Tennessee basketball coach Rick Barnes almost shuddered.
In this case, the problem of the annual large orange caravan stopping in Memphis on April 29 is hypothetical.
Given the current climate of college track and field, the number of players in the transfer portal exceeds a few thousand per year, and the amount of money paid to many of the same players is hundreds of thousands, in some cases, how you would deal with the reconstruction of the roster that almost rebuilds from scratch.
Just thinking about doing this, especially now at zero time and the dawn of the income sharing era, has almost brought a chill to Barnes.
"I don't know what numbers will bring to a 12-man lineup now," he said.
But for many, including Penny Hardaway, it's a stark reality. Starting the 2024-25 season, the eighth-grade Memphis basketball coach may have only one player (Dante Harris).
Part of that depends on what All-American defender PJ Haggerty decides to do. He recently entered the transfer portal and reportedly is looking for at least $4 million in games somewhere next season. Several sources told the business appeal on April 29.
But if neither Haggerty nor Dainja come back, Hardaway will have something Barnes desperate to hope he will never do. He and his plans work hard to avoid this. He attributes the coaching staff to scouting the right players, not only from athletic perspective, but personal health.
Barnes is still firm and firm in his belief in strict standards.
"We have a limit," he said.
Most of the time, Barnes never has to figure out what would happen if his team and prospective volunteers couldn’t reach a deal. He admitted that this had happened. Recently, in fact.
“This happened this year,” he said. “We have been involved in people who really want to go to the University of Tennessee, but they are looking for more money than we can offer.
"We know how far we're willing to go with every prospect, and that's the cutoff. If someone gives them more information, we'll say, 'Hey, good luck. We can't get there.' I want to think we'll never put ourselves in a desperate situation and we think we have to go beyond in areas that shouldn't be irresistible."
Tigers and Walls have not met in men's basketball games since December 2020.
This is the second game of three agreements. The first was played on FedExforum in 2019, and the second was in Knoxville. Tennessee won the first game, the second Memphis.
The rubber race is scheduled to take place in Nashville in 2021, but was cancelled before the tip due to planned Covid-19 tests in Memphis.
Barnes didn't have mean words when he said he didn't plan to arrange Memphis for the foreseeable future, and he insisted on that position on April 29.
"We haven't talked about it in a few years," he said. "With the change, the new team enters our league (SEC) - we just played the toughest, best meeting ever since history. So everything we do will be based on where we think the league is and what we need to do. ”
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