Purdue weekend update: WBB portal visitors, scouting report on one target, football's spring showcase and more
Four prospects are expected on campus through Monday, end of spring practice for Barry Odom's program and where things stand with Matt Painter's team
A little bit of this, a little bit of that heading into the weekend:
• As we’ve reported, women’s basketball coach Katie Gearlds and her staff are scheduled to welcome four transfer targets to campus through Monday. Three will be in West Lafayette this weekend - Edessa Noyan (Virginia), Lexus Bargesser (Indiana), Tanyuel Welch (Memphis) - and the fourth, KiKi Smith (Arkansas), is expected Monday. This comes after Ronnie Porter (Wisconsin) visited on Wednesday. More on the prospects here.
• With one transfer signed, guard Taylor Feldman from Northern Arizona, the roster stands at seven players. Women’s basketball programs can have 15 players, assuming the House Settlement is approved. That leaves eight spots. Would Gearlds add eight more players to the roster? My guess is unlikely, but 13 total players might be the number after the smoke clears from portal shopping. Not all the players are required to be on scholarship or receive revenue-sharing. If the five players who’ve visited or are scheduled to visit committed, that brings the number to 12. The critical question: Would Purdue have filled its needs for the 2025-26 season?
• Hearing Porter is also considering Illinois and Iowa State.
• Scouting report. This from a coach who faced Smith and Arkansas last season:
“Solid. A little turnover prone. More of an off-guard than a (point guard). Would be a good pickup.”
The 5-7 guard was named the 2024 NJCAA DI Women’s Basketball Player of the Year and First Team All-American before transferring to Arkansas. Smith shot 40.7% from 3-point range with the Razorbacks.
• When will Gearlds fill out her coaching staff? She has an opening for an assistant and is expected to hire a Chief of Staff to help in the NIL/fundraising world.
• With so much attention paid to the transfer portal, who will be the next recruit the program signs from the high school ranks?
• Barry Odom’s first spring practice concludes Saturday with a “Spring Showcase” at Ross-Ade Stadium (Noon). No traditional game this year as programs are scaling back to not expose their players to other teams looking to fill needs in the transfer portal. Spring games don’t offer much value anyway, but now they feature less. The idea that coaches nationwide don’t know who your players are is short-sighted. They know, just like Purdue and other schools know, who’s on everyone’s roster. Football coaches are just paranoid beyond repair.
Here’s an example from two years ago when Dillon Thieneman was a freshman. Then-coach Ryan Walters didn’t let freshmen conduct media interviews. OK, that’s fine, but once those freshmen begin playing - and in Thieneman’s case, starting - the so-called rules don’t apply anymore. Purdue tried to “hide” Thieneman from the spotlight so other programs wouldn’t know about him. There’s TV. There’s film. There’s social media. He was Big Ten Freshman of the Year. Someone wasn’t living in reality. Thieneman likely had offers to leave after his first year but stayed. Thieneman transferred to Oregon after his sophomore year. It’s hard to prevent players from getting in front of cameras and media opportunities because NIL is tied to visibility at some level.
• The feel-good story from spring practice - Ethan Trent was put on scholarship by Odom. Great move by the first-year coach. Trent’s brother, Tyler, was known as Purdue’s Super Fan and lost his cancer battle on New Year’s Day in 2019.
• Speaking of the transfer portal, football players can start knocking down the door on Wednesday. Purdue will lose a bunch. Odom will add a bunch. If there’s a program with names, numbers, heights, weights, hometowns, and former schools, I wouldn’t worry about keeping it around. It will change by the time preseason practices begin.
• From the how did you not see this coming file: Tennessee quarterback Nico Iamaleava didn’t attend spring practice on Friday. Why? He wants to renegotiate his NIL deal, per multiple reports. More from ESPN. Now, we have holdouts at the college level. This isn’t an unintended consequence of NIL/revenue-sharing but an expected outcome and one that will only grow.
• If you’re not up to speed on the comings and goings of the men’s basketball program, here’s a refresher.
Four players entered the portal - Brian Waddell, Will Berg, Myles Colvin, and Camden Heide. Colvin (Wake Forest) and Heide (Texas) have found new schools.
Matt Painter has added former South Dakota State big man Oscar Cluff, who started his college career at Washington State and is a native of Australia. Cluff joins Trey Kaufman-Renn, Daniel Jacobsen, and Raleigh Burgess inside. Jacobsen missed nearly the entire season after suffering a fractured tibia in the second game. Painter isn’t done adding to next year’s roster.
• The volleyball team closes its spring season on Saturday against Vanderbilt at the Fishers Event Center. The Boilermakers and the Commodores square off at 3 p.m., followed by the Indy Ignite-Grand Rapids pro volleyball matchup at 7 p.m. Vanderbilt is a new program for the 2025 season.
• Purdue baseball has a rare Monday afternoon game against a Power 4 opponent when Arizona State visits Alexander Field at 1 p.m. The Sun Devils play at Cincinnati over the weekend and travel to West Lafayette for one game.