The ADB Mailbag: Will Hamilton return next year?

Mail’s here! Don’t get up, I’ve got it right here. This week we tackle Jean-Claude Dan Ham (not literally, we would never), Sam Cassell Jr. and, as always, conference realignment.

Remember: If your question wasn’t answered or you’ve been living under a rock and are just hearing about this, you can submit your questions here or on Twitter (@ADimeBack).

I Hate Syracuse asks: What do you think the chances of Hamilton declaring for the draft are? Certainly, he has NBA talent, but don’t know if he is consistent enough yet. It would suck to see him be another DeAndre Daniels, who really should have stuck around another year to develop and really help the team. Not to mention how stacked UConn could be next year with Hamilton still around.

Well, I Hate Syracuse — if that is your real name — as we’ve said in the past regarding UConn’s possible early-entry candidates, if any of them (Hamilton, Brimah, Purvis) do decide to declare for the Draft, it will be because something very good happened.

The reason Daniels entered after the 2014 season was because he had just gained a ton of national attention by playing well during an inspired national championship run. If Hamilton finds himself in that position this April, great. I’ll never fault a kid for going after a paycheck. Even less so if they’ve just won a trophy.

That being said, I would wager Hamilton returns to UConn for his junior season. His stats are impressive this year, but he’s shown enough room for improvement that it would indicate more value staying in school. He needs to work on his jumper and his ball-handling. He needs to cut down on the turnovers, and it wouldn’t hurt him to add some more muscle to his frame. His base skill set is perfect for an NBA player — and he could slip his way into the second round with strong workouts this spring. But with more development, I firmly believe he could be a lottery pick in the 2017 Draft.

— Tyler Wilkinson

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Matt asks: Should we expect Sam Cassell to join the Rakim Lubin/Terrence Samuel all-stars next year?

It’s possible. After all, Cassell has struggled to make an impact in his almost two years as a Husky. If he were to stay, he might try to carve out a role as an Omar Calhoun-type player off the bench. That is if he can shoot consistently — a big IF. He has scored just nine total points since the Michigan game and Kevin Ollie does not seem comfortable enough with Cassell to leave him in for more than a couple minutes at a time (with reason). On the other hand, Cassell only has one year of eligibility left and would have to sit out a year before he can use it. Is it really worth it? Calhoun, Sterling Gibbs and possibly Rodney Purvis are all gone after this year, so if Cassell sticks around, he will at least have a chance to make his case for playing time. Then again, with 12 committed scholarships for next season (if Purvis, Hamilton and Brimah all return), it might be hard for him to stand out.

– Russ Steinberg

Coffill asks: The NCAA blows up, and for some incredible reason, UConn gets to hand-pick it’s new conference. Who’s in it? #mailbag

Ed. Note: Coffill, have you bugged the A Dime Back Slack channel (A Dime Slack)? We had this exact conversation yesterday. This is very weird.

For my part, I would play the old Big East game of partial memberships. Playing with fire? Perhaps, but there are two key differences here:

1)    Penn State famously campaigned for admission in the mid-1980s, and was denied by the foolishness of the Big East’s Catholic Contingent. For my purposes, they were admitted.

2)    Notre Dame never asked for full membership, but it’s worth noting that the Big East was dominating college basketball in the mid-80s, right around when Notre Dame was struggling – they had gone six seasons without finishing the season ranked, two season in a row they finished below .500 and without a bowl appearance. Maybe it wouldn’t have made a difference, but fuck you, this is my fantasy, so we’re doing it that way.

For all-sports members, you’d have Connecticut, Boston College, Syracuse, Rutgers, Temple, Penn State, Pittsburgh, West Virginia, Notre Dame, and Maryland.

For football-only members, you’d have Army and Navy.

For non-football members, you’d have Georgetown, Providence, St. John’s, Seton Hall, Villanova, and DePaul.

For football divisions, to keep things fair, I’d split up Notre Dame and Penn State. Notre Dame is going to want to play Army every year, and Army is going to want to play Navy every year, so they’d go in one division. Penn State should be in a division with Pittsburgh, who should be in a division with West Virginia. So far the divisions are pretty equal, with Connecticut, BC, Cuse, Rutgers, Temple, and Maryland left. To preserve regional games, Maryland (Navy) and Rutgers (Army) go in Notre Dame’s division. UConn, BC, and Cuse all go together in Penn State’s division. It doesn’t work out perfectly for Temple, but they’re sailing under a lucky star to get in this conference, so they won’t bitch.

Basketball doesn’t need divisions, so there wouldn’t be any.

Lacrosse (I care about this) would be great, with Syracuse, Notre Dame, Georgetown, Penn State, Villanova, Rutgers, Providence, and St. John’s. Maybe BC and UConn bring back D1 lacrosse (please still do this, though).

This is an elite basketball conference (replacing prime Big East basketball era Louisville, Cincinnati, USF and Marquette with Maryland, Temple, Penn State, and BC, close to a wash). The football is good enough to not be a problem, but not so good that UConn can’t compete. And furthermore, this league dominates every major eastern media market from Boston (BC, UConn, Providence), to New York (UConn, Cuse, Rutgers, St. John’s, Seton Hall, Army), to Philly (Penn State, Temple, Villanova), to Baltimore/DC (Maryland, Georgetown, Navy), to Chicago (Notre Dame, DePaul). That’s a ton of exposure, which means a ton of value, which means great TV deals and our own lucrative network. No one would ever leave, the quality of competition would always be high, and I could stop fucking thinking about this finally.

Football Divisions:

A
Penn State
Pittsburgh
West Virginia
Connecticut
Boston College
Syracuse

B
Notre Dame
Maryland
Rutgers
Army
Navy

— Peter Bard