2026 Transfer Portal

[mileskishnish72]

Reading this just took me back to when we played Nova in the Big East Tournament two years ago and Oso made a quick bounce pass to Kam that resulted in what would've been a game-winning buzzer beater. Still feeling the anxiety from those five long minutes of review.

Another Breeding MSG F-up.

[MUDPT]

If you watch from one angle, one of the refs counts it good, the other two (including Breeding)don't make any motion and go right to the monitor.

[K1 Lover]

Found the clip in case anyone wants to re-live it.

https://youtu.be/m-lX4KbS5UI?si=AGqZOQGPCzi5NM-Y

[Vander Blue Man Group]

Article in The Athletic regarding Shaka evolving to use the portal.  It might be free if you don't have a membership.

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7281593/2026/05/15/shaka-smart-marquette-transfer-portal-philosophy/

[MU82]

Found the clip in case anyone wants to re-live it.

https://youtu.be/m-lX4KbS5UI?si=AGqZOQGPCzi5NM-Y

Well, Sam's shot probably shouldn't have counted against Creighton, but they gave it to us and that let us win in OT. So maybe a case of these things evening out. Regardless, we went 2-0 in those games.

I'm enjoying the Scoopiness of us all having this conversation in this most appropriate thread for it!

[MU82]

Article in The Athletic regarding Shaka evolving to use the portal.  It might be free if you don't have a membership.

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7281593/2026/05/15/shaka-smart-marquette-transfer-portal-philosophy/

From the article:

This past season, Smart admits, he overestimated what he thought certain players would be able to do in the roles they were given, both on the court and culturally.
Marquette also had some injuries to veterans — Sean Jones and Zaide Lowery missed a combined 45 games — and that forced younger players into bigger roles. By early December, Smart was starting freshmen guards Nigel James and Adrien Stevens.

It's good that Shaka admitted that he overestimated what MU would get from numerous players. It was obvious to pretty much all of us here that was the case, and it pretty much kneecapped this past season.

The writer, CJ Moore, did a nice job ... though he was wrong about Lowery being injured - unless he was talking about Lowery's hurt ego.

[#UnleashThePortal]

Being reminded of that just annoys me more that the ball was out of his hands. At least we still won!

Went to do a victory smoke after the first replay showed it clearly out of his hand, came back in furious.

[Jay Bee]

It's good that Shaka admitted that he overestimated what MU would get from numerous players. It was obvious to pretty much all of us here that was the case, and it pretty much kneecapped this past season.

He's doing it again this coming season. #LastYear

[brewcity77]

Article in The Athletic regarding Shaka evolving to use the portal.  It might be free if you don't have a membership.

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7281593/2026/05/15/shaka-smart-marquette-transfer-portal-philosophy/

My biggest issue was this:

"The lesson: Seattle's process was not bad unless you're only basing it on the result."

Shaka uses this excerpt to indicate that if Marquette's process was good, the 12-20 result last year was not indicative of failure. Essentially, saying "don't read too much into the wins and losses."

However, that same principle should apply to 2022-23, 2023-24, and the first half of 2024-25. Don't read too much into the wins and losses and be willing to look at places where the process did or didn't work as designed.

Can you justify not taking transfers in 2023 after O-Max left because you had Joplin and felt there was enough quality on the bench? Sure. But after 2024, the process should be re-evaluated when you see what happened after TK went down. He got hurt, and we continued to play at a relatively high level because Kam unexpectedly showed acumen for the point. The lesson to take from this is not just that Kam can run the point, but that you need positional coverage for when your star runs out of gas, whether TK's injury or Kam falling off the next year.

Instead, they ignored the wins and losses, figured "if it ain't broke..." and ran it back with the same roster and no coverage for Kam. Even if you count Sean, the original injury reports the staff received had him sitting out the entire 2024-25 season and their optimism didn't show up until December that he might be back early. They knew in April/May what their depth situation would be and instead of learning from TK when the process was going well, they ignored that.

They continued to win but not at the same level, and ignored process lessons again by running back Caedin and Sean, expecting them to play at a high level despite no on-court evidence either was capable of doing that. Call it misevaluation, call it roster mismanagement, whatever, but it clearly was a failure. So they can ignore the losses of 2025-26, but if they are ignoring the process faults that led to them, they clearly didn't learn anything from the book they are citing to reinforce their system.

[wisblue]

Having an upperclassman starter become disgruntled and then leave the team probably had more of a negative impact on the team than if he had been injured.

[panda]

He's doing it again this coming season. #LastYear

You'll get more ch18 and you'll like it.

[withoutbias]

My biggest issue was this:

"The lesson: Seattle's process was not bad unless you're only basing it on the result."

Shaka uses this excerpt to indicate that if Marquette's process was good, the 12-20 result last year was not indicative of failure. Essentially, saying "don't read too much into the wins and losses."

However, that same principle should apply to 2022-23, 2023-24, and the first half of 2024-25. Don't read too much into the wins and losses and be willing to look at places where the process did or didn't work as designed.

Can you justify not taking transfers in 2023 after O-Max left because you had Joplin and felt there was enough quality on the bench? Sure. But after 2024, the process should be re-evaluated when you see what happened after TK went down. He got hurt, and we continued to play at a relatively high level because Kam unexpectedly showed acumen for the point. The lesson to take from this is not just that Kam can run the point, but that you need positional coverage for when your star runs out of gas, whether TK's injury or Kam falling off the next year.

Instead, they ignored the wins and losses, figured "if it ain't broke..." and ran it back with the same roster and no coverage for Kam. Even if you count Sean, the original injury reports the staff received had him sitting out the entire 2024-25 season and their optimism didn't show up until December that he might be back early. They knew in April/May what their depth situation would be and instead of learning from TK when the process was going well, they ignored that.

They continued to win but not at the same level, and ignored process lessons again by running back Caedin and Sean, expecting them to play at a high level despite no on-court evidence either was capable of doing that. Call it misevaluation, call it roster mismanagement, whatever, but it clearly was a failure. So they can ignore the losses of 2025-26, but if they are ignoring the process faults that led to them, they clearly didn't learn anything from the book they are citing to reinforce their system.

Shaka says he misevaluated what he thought players on the team would be able to do in new roles last year.  He talks about how what they did in 2022 appears to not be what they can do to be successful in 2026.  He changed courses and took two high level transfers.  And your takeaway is one sentence of the article that suggests that he ain't changing, last season wasn't an issue with the process it was a one year blip.

This after complaining constantly about who he hired and positions he didn't create.

Maybe look at everything he's done this offseason and trust that he realizes he messed up last season.  Look at his career as a head coach and realize he's a successful high major coach.

I know you went all in on him not being able to move away from RGV without changing jobs, not being able to take transfers if he's "a man of his word," and now that he's proven you wrong with that (or proven to be someone who won't live up to his word) everything has to be criticized, but he's proving that he's been willing to adjust and continue to compete at a high level.

Will we compete for a BE title next year?  We'll see.  But if we land Crowdis, then really the only big hole left is depth at the 5, and Shaka had that until somebody wildly overpaid for that depth piece we had to bring him to his hometown.  I can't find fault in Shaka for not overpaying to keep him.  We want Marquette to play the portal game.  We can't expect Marquette players not to play the portal game too.

[panda]

Shaka says he misevaluated what he thought players on the team would be able to do in new roles last year.  He talks about how what they did in 2022 appears to not be what they can do to be successful in 2026.  He changed courses and took two high level transfers.  And your takeaway is one sentence of the article that suggests that he ain't changing, last season wasn't an issue with the process it was a one year blip.

This after complaining constantly about who he hired and positions he didn't create.

Maybe look at everything he's done this offseason and trust that he realizes he messed up last season.  Look at his career as a head coach and realize he's a successful high major coach.

I know you went all in on him not being able to move away from RGV without changing jobs, not being able to take transfers if he's "a man of his word," and now that he's proven you wrong with that (or proven to be someone who won't live up to his word) everything has to be criticized, but he's proving that he's been willing to adjust and continue to compete at a high level.

Will we compete for a BE title next year?  We'll see.  But if we land Crowdis, then really the only big hole left is depth at the 5, and Shaka had that until somebody wildly overpaid for that depth piece we had to bring him to his hometown.  I can't find fault in Shaka for not overpaying to keep him.  We want Marquette to play the portal game.  We can't expect Marquette players not to play the portal game too.

#bareminimum offseason