk about his recruiting experience and why he joined the Iowa Hawkeyes. Make sure to check that out if you didn't get a chance to already. And again, we've been covering the draft, but I want to make sure you know about how the Locked On Podcast Network is covering the draft as well. Tomorrow, the Locked On Podcast Network is partnering with the Draft Network to cover the NFL Draft live.

Get insight and analysis from Locked On local experts and the Draft Network's national experts. Subscribe to the Locked On NFL YouTube page to watch live three-day coverage of the NFL Draft April 29th through May 1st. And as I say, we'll be covering that as well right here on the lockdown Hawkeyes podcast. If you love the show,

give us that five-star review and follow us wherever you downloaded this episode of the podcast app. And as always follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram have a fantastic Wednesday Hawkeye nation and let's go Hawks.